Pop-Up Restaurants Let New Chefs Take Chances

by Jennifer Lawinski, Posted Feb 12th 2010 @ 2:30PM

With the high cost of opening a restaurant, what's a young chef with a clever idea to do?

In San Francisco, the answer is to set up a temporary restaurant in an existing space a few nights a week, the New York Times reported.

Pop-up restaurants like Mission Street Food, which take up residence in the Chinese eatery Lung Shan Restaurant on Mission Street, are sprouting up all over the Bay Area, giving chefs with lots of creative ideas -- but little funding -- a way to show off their skills without breaking the bank.

"The food here is creative and interesting," Nick Lanham, a graduate student dining with friends at Mission Street Food, told the Times. "They go a little bit further. They can try out crazy stuff here."

At Coffee Bar, a cafe in the Mission neighborhood, chef Eskender Aseged runs Radio Africa & Kitchen, a pop-up restaurant open on Thursday and Friday nights that combines elements of the cuisine of his native Ethiopia with Mediterranean and north African flavors, the Times reported.

With the high cost of opening a restaurant, the pop-up concept helps chefs spread their wings without taking on the risk of a full-fledged operation.

"Even in this economic climate people are really out there trying to make things happen," Tommy Halvorson, a chef who has cooked at Mission Street Food and also runs another pop-up called EAT in an art gallery on Mondays, told the Times.

"Instead of crying because the bank won't give me $2 million to open a restaurant ... this is a way I can do it," he said.

Filed Under: Business, Restaurants
Tags: featured, mission street food, opening a restaurant, pop-up restaurants