When I met with Pam Jacob, owner of Pam’s Kitchen in Wallingford, I began asking questions about the history and food of Trinidad. But the conversation quickly turned to Pam’s story and a candid expression of her experience during the pandemic. I’ve split the interview away from the regional discussion as it deserves its own space — as a lens into the mental health of a chef-owner who’s trying to stay positive in a desperate time.
Along with the struggles, Pam expressed her deepest gratitude to Wallingford and Seattle for showing her love and support during this time. It’s given her a sense of belonging, and a clue into what she wants to achieve before she can say goodbye to the restaurant for good.
This interview was done in February, just before Pam opened the restaurant to 25% capacity.
How did you decide to move to Seattle and start a restaurant?
My brother and sister lived here while I was still in Trinidad, and I visited in 1987. I remember that the food was so bland compared to Trinidadian food — we actually walked around with hot sauce. So I made a promise to myself: If I ever come here, I will open up a restaurant.
At the time I had a little snack shack in Trinidad called “Pam’s Snack Shack”. It was just a little 10 by 10 foot space. I didn’t do the kind of food I do at Pam’s Kitchen here because everybody makes this food in their home. So I used to buy some bread called hops bread and I would make sandwiches. I would make chow mein, fried chicken, and it sold out like crazy.
When I decided to move to Seattle in the early 90s, everybody said I needed at least $30,000 to open a restaurant. So I said “one day” and started to do housekeeping. But I kept my eyes open, and I started to think about a stall at the street fair. I got the permit and we went ahead and we bought a little stove and the tents, and started serving my food there.
I did well at the University District Street Fair, and in 2006 I got our first permanent place in the University District. We signed the contract, but the place was a dump. And we opened up with $1,400, not $30,000. Guy Fieri said $1500 on his show, but It was $1,400. The family came together and pulled everything out, then did the electrical, plumbing, windows and the floors. We did everything from scratch. I guess I’m a from scratch kind of person, thinking about it.
How have you evolved as a chef here in Seattle?
My cooking actually expanded here, but I still don’t consider myself a chef. I feel like a chef is somebody who measures, and can take somebody else’s recipe and they make it their own. For me, it’s all from scratch. I don’t have recipes, but if I close my eyes and you tell me you want to cook 20 pounds of goat, I could tell you exactly how much of everything else to put in. And neither of us would have to even taste it before — it would come out perfect. That’s how we learned to cook back home.
As a girl in Trinidad, that’s what you were supposed to do: cook and clean and wash and sweep and stuff like that. I liked mimicking my mom. I’d make a hole in the backyard, have a fire and put a milk can with some other food and make something. That’s how much I liked cooking.
I didn’t realize what passion meant until I came here to the United States. I was hearing everybody say, well, I’m passionate about this and that. And then one day I thought, my passion is cooking. I am very, very passionate about it. I am so into cooking that I could be sick at home and I go to my kitchen. It took me a while to realize I was totally different in that way.
Nowadays I like to put my own flair on dishes. My pelau is different from Trinidad pelau. When Guy Fieri and I cooked, my aunt and uncle in Canada called me and said, “Oh my God, it’s so colorful. It’s so pretty. You have to teach us to cook pelau like this”. I just put my little two-piece in there to make it different.
You were on Guy Fieri’s show Diners, Drive-ins and Dines, twice. How did being on the show affect the restaurant?
We did the first one when I was in the University District. Then two years after I moved here, he sent his crew and they did another one. And we also did one more virtually during Covid.
Guy is a wonderful human being. I feel like if it wasn’t for him and his celebrity status, people like me with roots, the moms and pops, would not be noticed. Because that’s how the world knew about me. When they aired our show, it was crazy. People were calling from Vancouver, Portland, and there was a line around the block. All the Caribbean people were like, “you guys know there’s a roti shop in Seattle?”. People were going crazy because Seattle is far away from everything Caribbean. So he’s done a lot of good for us. And for everybody else on his shows.
How have you dealt with some of the struggles of Covid?
Honestly I’m not doing well right now. I bought a new freezer and it’s in the back with the ice cream maker sitting unused. It’s really starting to feel cluttered. Then I sit in the front and I take orders to-go and it’s boring as hell, you know? I feel like I’m going crazy.
It’s mentally messing with us really, but it’s not just me. And that’s my takeaway from it. It’s tough for us, The small restaurants who cannot make the payment. I am waiting patiently for that PPP. I am asking my daughter, who runs the business side, everyday. “Is it coming? Is it coming?” Because I really need the money. I’m having to pay my workers with manual checks, and the taxes really pile up.
With all of this, I’m not hungry, so I’m skipping meals and losing weight. I wasn’t like this a couple months ago — I think I am really drowning now.
So I am starting to feel down. I used to be the happy lady in the front, meeting my customers, always had something exciting to share or learn. But I’m losing it. I feel like all last year I was waiting, waiting, waiting, to see some progress happening. But 2021 comes and we’ve been in the same boat — it’s really tough.
I might close for a week or two, get my kids, put our heads together. I bought our SUV the same year we opened the restaurant, and it hasn’t been on a family trip for 15 years. It’s time.
What good has come from the pandemic for Pam’s Kitchen?
When we shut down the restaurant for Covid, I was like this is my life — If I don’t have a restaurant, what am I going to do? I’m a 63 year old woman. I’m not going to cook for anybody else or go back to cleaning homes. I can’t do that. But when we first opened up for take out and these two ladies came in. They said, “Pam, we just want to support you. We’re here because we don’t want you disappearing on us”.
Then it got really crazy when people were posting things online to go support us. I didn’t know that people loved me and appreciated this food that much. It was when I realized I had the acceptance of Wallingford. It wasn’t a hot spot when I moved here. I moved here in 2015, and I thought moving from the U district here would be fantastic. But that didn’t happen at first. I remember somebody posted on the Wallingford blog “Well, she’s not going to break the curse”, because restaurants in the same space had done so poorly. So all that really scared me.
But I knew who I was. I’m a positive thinking person. I knew the food was good, and I wasn’t going to please everybody. So I would say, you know what, I’m tired, but I cannot close this restaurant. And I have to see the end of it. But saying that I didn’t know what I was talking about. What is the end of the restaurant? What was I looking for?
I knew it wasn’t to drive a Tesla or to own a big house. I didn’t know what that thing was, until Covid showed me what it was. It was acceptance. It was being loved by the people. One day while we were doing takeout, a customer called in and asked to buy a gift card. And I said, so how much? Fifty? A hundred dollars? He said for $500. And the tears just started to run down my face. He said Pam’s Kitchen was one of his favorite restaurants and he needed it here. And he hasn’t even called in an order with it yet.
Last year in June and July we were doing fantastic, almost as much business as if we were open. I was paying down my loans and I was paying all my workers on time. But in August and since then that extra support for black owned businesses has steadily declined. And it makes sense, you don’t expect people to come spend the same amount of money that they were in the beginning of the pandemic. So money dwindled down as restaurants stayed partially closed.
But my spirits are still up because I know the minute we can have people here again, this place is going to be packed. People cannot wait to sit down and enjoy some of the cocktails. People can’t wait to come and sit in those booths, listen to some steel drum music. There will be dancing everywhere. People are going to feel comfortable again.
Enjoy a warm welcome and Pam’s Trinidadian dishes at Pam’s Kitchen in Wallingford. They’re currently open for dine-in at 50% capacity, takeout, and delivery through Uber Eats.
Leave a Reply