Often the work that goes into delivery services like DoorDash might be overlooked.
A bright button is pressed on a phone, and a half hour later, a meal from any number of eateries can be at the doorstep. It might be forgotten that a person has to drive and pick that order up, possibly waiting, and negotiating with the restaurant if an order isn’t correct.
It can be hard work, and for Dawna Blount, the constant driving, waiting and haggling started to sour. She decided to turn the tables and opened up Gram Gram’s Soul Food, 481 E. 260th St. in Euclid.
“Ever since I was a young girl, I wanted to open up a restaurant and I helped a lot of family members start their own businesses,” Blount said between taking online orders. “During the pandemic, I started doing DoorDash and Uber and it really brought back that dream, going to all those restaurants. I decided to go for it, but I couldn’t find a place I could afford.
“I drive past this way for work doing DoorDash every day, and the very next day I decided not to do that anymore, they put a sign up that this location was for sale,” she continued. “It was a lot of hard work; I worked so hard delivering food that some nights I cried.”
Blount said that she used to work in many different types of kitchens, from fast food to nursing homes and hospitals. She said that to this day she still knows how to make every item on Burger King’s menu.
Those experiences helped her when she started two years ago, as she had a vision and wanted to provide healthy local options made with care.
She said with pride that nothing is fried in her kitchen. Instead she cooks salmon in a pan with slices of lemon and then covered with butter and honey. The chicken is oven-roasted in the morning and then sits in a marinade to be served up later.
Most of the work is done in the morning. The salmon she said is always fresh and never frozen. She cuts and cooks the fish to order, but makes most of the sides, including black-eyed peas, skillet potatoes and turkey greens, in the morning.
She stays open until she sells out of what she makes and then closes. She said, with a smile, that the fastest she sold out was three hours on a Sunday.
“The whole point of my menu is geared towards being healthier,” Blount said. “I offer no fried foods of any kind. I should have named it ‘A Girl and Her Stove’ because I bake and grill everything. Because I suffer from high blood pressure and have for the past 15 years, you know, it’s the best way to eat and I decided to gear my business towards what I believe in.”
“It’s starting to pick back up,” Blount said. “The first few months are very slow, so I was doing specials on Sundays. Last Sunday I had lasagna or a roast.
“But starting next week I’m going to start adding pepper steak, meatloaf, and adding the beef special back every day now, just to add more options.”
She said that once she got settled in, she introduced a few staple dinners and went from there. She changed the way she did some of her staples after input. She said criticism is welcomed as she wants to give locals what they want, while still maintaining a healthy balance.
“Because of the fact that I used to sell dinners, I really had a good concept of putting it together,” Blount said. “It was really just coming up with a menu that I thought would be appetizing enough without being fried. And I did a lot of work, trying things out and trying things out, and even since I first opened there were things that I tweaked here.
“I changed the way I would do my chicken, I used to do the chicken in a more rotisserie style,” she continued. “Now I went to a more oven-roasted style.”
Devin Blount, her son, said that he takes some of the food that his mom produces and sells it at his own restaurant Yes It’s Fresh, a vegan restaurant in Tower City. He said that he’s happy the trend of fresh ingredients is continuing, and he wants to see more healthy options for people.
“She puts a lot of time and effort into making her food. A lot of soul food places, they use canned stuff, and it’s really cheap quality,” Devin Blount said. “Everything she makes is really high quality. We even buy some of her stuff and resell it in Tower City.
“That’s one of our things, fresh food tastes better,” he added. “It stands the test of time; fresh food tastes better. They try and use six different ingredients to substitute for one, and save a dollar. People are really starting to back away from stuff when they look and see so many different ingredients in things.
“People are starting to be more health conscious,” he continued. “I know she goes through a lot of salmon; people want leaner, and they want cleaner options. They don’t want everything to be fried, different ways and different times, people are more conscious now.”
Blount said that her life has changed forever. Now that she’s taking the orders, instead of driving them around, she feels more fulfilled. She said the support from the community has been key to her success over the past two years.
“I must say God couldn’t have put me in a better area or a neighborhood because from the first day I opened my doors here this community have been very supportive of me,” she said. “Most people when they open up, they can barely make $10 to $20 a day. They have truly supported me, and they enjoy my product.
“I want to say thanks to all of those people in my neighborhood, because they are the reason that I’m here right now.”
For current hours and to order online, visit www.gramgramssoulfood.com.
