kulture klub

Houston’s Black chefs heat up new 'Kultured' dinner series

The series kicks off next Sunday, November 7.

Houston’s newest pop-up dinner series has revealed its initial lineup. Kulture: A Black Chef Table utilizes the downtown restaurant to showcase BIPOC food purveyors and chefs.

Organized by Kulture owner Marcus Davis and chef Keisha Griggs (Ate Kitchen), the Black Chef Table series furthers Davis’ goal of utilizing Kulture as a venue for showcasing African American artists, musicians, and chefs. The dinner series will spotlight Black chefs as well as fishermen, ranchers, and farmers.

“Kulture was designed to give an artist a blank canvas on which to paint. The first artist was chef Dawn [Burrell],” Davis tells CultureMap. “This is an extension of that, providing that for multiple chefs, providing that access and that opportunity and exposure.”

First announced this summer, Davis and Griggs have assembled their initial lineup:

November 7: Michelle Wallace, Gatlin’s BBQ
November 12-13: Shawn Osbey, Shawn Osbey Catering
November 19-20: Reggie Scott, Uncle Reggie’s International BBQ
December 3-5: James Haywood and Ross Coleman, Kitchen 713 and Lit Chicken
January 13-14: Keisha Griggs Ate Kitchen and Bocage Catering

Tickets for the dinners are on sale now via the Black Chef Table website.

Wallace, who, like Davis, is a graduate of Texas Southern University, earned a CultureMap Tastemaker Awards nomination for her work at Gatlin’s. Haywood and Coleman received a James Beard Award semifinalist nomination for their work at Kitchen 713. Davis notes he has a personal connection to Haywood.

“I have a picture of him when I was 8 and he was 4. I’ve known him and his family for that long,” he says. “Chef James’ grandmother was one of the original kitchen ladies at The Breakfast Klub. The grits you love, she was the first person to stir ‘em in the kitchen. Just a little fun fact.”

Still, some of the other participants might not be as well known to diners. Davis is excited to showcase their work.

“Chef Shawn moved to Houston and has a nice pedigree, Davis says. “He’s been everything from a private chef to being on OWN Network. I think Houston needs to know who he is and what he has to offer. Quite frankly, the boy can burn. He’s got a gift.”

Scott worked as Burrell’s sous chef at Kulture. Griggs served creative Carribean food at the Politan Row food hall.

Assuming the initial series is successful, Davis hopes it becomes the new template for what Kulture is: a venue for “dinner parties” that showcase up-and-coming culinary talents.

“We’ll do something as long as the chefs are interested,” he says. “I hope the demand grows so high this is who we are and this is what we do.”

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New York Times critic awards Houston restaurant 2 stars in glowing review

Courtesy of ChòpnBlọk

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Let’s just call 2025 the year of ChòpnBlọk. In a review published Tuesday, December 16, the New York Times has awarded the Houston restaurant two stars (“very good”).

Written by chief restaurant critic Tejal Rao, the review touts many of the same qualities that the Times already praised when it included ChòpnBlọk on its list of America’s 50 best restaurants.

Rao writes that she usually avoids restaurants that serve food in bowls, but she’s impressed by the way that chef-owner Ope Amosu has put a West African spin on the concept.

“For inspiration, Ope Amosu looked to the kind of chain restaurants that were built to scale, where flavors are often subdued to appeal to the broadest possible audience, focus-grouped to death. But the delight of ChòpnBlok is in its sure sense of self, its lively, multidimensional cooking and clear, delicious vision for modern food from the Black diaspora,” Rao writes.

She singles out specific dishes, including the Nigerian red stew with short rib, the Black Star bowl with shrimp, and the signature Motherland, made with chicken, greens, and plantains. “It’s utterly simple, but draws you in for more with the mouthwatering twang of not-too-much MSG — an international shortcut to building umami that tends to be used carefully, and layered with other forms,” she writes.

The review also touches on the way Amosu switched the restaurant from counter service to full service — described as “warm, informal, and quick with the jokes” — and his time working at Chipotle to learn the basics of the restaurant operations.

A two-star review is only the latest instance of ChòpnBlọk receiving national attention. In addition to the Times 50 best list, Esquire recently named it one of America’s best new restaurants. The Michelin Guide awarded it a Bib Gourmand designation for 2025. Amosu earned a semifinalist nomination for Best Chef: Texas in the 2025 James Beard Awards.

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