INDIANAPOLIS — A delivery-only restaurant held its grand opening inside The AMP at 16 Tech on Tuesday. Melon Kitchens will prepare its food in a state-of-the-art industrial kitchen inside The AMP and use its own delivery service to distribute meals.
The idea was developed by Be Nimble Foundation, an Indianapolis nonprofit which identifies under-funded and under-resourced industries in the community.
"When you think about our way of solving the problem, it's eliminating the barriers that exist," said Be Nimble co-founder Jeff Williams. "When you're a new entrepreneur in the restaurant industry, access to industrial kitchens, having the licensing and the equipment to essentially scale your business and then also the funds to support it. Having access to those things are some of the barriers that our program essentially supports."
Be Nimble is using technology to connect people with good, healthy food while supporting emerging Black chefs.
"Since we believe that technology, as well as resources, can help solve the problem, there's opportunity for us to essentially connect," said Williams. "When you think about food and access to food, healthy food, and then also chefs having access to industrial kitchens and the resource and capacity to scale, their menus, we just thought this was a great place to start."
"As a chef, it's a great opportunity, because it's the first of its kind in the country," said Lanc George, one of six chefs working at Melon Kitchens. "It's an opportunity for exposure, a fantastic place to work at and just the access to so much for the tech side as well as the food side."
Melon Kitchens said they hope to be open and ready for orders by April.