There’s a new hot food option for those who use federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits and are also a senior, an individual with a disability or unhoused.
Chef Daddy’s Soul Food & BBQ, 5944 W. Lake St., was approved last month to accept SNAP through the Illinois Restaurant Meals Program. The program allows eligible SNAP recipients, like those who are over 60 years old, disabled or unhoused, to pay with their benefits at the restaurant — the first in the Austin neighborhood to participate in the Restaurant Meals Program.
After years of trying to get the program to the West Side, Alicia Cuevas, owner of Chef Daddy’s, said accepting SNAP allows the restaurant to improve access to hot and healthy meals for locals who might not have the ability or resources to cook for themselves.
Cuevas said non-fast food options in the area were sparse when Chef Daddy’s opened a decade ago on the corner of Austin Boulevard and Lake Street. And there were several nursing homes and camps of unhoused people nearby.
Over the years, Chef Daddy’s has often given soul food staples — like baked chicken, fresh cabbage, collard greens, yams and macaroni and cheese — to homeless people who came in.
“This location could definitely use a variety of fresh, nutritious meals,” Cuevas said. She added that the menu boasts “old-school, traditional southern food that a lot of seniors here enjoy.”
Cuevas has long wanted to accept SNAP benefits at her restaurant. While visiting California in 2020, she saw restaurants that took SNAP. But when she came home and called state officials to inquire about doing the same, she learned that the Restaurant Meals Program hadn’t come to Illinois yet. It did in 2022.
It wasn’t until Cuevas called officials in Springfield several more times — and Bill Hoover of Paragon Global, which invests in people and businesses with an emphasis on community engagement, came into Chef Daddy’s as a customer and offered to help contact officials — that she got an application to be a part of the Illinois Restaurant Meals Program. Chef Daddy’s was approved to accept SNAP on Nov. 20 and set up the Point of Sale system to accept benefits the same day.
“The West Side of Chicago needs this,” Cuevas said of Chef Daddy’s home-cooked meals. “The only options out here are a bunch of fried food and hot dogs and pizza puffs and stuff. We, the community, need this.”
Cuevas said she’s already hearing how grateful eligible SNAP users are.
She describes a sweet woman living in a nearby senior home, who regularly buys five hot meals at a time to microwave throughout the week. She tells the story of an unhoused woman staying at a hotel, who was so thankful for a home-cooked meal, and another woman with three well-mannered kids who had a field day choosing what food they wanted.
“You would think her kids were picking steak. They were so excited,” Cuevas said. “That brought tears to my eyes.”
Chef Daddy’s opened in 2015. In past years, the restaurant has had to navigate its aging equipment. Cuevas needs a new deep fryer, a warmer and oven.
Cuevas said she hopes additional, consistent revenue from eligible SNAP customers will allow her to invest in new equipment.
Despite that, some things at Chef Daddy’s haven’t changed in the last decade. Much of the same staff works there, and the restaurant is frequently visited for its chitterlings.
“I’m known for chitlins, which is a delicacy. It’s expensive,” Cuevas said. “You have to clean them, cook them for hours at a time. It’s just a lot of work.” She added that she’s the only restaurant in Chicago that serves chitlins every day.
To strengthen her leadership skills and sustainably grow her business, Cuevas completed Entrepreneurs Academy’s Fast Launch Educational Entrepreneurship Training program. As a part of creating a business plan with the program, she included her dream of expanding Chef Daddy’s to the South Side, across the city, and possibly to other states.
“I want a Chef Daddy’s to be in every area,” Cuevas said. “When people travel here, they’re like, ‘You need one of these in Iowa. You need one of these in California. In Michigan, we don’t have nothing like this.’”
Chef Daddy’s Soul Food & BBQ is open at 5944 W. Lake St. Wednesday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday from noon to 6 p.m.