We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Zach Keeshig. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Zach below.
Zach, appreciate you joining us today. What do you think matters most in terms of achieving success?
I think what is takes to become successful is having the passion for what you’re doing. If you believe in the product you’re giving your customers and it’s new innovative and creative, just keep pursuing and don’t give up, it will catch on and people will recognize eventually.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers
I started cooking at a very young age, I wasn’t pursuing becoming a chef at the start, I was actually doing a co-op to be a Plumber. What changed was moving out at a young age and needing money so I started working in restaurants and I noticed the very artistic way of cooking and presenting food and that got me.
When I first started doing my own thing, I didn’t really know what my cooking style was going to be, it felt as if I was recreating dishes from previous mentors. But that is where I decided I wanted to do a more modern, progressive style of indigenous food. I was already foraging and sourcing things from the ground that were in season, after a little research I started to find out what the Ojibwa people were eating and using around my area and incorporating that into my cooking.
Naagan (dish) now serves a 9 course tasting menu of progressive aboriginal cuisine, showcasing foraged/Local/Grown foods in a modern way. We recently started incorporating medicinal beverages to pair with our menu as well, we will forage white pine and make a strong tea with sea buckthorn and strain it through fine cheese cloth then sweeten it to taste with local honey.
We’ve been fortunate to be named apart of en route air Canadas 30 best new pop ups & have been recognize by Canadas top 100 bats/chefs/restaurants.
What’s been the best source of new clients for you?
We are very fortunate that word of mouth and social media help us receive customers.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
I think the restaurant/hospitality business you have to be resilient, I use to get so bummed out through the winter because we had slowed down so much, but as soon as spring hit it was our busy season. We’ve learned to adapt and create new revenue areas for our selves, we recently this year will be going to markets to sell our breads and bottled medicinal beverages. Winter is also a time we can focus on our education classes as well.
Contact Info:
- Website: naagan.squarespace.com
- Instagram: Chefzachkeeshig
- Facebook: Naagan by Zach Keeshig
Image Credits
@timforbes