We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jacquelynn Allen a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Jacquelynn thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how you came up with the name of your brand?

When I first started cooking, it was very important for me to smell each ingredient I put into a dish. Once the dish was almost complete, If I could smell every ingredient, I knew exactly how it’d taste! When I am cooking, I cook with my nose. I cook so many things at once, tasting every single thing was not ideal for me. So I came up with the name Scents of Taste because if I could smell each ingredient, I knew how it was going to taste and knew it’d be good. Now don’t get me wrong! I taste my food haha, but if the smell is right, I know I just made a masterpiece !

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I fell in love with cooking when I was 8 years old. I would wake up early on Saturdays and turn on PBS and watch every single cooking show that started at 8am. I was always so impressed with this Italian chef named Lidia. Her recipes were so simple and always came out fantastic. At the time I was being raised by my dad and he worked two jobs so he was always exhausted. I took note of this and wanted to help out so I started cooking dinner for me and my two younger sisters. I never stopped! My cooking skills progressed as I got older. I went into culinary school, traveled to Italy to cook with an Italian chef and went to culinary school again. I do high end dinner parties for almost any event such as bachelor and bachelorette parties, wedding receptions, baby showers, business meetings etc. I have traveled to different states to cater weddings as well. I am very proud of my concept of cooking. I believe we should all enjoy food and I love making people smile through their stomachs. I also believe while eating, we should be eating things that are good for us. So with my style of cooking, you can eat your day to day meals but I make them in a healthy way. I work very hard to exceed my clients expectations and give them a dining experience of a lifetime. Clients turn into repeat clients who turn into friends. Food IS my life, I wouldn’t be here without it.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

One night I was catering a big corporate dinner for a long time client of mine. It was my husbands first time catering with me. The next day he tragically passed away. I was extremely traumatized and grieving and the thought of cooking or catering brought back so many memories, I stopped taking clients and had stopped cooking for a year. I had lost everything. But my love for cooking couldn’t keep me away any longer. I started to market myself again, changed up my menu and came back stronger than ever. Cooking has saved my life in so many ways, I couldn’t leave it abandoned.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

What helped build my reputation in this market is my honesty and willingness to be transparent with my clients up front about expectations and cost. Word of mouth about my food also helped as well. I have helped so many get on track with their health journey and not compromise flavor or the things they love. Being a kind and honest person always works out in your favor in the end. We are all out here trying to make it, stay kind.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://scentsoftaste.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/scentsoftaste_catering
• Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/scentsoftastepersonalchef