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

Alright, Mordy thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s jump right into the heart of things. Outsiders often think businesses or industries have much larger profit margins than they actually do – the reason is that outsiders are often unaware of the biggest challenges to profitability in various industries – what’s the biggest challenge to profitability in your industry?

The biggest issue is keeping a high standard of ingredients and offering living wages while keeping food costs low in a struggling economy.

Mordy , love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I have spent years working in various restaurants and learning from great chefs but once Covid hit the restaurant industry went on pause. That gave me time to reflect and decide to branch out on my own. I spent that year road-tripping with my family cross country and what struck me was all the chicken and waffle restaurants there were. Being that I keep kosher that concept had not hit the Jewish community yet. So I spent the year testing and perfecting, not only a kosher chicken and waffle but the best chicken and waffle.

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

Of course, like most food trucks ours was riddled with mechanical issues. For the first few months, I would be unable to work on the truck and even got towed to my first catering event. Needless to say, I can laugh about it now. Literal blood, sweat, and tears have been put into this food truck. I consider it a success that a year later all the catering events that were towed to have all rebooked me. Thank G-d no tow truck stories for a year but I became very good friends with both my mechanic and tow truck driver after all those mechanical failures.

Do you have any stories of times when you almost missed payroll or any other near death experiences for your business?

Last year the Chabad community of Emerald Hills fundraised for me to go out to the West Coast of Florida to offer free meals to all those impacted by Hurricane Ian. On the way back from that trip, I popped tires due to the debris and damage on the road. Being stuck in the middle of the road, with very little cell service waiting for a tow right before Yom Kippur was pretty crazy.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.wildflourwaffles.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wildflourwaffles/
• Facebook: @wildflourwaffles