Kern’s Food Hall expands its Caribbean options with Hemingway’s Cuban Kitchen

Kern’s Food Hall has added another international food option with Hemingway’s Cuban Kitchen. Becoming well known as a hub for diverse culinary offerings, the food hall has now entered the Caribbean sector.

Though the Patel brothers are from India, they settled in Florida and found that Cuban food was a good business. However, they were still committed to making the food as authentic as possible, so they brought in a chef named Marco, who specializes in the Cuban sector.

“He changed the menu,” Raj Patel said. “He changed the way we are serving and everything, and now it's our mission for the chef to grow his authentic Cuban foods.”

Chef Marco has been with Hemingway’s for more than a decade, traveling to each new location to train staff on his menu. Hemingway’s now boasts locations in Tampa, Atlanta, and Kern’s Food Hall, which opened in June.

After signing their lease for Hemingway’s at Kern’s, the Patels also decided to open Ooh Lala Indian Kitchen to give customers more tastes to choose from. The goal is to have the two restaurants open together as they expand into different locations.

Though they want to continue expanding, the Patels are committed to growing their team in Knoxville and establishing a presence as football season nears.

“We just opened a few weeks back, so right now my entire time is going to just build a good team,” Patel said. “So currently we are bringing people from different states. My Ooh Lala Indian chef is coming from Arizona. And for the Hemingway site, we brought the chef from Tampa here. We can train the people locally, but we require some expertise so they don't lose the authenticity ... that's why we bring people from far away.”

While still in the infant stages of business at Kern’s, the Patels have seen the vision for Kern’s since the early stages of renovations. The food hall has been committed to making the space one that vendors and customers want to be in.

“The management is really supportive, so they bring the creative ideas to bring the people here and then they do a lot of marketing,” Patel said. “They do a lot of things to get the customer here. They organized a lot of the platform performances, like the karaoke songs, and they have the movie nights so people can get more interested and we can get the really good traffic here.

On July 7, the food hall embarked on a passport campaign that promotes the different tastes it has to offer. The customers win prizes while the vendors receive exposure to their food.

As Hemingway’s Cuban Kitchen and Ooh Lala Indian Kitchen establish themselves at Kern’s Food Hall, the Patels are committed to building a loyal customer base in Knoxville. With strong support from food hall management, they are optimistic about the journey ahead.

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Kern’s Food Hall in Knoxville expands with Hemingway’s Cuban Kitchen