Keisha Griggs

Owner-Executive Chef, Ate Kitchen + Bocage Catering | Houston, TX

Keisha Griggs is the owner and executive chef of Ate Kitchen and Bocage Catering. The Caribbean chef’s overall motivation is to bridge the gap between community and food while highlighting local sourcing from Black food purveyors across her projects. With the initial opening of her first restaurant, Ate Kitchen, she designed her concept around locally sourced seasonal dishes. Her food charmed customers with her weekly changing menu and creative vegetarian options; Ate Kitchen and Chef Griggs was named one of Houston’s TOP Female Chefs of Color in 2021, among other recognitions. Ate Kitchen is currently in early construction and will be open in 2024 within a community that highlights urban growing and agriculture. She has partnered with urban farmers to launch Kuji Kitchen, a Caribbean inspired franchise restaurant in the heart of Houston’s Southside, opening February 2023. Her catering arm, Bocage Catering, features her seasonal catering menu and in-person and virtual cooking classes. Chef Keisha’s passions have led her to co-create Black Chef Table, an ongoing chef dinner series located in downtown Houston’s James Beard Nominated restaurant Kulture that highlights Afro - descendant chefs in and around the city of Houston paired with Afro-descendant food purveyors. The purpose of the series is to show that Black food is not a monolith, and how it represents cultures around the world. Black Chef Table is the landscape for chefs to tell THEIR culinary story and to bridge the gap between Black food purveyors and the outstanding food community, demonstrating how each needs the other. Chef Keisha continues her dedication to growing relationships with farms, ranchers, fishermen, and gardens in and around Houston bringing chefs together in a completely organic way to build the foundation for harmonious relationships for everyone to continue to grow. @bocage_catering (Instagram)