As far as local celebrities go, Antwon Brinson has solidified his place in Charlottesville in unusual ways. His journey has taken him from fine dining, to training people to work in the restaurant industry to HBO’s “The Big Brunch.
He sat down with In My Humble Opinion’s Charles Lewis this month for the radio station’s latest First Person Charlottesville episode to talk about his career and the local culinary industry.
“Charlottesville has over 500 restaurants in a ten mile radius. That’s equivalent to New York, San Francisco and Washington, D.C.” Brinson said. “And it creates this ‘rob Peter, pay Paul’ mentality. I’m going to steal your dishwasher and pay him $0.50 more because there’s no other dishwashers in the area.”
Antwon is the founder and owner of Culinary Concepts AB, a business that trains people in the occupational and social skills they need to get jobs in central Virginia’s hospitality industry. He says that after 15 years of traveling internationally as a chef, he knew Charlottesville was the right place for his program.
He talks about his journey to founding Culinary Concepts AB, getting the call from HBO and why it took 25 years for him to put an Ethiopian dish on the menu.
In My Humble Opinion, the Sunday talk show on 101.3FM, launched the podcast series in December, building on the work of Charlottesville Inclusive Media to bring more of our community’s perspectives into critical conversations. The segments are called First Person Charlottesville and folks can hear them by subscribing to In My Humble Opinion on iTunes, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Charlottesville Inclusive Media is a partnership between the radio program, Vinegar Hill Magazine and Charlottesville Tomorrow.
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