"It was really hard to try to sell Jamaican food in Nashville," says Ouida Bradshaw, owner of the two Jamaicaway locations in the Nashville Farmers' Market and Cool Springs, as well as Topanaris in Midtown. "We used to literally coerce people to come taste the food, and they were like, 'Oh my God, this is actually good food!' "
These days it doesn't take much convincing to get customers through the doors. Bradshaw and her husband David have built up a very appreciative following since opening in the market 15 years ago. Everyone from goofy Guy Fieri to local chefs like Sean Brock have dined there, and Bradshaw's sons Kamal Kalokah and Rashean Conaway, who also run the Riddim N' Spice food truck, have further put Jamaicaway on the map by catering to the stars — Kalokah has been Rihanna's house chef, and the brothers have also toured with and cooked for Drake.
As the family juggles the responsibility of running three restaurants, a food truck and the occasional tour with pop stars, how do they work with each other without driving one another crazy?
"I mean, we do drive each other crazy," says Kalokah with a laugh. But seeing such happy reactions from customers makes it worth it. "I love it. There are little kids who came here [when Jamaicaway first opened] who are in college now."
It was Ouida Bradshaw's mother who taught her the importance of a good meal. "When I first relocated from Jamaica in 1973, my mom was one of those moms who felt her children needed a balanced meal three times a day," she says. "She had to work, so I thought it would be a good idea to go into the kitchen and start cooking food, just to help her out. That's where it started."
Bradshaw continued to express love and care through food while working as a grade school teacher in the Northeast for more than 20 years. "I would set some criteria for [my students] to do well in school," she says. "If they did all their homework, had good behavior, or if their attendance was good, at the end of each month I would turn my classroom into a restaurant of their choice. If they wanted Chinese, I would make them Chinese food. If they wanted Italian, I would make them Italian food. The first time I did it, they went for the whole school year without [missing a day], even the ones who were sick would come to school just because they wanted to be a part of the festivities."
Once the she and her family moved to Nashville in 1999, Bradshaw started cooking full time. Just one visit to Jamaicaway and it's easy to see how food incidentally became the center of this family — it's not rare to see dozens of people lined up, patiently waiting their turn to order jerk chicken, curried goat and oxtails and vegetarian dishes like mock chicken in a rich, sweet coconut sauce with sides like perfectly seasoned green beans and johnnycakes (fist-sized wads of deep-fried, chewy dough that's perfect for soaking up puddles of extra sauce).
Everything's done so well that even Kalokah's professional training in culinary school couldn't change some habits he learned from his mother — techniques that have been lovingly passed down through the years. "There are things that she does, I don't know where she gets them from. Like roasting a chicken: I don't just pan-sear it and put it in the oven like French technique. I follow her ways. I've cooked that way on tours, in French restaurants, and they look at me like, 'What the heck is he doin'?' But they taste it, and they're like, 'Dang.'
"The big part of why I like being here — a lot of chefs come here to eat," he continues. "We got a write-up from Tandy Wilson from City House, and the headline was 'Where Do Chefs Go to Eat,' and he said 'Jamaicaway.' And we killed, like, 10 goats that week."
