The First PourFirst Fridays in Oakland, California, where I own and operate my two restaurants, are busy and buzzy. Back when First Fridays started in 2011, they were a great way to support Oakland’s then-budding (now blossoming) restaurant scene. For AlaMar, my first restaurant, First Friday was the busiest night of the month. It wasn’t a great night to be short-staffed, much less at the bar. But that’s exactly what happened in 2018.
As a small business owner, you jump in where you’re needed, so I jumped behind the bar. Thing is though—I had no experience as a mixologist or when it came to interacting with our customers. I had always been in the kitchen, cooking my heart out. So there I was, feeling something between cool and nervous, adrenaline flowing for sure. The first cocktail I made was a twist on a daiquiri, tapping into what I had seen other bartenders do. Of course, I used rum—the most Dominican of liquors and a very familiar ingredient to me.
Before long, I realized riffing on cocktails felt kinda like cooking. To be honest, AlaMar was a success, and with everything running relatively smoothly, a kind of ennui had set in. Jumping behind the bar was a spur-of-the-moment choice at the time, but it gave me a much-needed spark, a new challenge. Creating cocktails felt familiar, but also different, fresh, and exciting.
Being face-to-face with the guests was also new, but to my surprise, the showmanship and storytelling that come part and parcel with bartending came naturally to me. It transported me back to hot New York summer evenings in The Heights (Washington Heights) where I grew up, to block parties and
chismeando (gossiping) on the stoop. In a way, that first night behind the bar at AlaMar set me on the path that would eventually put me in front of the camera on
Top Chef, and it laid the groundwork for other TV and social appearances—and for this book.
When I first started bartending, I was eager to learn, and eager to show my respect for those who had been behind the bar for years. Immersing myself in the craft deepened my appreciation for its artistry. I found inspiration
from talking to colleagues and neighbors, learning their perspectives and techniques. It was especially exciting to engage with other people of color in the industry, hearing their stories and building a supportive network. I am honored to have several of these talented individuals contributing recipes to this book as “guest bartenders.” This sense of community has been integral in shaping my journey.
Creating cocktails is really an art form, a craft—just like making food. I started to look for excuses to put myself behind the bar, honing my craft until it became my new passion. Soon, word spread, and friends started showing up to support me, hang out, and share stories. I was having fun—fun with friends, fun with customers who would become friends, and fun using my knowledge of flavors and ingredients in a new way.
What started as a spontaneous decision slowly turned into something real. And now, years later, it’s come full circle: I have a bar of my own in Oakland where those same kinds of connections are still being made, one cocktail at a time. It’s also where I get to bring in the lessons I learned from my uncles—the ones who taught me how to pour rum with respect, how to make Mamajuana, and that every bottle comes with a story. Those early conversations, shared over music, laughter, and family meals, are the root of everything I create behind the bar at Sobre Mesa today.
My Culinary SoulWherever people of African origin found themselves because of the Atlantic slave trade, they created food. That food is now foundational to the Afro-Latino communal identity not only in the Dominican Republic, where my mother was born, but throughout the diaspora.
This book is an exploration of my Afro-Latino roots, of my never-ending personal journey of discovery, shared through a culinary lens. Some of the recipes in this book are my mother’s dishes; others are my interpretations of my Dominican grandmother’s beloved recipes. Some are creations all my own, still informed by everything that came before me.
Coming to realize, truly understand, and embrace my dual identity was a game-changer. Life in my Dominican NYC neighborhood of Washington Heights revolved around community. Everybody knew each other by block; we shared food and swapped stories. The neighborhood smelled and sounded Dominican, with aromas wafting from the open windows as everyone’s moms made fried plantains,
gallina guisada (stewed chicken), and
moro (Dominican beans and rice), all punctuated by the sounds of merengue and bachata music.
No one talked about our African roots, much less acknowledged them. We were Latinos. We were not from Africa. Only it turns out, we were. In fact, my memories of my childhood—those smells wafting down the block, the food I ate growing up—are what would eventually lead me to explore my African heritage, and later express and share it through my cooking and bartending.
I remember the day a Black family dining at my first restaurant, AlaMar, asked about the Black owner they had heard about. A staff member responded, “This isn’t a Black-owned restaurant; this is a Dominican-owned restaurant.” That hit me hard. My family are Black Dominican Americans—part of the Spanish-speaking African diaspora. I realized I hadn’t done enough to highlight my Blackness or its role in shaping who I am. And it made me think about how much the African continent has influenced the culinary world.
I saw that what I was doing with drinks wasn’t just creative—it was cultural reclamation.
That realization deepened when I appeared on
Top Chef, where a challenge centered on African cuisine brought everything into focus. It reminded me that the flavors I grew up with—plantains, braised meats, rich spice blends—weren’t just Dominican; they were African, too.
The food world has gradually started to make space for these connections and embrace a wider array of ingredients and culinary history—but the cocktail world is still catching up. Too often, the contributions of the African diaspora flavors—ingredients like sorrel, kola nut, tamarind, Grains of Paradise—are left out of the conversation entirely. The stories behind these ingredients, the ancestral knowledge, the migration paths they’ve taken—they’re all right there, just waiting to be explored. I had already opened Sobre Mesa less than a year before filming
Top Chef, but that experience shifted something in me. I saw that what I was doing with drinks wasn’t just creative—it was cultural reclamation. It was time to bring the full weight of our flavors and stories into the cocktail glass.
Initially, my bar leaned more into Latino flavors, but after my experience on
Top Chef, I knew I had to dive even deeper. The cocktail world was underrepresenting and under-utilizing the spices, ingredients, and stories tied to the African diaspora. I wanted to change that. I wanted to honor this vast history and culture not just through food but also through drinks, blending them together to tell a richer story.
You can see it in the
Top Chef episode—the joy, the recognition, and the memories sparked by that meal. Eating that food, experiencing those flavors, and recognizing the connections gave me a renewed sense of purpose. It was the moment I truly understood the depth of my culinary identity and the path I wanted to take.
These moments didn’t just make me reflect on my own identity—they reminded me of how gatherings are central to Dominican culture, and how much we rely on food
and drink to bring people together. I experienced it every day growing up. Whether it was a wedding, a baptism, or a Sunday with family, we weren’t just sharing a meal—we were building community. My aunties, my grandmother, my tíos—all of them knew how to set a table that felt like home. And while the plates were full of Dominican staples, there was always something to sip on, too. There were homemade juices made from whatever fruit might be growing in someone’s yard—passion fruit, guava, sour orange, tamarind, mango. And tucked somewhere behind the bottles, there was always Mamajuana (see page 40)—dark, spiced, a little mysterious. Every family had their own mix and method for it.
The women taught me how to cook—how to build flavor, feed a crowd, and show love through food. The men taught me about rum.
Copyright © 2026 by Nelson German and Andréa Lawson Gray. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
