By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
Kabob It wants its customers to bring their favorite Mediterranean flavors home with them.
The Bowling Green restaurant has launched a new venture to bottle some of its diners’ favorite condiments.
To start that will be Kabob It’s Greek and fattoush dressings and the Mediterranean and shawarma marinades.
These could be available at the restaurant by October, said Kendra Baroudi, who owns and operates the Bowling Green eatery with her husband, Zach Baroudi. They hope they might be ready by sometime in September, even as early as Black Swamp At Festival weekend.
She and her husband had been talking about getting their products in grocery stores for some time. “These are the ones people have texted us and called us about,” she said. They wanted to purchase the condiments in quantity.
Some asked what goes into the Greek dressing? “You know we don’t want to give away our entire recipe,” she said.
The pandemic forced the restaurant to adapt in many ways, and many people who were reluctant to go out to eat started cooking at home.
“They can go to the store bring them home and do it themselves. It’s affordable, healthy and it’s a different flavor than what they’re used to,” she said.
To fund the project, the Kabob It team launched a Kickstarter campaign that raised $15,000 and then secure a $1,000 investor grant from the Bowling Green Chamber of Commerce.
This will go toward bottles and lids, nutrition labeling and bar codes, a required commercial production course and time at the Northwest Ohio Commercial Kitchen run by the Center for Innovative Food Technology where the condiments will be produced.
They’ve already sent the products to Cornell University to tested for shelf life. “They work you through what ingredients you need to add to make it shelf stable and give you exact quantities,” Kendra Baroudi said. Then the recipes are sent it to nutritionists to get nutrition label information.
Beyond the restaurant, they will also bring them to farmers markets to sell as well as reaching out to grocery stores, large and small.
The goal is to have the sauces widely available, Baroudi said.
Within a year, she said they plan to be selling hommous as well as tzatziki and garlic sauces.
This is the newest venture for the Kabob It brand.
Zach Baroudi’s father, Nabil Baroudi, opened the first Kabob It in Franklin Park Mall in 2009. Previously he had worked as director of operations for Magic Wok and still owns a franchise. “He’s been in the restaurant business for a long time,” Kendra Baroudi said.
Zach Baroudi, then 15, started working at the Toledo restaurant when it opened.
The Bowling Green eatery at 132 E. Wooster opened in 2014. Zach’s brothers, Alex, Adam, and Sam, all attended BGSU. “My father-in-law opened this location for his sons to run while they were in school,” Kendra Baroudi said.
When the brothers graduated, Zach and Kendra Baroudi bought the business.
“It’s truly family owned and operated,” she said. She worked at the Toledo Kabob It in Toledo when she and Zach were dating. Other members of her family have also worked there.
Kendra and Zach Baroudi now share life and career goals. “We share a business and want it to succeed.”
Kabob It has done well in Bowling Green. It has steady business even when students are not around. Its delivery service was well established early, so when the pandemic descended, it was in a good position to adjust.
She credited the restaurant’s popularity to having “ a lot of fusion items” on the menu. These help attract those customers, both young and old, who may otherwise be wary of the unfamiliar menu items such as falafel, tabbouli, shawarma, and baba ghanouf.
The restaurant uses fresh ingredients, and the health benefits of the Mediterranean diet has been well established.
“It’s very heart healthy,” Kendra Baroudi said. “People are looking how to do that at home.”
And Kabob It with its new line of is poised to help them do just that.
