yakibar (2022-2023)
rip to a legend
My friend Caleb (fondly called Cleb) is a software engineer who lives in SF and really likes cooking for people. He’s been this way since I first met him in college. He’d invite people over to his apartment and feed them. People would roll in uninvited knowing that he could feed them. Cleb has graciously hosted and put together a sushi bar for my retirement party when I quit my job, cooked up a storm to feed church volunteers every Sunday for years, made batches and batches of ice cream for Sisters’ Appreciation night—on and on and on.
Around this time last year, he got really into the idea of yakitori:
I have never really known Cleb to be someone who buys things for the sake of having them. He is generally not very materialistic, and didn’t seem too convinced on the idea of getting a grill at this point.
4 days later:
RIP yaki dreams.
The next day, Cleb asked me how tightly I hold onto dreams. Fascinating. Cleb is not really the type to harbor fanciful dreams. He thinks of doing things and then he figures out how to do them. If they are not very realistic, c’est la vie—Cleb does not pine for what ifs and entertain infinite hypotheticals like I do.
To this day I am not sure if Cleb actually did pray for his yakitori grill, but that week I found a gap in my schedule to stroll around the Koreatown Galleria in LA, picking up groceries and killing time before church group activities that evening.
Strolled mindlessly into a home goods store and of course I see a display of The Grill. A bunch of them, in fact.
Me: Do you believe in signs
Cleb: …I’m scared.
Me: I found your grill
Cleb: cop
I bought the grill. I gave it to a friend who was road tripping from LA up to the East Bay to pass it on to Cleb, and Yakibar was up and running every weekend for the better part of a year !!!
What a banger of a time. Cleb made a set menu:
and generally delicious and beautiful food:
And hung out with a bunch of people through this entire endeavor—friends of friends, coworkers, ex-coworkers, strangers turned friends… Considering that Cleb doesn’t use social media, I feel that Yakibar was a smashing success. A lot of people found out about it through word-of-mouth, and put together their own groups to book a weekend to visit.
It became easy for people to invite themselves into the home and into his life without too much social energy expenditure.
I got to visit once on a visit up to the Bay, months into the venture, and by that time, Yakibar was a whole production. He knew which cuts of meat to buy and how much, how to portion and schedule each round of food, and he has since learned how to spell yakitori (lol)
Turning it over to Cleb now—Here are some stats from this entire endeavor:
26 occurrences
104 guests
76 unique guests
6: highest number of repeat visits from a single guest
1200 skewers
10: number of times fire alarm was set off
And a list of frequently asked questions:
Yakibar really fascinated me, as do all things food-and-community related. Supper clubs are all the rage lately, and I think it speaks to the collective loneliness we feel as young adults in big cities.
Going out to eat has a certain narrative arc to it. You’re given a script as a customer to order, eat, pay and leave. There are stricter confines in terms of acceptable behavior, including how loudly you might speak, or how comfortably you might be dressed when you show up to eat. How much you can linger!
My favorite thing about Yakibar is that it was decidedly unpretentious. It’s just good food with humble and kind and interesting people with no particular agenda for showing off and networking. Just a guy cookin some food (At the end of the day, we are also just a bunch of guys eatin some food, too).
As I put together my art school portfolio, I decided to use Yakibar for a branding project.
The visual identity system is based from the answers to a brand audit conducted with the client, analyzing the philosophy and personality of Yakibar, its competitors, and the message it hopes to convey.
Yakibar’s branding portrays earthy, warm, and muted tones that to reflect the ingredients of the food offerings as well as the ceramic plates it is served on.
It’s cozy and not too stimulating. Modern serifs with a serious yet playful tone can be used to create and initiate conversation between the brand and the customers.
Type and photographic collage elements interact to showcase the quality of ingredients.
Plus some drafts that didn’t make the cut: Cleb really liked the little Yaki dude, which didn’t make it into the final brand because illustrations take long and I was strapped for time hahahahaha
I can’t say that I’m 100% happy with where this branding project went, because it still wasn’t completely authentic to the ethos of Yakibar being an unpretentious and nonexclusive endeavor. It just doesn’t accurately capture the quaintness of it well! As Cleb would say, it looks too… cool.
I also promised him that I’d design t-shirts and a new menu and stickers for him… never did, and alas, Yakibar is no more. Cleb moved to a new house in SF that no longer has a kitchen bar, and the logistics would outweigh the fun of it.
All in all, it was a really special time for everyone involved, and my friend is now set free from eating leftover chicken thigh every week.
As I wrote in the last newsletter, seasons change to make room for new things. It’s certainly more room to dream, to pray, and to cultivate the things that make your heart sing.
Some other fun things:
Sam, the friend in San Diego, rounded up a bunch of his friends to make pilgrimages to LA’s Koreatown to buy out the entire supply of grills from that electronic store. They still grill on the regular, and call themselves the #Yakigang.
Cleb was once commissioned to haul his grill from Emeryville to the South Bay to do Yakibar for his roommate’s family.
Did I mention all of this was free? He never charged anyone a cent for the entire year. The generosity of it all blows my mind !!!