Edible Blue Ridge Spring 2023

When the pandemic hit, Brinson’s innate adaptability helped him to transform his business into a virtual one. His home kitchen became a studio set and he incorporated private cooking classes into his repertoire. Since then, Brinson has reopened his facility, continuing his dedication to providing in-person instruction and helping to build the bridges that passionate industry professionals need to grow and succeed. He also continues his work within the community — but he became a bit of a celebrity, too. Recently, Brinson participated in the production of Dan Levy’s brainchild, “The Big Brunch,” as one of 10 chefs vying for $300,000 to turn their community-focused aspirations into reality. The warm show was a definite departure from typical food competition shows, with its heartfelt emotional investment from the judges and an obvious high level of respect and admiration among the competitors, who all helped each other in the kitchen in a way that is nearly never seen in other competitive food programming. “We are all socially-minded people from the industry — that’s the silver lining that connected all of us. It’s through and through who we all are; we help people — that’s just who we are; we don’t think about the competition aspect.” Brinson says he responded with “100% blind faith” to a call from Dan Levy looking for food industry professionals to participate in the show. According to Brinson, Levy was looking to create a show that highlighted a social mission and showcased what chefs were doing in their communities. “I went into that with the mindset of what a great opportunity it would be to use that platform to talk about my city and my organization. We didn’t know what the prize was going to be, who the other contestants were … we didn’t know what kind of cooking show it was going to be.

My focal point was: HBO has given me an opportunity to highlight what I’m passionate about and I’m going to take advantage of that.”

Throughout the show, Brinson drew from vast experiences throughout his cooking career but especially leaned into Ethiopian cuisine, a nod to his roots from his father’s side of the family.

“I went on and cooked Ethiopian food for others for the first time. The growth gave me a chance to highlight what’s important to me.”

Brinson has returned to Charlottesville after filming and remains close with the other chefs from the show.

“We all keep in contact in an ongoing group chat. Every few days someone chimes in. I can definitely say I made some lifelong friends.”

As for what’s next for Brinson, we’re certainly not going to spoil the results of the show. However, he did share exclusively with Edible Blue Ridge that there’s an incredible pop-up partnership on the way in coming months between Culinary Concepts AB and what he described as a “local powerhouse.” Regardless of the show’s outcome, it’s clear that Brinson’s commitment to Charlottesville and the members of the food industry is strong and that he intends to continue building on his dedication to contributing to the community. “The one thing that makes Charlottesville so special is that I’ve never lived in a place where people care about so much — that they generally want to add value to the place where they live and [they] care about their neighbors. It’s such a niche pocket of the world.”

edible blue ridge SPRING 2023 | 9