Article by media partner Cuisine Noir, the country’s first Black culinary lifestyle outlet since 2009 dedicated to connecting the African diaspora through food, drink and travel.
The highly anticipated opening of the Obama Presidential Center has finally come on this Juneteenth holiday. Located on the South Side of Chicago in historic Jackson Park, visitors exploring the center’s museum and 19.3-acre campus will have the opportunity to engage with the story of President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama through this inspiring public space, including dining options that reflect the joy of community gathering at the table.
South Side of Chicago’s Native Son
Leading the food and beverage program at the Obama Presidential Center is South Side of Chicago native, chef Cliff Rome. “The magnitude of it all still hasn’t settled because it’s the buildup to the opening. Then it’ll be 36 months after that before you could really sit down and just take a look at the history that you’ve been part of,” says the leading chef about his role in the culinary program.
The program at the Obama Presidential Center is in collaboration with his own catering/event company, Rome’s Joy Companies and Bon Appétit Management Company. Together they’re operating as BAMJoy to provide unique, Chicago-style dining experiences for the center’s private events as well as the public restaurant and cafe.
Growing up in the historic Englewood neighborhood, Chef Rome attributes his love for cooking, and his early training in the kitchen, to his grandmother. “I was probably around four years old. She had an old tin bucket in the kitchen and she used to make me stand on it and hold onto her house coat while she was frying so I wouldn’t get too close,” he recalls. “I was right behind her, but I could see everything she was doing.”
Those skills picked up in his grandmother’s kitchen were homed in while attending the culinary arts program at Chicago’s Kendall College and served to prep Chef Rome for a dynamic career. “I worked for Marriott and then I worked for Midway Airport Concessions. It was a combination of the things…some quick service kind of cuisine, fine dining and then catering on top of that. So it was a great mix of things,” he says about his earlier professional experiences. Some of which included working for chef/restaurateur Wolfgang Puck as well as the Cannes Film Festival.
During this time in his career, the chef divided his time between Chicago and Europe. “I was a chef with the American Pavilion, the hospitality center for the Cannes Film Festival,” he shares. “I was one of the chefs and I did that for about four years—and that took us from the South of France, to parts of Italy and Spain. So I did a lot of traveling during that time.”
In a culinary career that spans a little over three decades, sweet home Chicago always holds a place in this chef’s heart. He returned to the city in 2000 to form Rome’s Joy Companies, the parent company to several of his iconic Chicago-based establishments including: Peaches on 47th (a neighborhood restaurant serving southern comfort food), Rome’s Joy Catering, Parkway Social (a boutique co-working lounge and social club), Blanc Gallery (a fine arts and cultural space) and BAMJoy (the joint partnership with Bon Appétit Management Company that handles dining services at the Obama Presidential Center).
By Jocelyn Amador
