Ricardo Newell Jr. thinks about food all the time.
As director of the Culinary Arts program at Shaw High School in East Cleveland, Newell teaches more than 30 juniors and seniors to prepare food creatively and serve it safely. Outside of school, the “Gourmet Gent,” as he calls himself, caters events and works as a private chef.
At an event earlier this year at Midtown’s Central Kitchen, his wild thyme and mushroom crostini competed with his Hawaiian BBQ chicken pizza. His Tuscan salmon pasta delighted guests, and his bourbon apricot meatballs disappeared in a flash.
He focuses on flavor while keeping track of sodium content. To that end, he is working to develop his own line of healthy seasonings.
Newell said his fiancee, Marie Gates, a nurse at the Cleveland Clinic, is from Trinidad, where cooks often use “green seasonings” and spices to add zip to their dishes. He enjoys using what he calls wet seasonings on meats so he can infuse flavor throughout. One favorite: celery, with its natural sodium. He said using other green herbs and even spinach can also boost flavor as well as iron and potassium in food. And he recommends the Mrs. Dash and Tabitha Brown seasoning lines.
He worries about high blood pressure, kidney disease and other conditions that so many Clevelanders manage. “I want to kind of share how healthy eating can help,” he said.
The Euclid High School graduate holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Kent State University. After spending 10 years in the Philadelphia area, mostly working in higher education, he moved home to Cleveland in 2019 and launched his business, which offers personal chef experiences as well as catering.
‘Starting with just a dream’
Newell found a home for Gourmet Gent at Central Kitchen, which incubates food businesses from startup through scale-up. The organization at 7901 Carnegie Ave. has helped launch more than 1,000 products. Its co-founder and CEO, Eric Diamond, told Signal Cleveland that Newell stands out.
“Ricardo has been successful because he’s one of those rare entrepreneurs who not only takes feedback but actively seeks advice from other successful entrepreneurs,” Diamond said. “He fully embraced all the programming that Central Kitchen offered. … He exemplifies what’s possible with hard work and dedication — starting with just a dream, he leveraged our resources to create a thriving business.”
With Thanksgiving approaching, Newell said people should “never be afraid to work flavor into what you are cooking.” He offered some advice for timid cooks (like this reporter):
- Use fresh ingredients
- Actively slow down
- Set an atmosphere for cooking.
“Music is a must,” Newell declared.
He offered one more piece of guidance: “Be mindful to cook with love. If love is in the food, people taste it.”
Newell shared one of his recipes with Signal Cleveland. You can download it below.