A Southeast Texas veteran is hoping to become this year’s Carla Hall Presents Favorite Chef.
Jennifer Caldwell, a veteran, retired nurse and owner of Orange food truck Luna Nashoba, says she learned about the competition while reading recipes on the Food Network. And while she’d use some of the money to expand her business, most of it would go to American Walker — her newly-founded nonprofit organization that helps veterans with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Caldwell says her love for cooking stretches back to when she was five years old and her grandma would put her on a stool by the stove and teach her.
RELATED: Bridge City restaurant set to close its doors
“My grandma taught me Southern cooking, so white gravy, biscuits, how to make sausage and gravy, kind of a southern Oklahoma thing because we’re from Oklahoma,” Caldwell said. “Miss Ruby (Caldwell’s best friend’s grandma) taught me to make Texas (foods), because she lived in Texas. I learned how to make great food from her-everything from collard greens to how to do stuffed sausage to rice and gravy.”
Caldwell said that she started school to be a chef when she was 18 and stationed in Petaluma, California with the Coast Guard. She continued her culinary career after four years in the military and then started nursing school when she was 30 and retired from the field in March.
She decided to open the food truck because she has seen multiple restaurants close due to the economy, but a food truck is a “kitchen on wheels.” So, she can go all over the county and feed people.
“As a nurse, COVID really just did me in, and I’m exhausted, and I think the world has forgotten to how to enjoy just life again,” Caldwell said. “We were in lockdown for so long that people kind of lost that, and I feel like God led me to open something that brought people smiles again.”
RELATED: New Beaumont restaurant and bar to host ‘casting call’
Luna Nashoba, the business’ name, means “Alpha Female Wolf” in the Choctaw language — an homage to her husband’s Choctaw roots.
Caldwell said she and her husband bought the food truck in October 2022 and remodeled it almost completely on their own. Their first day officially open for business was March 23rd at the South Texas State Fair.
Caldwell said her food is out of the ordinary, with offerings such as red pepper jam, deep fried cranberry jalapeno cinnamon rolls, crawfish hot wings and grilled cheese with specialty jam on the side. The jam, which also can be purchased by the jar at the food truck or online is made by her sister who lives in Oklahoma. Ten percent of the proceeds from the jam goes to the Wounded Warrior Project.
Caldwell wants to continue to expand her menu with other items, including pulled pork sandwiches, deep fried cake and salty Margarita wings, which she says tastes like biting into a salty margarita. She is also learning to make boba pearls for her Boba spritzers.
RELATED: Performers added to Beaumont’s Juneteenth Celebration
“We can change our menu everywhere we go and I love that. I love being creative, and I love making up stuff and that’s kind of where we got the deep fried cinnamon rolls and the crawfish hot wings and so once a week we go into a test kitchen and we just kind of make up stuff,” Caldwell said.
Entering the Carla Hall presentation allowed Caldwell to flex that muscle, as it required chefs to submit original recipes and pictures.
“Every place that we’ve gone I’ve had people teach me and that’s another reason I want to win this competition is because Carla would be such an amazing person to be in the kitchen with and learn from,” Caldwell said.
Caldwell said that she wants to inspire people of all ages to cook as she is trying to do with her grandson who sometimes helps with the food truck.
RELATED: Kelly Catholic baseball champs celebrated
The winner of People’s Choice wins the grand prize of $25,000, a two-page advertorial in Taste of Home Magazine and the gets to cook with Carla Hall. Carla’s Pick will be recognized by Carla Hall, American chef, TV personality and former model.
The first round of voting started on June 12 and ends on June 22. The winner will be announced in August.