Our Story

Brooklyn has never had one kitchen. It has a hundred of them, stacked on top of one another, and every evening the smell of all of them meets in the same hallway. We grew up in that hallway — a Caribbean and Latin hallway — where sofrito simmered on one stove, jerk spice toasted on another, and the rhythm of Spanish, patois, and English all ran together.

Downstairs, a Puerto Rican family whose recaito you could smell before you reached the landing. Around the corner, a Jamaican bakery that opened before the sun. Down the block, Dominican rice, Trinidadian doubles, Mexican birria on a Sunday. Nobody was asked to give anything up. People simply fed each other, and everybody's cooking got better for it.

Love Story is that hallway, plated. Mofongo crowned with slow-braised meat. Whole fish dressed in garlic and lime. Crispy carne frita beside sweet plantain. Not one island borrowing from another, but every island sitting down at the same Brooklyn table.