Your Modesto, Central Valley restaurant delivery could be coming from a ghost kitchen
Restaurant delivery is nothing new. But, thanks to the pandemic, these days the food you order in the Central Valley could be coming from a “ghost kitchen” instead of a regular restaurant.
Don’t worry, that doesn’t mean Casper or any other friendly or non-friendly ghost is making your meal.
Instead, ghost kitchens are restaurants that offer delivery without dedicated dining rooms attached that work out of existing restaurant kitchens. The ghost kitchen or virtual restaurant concept isn’t necessarily new either, but as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic keeps local restaurants on a roller coaster of openings and closings, the idea has taken off.
Ghost kitchens provide another way for established restaurants to bring in revenue and to further their outreach to hungry potential customers scrolling through delivery apps looking for something to eat.
The trend has been embraced by national brands and locally owned independent restaurants alike. Corporate chains like Johnny Carino’s, Chili’s and Mimi’s Cafe have launched ghost kitchens out of their Central Valley restaurants, using the same staff and space but not associating with the established brand.
Established independent eateries like downtown Modesto’s Dewz and north Modesto’s GK Mongolian BBQ have also opened ghost kitchens out of their existing restaurants. West Side-based Pasta 209 started last summer using the ghost kitchen concept, working out of a local commercial kitchen and offering its own delivery.
Pandemic forced local restaurants to change course
“I believed from the start that COVID would be around and affecting us for a long time. That meant food models were going to have to shift. I wanted to build something COVID proof,” said Pasta 209 chef and owner Jason Buktenica, who lives in Newman. “I wanted to make restaurant-quality food and bring it to people’s homes at a time when they couldn’t go out to restaurants.”
For local independent ghost kitchens, the trend is a way to bring more business in as well as expand their customer base. Dewz, a fine-dining mainstay on J Street Modesto since 1997, has like other local restaurants weathered the shutdowns and reopenings due to coronavirus safety restrictions.
But, unlike a lot of other restaurants, it’s high-end food isn’t necessarily fitted to delivery. In fact, the restaurant was closed entirely for about the first five months of the pandemic last year.
Now the restaurant has slashed its staff from a dozen to four employees as it is only offering outdoor service, said executive chef Connor Carlin. So along with owner John Jacinto and another manager, they launched two ghost kitchens out of the Dewz kitchen to make up for lost revenue.
Modesto’s Dewz restaurant runs two ghost kitchens
The results are the delivery only ghost kitchens Chicken & Beer, which serves fried chicken wings, sides and craft beer, and Artisan by Dewz, which offers the restaurant’s from-scratch pasta dishes. Chicken & Beer launched through the third-party delivery app DoorDash last November and has been a hit.
It has done so well, Carlin and company started Artisan this January, to take advantage of the establishment’s in-house made fresh pasta.
“I think (ghost kitchens) are great. A lot of people want to eat at home and get convenient, great, cheaper food. This allows us to put on more than one hat. We can try different things,” Carlin said.
When they began Chicken & Beer, he said at first they didn’t necessarily want to associate Dewz — known as a white-tablecloth, special occasion restaurant — with the the humble wing. But as people found it, he realized it helped being linked to the upscale eatery. So shortly after Artisan launched they added the “by Dewz” for more name recognition.
Both ghost kitchens operate during normal Dewz hours, but only offer delivery through DoorDash.
Like Dewz, GK Mongolian BBQ — with locations on Sylvan Avenue in Modesto and West Monte Vista Avenue in Turlock — was looking for a way to increase sales while keeping its existing eatery afloat. Known for its Asian stir-fry dishes made on a large, circular griddle, the restaurant has open Alistair House as a ghost kitchen. It offers Chinese food favorites for delivery through an array of third-party delivery apps.
Third-party food delivery apps dominate orders
“We were going out of business like everyone else at the start of this,” said owner Matt Shih, who operates 10 locations in the Central Valley. “But we didn’t want to sacrifice our identity at GK Mongolian. (Alistair House) offers quick-service Chinese food that can utilize our existing infrastructure.”
Currently, Alistair House is available through DoorDash, Grubhub, UberEats and Postmates and its sales makes up about 10% of GK Mongolian’s revenue. Shin said third-party delivery apps have become a necessary lifeline for restaurants during the pandemic. They use six tablets at the Modesto site to handle all of their online orders.
Shih said those delivery apps now make up 75% of their overall business, compared to in-person pickup.
But local restaurants aren’t the only ones to catch on to the potential of ghost kitchens. Huge national companies are cashing in with focused restaurant concepts running out of their existing kitchens. Italian chain Johnny Carino’s on Dale Road across from Vintage Faire Mall in Modesto has partnered with Famous Dave’s BBQ restaurant.
Famous’ Dave’s is largely Midwestern restaurant brand known for its barbecued meats and ribs. But you can only get its food to-go or delivered through third-party apps locally.
National chains embrace virtual restaurant trend
Two other chains with Modesto locations in the Vintage Faire Mall complex, Chili’s and Mimi’s Cafe, have created separate chicken wing-based ghost kitchens out of their existing restaurants. Chili’s runs It’s Just Wings, which as the name suggests offers the fried favorites. And Mimi’s has House of Wings, another delivery-only wing shop.
The chicken wing ghost kitchen concept takes advantage of the inexpensive cut of poultry that is readily available, easy to store and can be sold cheap. Dewz chef Carlin said he welcomes the competition from corporate chains. He said it allows them to set themselves apart with higher-end ingredients and homemade sauces at Chicken & Beer.
“I think it’s great; I think it’s the future,” he said. “Once people warm up to having food delivered more, its only going to get bigger and bigger. There’s no way it can go downhill.”
Also banking on that trend is Pasta 209. Owner Buktenica, known as Chef Buck to friends, recently leased a small storefront in downtown Gustine which he plans to make his homebase for his from-scratch Italian ghost kitchen. But unlike many of the other virtual restaurant concepts, he isn’t reliant on third-party apps — which often take a hefty fee from 15% to 30% of sales from restaurants.
When he launched Pasta 209, he focused exclusively on offering delivery to residents in Turlock, Newman, Gustine, Hilmar, Crows Landing, Patterson and Stevinson. He and his girlfriend run the operation together, and he delivers food each weeknight in his SUV with custom heating and cooling storage chests in its trunk.
Buktenica specializes in family sized feasts, which can easily feed four people with leftovers for the next day. His pasta is all handmade as are his sauces, breads and desserts. Package orders cost from $49 to $55 and come with a heap of fresh-made pasta, salad and breadsticks.
With the nearest sit-down Italian restaurant about half an hour or more away from most of the West Side, Buktenica said he sees Pasta 209 surviving long after the pandemic is over. With his new space, which he plans to open in April, he will add walk-in pickup and pasta hot tray assortments to his services.
“Even after COVID goes away, people are still going to continue eating this way because we’ve all gotten so used to pickup and curbside and delivery,” he said. “This is the new normal, if you will.”
This story was originally published February 22, 2021 at 4:00 AM.
