A night without cooking might sound like a perfect holiday gift — we’re thankful for delivery apps like Uber Eats or GrubHub. Lately, we’ve seen some odd names while scrolling through options. We’d like to think we know San Diego pretty well — yet we’ve never seen a Flavortown Kitchen or Another Wing brick and mortar store anywhere.
Are these restaurants even real? The answer is yes + no; they’re ghost kitchens (aka cloud kitchens). The dining trend works like this:
- Restaurants use pre-existing commercial kitchens (often out of other eateries) to prepare menus.
- There’s no brick-and-mortar dining spaces or storefront attached.
- Third-party delivery apps bring food directly to customers.
The result: ghost kitchens have opened in our city, especially since the start of the pandemic. Here are five options you can currently find with big names attached to them.
Beastly burgers and fries. | Photo via @misslittleadventurous
🍔 MrBeast Burger
An early adopter, YouTuber MrBeast opened a ghost kitchen centered around burgers, fries + chicken. You can thank him for making the term ghost kitchen trend on social media and allowing you to have a “beast style” burger delivered to your house.
🌮 George Lopez Tacos
From TV screens to smartphone screens, George Lopez always leaves a big impression. Naturally, the sitcom family-man offers Mexican-style taco plates for the whole familia out of his ghost kitchen.
🍗 Another Wing
True to his trademark phrase, DJ Khaled is serving up Another Wing, but it’s more about the sauce than the chicken. You can choose your level of spice when ordering wings — let’s just hope DJ Khaled can take the heat of his own kitchen.
Some of the flavors at Flavortown | Photo via @kimquesadilla
🌶️ Flavortown Kitchen
After years of being on Food Network, Guy Fieri used delivery apps to finally put Flavortown on the map. If you know Guy, you’ll know his dishes are as big as his personality. With items like bacon-wrapped jalapeño poppers + “Mac Daddy Mac N Cheese,” you might want to try Flavortown before starting a health-related New Year’s resolution.
🍝 Pasqually’s
You might not know the name “Pasqually,” but you certainly know who’s putting the cheese on these pizzas — Chuck E. Cheese. Due to closures from the pandemic, Chuck E. Cheese adopted the ghost kitchen concept to keep cooking, but ditched its name so adults would actually order the food.
