Self-Proclaimed Punsters Publish ‘Bon Rappetite,’ The Hip-Hop Cookbook
“Bon Rappetite is the world’s first hip hop restaurant. Featuring a delicious menu that caters to the ballers,” is how BonRappetite.com explains the Atlanta dining concept.
Good idea, eh?
Much to the disappointment of foodies and hip-hop moguls alike, Bon Rappetite isn’t really a restaurant.
It’s a joke.
But it is growing into a world-wide sensation, says Everett Steele and wife Bunny McIntosh.
“Somehow a joke came up about Wu Tang Clams, and we just died laughing,” remembers Steele.
He says the idea was predicated on–what else–a night of drinking.
“So we sat up for the rest of the night and wrote out — I think we had like 300? We had an insane number of these Hip Hop dishes, just puns and parodies, and back and forth,” Steele says. “And we came home that night, and I was like, ‘I’m going to make a fake restaurant webpage.’”
An homage to hip hop, they decided. This is Atlanta. Everett and Bunny make webpages for a living. It seemed like a good idea.
“It was like 3AM, and I remember yelling ‘Turkey Minage! We need more women!,” laughs McIntosh.
Months later, after they’d forgotten about it, that page went viral. People started calling for reservations. Some showed up at their house.
That gave friend Chris Hassiotis an idea.
If they can’t open Bon Rappetite, the restaurant, why not create Bon Rappetite, the cookbook?
“From the day that suggestion popped up until the day we had a book in-hand, it was five weeks,” says Hassiotis.
Chris, a longtime friend of Everett and Bunny, says his relationship with puns and food goes way back to his days as a writer for the University of Georgia’s student paper. He called it “Chews Wisely.”
C-h-e-w… get it?
“The jokes came first,” says Hassiotis, who adapted those jokes into recipes found in the Bon Rappetite cookbook.
All dishes are a pun on rappers’ names.
Like “Roast Face Killah,” which is roast beef with au jus.
Lil’ Wangz, simple chicken wings.
And for dessert, Ol’ Dirty Custard.
“We all live in Atlanta, so there are a lot of southern traditions in the book too,” says Hassiotis.
For instance, one recipe calls for bacon drippings.
A hand full of online reviewers agree–the puns are good. The recipes are great.
The cookbook also comes with a mix tape download, featuring a blend of Atlanta, national and international hip-hop artists.
In its first month, Bon Rappetite has sold thousands of copies. It’s featured on Amazon.com, and the national chain “Urban Outfitters” plans to have it on its store shelves soon.
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