Caribbean Flavors at Pink Salt
Born and raised in Portland Parish, Jamaica, Chef Richard Robinson has been cooking his entire life. “As a kid in Jamaica, we had to learn to cook everything,” says Robinson. “We didn’t have the luxury where we can just go to KFC or McDonald’s.” Little did he know that would come in handy one day when he opened his restaurant Pink Salt.
Robinson’s mother owned a restaurant, where she prepared traditional Jamaican dishes for visitors, and he learned to cook at home while she was at work. Then, when he was 17, Robinson was awarded a scholarship to Johnson & Wales in Charleston, South Carolina. “I was one of the first of my siblings to get a college opportunity,” he says.
After earning his bachelor’s degree in culinary arts, Robinson called home to tell his mother he wanted to get a graduate degree. Worried her son was going to become a professional student, she told him it was time to get a job. Although he’d spent four years studying cooking, he went into the hotel industry, starting off as a front desk clerk at Bluegreen Resorts in Charleston and working his way up to task force manager for Hilton in Atlanta.
As task force manager, Robinson was sent around the country to help restructure struggling hotels; the position afforded him the opportunity to see America. He lived in Austin for a while and spent a year in New York City and Palm Beach, Florida. Then tragedy struck and changed the course of Robinson’s career. Robinson remembers his mother had flown in from Jamaica to visit. When he returned home from work on her second day in town, his manager called to tell him he needed to come back immediately.
When he returned to the hotel, there were news cameras and crime scene tape everywhere. A coworker had been violently murdered by an ex-boyfriend. As a member of upper management, Robinson says, “I found myself in the role of grief counselor, all while trying to manage my own grief.” The incident took such a toll that he left the hotel. “I took a year off and didn’t do anything,” says Robinson.
During that year, he had the “stupid idea” to open a restaurant. To try and get a handle on the business, he traveled the country and ate at other restaurants. Any chance he got, he would coax the owner out of the kitchen and pick their brain. “You have to get past your pride and ask, ‘How did you get to where you are?’”
Robinson decided to open a restaurant in Florida, where the climate was more like his home in Jamaica. He explored Orlando and Miami, but there were already enough Jamaican and Caribbean restaurants in those cities, leading him to Jacksonville. Jamaican food, he reasoned, could be just the thing Jacksonville diners didn’t even know they were missing.
Robinson describes his food at Pink Salt as Jamaican fusion. It’s part Jamaican and part American, with a Pakistani influence. The latter comes from his time in Atlanta, where he became close with a Pakistani family. He even gave up his apartment and moved into their spare bedroom. “Their children are like my brothers and sisters now,” says Robinson.
But it was Robinson’s mom who ultimately had the final say in the menu. While the ideas for each dish were his, they couldn’t be complete without his mother’s fine tuning. “My mom played a major role in menu development.”
It took two years for Pink Salt to find its footing. Originally, the restaurant started out just serving breakfast and lunch, but now the business is open for lunch and dinner Tuesday through Saturday. “I’m jamming in my groove, now,” Robinson says. Most nights, you don’t have to look far to find him. He will be in back, cooking. “They say I’m addicted to the kitchen,” says Robinson. “But this is my baby. I have to make sure things come out right.”
Sample Chef Robinson's culinary fare at Pink Salt Restaurant & Wine Bar, 1430 San Marco Blvd., Jacksonville, (904) 551-4289.
