Interview with Jennifer and Blake of Cafe Leva
“Look at this picture. We’re really reinforcing this, ‘we are married thing.’ Actually, today someone called and said, “Is your wife there? I said, ‘I don’t have a wife, but you can speak to Jennifer.’”
-Blake
People often confuse Blake and Jennifer as being married, but the two are good friends, and have been for more than twelve years. Together and with the support of their families, they opened Cafe Leva, an inviting cafe amongst a cozy residential community. Huge windows decorate the walls, as well as original artwork from local artists. Situated on a residential corner, Cafe Leva is bordered by homes and a quiet residential road.
1. When did you first become interested in working with food?
Jennifer: My food interest goes way back. My grandfather is a big chef in the family. I always wanted to be in the kitchen. I used to beg my mom to let me stay home from school so I could spend time cooking. It have always enjoyed cooking, playing with food. And eating it. Part of me liked making a mess in the kitchen.
Blake: I always liked cooking. I always had my easy-bake ovens running in tandem.
Jennifer (laughs): In tandem. You were a caterer since age five.
Blake: Oh totally. Yeah. I think it was my eighth birthday and my mom bought me a tea-caddy. I would load it up and would play restaurant.
2. What interested you about this particular kind of restaurant?
Jennifer: What I really love about this spot is I love that it’s a freestanding building. I love that it’s in a neighborhood. That’s super charming. I love that it’s in a university area. I love the surroundings. The windows. And it’s a great place to work.
Blake: When we first started shopping around for a place to open a restaurant it wasn’t going to be anything like this, and this sort of fell into our laps. The landlord was renovating it and he needed someone to move into this space.
3. Who have been some of the instrumental people who have really supported you through the starting and maintaining of your restaurant?
Blake: It’s gotta be our families, really.
Jennifer: Yeah. I would say customers and family really more than anybody else. We each have our own following of client�le who are so supportive. That’s probably why I’ve stayed in the business. I think of people I’ve done things for who were so gracious and loving it. But if I think of who has been with us at the beginning it was our families. And we have to put that in there because they definitely deserve the recognition.
Blake: Her mom works in the kitchen and my two younger brothers work with us up-front. My mom and dad help us with running errands.
Jennifer: I don’t know how people do it without their families. I don’t know how people go into the business without a partner that they don’t trust and love. The thought of doing both makes me think I would have a nervous breakdown.
4. What makes your restaurant interesting and unique to other restaurants? Chain restaurants in particular?
Jennifer: I think its hugely inviting. We’re able to do things chain restaurants aren’t able to do. We are able to do what the customers and what we want.
Blake: We employ individuals and I think we really encourage them to be themselves. To dress how they want, provided the level of service stays the same. We have brilliant people on staff. Physically I don’t think there is anything that compares to our bar and stuff. It’s pretty unique.
Jennifer: The artwork and stuff.
5. What have been your most significant joys and struggles of being an independent restaurant owner?
Jennifer: Joys are reaching the goals we set. Reaching some of them before we expected to. It validates what we’re doing. Being told by the staff that we’re the best bosses they’ve ever worked for.
Blake: I think the joys and struggles are both people. The joy of bringing people something and making a part of their day. Being able to buy somebody a coffee when they are having a down day and watching that help to turn it around. And struggles are the reality of the dynamic of people. It can stress me out. Usually on Saturdays.
6. Where do the ideas for your food come from?
Jennifer: I would say it comes from all of our previous experiences and wanting to learn new things. Blake is a bit better at that than I am. He’ll look through magazines and bring pictures and suggestions.
Blake: I’m not a repeater. I can be very consistent with the beverages, but when I cook I don’t like to do the same thing twice if I can.
Jennifer: Right now I think our salads and stuff is being driven by what is available. We’re doing lots of grow food. Veggie salads. Beans. Small potatoes. Alberta is very rich in resources. I don’t think people really realize that. There are so many small farms doing really neat things. Doing heritage foods, heritage seeds. I think it’s fascinating. Heritage seeds are old seeds that aren’t being used by the big producers. What happened was they stripped the seeds of things like apples and kept doing things to it. I don’t really know a lot about the science of it, but splitting it and grafting it. That way every tree would grow a certain type of fruit. So a lot of things that were around before stopped being grown. But small farms have some of the older foods and seeds. Orange tomatoes and zebra striped tomatoes and really beautiful things. But not just that. There are all kinds of produce like that that are available.
Blake: You would never get that kind of thing from a commercial operation. You need to get it from local producers.
Jennifer: Or farmer’s markets. That’s where I’d send somebody who was interested.
7. How largely do you try to buy locally/organically/fair trade?
Jennifer: More and more. We gave ourselves a goal of a year to get to the point we wanted to start from. But we also recognized you need to give yourself enough time to build a connection. Opening and getting this place running was really the priority. But now we have deliveries of local herbs from Morinville, organic meats from just outside the city. We aren’t getting everything organic yet. And ideally we would want to, but we have to be realistic too. But the things we really care about, like we really want to get free-range and organic meat. And it’s really great right now. There’s so much lovely produce and fruit. And it’s really easy. And I love buying locally. We don’t have delivery guys dropping stuff off. We have the farmer who has been up since 5am dropping stuff off. And they’re so into it. You learn stuff every day about this bean and this radish. It’s really really great.
8. Where does the restaurant’s name come from?
Blake: Leva is simply Italian for lever. It’s really just the lever that drove the water through the grove that the coffee comes out of. The name came with the business.
9. What are some of your interests and hobbies outside of the restaurant?
Jennifer: I collect stamps and coins too actually.
Blake: You do?
Jennifer (laughs): Ya. I’ll show you sometime. I have a really great collection.
Blake: Oh. The things you never know…
Jennifer: We both love to read. That’s my main past-time these days because it’s relaxing. I do bead work and crochet and a little bit of knitting, although I’m not too fabulous at it. Blake knits though. He’s really good. I have a scarf that he knit me 10 or so years ago.
Blake: I don’t knit so much. I knit more in the wintertime. In the summertime I’m more of a dog-walker. Bike rider. Gardener.
10. What life experience has strengthened you the most?
Jennifer: I would say for myself the experience of traveling. I went on my first big trip when I was sixteen. From then on I’ve always maintained those experiences do you more than anything you can learn in school. Not that I’m saying school doesn’t have a super important place. But experiencing things is important. I would say it was pretty life-changing to discover that. Then I caught the travel bug after that.
11. What is your biggest pet peeve?
Blake: People breathing through their teeth. Like they have something in their teeth.
Jennifer: You should carry toothpicks in your pocket that you can offer them in those situations.
Blake: Also I think generally inconsiderate people. People who act like they are the center of the universe and there is nobody else around them. That really gets me going.
Jennifer: I don’t know why I’m drawing a blank on this. I guess nothing really bothers me.
