Heather Golden Ray wants you to nourish your inner shine, and she has just the place for you to do it. It’s Hey, Sunshine Kitchen, and it’s the plant-based eatery she runs with her sister Jenny Engel in Culver City, CA.
For more than two decades, Engel and Ray have shared their love of plant-based food with the world through their cookery school, Spork Foods, and their cookery books, Spork-Fed and Vegan 101. In 2023, they decided to take their culinary journeys to the next level by opening their very own restaurant, Hey, Sunshine Kitchen.
The eatery’s ethos is clear from the name. Expect to sit down to soul-nourishing, flavor-laden, brightly colored meals, all made with plant-based ingredients. But it’s not all lettuce and avocado (although they certainly have their place on the menu). There’s the Classic Cheeseburger complete with a grilled vegan beef patty, a Spicy Carnitas Taco with shredded jackfruit, and sides like crispy housemade Chickpea Nuggets that you won’t be able to stop eating.
The quality of the food, the passion of the founders, and the skill of the in-house team have all led to Hey, Sunshine Kitchen being named on Yelp as the No. 1 woman-owned restaurant in the US. No easy feat, considering the challenging nature of the hospitality industry right now. There’s no denying it: vegan restaurants are struggling to keep their doors open.
Hey Sunshine Kitchen
According to Ray, keeping their ethos front and center helps them through any challenges, “and there are many,” she says, “as all restaurants face.” She is also inspired by the many other women working in the plant-based food industry right now, as was showcased at the recent Vegan Women’s Summit in Los Angeles, which Ray attended. Every year, the event brings together like-minded CEOs, celebrities, investors, and creators from all over the world. “We are so motivated and inspired by their contributions,” she said. “Within the vegan restaurant space, we see the concepts of other women vegan chefs thriving in a time that is really tough.”
Resilience, determination, and focus underline Engel and Ray’s success, there’s no doubt. But it’s also about compassion, too, as well as just really great vegan food that customers love to eat again, and again, and again. We recently spoke with Ray to find out more about her mission with Hey, Sunshine Kitchen, the business’ deep connection with its customers, and her advice for other women in the plant-based food industry.
James Michael Juarez
VegNews: Can you tell us a little more about why you and your sister Jenny decided to start Hey, Sunshine Kitchen?
Heather Golden Ray: We created this restaurant after running our vegan cooking school, Spork Foods, for about 15 years. We had always wanted a restaurant and felt that when the time was right, we would feel it out. We wanted to bring high-quality, plant-based, non-GMO options to the table, that also had tons of color, vitality, and energy-giving vitamins and minerals to nourish and align our customers.
VN: Would you say your own personal journeys with veganism are reflected in the restaurant’s menu?
HGR: Our personal vegan journeys began over 24 years ago when there weren’t the same convenient vegan offerings out there in the world. So we began creating our own versions of the foods we had loved previously. We brought many of those items into the menu at Hey, Sunshine Kitchen. We also added items that we wanted to see on menus around town but were missing. We thought about dishes our cooking students had loved throughout the years and added items for them, too.
VN: How do you go about meeting your customers where they’re at, whether they’re vegan, flexitarian, omnivore, or somewhere in between?
HGR: Our menu runs the gamut from housemade proteins using chickpea flour to a crispy chicken sandwich, to take into consideration where people may be on their plant-based journey and how they can feel comforted eating at our restaurant no matter what food choices they make.
“We honestly feel like this is our big mission on this planet, and it has been a wild and incredible ride.”
VN: Can you share any stories of how Hey, Sunshine Kitchen has impacted the lives of your customers?
HGR: We have had numerous customers who have seen positive impacts on their health and it fills us with joy. One lovely customer has ordered from us every day since opening, and without changing anything else in his life, his cholesterol dropped 40 points, and he is no longer pre-diabetic. We also love that parents can bring children who have many allergies here because they can feel safe.
VN: It must feel incredibly rewarding to have such an influential impact on your customers.
HGR: We can’t believe it when people we don’t know, or who just stumbled upon our restaurant enjoy what we have to offer. It seems like it should be a given, but it still makes us giddy. We also feel very lucky to have a sister business. Working together makes each day much more fun.
James Michael Juarez
VN: Mission- and women-led businesses like yours are becoming more common in the plant-based space, how do you see this evolving?
HGR: What we love about a more woman-focused upswelling in the movement is how the focus isn’t solely economic, or data-driven, but we are listening to our intuition and have bigger visions for the planet at the core of our businesses. Many of us are mothers who want our children to inherit a healthy planet. There is so much synergy among women in the vegan movement. It’s helping to build momentum and awareness in unforeseen ways.
“People come in thanking us, many times per week for offering healthy, affordable, and tasty food in their neighborhood, and we are blown away.”
VN: As the No. 1 woman-owned restaurant to visit in the US, per Yelp, what advice would you give to other women looking to start their own business in the food industry?
HGR: It can be daunting to start but it feels worse if you don’t act on your dreams. Try to do your research, partner with trustworthy, like-minded people, and go for it! If you do fail, it’s all part of the process and with every hurdle, there are opportunities to grow and learn. It will not be easy, but if you have a bigger mission in mind, have faith and keep chugging.
Find out more about Hey, Sunshine Kitchen here.
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Charlotte is a VegNews editor and writer based in sunny Southsea on England's southern coast.
