Today we’d like to introduce you to Deb Cantrell.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Deb. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
The story of Savor began when I was a licensed physical therapist here in Fort Worth. I noticed a trend that people were not healing as they should from their ailments and in many cases it was due to their diet. I became really interested in how your body uses food and one day I read an article about becoming a personal chef while raising my infant son. I decided to pursue culinary school and I trained at the Culinary Business Academy, Culinary Institute of America and the Culinary School of Fort Worth.
When my son was four years old, he received a medical diagnoses that categorized him as high functioning autistic with severe ADHD among other things. After extensive research on the autism spectrum and the effects of gluten in children, I changed his diet to see if that would help him.
Realizing what a positive effect it was having on him, I was attracting other people who wanted to overcome health issues by changing what they ate. One client turned into five and my son wound up as a starter on the football team, a member of the honor guard, had numerous friends, and was a straight A student.
Only one thing changed, and it was food. I knew there were other families out there and I wanted to help.
I began cooking in people’s homes and then I realized that I was only one person and couldn’t help as many people as I wanted to. I decided to slowly build a team of chefs who could cook for people with special dietary needs out of a commercial kitchen and deliver the meals all over the Dallas/Fort Worth area.
Now 15 years later, I have a team of 5 professional chefs (many who graduated from the Culinary School of Fort Worth) who I work with to create personalized meals for families who have a variety of eating styles including vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free, dairy-free, Paleo, Whole 30, diabetic-friendly, candida-friendly, GAPS, Low FODMAP, etc.
We cook for pretty much any dietary need or preference under the sun and have made meals for about 5,000 families in the area!
My hope is that we help even more families experience food in a whole new way this year.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I want to meet the person that says owning your own business is a smooth road! I saw a sign one time that looked like a bowl of spaghetti and it said “path to success.” I could not agree more. There were many struggles along the way. When things are running smoothly, that typically means I am way too comfortable and that a growth opportunity is around the corner.
The first thing is not knowing what the next step was. I needed a blueprint or a battle plan to really understand how to grow my company and at times just to get through the day. It was not until I invested in some really great coaches that I was truly able to grow. The other struggle as I am sure any business owner will tell you is finding employees that truly care and have a work ethic. I have an amazing staff now but boy did I have to kiss a lot of frogs and make some mistakes.
Please tell us about Savor Culinary Services.
At Savor Culinary Services we create personalized, chef-prepared meals that are delivered to individuals and families in the Dallas/Fort Worth area.
Before someone starts a service, we have them fill out a detailed food questionnaire that helps us better understand their dietary needs and preferences and what kind of service they are looking for (whether it’s breakfast, lunch, snacks, dinner, or dessert – or all the above!). These meals can either get delivered weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, etc. depending on what the client wants.
If someone is going out of town or they won’t be home much, our clients can pause their service and start back up when they are ready.
Our personalized meals are made with local, seasonal ingredients that are responsibly sourced. Using quality, fresh ingredients while supporting our local economy is very important to us.
That’s why over the years we have built relationships with local companies such as Lone Star and Burgandy beef for our meats, Latte Da Dairy for our cheeses, The Virgin Olive Oiler for the freshest olive oil, The Salty Pig Sausage Co. for our sausage and Wild Toad Toffee for some of our desserts. We get the majority of our produce from local farmer’s markets as well.
We truly believe you can taste the fresh, local ingredients in our food – it makes all the difference!
We specialize in serving those with unique dietary needs and medically-necessary diets (i.e. candida-friendly, diabetic friendly, Celiac disease, etc.) but we also serve busy families who are just looking for an easier way to get healthy meals on their table.
We are known for our very personal approach to food. Every meal we make is custom. Before each service, our client receives a custom menu (which changes each service) based on their food questionnaire/our initial consultation and they can make changes or special requests as they wish.
We’ve had clients send request vegetarian food one week and Paleo the next. Our service changes as the need of our clients’ change.
We’ve also had clients send us recipes from Pinterest that they want us to modify, heirloom recipes and some clients even ask us to make copycat meals from their favorite restaurants just with a healthier twist! The possibilities are endless with our talented team of chefs and that’s why our clients love us! They like having control over their food and knowing what goes into it.
There are a lot of things I am proud of – it’s hard to pick just one! One of my proudest moments was in 2016 when I received the “Personal Chef of the Year” award from the United States Personal Chef Association and was voted “Best Chef” and “Best Catering” by Fort Worth Texas Magazine readers in 2016 and 2017 respectively.
I was also very proud when our organization became the first meal delivery service in Fort Worth to be “Blue Zones approved” (and I think the only one right now).
But most importantly, I am proud to see how our meals change our clients’ lives – it sounds cheesy but it’s true. One our clients named Laurie had brain cancer and was bedridden for months. All her husband wanted was for them to travel together and “have his wife back.” After a few months of using our services, Laurie was able to reduce her cancer treatments in half and go on a fishing trip with her husband.
It’s stories like these that makes me proud to do what I do.
We do so much more than just make food – we consult with our clients to create a service that really works for their lifestyle and specific health needs. We are the only meal delivery service in the DFW area that offers food intolerance testing to give our clients a better understanding of foods they might have a mild or severe intolerance to (which often is linked to many health issues).
This test is called an ALCAT test and we often suggest that our clients take this test before we start planning their meals so we can really help them eat the best foods for THEIR body.
I often call this approach we take with food as “culinary medicine” and that is sort of the niche we are getting into. This past year we started teaming up with concierge doctors and wellness centers in Dallas and Fort Worth. Many doctors now refer their patients to us so we can help with the diet side of their patients’ health.
Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
Going fishing with my grandparents. I can remember being 5 years old with the water up to my armpits wading out into the middle of nowhere in the Gulf of Mexico catching fish all day, eating bologna sandwiches and drinking Tang for lunch while sitting in their small blue boat parked on a sandbar miles from anywhere or anything.
We ate what we caught that evening for dinner. To this day, nothing tastes like that fish. This trip not only taught me how to fish but taught me the value of patience which I have had to practice time and time again as a business owner.
Pricing:
- Prices vary depending on the customization, however, our smallest meal delivery service (3 meals, 2 servings) starts at $175 plus the cost of groceries.
Contact Info:
- Address: 800 W. 5th Street Fort Worth, TX 76102
- Website: http://www.savorculinaryservices.com/
- Phone: 817-277-3031
- Email: deb@savorculinaryservices.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/savor_culinary/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/savorculinary/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/savorculinary?lang=en
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/savor-culinary-services-fort-worth-3
- Other: https://www.pinterest.com/savorculinary/
Image Credit:
Starla Fortunato, The Lush List, Realife Photography Food by Gina Propp
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