Social media cooking sensation Rameish Desouza is preparing to open his restaurant on King Street in the downtown Kingston area in early May.

Desouza, who rose to social media fame with innovative dishes such as ackee ice cream, cow foot pizza and his personal favourite blue rice, says the imminent opening of ‘Ramesh’s Kitchen’ is like a dream come true.

According to Desouza, the idea to open the business was borne out of his success on social media, with many of his followers clamoring to taste his odd food combos.

“The biggest questions I use to get is, ‘How does that taste?’ ‘It really taste good?’ ‘How can I taste it ?” Desouza said.

“So, I decided that opening a business would be perfect. The only problem is I didn’t have the money to do it,” Desouza added.

To raise the start-up capital necessary for the business, Desouza turned to the popular crowdfunding platform, GoFundMe, where he launched a campaign in February 2022 to raise US$11,000.

Nearing his goal, having raised US$9,372 to date, Desouza said the task of raising the money necessary became easier as he started to get recognition from corporate Jamaica.

It’s a recognition that the 21-year-old said was hard won as in the early days of his culinary escapades, he could hardly even get his family members to taste his dishes.

Desouza, who started out baking, noted that while his family would try his oven crafted delights, they were not too keen on his stove top dishes.

Admittedly, his family’s hesitation was for good reason, as Desouza noted that he started out experimenting with scraps of unused foods from his parents’ cookshop.

“Me grow up inna restaurant at the side of the house. Them have a lot of coal stoves. When them done cook me use to ketch up back the coal stove dem and cook something. Them use to have things like chicken liver and chicken gizzard, wah left over me use to cut up that and try something. Me never know how fi cook so me just mix different things, me just a put things together,” explained Desouza.

“Me family use to seh me use to cook dutty pot. Things use to burn up but me never care. So once upon a time me family nor nobody never use to want to try my food,” he added.

Desouza added that community violence forced his family to shutter their business which was located in Reid’s Pen, near Braeton, Portmore.

Despite the business closing, Desouza’s passion for the kitchen remained.

After dropping out of Ascot High School in the ninth grade, due to frequent seizures, Desouza said he went through a period where he was confined to the house.

It was there that he became immersed in the world of YouTube, often day dreaming of having his own videos on the platform.

On his mother’s advice, Desouza soon started attending a Seventh Day Adventist church, a move which he credits with healing him of seizures. Once the seizures stopped, he began making videos on social media.

“My first YouTube video is when I make bulla cake. I don’t know the ingredients of actual bulla but I just mixed up some stuff that I thought should be in it. And because I didn’t have an oven or microwave, I used the rice cooker,” Desouza said.

“It looked like bulla so me just post the video. As me seh, me never start off good– me did terrible but the more me guh, the more me learn, start do research and take the craft more serious, me start be more dedicated, me always ah improve,” he added.

Similarly, Desouza said his venture into business would be an iterative journey, one which he doesn’t expect to get entirely right on the first go.

However, he notes that he is dedicated to his fans, and plans to do his best and see where it leads him.