Nacha Focaccia is located at 800 Franklin Avenue, just north of Eastern Parkway in Crown Heights, and is currently open on Wednesday through Friday from 6:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., and on Saturday and Sunday from 9:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Charlise Rookwood has lived a lot of lives. Born and raised in East London, with family spread from Jamaica to the Republic of Mauritius to the Bronx, Rookwood spent nearly 30 years in the music business, writing songs for Universal, before leaving the industry to raise her daughter (first in Jersey City, now in Crown Heights).
Another shift, and a new sense of purpose, came in 2013, when Rookwood’s dad died of stomach cancer and she started being much more intentional in her relationship with food, embracing a plant-based diet. But Rookwood didn’t simply become vegan and go about her business; she wanted to share, and hype, a wellness lifestyle that, as she put it to Happy Cow, “is rooted in care, awareness, and connection.”
So she created and hosted the YouTube series Black Vegan Cooking Show, trading tips, tricks, and secrets with recent and aspiring converts like Styles P, Jim Jones, Remy Ma, and more. She wrote a James Beard Award-nominated cookbook called Vegan Soulicious, filled with plant-based versions of her family’s favorite Jamaican and African dishes.
(Photo by Scott Lynch)
And now Rookwood has taken her love and enthusiasm for healthy eating into the brick-and-mortar restaurant world with an adorable new cafe on Franklin Avenue called Nacha Focaccia—the first part, a portmanteau of CHArlise and her business partner NAima Coleman; the second part, the bread she uses in all kinds of delightful ways here.
You can get your focaccia as a straight-up slab (I recommend springing for a sauce on the side with this; Rookwood’s harissa one is fire); or gussied up “piment rouge” style, infused with Mauritian and Creole flavors and a coconut chutney dip. Or go sweet with the double-chocolate chunk “choco bliss,” which Rookwood said was on the menu at her daughter’s insistence.
For something even more hearty, get one of Rookwood’s sandwiches. Before you order, though, it’s important to note that she doesn’t use words like “plant-based” on the menu, but when you see ingredients like peppered turkey or bacon here, they are, like everything else, vegan.
A “Morning Munch,” “Shiko’s Katsu,” and a coco bliss slab (Photo by Scott Lynch)
The “Morning Munch” features that vegan bacon, as well as (vegan) eggs and a crunchy seed-based mayo. The “Rainbow Harvest” involves colorful veggies, green mango, and a spicy sambal mayo. And “Shiko’s Katsu” is named after Rookwood’s Japanese mother-in-law, who taught her how to make the traditional katsu sauce and panko crust, which she deploys here onto squares of tofu.
The coco bliss slab, $6.50 (Photo by Scott Lynch)
Not to reduce the concept, but at its most basic level Nacha Focaccia is a coffee shop, and Naima—a former barista—runs the beverage program. In addition to all the expected coffee drinks, you can get things like a bright strawberry matcha, or an iced-something topped with ube cold foam, or a caffeine-free sesame latte (Naima’s invention), or the cocoa bliss—”like my grandma used to give us in Kingston”— which Rookwood makes from scratch using raw cacao, nutmeg, cinnamon, and star anise.
The space itself is lovely, from the grand limestone in the windowed archway that serves as the entrance to the moss wall and the recessed shelving inside. Bonus: laptopping is extremely discouraged. “It just saps the energy out of the room,” Rookwood said, correctly. On weekends, the music is loud and bumping. “This is not a whispery place,” she said. “Like, wake up everybody!! Let’s go!!!”
(Photo by Scott Lynch)
There’s lots more to come, too. Not only at Nacha Focaccia, where Rookwood says she wants to host community events and workshops in the evening, but also two doors down, where Food Yard used to be, and where she plans on opening a fast-casual restaurant using the dishes from Vegan Soulicious. Opening even sooner is Rookwood’s speakeasy, with music and booze, in the building’s basement.
“Nacha Focaccia is my first restaurant ever,” Rookwood said. “I’m speechless at the community, and how they’ve come out. The way they’ve embraced us. Because you never really know. You work on something for so long, and you get so attached to it, but it’s been amazing. I don’t know what the future is going to bring, but it’s crazier than I anticipated.”
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