Twelve independent, chef-driven, James Beard and Michelin awarded restaurants have partnered together to create Moveable Feast, an upscale meal delivery platform offering a culinary journey for guests to enjoy restaurant quality experiences at home. The new platform was created by twelve founding restaurant partners to provide a sustainable and scalable business model for independent restaurants to reach customers at home. Beginning March 1, 2023, Moveable Feast’s reservations will officially be open for guests to order feasts from Nina Compton of New Orleans’ Compère Lapin.
“No existing food delivery platform works for independent restaurants to reach customers at home at scale,” says John Stubbs, co-founder and CEO of Moveable Feast and owner of Jewel of the South in New Orleans. “So we decided to build one that does.”
Each month, Moveable Feast will feature a new restaurant and a new menu for customers to enjoy at home. Moveable Feast spent the last 8 months building and optimizing an open and collaborative kitchen in downtown Napa, California where each restaurant partner designs a menu and sources the finest seasonal and sustainably grown ingredients, largely drawn from the bounty of local farms near Napa. The brand executed a “soft launch” from October 2022 through February 2023 to an extended network of friends and family with more than 2,000 guests trying the service, providing feedback, and helping fine tune the product, packaging, and experiential offerings.
“Through Moveable Feast, for the first time we are able to reach old friends and new guests at home – potentially thousands of them – at the same time,” says Chef Nina. “The conversation and connection we have each night with guests in New Orleans can now reach a much broader community in dining rooms at home across America.”
Moveable Feast’s schedule of founding partners for its inaugural season of feasts:
April – Compère Lapin, New Orleans
May – Frasca Food and Wine, Boulder
June – Albi, Washington D.C.
July – Octavia, San Francisco
August – Roots Southern Table, Dallas
September – Tail Up Goat, Washington D.C.
October – Birdie G’s, Los Angeles
November – Nightbird, San Francisco
December – Jewel of the South, New Orleans
January ‘24 – Dirt Candy, New York
February ‘24 – Reverie, Washington D.C.
March ‘24 – Ernest, San Francisco
The Moveable Feast kitchen, led by co-founder, culinary director and Michelin-star awarded chef Jon Sybert (Tail Up Goat in Washington D.C.), works with each partner to produce tailored one-of-a-kind menus that are reflective of an exclusive restaurant experience. Customers nationwide receive access each month to a new fully prepared feast that features canapés, a family-style dinner, and dessert, with easy-to-follow instructions to plate and present at home like the professionals.
“Presenting this caliber of cuisine and full experience to guests at home hasn’t been done before, and we’re thrilled to be able to connect some of the most progressive, innovative chefs and restaurant partners to new communities of fans across America,” says Sybert.
Using rich and original content, customers can discover new restaurants, or reconnect with favorite restaurants, regardless of where they are located. Moveable Feast offers diners unprecedented new access to chefs and partners through interviews, virtual and live events, and new insights into each restaurant’s unique culinary perspective. Each feast features original videos, thoughtful touches from the kitchen, individual menus for guest place settings, and two playlists: one for the back of house (kitchen) and one for the front of house (dining room).
The first founding partner to kick off Moveable Feast’s inaugural season, Compère Lapin, is the flagship restaurant of Chef Nina Compton, a chef from Saint Lucia who fuses her roots and upbringing with the rich cultures of New Orleans to present a refined Caribbean restaurant. Chef Nina’s husband and partner, Larry Miller, runs the front of the house at Compère Lapin. Their philosophy is as follows: “Our histories, vast and varied, deserve to be memorialized and romanticized by dishes that at once remind us of home and transport us to somewhere new.”
The April menu for Compère Lapin consists of the following dishes:
Louisiana Bowfin Caviar with Tostones
Pickled Shrimp with Avocado and Taro Root
Whole Jerk Chicken
Cow Heel Soup with Smoked Bone Marrow
Little Gem Salad with Coconut Dressing and Crispy Shallots
Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Coriander and Lime Butter
Buttermilk Biscuits with Honey Butter
Coconut Tres Leches Cake with Toasted Coconut
Limited “Friends and Family Forever memberships” are available and provide priority access to reservations before the general public, discounts on feasts, and invitations to members-only private dinners. Seasonal Members will receive reservation priority access on February 27, and All In Members will receive priority reservation access on February 25. Each feast is priced at $385 including shipping and handling and includes servings for four people.
The two levels of membership include:
Seasonal Membership: $1,400 ($350 per feast)
Includes four feasts per year for four people (may add additional people)
Access to reservations each month two days prior to the general public
Exclusive in person dinners and experiences that only this membership is able to acquire
All In Membership: $3,960 ($330 per feast)
Includes twelve feasts per year for four people (may add additional people)
Access to reservations each month four days prior to the general public
Exclusive in person dinners and experiences that only this membership is able to acquire
Following the April feast from Compère Lapin, Moveable Feast will deliver a Friuli-inspired Italian dream from Frasca Food and Wine in Boulder, Colorado, winner of multiple James Beard Awards. Frasca’s menu includes a braised Colorado lamb shank, artichokes with peas and mint jus, a chicory salad with warm guanciale vinaigrette, and a brown butter Spin Rosso polenta with smoked ricotta. In June, Moveable Feast will be taking its guests on an exploration of Levant cuisine as seen through the eyes of Michael Rafidi’s Michelin-starred Albi in Washington D.C. Albi’s exclusive Moveable Feast menu will include falafel Arayes, whipped tahini Maryland crab dolmas, sweet corn mujadara with Carolina gold rice and urfa chili, and a fattoush salad with smoked feta and honey-harissa dressing.
