New names on DoorDash? Fresno restaurants pivot with ‘ghost kitchens’ amid pandemic
Hankering to have some takeout delivered?
You might discover some new restaurant names in Fresno when scrolling through DoorDash or other delivery services.
Cooped Up Wings, Jolene’s Wings, House of Wings and It’s Just Wings are all recent newcomers to the Fresno food scene.
But here’s the odd thing (besides the fact that all four serve chicken wings). You won’t find a restaurant anywhere in town with those names on the sign. You can’t go to Cooped Up Wings, or any of them, and sit down to eat a meal, even if we weren’t in the middle pandemic.
They operate solely through delivery services.
They are all ghost kitchens, sometimes called ghost restaurants, virtual kitchens or cloud kitchens, depending upon how they’re set up.
It’s a trend that’s been growing in the restaurant industry for years and the pandemic has sped it up in Fresno.
Fresno ghost kitchens
Cooped Up Wings makes chicken wings in Me-n-Ed’s kitchens. Jolene’s Wings & Beer actually comes from Lazy Dog’s kitchen. It’s Just Wings specializes in wings and curly fries and uses Chili’s kitchens in Fresno.
And House of Wings? They won’t talk about it, but if you note the address where the food is delivered from in the fine print, it’s Mimi’s Cafe.
Me-n-Ed’s started Cooped Up Wings in October.
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the Me-n-Ed’s Coney Island Grill in River Park and Me-n-Ed’s Pizzeria Victory Grill at Granite Park were hit hard, explained CEO and President John Ferdinandi.
Both relied heavily on people dining inside, especially for family gatherings and parties, which got a lot harder to do in California when restrictions to prevent the spread of coronavirus were enacted, he said.
But both locations have sophisticated enough kitchens they can handle the wings, plus still doing takeout pizza and the rest of their regular menus, he said. One kitchen services the northern half of the city, the other the southern half.
And these are not the same wings you may have ordered as a side to a Me-n-Ed’s pizza. It’s a whole new menu with 10 kinds of wings.
Options include classic barbecue and hot wings, but also Mexican-inspired mole wings, pineapple teriyaki wings and inferno wings with a “habanero-ghost pepper punch.”
Several types of french fries (including a basket of mixed potato wedges, and waffle, crinkle, and regular fries) are on the menu, along with veggie sticks. Growlers of beer are also available.
“We came up with a whole new type of wing. They’re a larger wing without any antibiotics. They’re cage free,” Ferdinandi said. “It’s a whole different experience than your traditional Me-n-Ed’s wings.”
The restaurants will continue to run Cooped Up Wings, even when the pandemic is over.
Jolene’s Wings & Beer was in the works before the pandemic hit. Its CEO and founder wanted a way to connect with younger customers who were already using delivery apps.
Jolene’s – which offers both delivery and pickup at Lazy Dog – has eight types of wings on the menu, along with four packs of the restaurant’s own line of beer. You can also order its frozen TV dinners, like pot roast with mashed potatoes, that are heated up in the oven.
House of Wings also sells several types of wings and beer.
Not just chicken wings
Although the chicken wing places are making a big splash, they’re not the first ghost kitchens in Fresno.
Locally, Rocket Dog Brats & Brew launched one called Salad Salad Salad out of its Clovis restaurant about a year ago. The business sold all kinds of salads via delivery services.
The Clovis location closed in October, but the owners are planning to get Salad Salad Salad up and running out of their Fresno location soon.
Fat Rabbit Kitchen is another virtual restaurant that isn’t up and running yet, but will soon be. It’s a second location of a San Antonio business, and will deliver its vegan comfort food from a commercial kitchen used by caterers and others in downtown Fresno.
Follow Fat Rabbit Kitchen on Instagram to find out when it opens.
Nationally, several national restaurants are delivering under similar names.
Famous Dave’s barbecue restaurant is also planning to build new ghost kitchens that will essentially function as another location to deliver food. That way, even if you live far from the actual restaurant, your food will be still be hot because it’s coming from a kitchen that’s closer to you.
Locally, Little Fat Dumpling is doing something similar. The dumpling and noodle restaurant still has its restaurant on Friant Road open.
But the location near Palm and Olive avenues is also open – but only for DoorDash orders. With just one chef working there, they aren’t taking walk-in orders for takeout, just orders through the app.
Since it’s been shut down during much of the pandemic, Chuck E. Cheese has turned itself into a ghost kitchen of sorts.
It sells pizza, wings and a chocolate chip cookie pizza via GrubHub under the name Pasqually’s Pizza & Wings.
Pasqually is Pasqually P. Pieplate, a character who is the chief pizza chef, an aspiring comedian and the drummer in Munch’s Make-Believe Band.
This story was originally published January 3, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
