I
t’s lunchtime, but Hunny Khodorkovsky
is afraid to sit down for a bite to eat.
Relaxing even for a few minutes will
make it that much harder to push through
her long workday, so she just lets the
adrenaline flow.
As the executive chef for Epic Kosher
Catering, “Chef Hunny” oversees the food
preparation at Soul Café in West Bloomfield
as well as for Milk & Honey, which caters
dairy events, and Epic, which handles meat
meals. She also offers cooking classes, both
privately and for organizations.
She estimates she puts in at least 60 hours,
sometimes more, in an average Sunday-
through-Friday week. So she’s looking for-
ward to Passover, when the kosher dairy
restaurant will be closed.
Khodorkovsky was born in Israel to par-
ents of Moroccan descent. She grew up in
Montreal, lived in Los Angeles and Puerto
Rico after getting married, and moved to
Detroit in 2012 when her husband, Daniel, a
commodity trader and software developer,
got a job here. They live in Southfield with
their four children, Alexander, 10, Olivia, 7,
Aaliyah, 5, and Judah, 4, and are members of
Young Israel of Southfield.
Khodorkovsky has always loved to cook,
learning the basics from her mother. At
Touro College in New York City, she studied
business marketing and cross-cultural com-
munications, thinking she might go into
fashion design, then spent a year in Israel
before getting married and having children.
After moving to Michigan, she entered
the culinary program at the Art Institute
of Michigan in Novi although she had no
ambitions to be a professional chef. Having
to prepare non-kosher foods as part of her
training didn’t faze her, even though she
couldn’t taste her own dishes. “Cooking is
not only about eating,” she said.
Khodorkovsky was still in culinary school
and working for a non-kosher chef when she
met Bassie Shemtov, director of Friendship
Circle, which provides support and friend-
ship for children with special needs and their
families. Shemtov was planning Shabbat at
the Spa, a weekend retreat for Friendship
Circle mothers, and several women told her
about a young woman, relatively new to the
community, who could really cook.
Friendship Circle was getting ready to
open the Farber Soul Center, a hub for artis-
tic self-expression, vocational training and
employment opportunities for young adults
leaving the main Friendship Circle program.
Shemtov was planning to have a restaurant
in the Soul Center and, after the spa week-
end, she knew she’d found her chef.
“We all fell in love with her,” Shemtov said.
“I told Shalom [Shomer, director of kosher
operations for Epicurean Group] she would
be a great person for our new café.”
Khodorkovsky came on board in 2015.
She helped plan the restaurant and created
all the menus. The café opened in March
2016, serving breakfast and lunch six days
a week; Sunday dinners were added in
January. Next to the café is a large event
space that can be rented for catered parties
and other large gatherings. When it’s free,
the space is often used by small groups play-
ing cards or mahjj after eating in the café.
Khodorkovsky creates a new breakfast
and lunch menu three times a year; the
Sunday dinner menu varies every month,
with café favorites augmented by special
themed dishes.
The café features pizzas made in a wood-
fired oven, a wide variety of salads, pastas,
sandwiches and egg dishes, fresh baked
goods and home-made ice cream in creative
flavors such as lavender and pine nut and
chocolate dulce de leche.
Shomer said he’s worked with a lot of chefs
over the years, including some with 30 years’
experience, and Khodorkovsky is special.
“What I see in her is a ‘we can’ attitude.
She doesn’t let obstacles stand in her way,”
he said. “If she’s catering a party and an
oven stops working, she’ll figure out a way
around it. If a recipe is not working, she’ll try
variations to fix it. She’s always positive and
energetic.”
Clients agree. “We had a luncheon meet-
ing at Soul Café last March and there was a
major windstorm that knocked out electric-
ity in West Bloomfield,” said Ilene Schwartz
of Franklin, a board member of the Eleanor
Roosevelt Chapter of Hadassah.
“I arrived at the Soul Cafe 30 minutes
before our luncheon, and within minutes
they lost power,” she said. “I assumed that
we would just have cold items for our meal,
but since the restaurant’s ovens operate
at such high temperatures, they were hot
enough that Chef Hunny was able to pre-
pare our salmon and pizzas. When it came
time to serve lunch, we had everything we
contracted for. She was a rock star that
day!”
Chef Hunny’s day doesn’t always end
when the café closes. Sometimes there’s a
catered dinner or reception, or a cooking
demo in the evening.
Khodorkovsky admits her long hours
make it a challenge to balance the needs
of her job and those of her family. Several
months ago, two of her children were at the
café on a day with no school. One of the
staff noted her child-care challenges; he
said his mother wasn’t busy and could come
over to look after the kids. She soon became
the family’s full-time nanny.
Providing good food and a community
meeting place is only part of Soul Café’s mis-
sion. The café also provides training and
jobs for young adults with developmental
disabilities.
“It’s amazing to see how these young
people transform. They feel more included,
more confident. They realize they can do
things they never thought of,” Khodorkovky
said.
On any given day, the chef oversees a staff
of about 15, which can swell to 30 when
there’s a special event to cater. She treats
the special needs staff the same way she
treats the others.
“If I need to be hard on them, I don’t hold
back,” she said. “And they appreciate it. They
don’t want to be treated differently because
of their disabilities.”
Khordokovsky said her parents and her
in-laws have become good friends. The two
families regularly get together for Passover,
either in Detroit or with her parents in
Montreal or her husband’s parents in Los
Angeles. Siblings and other relatives join in,
creating a seder table of 25 or 30 people.
She grew up with Sephardic traditions.
Her husband and in-laws are immigrants
from Communist Russia, where Jewish
observance was suppressed, and they’ve
adopted her family’s practices.
“We all like good food and each other’s
company,” she said.
Khodorkovsky also looks forward to
Mimouna, the Sephardic holiday celebrating
the end of Passover. Families make their first
post-Passover leavened foods, including muf-
fleta, crepes served with butter and honey,
and visit neighbors to share the goodies. “It’s
a very fun celebration,” she said.
In just two years, Khodorkovsky has
become a pillar of the community.
“When I came here I didn’t know anyone,”
said Khodorkovsky. “Now I feel like I know
the whole town.” •
jn
March 15 • 2018
45