KeVen Parker, soul food stuff entrepreneur and operator of Ms. Tootsie’s, dies at 57

KeVen Parker, 57, of Philadelphia, an entrepreneur who carried on his mother’s mission of feeding individuals deliciously with places to eat on South Road and in Looking at Terminal Market and a catering small business, died Friday, Jan. 15.

© DAVID SWANSON/The Philadelphia Inquirer/TNS
KeVen Parker of the Ms. Tootsies dining establishments at 1312-14 South St. in 2019.

Mr. Parker’s death took most people, such as staff members at his Ms. Tootsie’s dining places, by surprise. Naturally cheery, he had held non-public a long battle with diabetes and its troubles.

Mr. Parker moved conveniently in Philadelphia’s amusement and life-style circles, and his dining places hosted these types of individuals as Monthly bill Clinton, Oprah Winfrey, Will Smith, Mo’Nique, and Patti LaBelle. It was the late chat-radio host Mary Mason who suggested him to capitalize the “V” in his 1st identify to assist him stand out.

WDAS radio individuality Patty Jackson, who’s identified Mr. Parker since he began in catering 25 decades in the past, stated persons liked him and his food stuff. “He wished individuals to get pleasure from the complete working experience,” she mentioned. “He saw by his mother’s aspiration.”

His sister, Lynette Saunders, described Mr. Parker as the “most caring human being in the world. There was never a time in my existence when he was not there for me.”

Ms. Tootsie’s, at 1312 South St., was named the very best Southern-design and style cafe for three years functioning in Black Company magazine, and appeared often on food stuff Tv set displays. The Food stuff Network’s Robert Irvine raved about his fried rooster on The Most effective Matter I Ever Ate.

Mr. Parker also was charitable, donating groceries and foods to family members in need to have as a result of his Distribute the Love marketing campaign.

In 2012, Inquirer columnist Jenice Armstrong, then with the Day by day Information, recalled going to him in his workplace and overhearing a cell phone phone. Mr. Parker organized for a woman who had been a victim of domestic violence to take her small children to a Phillies match — just after they ended up addressed to a food in his restaurant.

He also developed a life style manufacturer termed KPD Life style to structure pieces for the household and office environment.

Still, Mr. Parker explained, proudly owning soul-food stuff restaurants “was by no means my intention, ever, ever, at any time, at any time, ever. I wanted to be this terrific businessman.”

Mr. Parker, a Drexel College graduate, was doing work in neighborhood affairs for Comcast in the mid-1990s. He also was chairman of the money-strapped Men’s Working day program at 1st African Baptist Church, then in South Philadelphia. “I arrived up with this dazzling strategy to do a breakfast,” he recalled.

He attained out to the a single particular person who could pull off this sort of an function, his mom, Joyce — regarded to all as “Tootsie” because childhood because of her fondness for Tootsie Rolls. She was the community cook, her son described. The breakfast was a results.

“I remember my pastor contacting me and declaring, ‘I’m acquiring these calls at the church. Men and women want your phone selection,” Mr. Parker mentioned. “They want you to prepare dinner for them.’ I explained to myself, ‘I wonder if I could do this.’”

As he deliberated his potential, Mr. Parker recalled, he ran into Comcast founder Ralph Roberts in the hallway of the outdated headquarters at 1500 Current market St. “I bear in mind [Roberts] inquiring why I needed to go away. ‘Was it revenue?’ I reported, ‘I just truly want to go after my potential. I never know what I want to do. But I’m youthful plenty of that if I make a slip-up and it doesn’t do the job, I can go get an additional occupation. But I’ll never know if I really do not consider.’ He reported to me, ‘I concur 100 p.c.’”

Mr. Parker started out Only Scrumptious Catering in 1996. Before long, he was working the foodstuff operation at Cafe 3801 at 38th and Sector Streets in University City. Just after the closing of just one of his favourite places to eat, Mom’s Tender Touch at 1314 South St., he questioned the operator to offer him the making. Ignoring friends who warned him that the block was perilous, Mr. Parker and his mom drained their 401(k) accounts and in 2000 opened Ms. Tootsie’s Soul Food Cafe, with 18 seats.

“I was experience my way all around everything,” he said. “I just understood that we could prepare dinner this great food. We opened up, and it just took appropriate off. I was in awe.” In 2005, his neighbor, the jeweler Henri David, told Mr. Parker that he was promoting his creating. David requested him if he was intrigued in expanding, but Mr. Parker was doubtful that he could get a mortgage loan. David countered with an provide that Mr. Parker could not refuse: He would hold the mortgage loan, and Mr. Parker would shell out it down just about every thirty day period.

“He explained to me, ‘I don’t want anybody else to have this creating but you, because I see a little something in you that is going to transform this entire neighborhood.” That led to Ms. Tootsie’s Cafe Bar Lounge, a place cafe.

Joyce Parker died in 2011, and the Ms. Tootsie’s stand at Reading Terminal Market place arrived together in early 2013, changing Delilah’s.

Mr. Parker usually turned down gives to compose a cookbook. His mom, he said, regarded as their recipes to be “our gems.”

“She also stated, ‘Don’t do anything for the cash. The income will appear. And really do not compromise our merchandise.’ We had a deal with a supermarket to do our mac and cheese. They did like 4 or five prototypes, and my mother was like, ‘We’re not doing that.’ I questioned why? She mentioned, ‘It’s not our item.’ What she understood was not to compromise what our loved ones labored for for a dollar,” he said.

In addition to his sister, Mr. Parker is survived by 3 nephews and an aunt, Laura Garfield. Funeral preparations are pending.