Boogie Down Bites: Soul Snacks Cafe

A Bronx musician is switching things up by opening his own restaurant in the place he calls home.
For Ralph Rolle, owner of Soul Snacks Café in Westchester Square, it was important for him to open his business in the Boogie Down.
"I grew up in Bronx River Houses, and I learned how to bake from my grandmother and my mother. I learned to cook, and I loved it,” says Rolle.

The world renowned musician and entrepreneur, who has shared the stage with some of the entertainment industry's biggest names, is putting his own personal twist on southern cuisine in the Bronx.

"The big seller right now is our sautéed shrimp wrap and our oxtail wraps. What we did is we decided, ‘let's try it in a wrap and see how it works.' So you can get it in a spinach wrap or tortilla wrap and it's different than anyone else has ever done and folks really like it,” says Rolle.

All the platters can be paired with a number of traditional sides like collard greens, cornbread and mac and cheese. For dessert, Rolle has his popular cookies in a variety of flavors up for grabs that he's been making for more than 20 years.

"The goal of my life was to become a professional and to come back to my community and do the best I possibly could to empower people, to employ people. Although I traveled the world and played with so many people and I've made cookies and food for so many people, now at this point, it was just important to me to be an example of what a person could do if they just put your mind to it,” says Rolle.

An example Rolle hopes he can prove each time someone steps inside Soul Snacks Café.