True PIMENTO CHEESE Story: Chef Stacey Suga West




Ash Said It® Daily show

Summary: Suga’s Pimento Cheeses has added two new mouth-watering flavors, Gourmet Pesto & Feta and Black Truffle, to an already-diverse menu of pimento cheese offerings. The new options join other cravable and popular flavors already on Suga’s menu including Bacon Asiago, Smoked Gouda, Roasted Poblano and Monterey Jack, an extra spicy version with serrano peppers. Suga’s offers eight total traditional flavors and four vegan pimento cheese options. Suga’s Pimento Cheeses also launches a new interactive web site to further penetrate local Atlanta shops, larger markets in the Atlanta metro, and expand throughout the Southern region. The new web site will feature pimento cheese recipe inspiration, the story behind the cheese, a list of local stores and markets where Suga’s Pimento Cheeses can be purchased and an e-commerce store where customers can purchase their favorite flavors. Web: https://sugasfood.com Follow: @sugaspimentocheeses “Pesto & Feta and Black Truffle are direct responses to what our customers asked for,” said Chef Suga, founder and creator of Suga’s Pimento Cheeses. “Even though COVID-19 set everyone back, we are blessed to expand and grow our presence in stores throughout Atlanta and into Tennessee. We’re confident the web relaunch will help us bring our pimento cheese to even more raving fans.” Stacey West, aka Chef Suga, and her pimento cheeses have been sought after throughout metro Atlanta thanks to her memorable presence at local farmer’s markets and hyper-local shops as well as an early foray into a weekly Powder Springs brunch spot where the fan favorite was her signature Southern cheese spread. Chef Suga graduated from Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Atlanta with dreams of running a restaurant. After working with some of the top chefs in the Atlanta Metro area, including Chef Hilary of The Hil at Serenbe and Chef Holly, executive chef of Georgia Grown, she launched Suga’s Enterprises, LLC in April 2016, taking over the kitchen and dining room of a local Powder Springs restaurant one day only for two months to serve Sunday brunch and try her hand at the restaurant industry. Stacey, her son Quinton Jones, who is also a chef, and her husband Robert West created southern brunch favorites such as chicken and waffles with maple butter, catfish po’ boys, sweet potato corn muffins, and pimento cheese and grits. While they enjoyed the entire menu, customers overwhelmingly latched onto the pimento cheese. Suga’s Pimento Cheeses launched just over a year later, in June 2017, thanks to the raving fans and high demand for the creative pimento cheese brand. “Our pimento cheeses are perfect on burgers, eggs, in grilled cheese or just fresh out of the container,” Chef Suga said. When she received requests for a spicier version in addition to her original pimento cheese, Chef Suga started experimenting with different types of spicy peppers, started selling her pimento cheese spread at the Marietta Square Farmers Market and sold out on the first day. Eventually the West’s grew the business to many other markets and stores around metro Atlanta and into Tennessee and launched nine different flavors of pimento cheese. They debuted a 10th flavor, the smoked gouda pimento cheese, at the 2018 Atlanta Cheese Fest earning a finalist spot in the 2019 Flavor of Georgia food competition. Chef Suga and her team uses farm fresh, no preservatives and small batch ingredients from local restaurant supply companies, Atlanta farmers and other local vendors to ensure the highest and most fresh quality. Suga’s Pimento Cheeses’ vegan options are dairy, soy and nut free and contain potato and corn-based cheese, vegan mayo, vegan cream cheese and other non-dairy ingredients. Stacey earned the nickname “Suga” (pronounced “Shuh-gah”) when her first grandbaby was born. She didn’t want to be called “grandma” so her daughter, Chanty, came up with the alternative “Suga.” She quickly began to be known as “Chef Suga.” Suga’s...