Local chef, a former data consultant, primed to take flight in Dupont Circle

It is a sweltering Thursday afternoon in the city 45 minutes before The Caged Bird will open for its happy hour. Amid the final preparations for the evening’s operations at this new restaurant/lounge/meeting spot in Dupont Circle, co-owner and executive chef Meshach Cisero sits at a table discussing kitchen needs with a member of his 19-person staff.

Cisero, 28, has been on the clock since noon, and that was after walking out his last patrons at midnight. At the table, Cisero’s attention is divided between his MacBook, his iPhone and a notepad. With workdays that regularly go 12 to 15 hours deep and multiple events held at The Caged Bird weekly, it is hard to believe that just three short years ago this vision was not even on the back burner for this up-and-coming restaurateur.

Staying in DC after graduating from George Washington University in 2012 with a degree in marketing, Cisero — originally from Springfield, Mass. — quickly found himself making waves in the data science field at major firms such as IBM. (In the spirit of full disclosure I first met Cisero during his time at GWU, as we are members of the same fraternity.)

While he enjoyed his corporate life, there was something missing. After being challenged by an ex-girlfriend to find and create a passion project, Cisero started a food blog in 2015. The blog featured recipes, photos and Cisero’s thoughts on a range of food and dining topics.

The popularity of the blog led to catering requests large and small, and in May 2017 a major breakthrough occurred. Cisero was invited on ABC’s Good Morning America to participate in a cooking challenge to be judged by world-renowned chef and TV star Gordon Ramsay.

The exposure from the TV appearance helped establish the Chef Cisero brand, but that success also put Cisero at a critical crossroads. Down one path was the exciting yet unpredictable world of being a professional chef. Cisero’s burgeoning cooking career could no longer be bound to weekends and special occasions. In the other direction was the steadiness of Cisero’s 9-to-5 data science work, which allowed him to pursue his passion for cooking but ultimately was not personally gratifying.

Cisero knew he was beyond the point where he could do both jobs well. So, true to his analytics background, he crunched the numbers, ran the scenarios and decided to launch Chef Cisero LLC in the fall of 2017, leaving the data science world behind.

Food had always held a special place for Cisero, who traces his love for cuisine back to his father and grandmother.  At the age of 7, Cisero went on a fishing trip with his father. He remembers being terrified as he hooked his first catch. Then Cisero observed the fish being cooked.

“I watched my dad clean and prepare that tiny fish for the grill,” he remembered. “The pride he had in me for catching it and the joy of seeing him eating it changed my relationship to food.”

It was his grandmother and her recipes, however, that served as his culinary inspiration. “My grandmother would tell me and my brother that if you are going to be in her kitchen, you had to work,” he recalled. This would lead to hourlong conversations about ingredients, preparation and serving.

Despite his lack of a formal culinary education, Cisero has committed himself to learning and growing in other ways. An avid traveler who has been to 20 countries, Cisero makes a point of volunteering in local kitchens at each stop. A trip to Morocco found the chef following a modest routine that delivered a big payoff.

He spent the better part of a week embedded with cooks at a diner. Each day, Cisero would go to the market in the morning, return to the kitchen for prep work, then cook and serve. “It was affirming that you didn’t need fancy equipment or high-end techniques to make wonderful food,” Cisero said. “The only necessities were good ingredients, a passion for the food and an opportunity.”    

Cisero is also a private chef who has cooked for the likes of Major League Baseball All- Star Aaron Judge, actor Kofi Siriboe, and R&B artist Mack Wilds. Away from the kitchen you will likely find Cisero in one of three places: deadlifting the stress away in a CrossFit gym, running the streets with his 4-year-old purebred boxer Val, or attending a music festival, usually with his identical twin brother Meshawn. It was Meshawn who stood beside Meshach soaking up gallons of food knowledge from their grandmother. To this day Cisero still goes over the recipes and trade secrets he and his brother learned as children.

You can taste and feel that famillairy at The Caged Bird. It has three main services: weekend brunch (11 a.m. to 5 p.m.), late night (open to 4 a.m. Friday and Saturday) and happy hour from 5 to 8 p.m. Tuesday to Friday. The food offerings are executed well without being overly complicated. The menus put an emphasis on Southern comfort food, which oddly enough works well with the weekly trivia nights, Spades tournaments and DJ in residence.

The restaurant at 1723 Connecticut Ave. NW is spread out over two floors, both with full bars. The top level is well-suited for anyone looking to mix and mingle. The bottom level — home to the DJ booth — is where most events take place. On this particular evening, a spoken-word poetry program was already being set up. The next night would bring a live podcast streaming from the same space.

The lifeblood of any business is the repeat customer, but the Caged Bird has a distinctive approach to building community. Cisero and his business partners are young, urban and socially aware, and all three characteristics are injected into every aspect of the Caged Bird. The sensibility is visible from the decor — which includes a framed black T-shirt with the names “Emmett, Amadou, Sean, Oscar, Trayvon and Jordan” — to an events schedule that spans from open mic nights to school supply drives.

“We want people to become regulars, but not just for our bottom line,” Cisero said. “We are an inclusive space, but we do want The Caged Bird to be a safe space for black and brown people. If our customers have an idea, we want to partner with them to turn it into a reality.”

As one of the few black-owned businesses in Dupont Circle, The Caged Bird (whose name is a tribute to Maya Angelou’s 1969 autobiographical masterpiece “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings,”) stands out not only for the customers they draw to this tried-and-true DC neighborhood, but also how quickly it has become a welcoming neighborhood outpost. The consistency of the weekend brunch crowds hints that The Caged Bird, open since July 6, is already meeting a well-established need. The Caged Bird also jumped at the chance to become one of about 20 DC restaurants participating in the area’s inaugural Black Restaurant Week, slated for Nov. 4 to 11.

Before Cisero opened the doors of The Caged Bird, he was tapped as visiting executive chef at Prequel Restaurant Incubator. Now located at 919 19th St. NW, Prequel — which launched in early 2015 at another downtown location — offers chefs the opportunity to try out new concepts while using guest feedback to hone their dishes. Soon after Cisero started his Prequel run in January, he was approached by real estate developer Brandon Rule about a possible location for his post-Prequel venture.

From the outset, the brain trust of Chef Cisero LLC believed the Connecticut Avenue location had great potential. Applying the lessons learned from two of his mentors — chefs JR Robinson of Kitchencary and Paul Kennedy of Mango Tree — Cisero is keeping an eye on the day-to-day details, along with the big picture.

After a whirlwind year that has taken him from catering events on the weekends to leaving his corporate job to opening his first restaurant, Cisero is not satisfied. When asked what is on the horizon, he said: “In a year I would love to be in a position to talk about a second location. If we continue to work on our system, I believe we have the talent and skill; we just need to expand our network.”

With the Food Network having shot footage at The Caged Bird in late September (details such as the show’s name and an air date aren’t yet available), Cisero’s brand could be expanding sooner than expected.

This post has been updated to identify Meshach Cisero as co-owner and chef of The Caged Bird, rather than owner and chef.