When Selam expanded from a storefront butcher shop to a full-blown restaurant, they asked us to create a brand that captures the full range of their products and stands out from the competition. To differentiate the new establishment, we used market data and the owners’ vision to position Selam strategically as a restaurant creating moments of togetherness and happiness with organic and locally-sourced ingredients that deliver the true taste of Ethiopian flavors.
We delivered...
“Selam Ethiopian Kitchen Brings it Raw”
Selam’s signature dishes may have been born of war, but today they, along with the rest of the menu, provide an opportunity for the best kind of eating, one imitated in restaurants the world over. They’re the true form of the shared plate—and no one’s going to fight over that.” — Chicago Reader
“Meet Selamawit and Solomon Abebe of Selam in Uptown Neighborhood”
Selamawit “Selam” has always been passionate about cooking. When she was a little girl, she spent hours in the kitchen of her parent’s restaurant in Addis Ababa, making a mess but learning delicious traditional Ethiopian recipes. Today, she’s still the same little girl playing in the kitchen. She remains faithful to the Ethiopian traditions, flavors, and ingredients which are organic and local.” — Voyage Chicago
“The Best New Chicago Restaurant of the Year”
Opposite sides of Africa were represented: Uptown’s Selam Ethiopian Kitchen got downright medieval, offering tire siga, West African tartare if you will, from which one carves “morsels of raw beef from a fist-size chunk of bottom round, then [swirls] them through a mixture of mitmita, berbere-spiked awaze sauce, and a sinus-scouring mustard called senafitch.” — Chicago Reader
