Closed since 2018, this Wichita restaurant is about to return with a new name, address
More than a year after she closed her once popular downtown Wichita soul food restaurant, Rhonda Williams is almost ready to get back to work.
Williams, who closed her Rachel’s Kitchen at 818 N. Mosley in October 2018, said she is a couple of months away from reopening her restaurant, although it will be in a new part of town and have a new name.
She’s calling the new restaurant 750 Soul, and she’ll open it in the restaurant space at 4601 E. 13th St. that was previously home to Miller’s Bar-B-Que, Froggar’s BBQ and, most recently, New Great Wall Chinese restaurant.
The restaurant will serve the soul food dishes Williams was known for at Rachel’s Kitchen, including catfish, chicken, collard greens, ham hocks and burgers. But at 750 Soul, Williams is partnering with her daughter, Nicole Williams, who will be injecting the menu with vegetarian soul food dishes as well.
“A lot of people are trying to make healthier choices, and we want to offer that to them,” Williams said.
It’s been a long, strange couple of years for Williams, who first opened Rachel’s Kitchen in 2014 and named it after her mother, who has since passed away. The strangeness started when she was served with papers demanding that she change the restaurant’s name, which she found out had been trademarked by a Rachel’s Kitchen in Las Vegas.
She and her family closed the restaurant so she could care for her sick mother, and in the meantime decided to change the name of the restaurant to 750 Soul. The name is a tribute to Williams’ late brother, Clark Coleman, who died in July 2018. His lucky number was 750.
Williams has already put up a sign for the new restaurant and says she’ll let me know when she’s ready to open.
This story was originally published January 30, 2020 at 10:38 AM.
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