Host Dave Fiore speaks with Akane Matsumoto, founder of Chubby Rice, a Tallahassee pop-up serving Japanese rice balls. Akane grew up outside Chicago in a tight-knit Japanese community, raised by parents who built a karate studio from nothing and taught her what it means to work hard for something you believe in. She tried a few paths before finding her footing – pastry school, a corporate customer service job, and years building a following in social media that gave her the skills to eventually tell her own story through food.
Her husband’s career eventually brought them to Tallahassee, a big change from the food scene she grew up around. Rather than settle for what was missing, she decided to build it herself. Chubby Rice blends the recipes she grew up on with new flavors shaped by the community she now calls home.
Akane talks about family, reinvention and what it looks like to turn a lifetime of varied experience into something entirely her own.
