"When Shonya Williams, better known as Chef Royce, received a call from her daughter Tot in winter of 2022, she thought her prayers had been answered. Williams had suffered a stroke in 2019, which led her to close her two-and-a-half-year-old restaurant, Kiss My Dish in suburban Oswego. A veteran restaurateur who has opened four restaurants, Royce was taking time to heal while working as a caterer when she received her daughter’s call about a restaurant location that was being advertised as a turnkey rental at the corner of Armitage Avenue and Halsted Street in Lincoln Park. Williams was already looking to open a new restaurant on the city’s West Side in Austin, but her daughter’s call was a sign: 'I really wanted to be back on the scene again. [Cooking] is what I love. So I asked God, ‘When is it gonna be my turn again? I want to do this again.' Williams signed a lease in Lincoln Park on March 15, 2023 across the street from where Chicago’s largest hospitality group, Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises, has three restaurants and a fourth on its way. She spent two months renovating the former Taco Bar space, opening Soul Prime, a soul food restaurant with fried chicken, fried catfish, and lobster on the menu, in time for Mother’s Day. But just four months later with a monthly rent of $14,338.51 and sales of less than $1,000 a day, she was thinking of closing. 'I didn’t have loans or grants,' Williams says. 'I have money that I have saved on my own. And I used every single dollar getting the place to a beautiful look inside, so that I can match this amazing community. I needed support from this actual community that I sit in, which I didn’t know a whole lot about. Unfortunately, I did not spend any money on marketing. I felt like people knew [me and my work], and it didn’t work like that.' Williams remains in business thanks, in part, to a visit from Keith Lee, an MMA fighter and popular food reviewer on TikTok. Lee reviewed Soul Prime in September 2023. In the video, he swoons over the collard green dip, fried chicken dipped in hot honey sauce, and peach lemonade while sitting curbside. He enters the restaurant after his meal is complete (something he says he’s never done before) to talk to chef Williams, who shares her struggle in bringing her vision to life and keeping it afloat." - Ximena N. Beltran Quan Kiu
