Last year, Army veteran David Heron went from breaking up prison fights as a correctional officer to breaking eggs in the kitchen at the Culinary Institute of Virginia.
With the encouragement and support of culinary school faculty, the recent graduate’s passion came to life in the form of a food truck called Unity that Heron operates in ECPI University’s parking lot in Norfolk. With the momentum one only finds when pursuing their true calling, Heron doesn’t plan to stop there.
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Letting go of the ‘tough guy’
After sustaining an injury at the prison last year, Heron thought to himself, “I can’t do this anymore. I’m too old to be fighting and rolling around on people … so that’s when I got back into the kitchen.”
“I always thought I was going to be this rough and tumble guy,” he said in a telephone interview about his life and work.
After growing up in Brooklyn, New York, serving in the Marine Corps, retiring from the Army and working as both a police and correctional officer, Heron finally stepped away from the idea that he had to be the tough guy — a mentality and line of work that no longer served his spirit.
“This is who I am,” Heron said. “For the longest time, I felt like I was being something that other people wanted me to be. You had to be this tough guy in Brooklyn. You join the military? You have to be a tough guy. You become a cop? You have to be a tough guy. Everything I’ve always done, it was like I was trying to fill this role that everybody wanted me to be and I assumed that’s what I was supposed to do, but cooking — it just comes to me,” Heron said.
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Bringing art to life
“To tell you the truth, I wasn’t always into cooking; it was like a thing that my family did,” Heron said. His mother was interested in starting a hot dog stand and his grandmother would often have him help in the kitchen as she would “feed the neighborhood,” he recalled. Those family roots clearly took hold and are now breaking through the soil.
“My whole theme is bringing people together through food and music. That’s why I called it Unity,” Heron said. “I was always taught you’ve got to be passionate about what you’re doing, and my passion is to bring people together.”
“I look at food like music. If you put the right notes together, it will give you a beautiful song but you don’t want to put too much into it because then you’ll create chaos, so I put just the right amount of notes into my hamburger,” Heron said.
The food truck offers a selection of lunch options including his signature cheeseburger, a Mediterranean chicken sandwich and a curry chicken salad.
“Music and art is in my family,” Heron said. “Everything is about art, and I think food is creating. It’s just like art. It’s just like music. It’s just like anything else you’re creating. You’re bringing something to life and it’s beautiful. So that’s what I do.”
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Timing presents an opportunity
Before the pandemic, Culinary Institute of Virginia used to operate its own food truck once a week at the school and at other special events, but the COVID-19 shutdown put an end to that. When the faculty began talking about what to do with the truck again, it just so happened that Chef Steve Sadowski, dean of students, had recently spoken to Heron about his desire to start a food truck and the timing was right for everyone.
The school offered Heron a minimal cost lease on the food truck, use of the school as his commissary and guidance and assistance with paperwork, which can be overwhelming for new business owners. Instructor and Chef Chris Hill was also interested in assisting Heron on the truck.
“This is about creating an opportunity for someone and we’re just so excited,” said Andy Gladstein, CIV campus president. “When you try something, you may have a great idea, but if it’s not the right person that you’re taking a chance on, it doesn’t work; you don’t know if it was a bad idea or it just wasn’t the right fit in terms of who was executing the idea, but David was just an incredible student. He earned the opportunity through his time with us.”
Gladstein hopes that this can be the start of an incubator project that will help to get other culinary entrepreneurs on their feet after Heron.
“David is going to run his truck for a year and a half or more, build up a following, and then be able to go out on his own, and then that opportunity will exist for others, but we want to do all we can to help him get his business going,” Gladstein said.
“It’s an easy way to learn the business piece by piece, gain a great following, and then, after learning what it takes, realizing it makes sense to go out and do it on your own,” Gladstein explained.
“I’m very thankful to ECPI for giving me this opportunity,” Heron said. “I’m very thankful for them showing me these skills. A lot of times, I would just be in the kitchen messing around but now I actually know this is what I’m doing. This is how you do it,” he said.
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‘You can’t just talk about it’
Heron’s goal is to one day have three food trucks and a restaurant that turns into a nightclub, circling back to his theme to bring people together with food and music.
“We will just see how it works out,” Heron said. “I’m hopeful and I believe that it will happen. I see the vision and I’m taking it step by step. I’m not rushing anything but I see where I want it to go,” he said.
With two sons and a daughter at home, Heron’s goal is to always be an example.
“I tell them ‘Draw your vision board, make your plan, and then execute. Small steps lead to big ones and don’t be afraid to talk to people,’” he said.
His children see him starting his own business and they’re getting the entrepreneurial bug themselves, he explained.
“I’m trying to guide them as best as I can to look forward. I always tell them that time only goes forward and you can’t waste the time that you have. Always look forward. Always be prepared for the next step. I hope to always be an example. That’s the goal. You can’t just talk about it,” Heron said.
