New fried chicken concept is opening on K Street where Nash & Proper used to be
A new tenant is moving into the Crest Theatre building after Nash & Proper closed its brick-and-mortar location.
Nashville-style fried chicken restaurant Fire & Crisp is picking up where its predecessor left off at 1023 K St. in downtown Sacramento. Owner Cesar Jimenez has never run a food business, but he’s not new to the entrepreneurship world — after graduating from UC Davis in 2017, he started a successful cellphone repair shop in Davis.
“I’ve always had an inclination for food service, and ... I’ve always wanted to make a really unique spicy chicken place,” he said. “Coming from the side of entrepreneurship ... I think it’s a different perspective than somebody who maybe was a cook their whole life.”
For his new concept revitalizing the former Nash & Proper space, Jimenez is taking inspiration from popular fast food chains such as In-N-Out and Raising Cane’s Chicken Fingers, which have compact menus with high-quality ingredients. The eatery’s offerings will include a chicken sandwich with seven spice levels, tater tots, waffle fries, milkshakes and specialty soft drinks like flavored lemonade, he said.
Jimenez plans to open Fire & Crisp on Aug. 1, with a soft opening for friends and family the week prior.
Nash & Proper never officially announced its downtown closure, though its website and social media still listed the K Street unit as an outpost as of Monday. According to the Sacramento Business Journal, the California Alcoholic Beverage Control department revoked the restaurant’s liquor license in December.
In the lead-up to Fire & Crisp’s grand opening, Jimenez has been documenting the process for starting his food business on the restaurant’s social media. Through daily posts, Jimenez shows the steps he has taken to renovate the K Street restaurant unit, obtain a business license and pass a health inspection.
“Marketing is probably one of the biggest factors (in opening a business) that a lot of people kind of forget about,” he said. “You really have to get people to know about you and also build a storyline behind it.”
The restaurant is adjacent to the underground bar and restaurant Empress Tavern, which was recently taken over by capital nonprofit Alchemist Community Development Corp.
The theater’s owner, Robert Emerick, worked with Alchemist CDC to find a suitable tenant for the vacated space, according to the organization’s director of advancement, Shannin Stein. She said Alchemist CDC and Emerick saw strong potential in Jimenez’s lease application.
According to Stein, Emerick stipulated in the unit’s lease agreement that Jimenez would be required to enroll Fire & Crisp in Alchemist CDC’s Microenterprise Academy program. As part of the deal, Emerick would pay the business’s program attendance fees, Stein said.
The Alchemist Microenterprise Academy is a 12-week program for budding small businesses in the Sacramento region, teaching entrepreneurs everything about how to run a food business, from permitting requirements to food safety laws and employee management.
The session Jimenez is participating in will begin in the fall, after Fire & Crisp’s opening. Jimenez said he looked forward to meeting other area restaurateurs and finding new business strategies as part of the program.
“My goal is to always continue to evolve and work on the menu ... (and) figure out what’s working,” he said. “I think I’ll actually have a better experience, because I’ll actually be able to go and say, ‘This is a business I already have. What are some things I could do to make it better?’ versus going in and saying, ‘I don’t even know where to start.’”
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