It’s barely 11 o’clock on a Monday morning; seated inside a bus surrounded by food Keith Hutchins is already busy at work on the pave at the side of Texaco Gas Station on Eping Avenue and Vlissengen Road.
With a rhythm learnt over the years he quickly wraps a puri in greaseproof paper, bags it and passes it through the window of his bus to a customer, and the begins to squeeze ‘sour’ onto another puri. Customers continue to show up at the windows calling for their food of choice.
Hutchins, called Rasta or Rastaman by his customers, sold to a few more customers and then interrupted his work to speak with Sunday Stabroek. Sitting at the back of his bus, his assistant continued to sell.
At 53 years old, Hutchins said he began selling food during the shortage of petrol back in the ’80s. However, he says he has been vending at Eping Avenue since 1982.
Back in 1975, Hutchins said he worked with Brown Betty “selling food” when the eatery was burnt down. After that “I did lil slack work like carpentry and masonry and such.”
Eventually, Hutchins began selling at the Eping Avenue location. “I start selling out here in ’82 with a stand like a sweet stand selling corn curls, plantain chip, sugarcake and such.”
“Why I switch to the food was when there was kero and petrol shortage, out hey use to get a crowd and they tell me, Rastaman you doing stupidness ya gah mek food.” And so he listened to the crowd and King Sip was created. Hutchins’s business is located between the Texaco Service station and the Shell Service Station. With his wife doing all the baking and he the cooking, Hutchins says that his new business was a hit from the start “and people keep coming.”
He says that he has seen a lot of his customers grow into working men and women.
Selling “ital food,” Hutchins says that his cuisine is vegetarian: “It aint get no rank, no aji and all them thing.” He explains that he prepares vegetarian dishes because of his Rastafarian beliefs.
As he sits at the back of his bus, the interview is interrupted twice for him to “make change” for the customers who keep on coming. When he is finished he continues the interview. Hutchins explained that even though he began selling food instead of confectionery, he still had a small stand. However, he was told by the city council that if he wanted to continue to sell in the area he had to have a mobile stall. That is when he upgraded to the bus, he says, and business has been good to him from the start.
He wakes at 4am every morning, Monday to Saturday, to prepare the meals, and by 10.30 am he is out at his spot selling and “depend on the day I leave here about four or after.” To show his appreciation to his customers, Hutchins has been giving free food on Old Year’s Day every year to 300 customers.
“I does give back to the customer I does gah free up. This is how I feel I been doing this for about 17 years. I does really cater for the free up because some people does come by me every day,” he explains.
Hutchins says that the business of making and selling food is one he is committed to but, he plans to retire one day: “I is the same old me but I thinking about another year or two to retire cause me aint getting time for myself.”
With two grown adult children, a six year old and a grandchild, he says he will spend his retirement with his younger children. “I need lil time fuh myself; this wuk is day and night. It help me mind ma family and I enjoyed doing it.”
