Vincent Cañete cooks for his new food service, Akitsu Kitchen. Francesca Cella | Collegian

An Asian takeout dining business called Akitsu Kitchen will open Oct. 2.

Vincent Cañete is renting the Dawn Park Catering Kitchen, located in the same building as Rough Draft, where he will cook dishes representative of various Asian cuisines available within 10 minutes of purchase. 

Cañete said he is opening Akitsu Kitchen to expand the cuisines available in Hillsdale. 

“Everyone’s been saying it: Hillsdale doesn’t have any good food,” Cañete said. “But I would argue to go even further. There isn’t any diversity in Asian cuisine. What I wanted to do is to make it limited, to provide authentic food, so that every week or so you can look forward to the opportunity to try something of great quality.”

Akitsu Kitchen will have a menu in Rough Draft listing the two dishes of the week available for purchase in a $15 single-portion takeout box. Cañete said Akitsu Kitchen will only serve specialty dishes.

“Cooks have the chef’s special that they can be passionate about,” Cañete said. “My menus are literally all chef specials.”

Emma Lindley, wife of Associate Professor of English Dwight Lindley, said Cañete has helped her cook for several events, including a sushi party she hosted for her extended family.

“I had wanted to do something special for them because they’re all from New England or from Los Angeles, and they were meeting in Hillsdale, and I felt that we didn’t have a lot of fancy stuff,” Lindley said. “But Vincent did a fantastic and highly impressive sushi party. They loved it.”

Lindley said Cañete judges the flavor of food just by reading a recipe and adjusts it to improve the taste. 

“The nice thing about Vincent is he always does extra,” Lindley said. “He’s thinking, ‘What are the textures? What are the flavors?’ I love cooking with him because I know he thinks about things: what’s going to go with what, what would be interesting here, what’s a good contrast?”

Although Cañete never received formal culinary training, he said he’s been cooking as long as he can remember.

“As a child, I was very passionate about cooking, always watching cooking shows,” Cañete said. “The first job I ever got when I was 16 was as a sushi chef. The kitchen was willing to take me because I begged them, and from there it just took one guy giving me a shot to gain enough experience to continue to pursue something.”

Since then, Cañete said he has spent six years as a sushi chef and several years as a line cook. After exploring many careers, Cañete said he has returned to cooking because it allows him to connect with people.

“I was a mechanic, I was in the film industry, I was an electrician, I was a welder — I was a number of different things,” Cañete said. “This was the one type of job where I was actually able to share something with people. Sure, you can share by building a balcony or something, but this is something that you can give consistently and make people happy.”

Senior Augustine McCormack said he hadn’t tried much Indian cuisine before he sampled Cañete’s Indian butter chicken over the summer. McCormack said Cañete’s food stands out for its rich flavor.

“If you want a quality meal, you’re missing home, feeling homesick, go get it and take it out, have it with friends, or just have it by yourself,” McCormack said. “It is a very mature taste, and you’re like, ‘This tastes like something my mom made.’”

A mother of nine, Lindley said she is glad to have another food option in Hillsdale.

“There was a time when our family really needed takeout,” Lindley said. “The twins were just born, our family is all far away, and my mom was like, ‘We’d really love to help. Can we just give you money for some meals?’ I was like, ‘You can, but there’s a limit to how much pizza we can eat.’ There weren’t any good options.”

Cañete said Akitsu Kitchen will go the extra mile to serve a better meal.

“Everything’s made from scratch,” Cañete said. “I’m not using a can of pureed tomatoes. I’m buying fresh tomatoes and pureeing them. I’m not using ginger powder. I’m buying whole ginger and mincing it up. It’s literally some of the freshest food you can get in Hillsdale.”

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