A family that makes history together excels in business together (We don’t make the rules!).

Darryl Lelie and his family have expanded their horizons from one restaurant to a second — located in City Island in the Bronx borough of New York — making it the first Black-owned restaurant to land in the vicinity, the Bronx Times reports.

In the case of Lelie and Seafood Kingz 2, delayed does not mean denied because the new location was originally vetted by the team five years ago. When they initially set out to find a home for their first business, Seafood Kingz, the timing was not right, but now that it is, things are already looking up with a groundbreaking move. 

Despite some hiccups along the way with the original second location opening and closing during the pandemic, Lelie jumped at a chance for a fresh start, bringing his family and their traditions with him every step of the way.

“We give them an avenue to have some of their own food, with the things that they love,” Lelie said, according to the outlet. “So you get your seafood with soul food trimmings. You can’t copy it up here, you know, you can’t imitate it. This is the real soulful stuff.”

A Family Affair

Lelie’s son, Dalvin is the head chef over at Seafood Kingz 2 and he has perfectly curated a menu, which includes a host of seafood choices made up of king crab legs, fried lobster tails, fish, shrimp, and more.

At just age 21, Dalvin runs the show — responsible for ensuring that customers come in hungry, but leave full of delicious options that are rooted in the family’s favorite recipes, including his very own.

It All Works Out In The End

Lelie has been in the restaurant business for two decades and first launched the flagship Seafood Kingz restaurant in Queens, New York back in 2019. Despite the pandemic, the business has remained on the up and up with expansion complications being the reason that the original second location located in South Bronx shut down.

With one historic move under their belt, only time will tell in the next level of success for the Lelie family in their journey as a Black-owned family restaurant.