As a licensed pharmacist, many would recommend medicine to their patients when they are ill. However, Dr. Flava Spices is not your average pharmacist. Instead of treating patients with medicine, she instead asks them what kind of food they’ve consumed. In January 2017, Dr. Flava Spices created an eight-flavor seasoning line to not only encourage consumers to make healthier choices, but to also give them the ability to cook with confidence.
Who is Dr. Flava Spices?
Dr. Flava Spices is a woman owned business that was created with you in mind, the consumer. Our flavors are attached to over 6-13 herbs and spices — just shake the seasoning on your food, and you will create an amazing dish. I created this because I wanted people to get back to cooking without having to get caught up in all of these recipes and thousands of ingredients. Dr. Flava Spices truly does take the seasoning out of cooking.
How did you get started and what made you want to create Dr. Flava Spices?
I am a licensed pharmacist, and have been in health care for over 13 years. I see people who are sick every single day. It saddens my heart because I see these people and I’m like OK, there’s something that we can do to prevent this. It’s nothing that’s written in stone that says you have to have high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, even depression — all of these things are linked to environment and our diet.
I started to cater to pharmacists and doctors and created a healthier spin on food. People actually lost weight. I never told them it was weight-loss food.
So when I was cooking, I found myself with all of these seasonings, I used to just place things in a pot and my husband was like, “Babe, why don’t you start writing things down that you’re doing?” I started to find that I could never use one seasoning I had to use like an all-purpose seasoning, garlic, onions, grind up ginger, and all these different things, and I was just like- this is too hard.
Christmas of 2016, I was talking to my husband, and a friend of mine we were all thinking about doing our own businesses, and I said, “I’m going to give spices as Christmas gifts,” and that’s when I did my first two blends, which is the Original Everything and the Creole Delight. January of 2017, I decided to establish it as a real business.
What are five benefits of using your spices?
The number one thing that I would say:
- You don’t have to add anything to our spices, if you pick up one bottle you can shake that on your food and it’s going to be amazing;
- Our spices are lower in sodium;
- Our flavors are unique; you can mix in blend the spices together;
- Our spices make yummy amazing dressings and you can use for different sauces;
- You can use them for any cooking style, bake, grill, fry, etc.
One of things, especially living in the South, I find that people think that flavor requires salt, but our spices give you the flavor without all the salt.
What advice would you give the younger generation and those who are aspiring entrepreneurs?
Definitely just stay consistent and keep pushing because it doesn’t come easy. … So, I would definitely say when you’re following your passion, that you’re going to be satisfied, you’re going to be fulfilled and that they just need to stay focused, trust in God, and know that he’s going to direct their path. When you do what you’re supposed to do and what you’re called to do, it’s almost a ministry, I call it my ministry — you’re going to be successful. When God puts his hand on you, success is going to come.
Who would you say inspires you to continue to follow your passion?
Well my grandmother, she truly did inspire me because she was such a great cook. I remember just the look on her face, she was just known for cooking like the best food. … She was such an amazing cook — I remember just the look on her face and how people anticipated her food, and I enjoyed that. I was like, “Ooh, I want to be like that too.”
My mother also was a great inspiration, being an entrepreneur, she’s a great cook as well. She has her own non-profit business. Seeing her leave corporate America, where she was very successful and decided to step out on faith, made me know that it’s in me — it’s in my blood, it’s my genes and I can do this.
What are some of the next steps Dr. Flava Spices is taking that we can look forward to?
Well definitely, you can look forward to Dr. Flava Spices getting in more homes, number one because not enough people know about me. And that’s a big thing, because when you have a good product, you hope to get bigger distributions, right now I’m just online. I also want to teach people about the food that we eat, and how there is certain food that we can eat that can be helpful to us. Even speaking, talking to more audiences, because that’s really my passion — each and every day. I want to let people know that yes, I do have a spice line, but most importantly I care about people’s health, and I want people to know that we can still eat flavorful foods, but we have to think about our hearts, think about our arteries, and all these different things that we forget about when we’re eating.
You can purchase Dr. Flava’s Spices at https://www.drflavaspices.com or find her on Instagram @drflavaspices.
