Photography By Albert Yee
Gentle Soul
By Alexandra W. Jones
Sometimes a single Instagram post can change your life—or at least that was the case for Bryon and Natasha Dockett.
A few years ago, as vegan bloggers, they posted a shot of their homemade dinner online and got a message in their inbox. It looked so good that one of their followers wanted to know where he could order the same meal.
It was then that the idea of starting a vegan catering business clicked. “We just sort of stumbled into serving food to people,” Bryon says.
The Docketts have been catering private events and vending at pop-up markets as UnSoul Food for about a year now, serving veganized versions of popular soul food dishes. They also post a rotating menu on their Instagram page every week, offering personal platters that feature foods like BBQ UnRibbs, fried oyster mushrooms, collard greens, and mac and cheese. Customers direct message @unsoulfood to order and pay via Cash App or Paypal.
“We have a commissary kitchen that we cook in but we’re not allowed to have people show up there,” Bryon explains, so customers pick up the meals from the Docketts’ home in South Philly.
The couple has a dozen years of experience in the restaurant industry between them and Bryon went to culinary school, but before starting UnSoul, neither were working closely with food. Bryon was working as the night auditor for the Ritz Carlton and Natasha was a client coordinator for a custom suits company in Center City.
“We had really good jobs so people were looking at us kind of crazy, like, ‘Why would you leave those good jobs and go do your own thing?’ But we just had this feeling,” says Natasha, who has been cooking since she was eight years old. “It was a passion that just started igniting.”
Part of their drive, Bryon says, comes from a period of time in 2015 when they were homeless.
“During that time, we stayed in an RV that we owned and we didn’t have jobs,” Bryon says.
They used the last of their savings to buy the RV, but it wasn’t in good shape. It didn’t have a bed, a working shower, and the gas and septic tanks both leaked, Bryon says. They lived under I-95 near Columbus Boulevard before relocating it to southern New Jersey.
“We were vegan at the time and it was so important to us to stay vegan that we foraged dandelions for weeks because we didn’t have anything to eat,” he says. “We reached a point some would consider rock bottom.”
The strength that they gained working through these hard times gave them the courage to quit their jobs and go into business. “I think all the fear’s gone at this point,” Bryon says.
Both went vegan in 2014 after watching the documentary Earthlings—but for different reasons.
“My mind was definitely on the emotional side of things,” says Natasha. “When I saw what happened to the animals, it was disgusting to me, and I did not stand for anything that was going on whatsoever.”
Bryon’s reason was more personal.
“It really made me consider what I was putting this on my body,” he says. “At the time, my father was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and he passed away months later. I thought to myself, ‘Why wait until the doctor tells me?’ Why not make the decision not to walk the same path that my father followed—and as a bonus I don’t have to eat the animals that are coming from these tragic conditions.”
Looking back on things now, he says it’s the best decision they’ve ever made.
The idea behind UnSoul, as Natasha puts it, is that they’re making soul food without “souls.”
“The problem with classic soul food in the South is there’s animals in everything,” Bryon says. “If you look at the collard greens, there’s turkey, and if you look at, even the simple vegetables, the string beans, there’s fatback and pork in everything.”
UnSoul is “one hundred percent vegan food,” Natasha says. “No animals whatsoever, no byproducts—nothing.”
It’s a message Joe Filaseta, a pharmacist from Graduate Hospital, can get on board with. He’s been a customer of UnSoul since 2018, when he stumbled across their Instagram page.
“Everything I’ve had from them has been outstanding,” he says.
Filaseta is a connoisseur of vegan comfort and junk food and runs an Instagram blog under the name @phillyveganmonster with more than 4,000 followers.
“I’d have to say their mac and cheese is one of, if not, the best I’ve had at any restaurant anywhere,” he says. “A good vegan mac and cheese is hard to pull off, especially when you are making them in bulk for a large amount of orders. They really have got it down.”
Another customer, Raelia Lewis, of Northern Liberties, agrees.
“They have the best mac and cheese,” she says. “I’m not a huge fan of vegan cheese, but theirs changed my mind.”
UnSoul’s mac and cheese took the award for Philly’s Choice, voted by attendees last year at Philly MAC-Down, V Marks the Shop’s vegan mac and cheese competition.
The Docketts are also behind the Philly Vegan Night Market, a Thursday night market where customers can shop for vegan meals and products. Although the market has been on hold during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Docketts hope to bring it back once social-distancing restrictions relax.
Paul Carmine, who co-owns the South Philly vegan café Batter & Crumbs with his husband, John Schultz, says the market was a great addition to Philly’s vegan events scene. Batter & Crumbs served as a dessert vendor.
“It really gave the vegan community a chance to gather,” Carmine says. “You know, these events were being done by others like every couple of months, but Brian and Natasha turned it into a weekly event.”
UnSoul customer Kathy Katz adds that the markets also give small-business owners a way to connect with customers. She’s shown up a few times to support the Docketts herself.
“These two exude such enthusiasm, positivity and warmth, you cannot help wanting to be a part of their journey,” says Katz.
Bryon and Natasha say they’re working toward opening a food truck and are happy right now with the traction their business is gaining.
“Our hope is that it doesn’t stop growing,” Bryon says. “The message that we’re trying to spread with UnSoul Food is that good food is vegan food—and not just that, but that this diet is an open door to a greater discussion about how we can save our planet and save the integrity of our species.”
