The menu for Your Farms, Your Table changes daily. Pictured is chicken marsala with Urban Gourmet Farms mushrooms, polenta, and vegetables. Kristen Wile/UP

On Sunday, March 15, executive chef Sam Diminich and the team at Upstream decided to end lunch service as the coronavirus pandemic hit the United States. The change was intended to cut costs as the restaurant prepared for fewer diners coming into its dining room.

Two days later, he was laid off along with the rest of the staff by email. 

Just weeks before losing his job via a mass e-mail, Diminich believed 2020 was going to bring success to Upstream after years of struggle. Restoration Hardware’s opening brought buzz back to the area, and Diminich was on several TV shows, including the Food Network’s Beat Bobby Flay. Instead of enjoying the success he’d been working so hard for, Diminich found himself applying for a job at Amazon.

Newly unemployed, the chef was grilling with a friend when the two started talking about selling meals made with local products out of his car in neighborhoods around Charlotte. But it was Chick-fil-A that really pushed him to start his new business, Your Farms, Your Table, and bring locally-sourced, restaurant-quality meals into more households. Living around the corner from the fast-food restaurant in Cotswold, Diminich saw the long line of cars stretching its parking lot.

“That bothered me so bad because at this point, some restaurants are trying to stay open, some restaurants are just trying to make enough sales to make payroll to keep people employed,” he says. “And so that Chick-fil-A compelled me to want to do this even more in the fact that there’s local options available; there’s local people that have spent their life just like I have, behind the stoves or in the fields or raising cattle and pigs and chicken, and spent their whole life’s passion trying to provide for the community. I did not want us in this pandemic to take the easy route and go convenience food the entire time.”

A phone call with Harmony Ridge Farms owner Isaac Oliver helped him understand what his role could be in creating a meal service that brought healthy meals to home diners and supported local farms. When restaurants were forced to shut their doors, many farms like Harmony Ridge that catered to chefs were left without their best clients.

“He’s not the biggest one, but he’s not a small farm,” Diminich says. “Then I thought about all the other smaller scale farms that have been a part of the fabric of our community for years and years and years, and what they would do. I just started thinking about, how can I come up with a way to be a cook — which I love to do, and I love cooking more than ever — and be able to help these people out?”

Your Farms, Your Table delivers three-course meals to your home for $30 per meal. The menu changes daily based on what the farmers have available. Because his fixed costs are low — Diminich does the cooking at home, and his sister Stephanie Lockhart helps run the business — he can spend more money on the ingredients. 

Diminich won’t be returning to Upstream, and instead will focus on growing Your Farms, Your Table. He’s currently selling 20 meals per day, but is moving into a commissary kitchen where he’ll be able to up his production. Lunch delivery will likely kick off in the fall, as well. The meals truly are of restaurant quality, and are vegetable-heavy and flavorful. The seasonality of them is their biggest strength; the freshness of the ingredients make for an unforgettable taste of Charlotte. Order online here. —Kristen Wile