ROANOKE, Va. – Sometimes, in a world filled with chaos, a little sprinkle of hope can go a long way. For people like Shirley Baptiste, this ideology guides her actions each day, both in her everyday life and in her role as a restaurant owner.
When she first opened the doors to Gianni’s in the Grandin area of Roanoke in August 2024, she did so with an eagerness to serve others and share Caribbean-Creole dishes, which she says she didn’t see in the restaurant scene when she first moved to the area in 2019.
Nearly one year after the restaurant’s opening, she continues to bring delicious Caribbean-Creole flavors to the Star City, handcrafted with mouthwatering ingredients that draw from her rich Haitian roots, combined with the soulful spices of Creole cuisine for the best of both worlds.
From Shrimp Étouffée Tacos to Gumbo Risotto to Oxtails, each meal is made with a touch of love and thoughtfulness, something she calls the secret ingredient driving her every day.
That’s the calling. That’s what we’re sent here for, to love people. It’s the second commandment. The first one is to love God, and the second one is to love your neighbors. I feel like this world lacks love … If we were to follow the second commandment and love one another, the way God created it, we would save ourselves a lot of trouble.
Shirley Baptiste
Stepping inside Gianni’s feels like walking into your family’s kitchen as you are enveloped in the aroma of food made from the soul, while gentle and relaxing jazz plays in the background. You’ll be met with a soft smile and warm welcome from Baptiste, who strives to make everyone feel right at home.
“It’s a very peaceful environment … Baptiste has a beautiful spirit, a beautiful soul, always smiling. She’s an awesome person,” said Jacques St. Juste, a long-time friend of Baptiste’s who has supported her restaurant from the very beginning.
And when it comes to the beginning of Baptiste’s journey as a restaurant owner, it was certainly a full-circle moment. She was born and spent much of her early years in Haiti, where her family was deeply grounded in Christian faith. Both of her parents served as pastors, a generational calling passed down from her great-grandfather, whom she credits with introducing Christianity to their hometown.
“Being a pastor’s kid, I grew up with my parents going into missions, to different places and bringing food, and having large gatherings at church and cooking for the people at church.”
At 15, she moved from Haiti to New York with her dad’s friend, whom they considered family, along with her siblings, due to the conditions in her country. Though adapting to a new culture and learning a new language was daunting, she stayed true to her roots, allowing God to guide her way. In 2008, her family opened their own restaurant in Queens, New York, which still operates today.
“At the time, I wasn’t thinking in my mind, ‘Hey, I wanna open a restaurant,’ because I was focused on school. I wanted to be a nurse. Actually, I wanted to be a doctor, but I ended up being a nurse. But as the years went by, I started to feel like that was something I really wanted to do, you know, cooking for people and serving them.”
She added, “And then I decided to open the restaurant, but the experience of living with my family and them starting the restaurant really laid the foundation because it was good for me to see firsthand all the work that goes into opening a restaurant and keeping the doors open.”
In the end, Baptiste achieved both dreams. She now serves as both a restaurant owner and a nurse, roles she says are one and the same.
It is pretty much still serving people … It’s like you do everything when you’re a nurse caring for a patient, and it’s not much different from being a restaurant owner I’m finding out, especially meeting different people and how they come to you and tell you their life stories. You’re not caring for them in a medical way, but you almost cater to the same way you would in the hospital--listening to them, talking to them and serving them.
Shirley Baptiste
All and all, her main purpose is to plant seeds of hope and love wherever she goes.
“I go to work every day with a smile and with the goal to put a smile on someone’s face, either by the food that I serve them or a conversation that we’re having. Every day, I go out with that hope, and I just let God do it because sometimes you may not be able to see too far in the future, but you can lean on the one who holds the future.”
Shirley Baptiste also brought the heat to our studio in June with her delicious Caribbean-Creole dishes.