Former Kent State football standout serves up Cajun favorites | Local Flavor on Wheels

Local Flavor on Wheels: This summer, we’re trying area food trucks for our Local Flavor series instead of sit-down establishments. We hope you’ll come along for the ride!

It all started sitting in a classroom at Kent State.

And now for Will Matthews it means standing in a kitchen in his Highland Square storefront or in a mobile kitchen on his food truck doing something he loves.

But there's a lot of life and miles between growing up in New Orleans and landing at Kent State where he was a star running back and a member of the squad that won the college's first bowl game ever in 2019.

Matthews said Cajun food was part of his blood as he grew up in the kitchen watching his parents and his grandfather, who was a chef, cook.

Need a break? Play the USA TODAY Daily Crossword Puzzle.

"I grew up around food all of my life," he said.

So when he found himself sitting in a Kent State classroom with an assignment to create a business plan for his entrepreneurial studies, Matthews, along with fellow classmate Zach Mottershead, came up with the idea for a Cajun-inspired food truck.

The Southern Comfort Kitchen food truck was born and began serving up food to hungry students back in 2019.

The brick-and-mortar restaurant in Akron's Highland Square would follow in 2022.

Matthews said his first customers were actually his teammates who tried out his recipes as he worked to perfect them.

The challenges of avoiding tackles, he said, is nothing compared to managing a business and keeping up with the orders of hungry customers.

"When you do a busy event − it's for better or for worse," Matthews said. "It gets really, really intense."

What does the Southern Comfort Kitchen food truck serve up?

The best part of a food truck is the food comes to you.

And in this instance, the Southern Comfort Kitchen takes to the road two or three times a week to set up shop in and around Akron.

The food truck menu is more limited than what's offered at the restaurant, but it includes many of the Southern Comfort Kitchen's seafood favorites.

The truck serves up Po Boys including fried and grilled shrimp ($13 and $15 respectively) and a SoCo burger ($12).

The menu at the restaurant is a bit more extensive and ranges from Po Boy sandwiches ($12 to $16) to jambalaya ($7 for a small) to chicken wings ($12 for 6).

It was tough deciding what to order for dinner.

We went for the double fish and chips ($16) and an order of shrimp and fries ($13).

The crawfish mac ($9 for a large) sounded yummy so we added on a large order of that.

And we couldn't pass up the hush puppies that were $4 for eight.

I regret passing up on the bread pudding for $5, but truth be told we were pretty stuffed from all the food.

The hushpuppies were divine.

They were crispy on the outside and warm and soft on the inside with a nice sweetness to them.

The breading on the fish and shrimp had a great texture and had a little bit of a bite, but not too hot.

All in all, the Southern Comfort Kitchen offers a tasty trip to New Orleans without all the hassle of packing a bag and climbing aboard an airplane.