Jennifer Otis’s Stories, Lessons & Insights

We recently had the chance to connect with Jennifer Otis and have shared our conversation below.

Jennifer, it’s always a pleasure to learn from you and your journey. Let’s start with a bit of a warmup: What do the first 90 minutes of your day look like?
The start of my day looks much differently than it did over a year ago. I used to start my mornings, grumbling about having to get up early, grabbing my phone and immediately scrolling on my social media pages before reluctantly getting out of the bed. Now that I am deeply following my walk with God, I start my day off each day with extreme gratitude! As soon as I open my eyes, I thank him for allowing me to see another day and I start off with prayer.

I’m thankful for the accessibility to move my body, so I go to the gym in the morning and get myself a workout in and then I come home and fix myself a healthy breakfast. While I have my breakfast, I’ll have my morning devotion which consist of reading a a daily word, reading a chapter of my Bible, prayer, and listening to a couple gospel songs.

After I nourish my spirit and body, I write a checklist of things that I need to get completed for the day. As someone who has ADHD, it is very important for me to start with a checklist of things so I can ensure productivity for that day.

Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
My name is Jennifer Otis, also known as JennioVittles. I own a private chef/catering company located in Cincinnati, Ohio. I’m a 2x cookbook author as well as a food content creator across platforms, such as TikTok, Lemon8, YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook.

God is the head of my life and without him nothing would be possible. My family is the most important thing to me. I love to spending time with them because they bring me so much joy. I love, bringing smiles to people‘s faces with jokes, traveling, watching and going to the movies, exploring different restaurants, and most importantly cooking! The kitchen is definitely my happy place!

What sets me apart from many other catering companies, is I cook with love and I put my emotions into my food. I make sure that I’m always in a peaceful state when I am cooking and it always shines through with each meal. I’ve always enjoyed event planning and hosting, so I love being able to not only provide the food, but to plan and decorate. I’m a one-stop shop and I love a themed event where I can showcase my creativity!

I don’t have a set menu. I have a wide range of things I can cook and bake from my experiences of many different cultures of food from my worldly travels. I cultivate menus based upon each client’s event so nothing is ever the exact same because no event is.

As a former single Mom and educator, I understand how important it is to do things that are affordable, especially in today’s economy. It’s important that I don’t price gouge, even though my food is phenomenal. God has blessed me with a gift and I want the opportunity to be able to share it with anyone no matter their budget.

Appreciate your sharing that. Let’s talk about your life, growing up and some of topics and learnings around that. Who were you before the world told you who you had to be?
I was the person that tried to do things the “American Way.” I went to school got degrees, worked 9 to 5 jobs in Corporate America and in the education field, but I never quite felt that was my true calling.

I did work some jobs that gave me fulfillment, but it never quite felt like I belonged there. Something always pulled at me that I could be doing more and to not limit myself.

I let the fear of others lead me because they may have started a business venture and may not have found success. I had to understand, we’re different people and so are our stories. God called me to do something different and I finally listened and was obedient. I’ll always be grateful for all of my experiences and losses I’ve ever taken because it’s helped me grow into the woman I am today!

If you could say one kind thing to your younger self, what would it be?
I would definitely tell myself don’t ever shave myself down to fit into any space where I didn’t belong. I have always been a person that marched to the beat of her own drum and sometimes I would march to the beat of other people’s drum because I wanted to fit in and not feel excluded.

Not everyone understood my visions or my passions or dreamed as big as I did, so sometimes I was misunderstood when I was younger. Because of that, I definitely dimmed my own light sometimes because I didn’t want to feel bad for outshining someone else whose light didn’t shine as brightly as mine.

It took me a very long time to understand that I was made to stand out on my own and to be my own person, to use my voice for good and to help others. I’m forever grateful to learn the woman that I am because nobody can ever tell me who I am I because I already know!

So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. Is the public version of you the real you?
Most definitely! I have always found it to be very important to start off my journey, especially with my social media presence to be authentically me. I’m not doing it to impress anyone, I just wanted to share some of my recipes and teach people how to cook without being shamed, because not everyone has learned.

Sometimes you’ll see me cooking recipes with my hair bonnet on because I’m at home, relaxed in my kitchen, cooking for my family in my most raw and truest form. I refuse to get dolled up at home and put on some façade just to cook because that’s unrealistic for me.

Most importantly, I feel it is very important to be vulnerable with people. It’s a very challenging thing to do in such a critical world, you really have to not care what others think about you. Not everyone is cut out for judgment from others that’s for sure. I’ve been looked at as an underdog my entire life and I continue to prove people wrong without having to say a word. God already told me who I am, so he moves on my behalf.

So many people are used to being shamed for real life situations. I have gone through a tremendous amount of things and I’ve been brought through all of those because it is my calling to use it as a testimony to help others. No one should feel like they’re alone in the things they go through in life because we all go through things. Some people are afraid to tell their truth when they are struggling because they’ve been shamed before or are taught that they need to keep quiet, when in reality your story could truly bless someone else.

Thank you so much for all of your openness so far. Maybe we can close with a future oriented question. When do you feel most at peace?
I feel most at peace when I’m in the comfort of my home with my husband and son. Whether we’re having dinner together, watching a show, or even just playing around with each other, those are the moments that you can’t pay for. They are my answered prayer. They love and support me and have also seen me in my lowest moments, yet they still love me like I have no flaws. Even through every obstacle we may face in life, it still is manageable because I have them. Nothing beats that peace!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://a.co/d/8mv7zrM
• Instagram: Igotthevittles
• Facebook: I Got the Vittles
• Youtube: Jennio.Vittles
• Other: TikTok: Jennio.Vittles

  Lemon8: Jennio.Vittles