The way I would describe Nishaan is Pakistani American street food. It's unreal. It's taking American classics and adding Pakistani flavors into it. Chopped cheese. Good, right? This is banging. I'm Zeeshan, founder of Nishaan, home of the Pakistani chopped cheese. My whole goal in life is to feed people. I'm an American kid with a Pakistani background. It's all the flavors I grew up with from both cultures, American and Pakistani, and I'm just combining them into my menu at Nishaan. So I grew up in Chicago.

I grew up in Devon, which is a neighborhood of like Pakistanis, Indians. My dad was a taxi driver in the beginning, and now he's been working for American Airlines as a baggage handler for the last 25 years. And my mom has just been a homemaker. But all through our lives, she's done something to like help support the family from like catering to teaching, like tutoring kids, working at a warehouse. Seeing her the way she cooked, there was never any rules for her. She would eat like lentil, like dal sandwiches with cheese in it, like just pass it out to my cousins. And they're like, oh, this is delicious. And like, nobody ever said like,

oh, this is weird. Don't do this. I never grew up with that attitude. It was always just like, hey, make stuff that tastes good. My menu does not exist anywhere else in the world. And Nishaan, we saw the Pakistani chopped cheese. We take a classic kebab, some of the spices from there mix it into a ground beef patty, top it with pepper, jack and American cheese and finish it off with our lime, cilantro, salsa tamarind chutney and wrap it in a toasted hero. It's delicious. You saw our barbacoa tacos, which is spicy Smoky Buffalo Tandoori Chicken Sandwich, which is a kind of classic.

Imagine buffalo chicken meets tandoori masala. Crazy sandwich. So many layers of flavor. It is just unbelievable. New York City is just a place for food like this. The people are here that will taste it. It's delicious. And it makes you level up to a place where, like, it has to be good. You can't miss. If you miss in New York, you're gonna find out fast. Before all this came, I kind of went down the standard path, went to college, got a degree, got a job, mainly worked in finance companies. I was at JP Morgan for a little bit

and when I got laid off, I couldn't find a job and I was like, I know how to cook and I think I can sell food. At that point, I signed up for Smorgasburg, which is a food festival in New York City, and we sell out in like two hours. I get a message like four days after it ends, like, hey, do you want to be on the great food truck race? We're casting for it. We had our ups, we had our downs. We were almost out of the competition. But at the end we, we won. So they gave me this confidence of like, I, I, I have to open a restaurant now.

I had a budget of $70,000 like my life savings. I've been fasting all day. The sun is down. It's time for my first bite. Of course it's gonna be a chopped cheese. You know, I don't eat that many anymore, but every time I do. $30,000 was just the deposit. It was about $10,000 in electrical work. I'm making my hot chicken spice mix for today. $15,000 in equipment. Just like $10,000 on remodel. Hello? What's up? You coming down? Nothing. I'm about to go chop some cheeses. We've been open for around seven months now. In September we made 75,000. In October we made 100,000.

In November, which was our biggest month was 140,000. In December, we did 120,000. In January we did 114. In February we did 113,000. We got 2323. Make sure you have your tickets. 23. My rent is 6100 a month. I think I spent like 15,000 just on me. My employee cost is about like 25 to $30,000 a month. We are profitable, but I'm just kind of investing it back into business and make sure we have a rainy day fund. I'm surviving off of like laid off severance money right now, so I don't need the income from the business. I think for any restaurant to

be successful, you have to have people in the door. Look at the steam coming here. And the best way nowadays is to use social media to get people into the doors. Oh, I saw a video on TikTok. It was definitely worth the hype. Like I saw it on TikTok and stuff. Bon appetit was the one. She blew my like restaurant up and she just. It's a hilarious concept where she rates things by moans. Mhm. Oh, paratha. Homemade bangin. And the inside. Look at all that bacon.

It's got aioli. It's got onion which brings the freshness I rate Nissan. 9.1 big dumb number 132. The community aspect of Nishaan has been a big huge boost in the sales itself. You'll be able to survive if your community shows up for you. I like supporting local small businesses, especially businesses that are owned by South Asians. So whenever there's a South Asian business, we have to come and represent.

I say like, I'm, we're 1% of America, 99% is everybody else. If I can capture 1% of 99%, I can survive. I need to check off every order that's been sent out. I used to work four hours a day. Now I work 14 hours a day. I wouldn't say I'm overwhelmed. I'm tired. I would say I'm tired. My brain is getting fried, bro. My brain is getting fried. Standard for everybody like that opens up like a fast casual spot is expand. Open up more locations. That'd be awesome to do. But I also look at it from an aspect of like,

do the work and the results will come as they are, and I'm just gonna continue working on that same path, same attitude that I've had, and I'm just gonna see what happens. Masala. Garam masala. Hot chicken. 47. Come back 47. I don't want to take these inside. Every day. Packed house. It's actually a crazy feeling.

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