It's a little chilly outside the warmth of Hood Famous Cafe + Bar in the Chinatown-International District. The film crew of the local web series B*tch I'm Hungry is milling around in front of the cafe under the velvety blue-purple sky, waiting for the host, Seattle rapper Jarv Dee, to arrive.
The crew decides to duck back inside. Jarv trots in a few minutes later, decked out in a black, red, and white Nike tracksuit and a Herschel fanny pack, his long dreadlocks pulled back into a ponytail underneath a beanie. He smells a little bit like weed.
"Today I'm trying something new," the rapper declares, pulling a jar of bud from his pocket and setting it down on the table. "It's a hybrid." As Jarv states at the beginning of each episode, he typically prefers sativas—"because I don't like to sleep."
The guest of tonight's episode is Prometheus Brown of Blue Scholars, aka Geo Quibuyen, who co-owns the Filipino bakery, cafe, and bar with his wife, Chera Amlag.
After greeting the crew and staff inside the cafe, Jarv and his videographer, Coi Tran, head outside to a street corner to film the intro segment. Jarv produces a blunt of the aforementioned hybrid: Lemonchello 28, Lemonade's cross between Cherry Pie and the Original Lemonade. It's not super funky and it hits clean, the smell of citrus all up in your nose.
Tran hits "record," and Jarv immediately launches into a quick and charming monologue, introducing the show, shouting-out his weed sponsor Clutch Cannabis, and emphasizing again the strangeness of him smoking a non-sativa strain. "We're gonna hit this hybrid and hope I don't fall asleep during this episode," he laughs, then hits, the smoke furling out of his nose and mouth. "Let's get baked and hit the bakeshop."
B*tch I'm Hungry, a monthly web series started in February of this year, follows Jarv on a cannabis-fueled culinary journey around the Seattle area. Generally featuring one restaurant per episode, the rapper invites local musicians, producers, and cannabis influencers to come smoke, eat, and chat—all the good things in life. The series mostly focuses its attention on minority-owned food spots located in Central and South Seattle, like Fat's Chicken and Waffles in the CD and Super Six in Columbia City.
"You don't have to just go downtown to find a restaurant," he told me when I met up with him at Pagliacci Pizza in Columbia City. "If you're out and about in South Seattle, if you're in the Central [District], there are great spots you can eat at."
Neither a chef nor a cannabis connoisseur by trade, Jarv has been a figure (and a stoner) within the hip-hop scene in Seattle for almost a decade. Growing up on Beacon Hill and in Yesler Terrace, he got his start as a hype man for the group Cloud Nine and a lyricist for electronic hip-hop band Kingdom Crumbs. He's since put out four records, collaborated on tracks with major-label rappers like Jay Park, and founded Moor Gang, a collective of Seattle hip-hop artists that includes Gifted Gab and Nacho Picasso.
Though music was always front and center for the rapper, weed—and especially weed and food—has been a constant in his life. To promote the release of his 2016 EP The Red Eye Jedi, he held a press stunt/listening party in Cannabus, a 420-hotbox-friendly bus that traveled around the city, ending at local hamburger joint Li'l Woody's. His discography also reflects his love of the little green plant, like "Smoke 2 Much" and "I Just Wanna," which make appearances throughout the episodes of the web series.
The idea for B*tch I'm Hungry came in late 2018, during a brainstorming session between Jarv and his fiancée, Casey Carter, a podcast host and KUBE 93.3 radio host who also produces the series. "We were looking for other ways to market Jarv and his personality besides music," said Casey.
"I mean, it's two things I like doing anyway," added Jarv. "I like smoking. I like eating. It was that easy to come up with [B*tch I'm Hungry]."
Each episode is generally split into three sections: a beginning where Jarv introduces the show, restaurant, and guests, all while smoking some sponsored weed; a middle that involves a truly insane amount of eating and talking about life, the music and/or cannabis industry, and pot preferences; and an end where a bleary-eyed Jarv does an outro, finishing the blunt from earlier, all full and stoned. It's a simple and straightforward 6 to 10 minutes.
You wouldn't be wrong if you think you've heard of this sort of concept before. Viceland had a similar web to television series with a potty-mouthed title, Fuck, That's Delicious, hosted by former chef and rapper Action Bronson. Jarv acknowledged that the shows are "similar-ish," but highlighted that Bronson was drawing on his history as a cook, whereas Jarv wants to bring more attention to "what we do" in the Northwest—which is smoke and eat.
Part of the appeal of the show is Jarv's connection to the hip-hop scene in the city. His roster of guests in the first season included rapper Dave B. (with whom he ate a truly impressive amount of fried chicken), rapper Jay Park (his most watched episode to date), and the recently relocated Moor Gang affiliate Gifted Gab.
"A lot of those people, I have relationships with them, they're my friends," he told me. "Doing music in Seattle, it's kind of a small circle, so you know who's who. I'm blessed to know a lot of people. It's like calling friends up, 'Hey, man, you want to smoke and eat?'"
The show isn't a high-stakes round of question and answer, but a chance to see some local musicians open up about their career, life, and relationships over a plate (or five) of local eats. Throughout it all, Jarv is the red-eyed host, his chill demeanor, buoyant laugh, and appetite propelling the conversation forward.
Jarv is naturally gregarious, and although a lot of his random-ness and off-the-cuff humor doesn't make it to the final cut, his easygoing attitude makes the series an enjoyable stoned watch, full of inspiration for locals on where to eat next.
Though he does want to expand and start going to restaurants in other cities ("I want to be like Anthony Bourdain"), his focus at the moment is to shine a light on lesser-known restaurants in the Northwest while also popularizing the idea of who smokes weed.
"I want to normalize [cannabis]. And just to show that in the Northwest, we do smoke weed, and we do have people of color that do smoke weed, and we do have nice restaurants from people of color," he said. "And we've just got a lot of variety here."
Back at Hood Famous, Geo and Jarv dig into the cafe's recently expanded food and drink menu. The first course—greasy fried chicken skin dipped into spiced vinegar, garlic corn nuts, and tangy glazed cashews—gets washed down with a Toki highball in a tall crystal glass.
Geo talks about his crossover from making music to going into business with his wife and starting their restaurants. He mentions the community support behind Chera's famous ube cheesecake and what it's like to be the father of a SoundCloud rapper.
They gobble up the cafe's version of taho (a sweet Filipino street food made of silken tofu, tapioca balls, rum, and brown sugar syrup), down balut (a traditional Filipino dish consisting of a half-developed duck embryo eaten straight from the shell), and suck on slow-roasted, coffee-rubbed ribs slathered in spicy calamansi kosho paste. They top off the feast with buko (a young coconut custard pie) and puffy ube cookies. During filming, various friends and family of the men roll through, eating leftovers from the shoot.
Jarv sits in front of the camera gobsmacked by the flavors, asking Geo questions as he fastidiously licks his fingers, making sure no one else eats the ribs. By the end, he's full, but something's missing. Hey, how about the rest of that blunt?
