Living The Red Life - From Gas Station Kitchen to Global Franchise Empire

Episode Date: May 26, 2026

He starts with nothing but grit, faith, and a vision—and builds something far bigger than a restaurant. Muhieddine El-Hamawi, founder of Big Mo’s Kitchen, shares how he transforms a 400 sq ft gas station concept into a fast-growing restaurant franchise with global reach. Through relentless consistency, system building, and a deep focus on company culture, he reveals the mindset behind scaling a food business in today’s competitive market. This episode dives into entrepreneurship, leadership, and the real strategies behind building a brand that lasts. But the biggest lesson isn’t about food—it’s about purpose, pressure, and the decisions that define your future.Key Takeaways • Why starting small creates a stronger business foundation • The real role of culture in scaling a restaurant franchise • How consistency and patience outperform talent • Why most entrepreneurs fail at decision-making and systems • The strategy behind testing before expanding globallyNotable Quotes • “Consistency, patience, and a whole lot of faith.” • “It’s not about the dish—it’s about the purpose.” • “Entrepreneurship is money managing and decision making.” • “If you don’t like what you do, stop doing it.” • “You have to connect to what you’re doing.”Connect with Rudy Mawer:LinkedInInstagramFacebookTwitter

When everybody's waiting for that payday and you are the one that's calling everybody's check, I look at it, this is the purpose. Yes, sir. It's all about the purpose. It's not about the dish that we're serving. It's not about the shrimp that we're eating. It's literally a lot deeper than that. You're providing jobs.

Yes, sir. You're providing opportunities. You're providing a good work environment. You're providing this competitive environment between your employees. Muayadine El Hamawi is a resilient, visionary, and self-made entrepreneur. restaurateur, and franchise founder, best known as the creator of Big Mo's kitchen franchise company.

This is the culture. This is the culture that I've been working on. And I tried to implement it every day with my employees, with my quarterly meetings, with my daily meetings, with my social media all across. That's awesome, man. Where does one learn this?

Did you kind of like figure it out yourself? Did you crawl before you ran? Like, or did you have coaches? So it started in the... My name's Rudy Moore, host of Living the Red Life. podcast and I'm here to change the way you see your life in your earpiece every single week. If you're ready to start living the red life, ditch the blue pill, take the red pill,

join me in Wonderland and change your life. Welcome back to another episode of the Living Your Legacy podcast, the Red Life edition. Joining me today right before we film his episode of Legacy Makers is the one and only Big Mo. Big Mo, yes. Big Mo, executive chef of the world, of the galaxy. executive chef CEO founder of big most kitchen right on i love it a new american style restaurant established in 2016 i was the only employee for the first uh year or so until the other day i'm just kidding until last week and and uh you know and i'm still an employee for my company of course and

that's that's it's all about entrepreneurship i mean when you're an entrepreneur there's no days off you work 24-7 is whether you like her or not sometimes I answer emails while I'm in my boxes. Sure. So. Or the bathtub. And this is just business. Yeah, man.

I love the chaos. I love the business. I just love the kitchen too. Yeah, brother. I got to rewind and how we originally met, which is quite their journey. We met with Damon John in the room. We met last year, me and you at Damon John's CEO day. It was a great event.

And we're here today. Yeah. It's all about networking. It's all about the camaraderie. It's all about being in it together. My friend, let's talk about your heritage, your background. I always think folks like you are so beautiful. Thank you.

Like you are beyond galactic. Like what you people preach and believe is quite beautiful. Let's talk about how you connect that soul to the soul of your food. So I am an immigration lottery winner. Right on. I have won my immigration lottery back in 2004 after my brother, which he's the company's advocate today. He's the company's lawyer.

He applied for us on an immigration lottery, and then we won a lottery. Right on. And then we came here. I was born and raised in Beirut, Lebanon. Beautiful. Born in September 6, 1988. Right on.

Started working with my dad when I was nine years old. Wow. And this is, I can tell you, this is where I got most of my knowledge and entrepreneurship at a young, age but I did not know how to apply it until I reached a certain age and it's crazy right when we when we teach our kids something we might think they're not learning but you'll be surprised when they show you that they have learned what you taught

him oh it's time to implement it and you know when I when I had a certain age after I came to the US I moved here in 2005 and I just started working 16 hours a day They busted my ass and decided to go to culinary school. Right on. Like, you know, I have a passion for cooking. So let me go to culinary school. Went to culinary school in 2013, graduated in 2015, opened up my first location and a gas station.

Just like that. A 400 square fee restaurant. Like literally, 400 square feet restaurant. Only with four chairs for people to wait for their orders because it was strictly carry out. Right. We had no full service. I was the purchasing, handling, cashier, prep cook, you name it.

All your energy. All you. I'm picking up stuff from Restaurant Depot in the morning. Picking up stuff from my local produce markets in the morning, going to the restaurant, preparing that, getting ready for the day, leaving a ton. And it was a hell of a journey. A hell of a journey. And we're still doing that till today.

We learned a better way of doing it. We learned, you know, I was able to implement a nice system into the company. to a point where we got to franchise it. I sold my first franchise back in 2022 in Grand Black, Michigan. And now we have five franchises. Wow. Including two in Lebanon.

So, I mean, it's there. We're working on growing it more. Right on. And just a matter of time. Yeah, you're on that journey of growth. I got to ask, I've never had anyone that's done, you know, the Rudy Moore program and then the Damon John program. Like, for folks that are listening and they're kind of curious as to,

What are these masterclasses? What are these masterminds? Are they worth it? You know, even if you want to share some of your honesty and skepticism of what you've learned and why these networking events are important or, I don't know, maybe useless. What's your perspective? I look at it this way. The events like that are very important if you can utilize them, just like anything else in life, right?

There's no point for me to drive a brand new Ferrari that I'm going to pay a top dollar for if I'm not going to put some work into it. For sure. And nowadays, it's different. entrepreneurship is different business is different you know especially after COVID there's a lot of things that have changed and mastermind class my opinion is one of the best thing that you can ever attend and it depends with who and and it depends on you as a person on you as a businessman are you going to be

able to learn from these masterminds what do you want to learn what are you going there to actually what are you looking for what are you going to find it's like walking into an escape room, right? Yeah. You're walking into an escape room. You don't know anybody. You don't know the tricks. You don't know the answers.

You don't know the questions. You know, Rudy got his own program, and it's on you to actually find the puzzle. It's on you to put these pieces together. So you can actually benefit from whatever you're attending. Yeah, yeah. I completely agree. Try working for the man.

It's every day it's a master class. And you kind of, like the reason why I enjoy working for folks like Damon John and Rudy, it's because they're entrepreneurs, but I really enjoy working for their cause, their message, their energy. And like, you can just feel it in transcendence. When Rudy and I speak, we'd even speak, we just look at each other,

oh, got it, and I just move on, I know exactly what he wanted. Yes. And it's just like, I enjoy being a part of, and in his brain, we're quite literally in his brain. Yeah. But vice versa. What is your philosophy?

Do you have a second of command, a general, like, do you have a mini you, or is it just all you, all AI, and you're just running your kitchens? What's your philosophy about your tribe? I mean, we, I'm a vegan culture. I'm big on culture. My five franchisees that we have today,

they were actually former employees. Wow. That I actually promoted into a position and then gave them the opportunity into becoming their own bosses. Some of them owe me money, which is fine. They're paying me back.

We're good. I love it. So, I mean, it's all about given that opportunity. It's all about giving that chance because, you know, even, even, I mean, me as an immigrant, it wasn't, I didn't have it. I had to wake up, I had to get out there.

I mean, at one point I was collecting recyclable cans. I could sell them and make 10 cents back. Sometimes I've sold it to the, you know, put it in the machine, give it to the, I mean, there's a lot of stuff that's involved. Sure. You gotta implement that culture. You gotta implement the fact that you gotta create this competitive environment within

your kitchen. Today we have about 300 plus employees. I got employees on my payroll in Lebanon. I got employees on my payroll in Dubai. There you go, man. And Pakistan and Brazil. And that's a blessing on its own. Yes, sir.

When everybody's waiting for that payday and you are the one that's caught everybody's chuck, I look at it. This is the purpose. Yes, sir. It's all about the purpose. It's not about the dish that we're serving. It's not about the shrimp that we're eating.

It's literally a lot, farther than that. It's literally a lot deeper than that. You're providing jobs. You're providing opportunities. You're providing a good work environment. You're providing this competitive environment between

your employees. Like I got employees right now that are just, you know, they're itching for their location. Like, okay, when am I next? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm going to get my own of those locations? Exactly. So, I mean, this is, this is it creates this is the culture. This is the culture.

Right on, dude. that I've been working on and I try to implement it every day with my employees with my quarterly meetings with my daily meetings with my social media all across that's awesome man um where does one learn this did you kind of like figure it out yourself did you crawl before you ran like or did you have coaches so it started in the kitchen and it's the great place to learn I this is an advice for everybody and not even if you don't like cooking this is an advice for you even if you If you hate cooking, you need to spend at least six months in the kitchen. And I say that for a reason.

I say that because the kitchen teaches you a lot of stuff way beyond kitchen, right? It teaches you entrepreneurship. It teaches you how to be a team player, which is the most important thing right now because it's hard to find team players and nowadays. Everybody wants to be their own boss. The ego gets in the way. Guilty. So being in the kitchen teaches you how to work.

as a team teaches you how not to use your ego because what's important is that final product that you are going to put in front of this person that's actually went out of their way. They came to your restaurant to enjoy the experience. So when it gets to a point where it's about the client, the team has to do what they have to do regardless of how they're feeling, regardless of what they're going through, they have to deliver. So being under that pressure taught me a lot of things. And then when I decided to open my own restaurant,

you know, my chef goes to me, he's like, Mo, you know, you went to culinary school for two, three years. You're a fine dining chef. I worked at one of the best places in Michigan called Detroit Athletic Club, which is a private club. And he's like, you're leaving all that to go open up a small restaurant inside a gas station to sell subs and burgers.

Yes, sir. I'm like, chef, I know it sounds crazy, but I got to do it. Yeah. I need to try because I don't know what it. I don't know what it is. I want to try. If I fail, worst case scenario, I'll come back and get my job back,

if not here, anywhere else. Yeah, because at that point, I was already graduated from culinary school. I already knew the kitchen life and the business, and I can run one of the best kitchens in the world. So I'm like, you know what? Let me go try for a couple years. If it didn't work, who cares?

My resume's there. I'm a certified culinaryian. It's there. I can reuse it back. And it's crazy. It worked out. But consistency, consistency, see patience, you need all that to work.

You cannot just, you cannot give up. When, when you are in your, in your zone, how does that transpose into the rest of the restaurant? Where does the experience truly begin? Is it walking in and you catch a something and then a host guide you into a chair? Or is the experience on an ad? Because, you know, you're really more about the food versus walking in and feeling something. What's your philosophy about the actual brick and mortar restaurant?

So my philosophy is to be able to provide an affordable dining experience a la carte style at a quick service restaurant. So let me let me rephrase that. Okay. Let me rephrase it by, I look at Big Moose Kitchen the same way I look at Starbucks and the coffee business. So Big Moast Kitchen, I'm working on making that place into like the Starbucks of the food industry. When you walk into a big most kitchen, you can literally get a fine dined dish for $18. Instead of spending $50 somewhere else,

because when you're spending $50, you're paying for the full service, for the waitress, for all this experience. Now we're giving you this experience so you can take home with you or you can even do a quick buy at the restaurant. Great. So, yes, it's affordable using local ingredients,

a la carte style, so we're not pre-cooked. We don't pre-cooked our stuff. Everything gets cooked to order. And then I was able to minimize that from making it into a 15 to 20 minute max ticket time. Right on. Which is, I mean, people in my industry, they know. You know, to serve a fine dined dish at a 20 minutes in this kind of style. I've had a lot of business owners and restaurant owners in my community

that came to me when I first saw a Big Moose kitchen and they're like, how the hell you made this dish into a carryout dish? because we've been trying to do it for 10 years. That's amazing. So, I mean, this is, this is the catch. I was going to say, yeah, that's great. I feel like you figured out your high tickets offer and now you've ascended that and taken it to the next level.

Are you mentoring, sir? Are you coaching? Are you thinking of like becoming the brand versus the restaurants because you're a franchise owner? So I feel like the franchises are in front of you as a brand. Franchisor? Yes. Are you pushing yourself as the brand?

where it's almost like a lot of these cats that are on like, you know, the food network and the big blonde hair. Like, is it your turn to take that place? I'm currently working on, you know, I'm focusing right now in Big Moast Kitchen. I'm growing a company. I'm not in the kitchen like I used to be before. But I'm doing more hard stuff now, right? People think if you're not in the kitchen, oh, this guy is sitting down, he's enjoying his life. No, it gets harder because now you're putting out fires.

Now you're making decisions. Now I'm coaching my employees. When I jump on a Zoom call and I have up to 50 managers across the globe, social media managers, franchisees, their managers, chefs, executive chef, my quality control chef. So we do have everything set up in a correct way. I would love to coach even outside of Big Moores Kitchen. But for the meantime, I'm focusing on my team. I'm focusing on my franchisees.

And I'm focusing on growing the business as much as I can. Right on. I love systems. And I personally built the systems that we have here in the studios. When you create, I love the fact that you kind of timed the whole dish experience from I guess from conception to actual delivery. When you design a menu, are you looking at the system?

Like, oh, well, this would be a great idea, but it's going to push us back. Another five, and that five can be reused for this. And then you can see the domino effect, trail off. How do you build your system, AKA menu. To see the menu, it's funny. When I built a menu, I was in Florida.

I was here in Florida. And, you know, I was, I took the kids to Disneyland. And day one. And that, you know, that happened back in 2017. Big Moose Kitchen was established already. The menu was manipulated five times already. So I had to redo the menu five times throughout my career. in Big Moose kitchen.

Like there's a lot of things that were on the first menu ever that we don't even serve anymore. And the great thing about it is I still get some regular customers that ask for these dishes till today. Secret menu. So it's like a secret menu for me. I love it. Only, only, you know, only people that knew us from the beginning

know these menu items. And, you know, I designed a menu in a way where, okay, well, let me just make a restaurant and make a menu with everything that I like. And I'm a weird eater, right? Because I like Arabic food and I like American food. I love pizza. I love Chinese.

I just love food because I've done all cuisines. So this is where I decided to just have a little bit of everything on my menu. And I decided to name it Big Mosk Kitchen on purpose because I don't want to be stuck under steak or chicken or, you know, like pizza. Grill this. I'm like, it's Big Most Kitchen. I can literally change up the menu overnight if I want to. It's my kitchen, right?

So I went then just made it into a new American style. And back then, by the way, 2016, we can go back. That new American quick service style was not famous that much. Yeah, maybe Chipotle was there, but Chipotle have got into the corporate system already. Shout out to Chipotle. Great company. Great company. So what they did, they got so into the corporate system.

And they, you know, we were more into actually connecting with the food before we serve it to you. That's what I wanted to hear. So when we do the shrimp, we're actually found out the shrimp. We're bread in them. We're using a three-step. Big companies with all the respect to all companies that they do, they get it done from their warehouse. So it comes in already frozen. There's machines that have processed.

Machines that have done that. Yes. So I have my team on a daily basis, they sit down and do hundreds of pounds of Bam Bam Shrimp. Bam Bam shrimp is our signature item. And yes, we still connect with the food. We still touch the food. We still clean it. We still cut the tomatoes.

That's all important. We don't get on package. We still cut our own lettuce. That's all important. You know what I mean? And then we were able to do that and still manage to give you your dish and 15 minutes, which is, they know it's crazy. So full circle, your culture, religion, now entrepreneurship, big mo, like, it's all full

circle. It's all energy. Like, you just basically, it's all energy based. Like, everything you just explained is so beautiful because it's like, like, the energy of the person creating the art of feeding someone else is what is you're selling. How does that feel annoying? Oh, man, I had it, I had it a right all along. See, I tell my employees that you have to, you have to connect to what you're doing.

one. Yes, sir. So if you're doing something and you hate it, you need to stop. Yeah. Like, I'll pay you, but you need to stop. Like, stop doing it. If you're not doing it because you want to do it, you're not supposed to. It's even everything, not only food. Because I feel like when you do something that you love, without you knowing, you're going to end up doing it better. But who's going to be able to see that? The consumer, my partners, my clients, my friends, they're going to be able to see that. Am I not able to see that? Because To me, I've done it from my inner side. So it came out so natural to me, but to everybody else, it's going to be special.

And this is what I tell my guys. Like, if you don't like what you do, do it for a short period of time, make some money, save up some money, go do something you love. Even my employees, even my cooks. I tell them that on a daily basis because I do want to create this happy environment inside my kitchens because at the end of the day, I'm dealing with people's food, something that people are consuming. Right on.

So I want to make sure there's love in there. Oh yeah. There's care in there. Oh yeah. There's, you know, consistency. There's a very quality produce and product that we're using. And I'm all beg on that. Right on, dude.

What's next for you now? You're expanding, but I guess what I can ask is, no, let's go for it. How are you, do you feel like you need to expand? So one of the things that we actually, this, this, this, this, this, week I attended the mastermind event with Rudy and the team. Oh, so you know where my big screen went. Of course. It was a very red event and I love it, you know?

When I met Rudy last year at Damon John, he looked at my logo. He's like, okay, it's red. What made you do red? Like, I don't know, man. Like, I was looking at McDonald's. I was looking at KFC. I did some research on the red color, how it attracts people. At the same time, it does not make you sit too long because

somehow your eyes are, you know. So, and then I implemented the yellow inside my logo. So that was done. Sorry. I did not know this stuff. I did not know this stuff. What took me there is the energy. What took me there is the fact that I'm doing it from my heart.

From the source. And it worked out. We're still using the same logo till today, which is amazing. What was the question before that too? Oh, I probably forgot. What's next for you? Like, what is the big next step? Mastermind.

We were talking about the mastermind. Yes, sir. So one of the things that actually was discussed at the mastermind about this week, the way how to build your funnel and your wife and all that. The good stuff. So this is, when Rudy was speaking on stage, I smirked. I'm like, amazing. I did not know this stuff.

However, this is how I did it. I did it backwards. So I established my corporate locations after I established. I established my corporate locations. I gave my employees and the friends that I care about an opportunity to own their own franchise. And this way I'm keeping my secret recipes in house. I'm not given that to anybody that I don't know.

I know who has access to my recipes. That's awesome. I can name them for you. So what I did, I did it this way so I can set a proof of concept. I'm really big on trying something before I actually expanded. actually expand it because I want to see what people think about that before I go crazy. Sure. Okay, maybe in this city people liked my food.

That doesn't mean in Miami, Florida, they're going to like it. That doesn't mean maybe overseas they're going to like it. And that was something I was able to realize, too, when I started traveling more, like, if you go on a trip to Dubai or to Saudi Arabia, there's a lot. I mean, can you imagine Tim Horten sells pizza in Canada? You know, they don't sell pizzas in the Midwest. So that's something. they sell a Halumi sandwich in Qatar.

There's no Halumi sandwich here in the U.S. on the menu. So that's something that opened up my eye because I'm a person that pays attention. You have to be paying attention. As a business owner, as an entrepreneur, if you're not paying attention, that means you're not keeping up with your business. You have to pay attention so you can know what's going on in the industry, what the competitors are doing, so you can implement your way of that. And so I did it back.

And everybody was blaming me for that. My lawyer, my partners, my friends, my family. Like, why are you doing it this way when you can do it a better way? I'm like, okay, but if I do it this way and I fail, God forbid, I'm not going to lose as much as when I go full on and open a hundred location one time. So we implemented the system. We got better with the system.

Today we're getting ready to drop our sauces at big companies, local produce shop, local markets. We're trying to get into Kroger, Meyer, Walmart, you name it. We're working on it. 16 ounce, our signature sauces, eight sauces, Bam Bam sauce, the Asia Sesame, the smoked Chipotle, jalapino. So that was all something that I created from scratch these sauces. And now we got to our point where we copacking them.

So now nobody need to know my recipes anymore. Right on, right? Because I got this company's making them from me. And now my franchisees are going to be able to order it. straight from my food distributor company directly to their location. Wow. So this is where we'll, that method right there will help us expand more. Quickly.

And that method will help us expand the right way. Now we know what mistakes were. Now we know what hiccups we're going to face. Because I've faced these hiccups already with the five locations. You did it the Apple way. Don't be, don't be upset. You did the Apple way. Apple will just stand back and be like, AI, mm-hmm, VR, mm-hmm.

We'll wait, we'll build this crazy technology. We'll focus group. but oh now it's ready for mass market. It only took us eight years while you guys are still keyling each other after 16. You know what I mean? Like I completely good. I think you did it the absolute rate.

Amazing. Yeah, dude. How can people learn more about you? Actually, what are we going to learn about you in your legacy maker's episode? Give us a preview. We're about to shoot your episode in a couple of moments. We're going to learn consistency wins.

Right on. Patience. And you need a whole lot of faith. Yes, sir. So consistency, patience. see patience and a whole lot of faith. And we're going to learn a lot of good stuff. Right on.

And I'm excited for it. Yeah. This is why masterminds and co-chings and leveling up doing episodes like this are important because you mentioned all these wonderful things. But as the good old Jay-Z says, more money, more problems. Yeah. And these problems,

we're in the room with a lot of folks that are- Aren't you glad when you deal with your problems, when you have money instead of dealing with your problems? You create a system. Yeah, yeah, I know. It's a lot of easier to do with problems. I'm getting with my problems when I actually got the money to fix the problem. Because entrepreneurship, people get mistaken sometimes.

In my opinion, it's two things. Money managing? Making decisions. That's it. Everything else everybody can do. Yeah, you're just self-employed. Managing the money and taking that decision to put out that fire, it's the hard part. Yeah, for sure.

Yeah, it's the decision makers. Because when you make that eye contact, it's the unspoken language is like, I'll follow you. whatever you need. Yes. And it's just, done. What do you need, Bubba?

So with that, my friend, how can people learn more about you? Is there a website? Is there a social media handle? Yes. So Big Moose Kitchen

all across, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok. Go to www. www. Bigmoskitchen.com. You can even apply for a,

you can request a donation on there. We do a lot for local communities for our high schools. We do a lot for churches and masks and people that are in our community. We help out a lot. You can, apply to become a franchisee also on that website there's a button and you can check out the

beautiful menu we have right on dude all right and back to that that's a philanthropy is another podcast but that's all energy again you give it back and it'll return uh with that we'll leave a preview uh this is the big mo himself and i am the little regutieres but we are both inside success