Meet the Founder.

I'm 24, born and raised in Los Angeles, but I grew up with one foot in Europe. My mom has Viennese roots and my dad is from the former Yugoslavia, so every summer we returned to visit my grandparents.

Cafés there weren't places to grab coffee — they were where people gathered for hours over dessert, espresso, and conversation. Meals weren't rushed; they were experiences. Long before I ever imagined starting a business, Europe had already shown me what hospitality could feel like.

Ironically, my love of cooking started because my free school lunch disappeared. I attended a private high school on financial aid, and when my brother graduated the lunch benefit disappeared with him. My dad — who I've always believed could have been a Michelin-star chef had he not chosen sound engineering — looked at me and said, "Learn how to do it yourself."

Packing my own lunches turned into experimenting in the kitchen, which turned into a food Instagram called @cookingwithkalaflower, which turned into professional kitchens across Los Angeles — from Le Café de la Plage in Malibu to Tocaya Organica — and eventually UC Berkeley, where I studied Conservation & Resource Studies with a focus in Food Systems, alongside Art.

At Berkeley I managed a co-op kitchen and garden, cooked at UC Berkeley Hillel, taught students to cook through a campus arts space, ran an alternative dining program one summer for campers with dietary needs, and volunteered most Saturdays with Food Not Bombs at People's Park. Food, I learned, is never just what's on the plate.

After graduation I moved to New York City, worked in hospitality marketing, and then in paid media on brands like Laura Mercier, Spanx, and QVC. Eventually I moved home to Los Angeles to pursue my Master's in Information and Data Science at UC Berkeley while working full-time in AI.

But I missed creating things with my hands. Nearly every afternoon I'd work remotely from MUD/WTR and then walk to Dolce Nero for an affogato. One day I asked a barista, "Why don't you serve affogatos?" Nothing came of it. I asked an ice cream shop founder I knew — he said affogatos didn't fit his vision. I couldn't stop thinking about them.

My brother's wedding in Ann Arbor somehow turned into a little European summer, and it reminded me exactly what I'd been missing. Soon afterward I visited my cousin Joey in Båstad, Sweden while he was training at Pensionat Furuhem, and I crafted the very first affogato they'd ever served.

Over the next weeks I traveled through Sweden, Copenhagen, and Vienna tasting every affogato I could find. Some were beautifully traditional. Others reinvented the dessert entirely — one paired affogato with vermouth, another combined beet, raspberry balsamic, and goat cheese ice cream.

In Vienna I visited the Arnold Schoenberg Center — a museum devoted to my great-grandfather, the composer. Walking those rooms I kept thinking about the risks he took — how during much of his life his work was misunderstood, and how he built anyway. Creating something original almost always requires the courage to trust your instincts long before others understand the vision.

I landed back in Los Angeles on June 27, 2026. On the flight home I couldn't stop thinking about affogatos, so I asked the flight attendant for coffee, cream, sugar, salt, and ice, and shook homemade "ice cream" together in a plastic bag somewhere over the Atlantic. I proudly call it the first Mile-High Fogato.

It was not my finest culinary achievement. But it confirmed what I already knew. I had to build this.

Back in Los Angeles, I became obsessed with one question: what would the perfect affogato look like? So I asked everyone — surfers, models, bartenders, corporate professionals, the general manager at U-Haul, a Costco employee, friends, strangers. I wanted to understand what people loved, what they were missing, and how an affogato could become more than dessert.

In less than a month I developed every recipe, designed the brand identity, photographed every drink, built the website, launched our social platforms, filed the LLC, began reaching out to cafés and restaurants across Los Angeles, planned the first pop-ups, and finalized the menu I'd imagined on that plane — the Thaitini, the Strawberry Matchatini, the Espressotini, and our non-alcoholic Butterfly Blue.

Fogato isn't backed by investors, a hospitality group, or a family business. It's built with savings from years of working in food service and marketing, countless late nights, and a community of friends who believed in this dream long before it had a name. A neighbor's kitchen has quietly become our first headquarters. Artists and photographer friends have generously given their talent. Another friend — my unofficial LA furniture plug — has filled our pop-ups with beautiful pieces so I could create the world I imagined long before I could afford it.

I'm leaving my career in AI while continuing my Master's at Berkeley to build Fogato full-time. It's exciting. It's terrifying. And I honestly couldn't be happier.

My dream isn't simply to serve affogatos. It's to create the place I fell in love with growing up in Europe — where dessert isn't the end of the night, but the beginning of the conversation.

I want Fogato to bring together the timeless spirit of European café culture with the creativity, diversity, and optimism of Los Angeles. Somewhere strangers become friends. Ideas are born. Celebrations happen. Everyone feels welcome.

As we grow, I hope Fogato becomes more than a café — a platform that supports shelter cat adoptions, helps ease student debt in meaningful ways, and creates opportunities to bring people together through food.

If you're reading this, thank you for being here at the very beginning. A few weeks ago Fogato existed only as an idea I couldn't stop thinking about at my brother's wedding. Today, it's real. I can't wait to serve Los Angeles — one Fogato at a time.