Hi, my name is Matthew! I am the chef/director of NOLA soul located here in Govanhill, Glasgow. I started NOLA with my good friend and chef Ryan. Our focus has always been on producing everything fresh and from scratch - we specialise in making our own milk buns every morning.

After 3 years of hard work and sacrifice from us both, Ryan has decided to move on and I will be continuing, incredibly grateful for all of his hard work.

Our business is successful, I have made my investment back, but the cost of breaking equipment has put me in a situation where I need to ask for help from the local and wider community within which I love being a part of.

A broken two door commercial fridge has snowballed into a lot of work. My kitchen was essentially built around this fridge, so the whole place needs deconstructed to remove and replace it. To my delight, the electrics have been confirmed as unsafe and will need rewired. The flooring around the kitchen needs replaced, and whilst the kitchen is apart, I need to replace a sink that has a leak. My drinks fridge broke aswell, just a week before my two door fridge!

I am a single dad with shared custody of my 3 young children. When I am not running NOLA myself, I am taking care of my kids on my days off. During this time of renovation works, I am closed for business and therefore I am essentially faced with two choices. I can either walk away from this business and work as a chef elsewhere, or I can ask for your help. Upon talks with family and friends, I believe that due to the overwhelmingly positive feedback I have received from guests, there will be enough interest in contributing to keeping NOLA up and running.

I believe enough people within the community would be genuinely crestfallen if I closed and that is why I am asking for your help. For 3 years I have poured everything I have into NOLA, aside from my children this is everything I work for in life. I have worked in kitchens since I was 13, and I have always loved what I do. Being here for the past 3 years has brought me so much happiness and fulfillment. To witness guests enjoying their experience honestly makes me so emotional and it's something I want to continue to do, with all of your much needed support.

Money raised will be directly used to pay for joinery work involving deconstructing and rebuilding the new kitchen, electrical work involving an EICR, a full rewiring and installing new electric sockets in the new kitchen, new kitchen flooring, a new sink to be fabricated and installed, a new two door commercial fridge, a drinks fridge and to help cover my overheads whilst we are closed.

It is my intention once reopened to run occasional community dinners/lunches so I can give back to the community and show my appreciation for those who have helped keep this business running.

I really appreciate everyone's support and want to thank you for taking the time to read this. I know times are tough, so if you can't afford to donate, please instead consider sharing this fundraiser so we can reach the wider community.