Chris Gardener grew up in Jamaica and moved to the United States as a young adult. Pursuing a dream of being an airline mechanic proved financially unfeasible, so he turned to his longtime avocation, cooking.
This is to our benefit, which residents of the Hudson area have known since 2023, when Gardener opened Chico’s Caribbean Garden in a stationary food trailer in Greenport, just outside the Columbia County city.
“Business grew so much, I knew I needed more space and to be in a building,” Gardener tells me. He closed in Greenport in August to scout locations, finding one in the former Andy & Sons Importing Co. on Delaware Avenue in Albany. It has been vacant since the Italian import store closed in late 2022 after 65 years…