What Ali Schlichter Taught Me About Building Something From Nothing
The Kitchen That Wasn't Hers Anymore
I met Ali Schlichter, founder of Chin Dribblin' Sauces, at a farmers market, and I loved her sauces before I ever knew her story. That is the thing about food. It gets you first, and the story comes after. Hers is one of the most honest conversations I have had on this show.
Ali spent thirteen years as a professional chef. Pastry, butchery, dishwashing, she has done it all, starting so young she fudged her age at fourteen just to get into a kitchen. But somewhere in all those years spent building someone else's vision, she lost track of her own. Right after COVID, burned out as a head chef, she told me she didn't recognize herself anymore.
A Conversation With a Friend Changed Everything
It took one honest conversation with a friend for Ali to realize she needed something that was hers. She saved fifteen thousand dollars and jumped, with no roadmap and no real idea what she was doing. Passion was the only thing fueling her. In an industry with rising food costs, brutal distribution fees, and consumers watching every dollar, passion turned out to be the thing that kept her at the table when the business side got hard.
Grief Took Everything, Then Gave Her Something Back
About three years ago, Ali lost her mom. In that same stretch of time, she went through her biggest breakup and lost one of her closest friends. She told me she hit rock bottom, and rock bottom is where she learned that fear doesn't hold the same power once you've already survived the worst of it.
Six months after that low point, she was on a plane to London, competing on a Gordon Ramsay show in front of nine million viewers. She beat out roughly three thousand other applicants, had a nerve-wracking moment pitching alongside Lisa Vanderpump, and chose Gordon's team because her mom had always been his biggest fan. Her mom never got to see it happen. Ali is certain she was there anyway.
The Slow Moments Are Where the Breakthroughs Live
What struck me most was Ali calling this her make-it-or-break-it year, and instead of speeding up, she pulled back. She stepped away from a packed market schedule to figure out which moves actually move the business forward. She told me clarity doesn't come from sprinting. It comes from being still enough to think. That is a lesson I needed to hear too.
Do It Afraid
When I asked Ali the quote she comes back to most, her answer was simple: do it afraid. Fear ran her business for the first two years. She stayed small on purpose, unsure she was ready for growth. Then she lost so much of what was holding her together, and on the other side of it, she found out what she was actually made of.
If you want to taste what she built from all of it, her sauces are unapologetically fusion, from a chimichurri she didn't expect to blow up to a spicy pineapple peanut Kung Pao sauce my own family cannot get enough of. Order at chindribblin.com, where shipping is free over fifty dollars, or find her in stores across Colorado and beyond. And if you're building something of your own and need someone who has been in it, Ali welcomes your questions.
Keep dreaming. And never forget, the world always makes way for the dreamer.