Body and Soul, a new restaurant at 3015 S. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Blvd. in Lansing serves upscale, southern-style American cuisine.
Head chef and owner, Rev. Freddie Thomas, who also preaches at New Direction Bible Ministries in South Lansing, opened Body and Soul to combine 
his passion for cooking with his ministry. “I decided to try to correlate these two entities together to birth this vision and place that I have called Body and Soul. Feeding the body and soul, that’s how the name came about,” says Rev. Thomas.
Rev. Thomas has been cooking most of his life. Originally from Mobile,
Alabama, his recipes are part family tradition and part southern flare.
Menu options include unusual combinations like chicken and waffles or
spaghetti and wings, the way his momma makes it.
Although the restaurant serves food for the soul, it should not be
mistaken for Soul Food. “Soul food is more of a northern entity,” Rev.
Thomas explains. “In the south [they] take unusual combinations because
they did a lot of leftover mixes. For instance, we have chicken and
waffles, a breakfast and a dinner dish. The southern style of cooking
was always to combine two entrées together as opposed to one meat and
one side.”
Source: Rev. Freddie Thomas, Body and Soul Restaurant.
Suban Nur Cooley, interim development news editor, can be reached here.
All Photographs © Dave Trumpie
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