About Us

Born and raised in Ukiah, Molina has been part of the city’s restaurant scene since he was a child. He started working at Lalo’s, which is co-owned by his sister Gaby and brother-in law Lalo, when he was just six or seven years old. He continued working there on and off until he graduated from high school, through its transition from a food truck to a brick-and-mortar restaurant.

The experience gave him a solid grounding in the skills and hard work required to successfully run a restaurant, and inspired him to want to open his own restaurant some day. But then he decided to go in a different direction, if only temporarily.

“Because I was at Lalo’s every day, I sort of started to hate food,” Molina said. “For a while, I didn’t want anything to do with restaurants.”

Instead, he studied criminal justice for a couple of semesters, then attended the Cal Fire academy and got picked up by the organization when he was 18. He spent five seasons as a fireman, although he did continue to work in the family food business in the off seasons.