Meet the Kitchen Behind Prepd: Jon Evans and Cafe Sonoma

Every Prepd box comes out of one kitchen, and it's worth knowing whose.

Sonoma County to Cape Town

Jon Evans grew up in Sonoma County, California — a place where a relaxed, community-focused lifestyle and great food go hand in hand, and where the shortcut was never on the menu. When love drew him across the globe to Cape Town, he brought that spirit with him.

With over twenty years in the culinary industry, working his way up the kitchen ranks to executive chef, Jon poured a lifetime of experience into creating something special. Opened in 2025 in Roeland Square, Gardens, Cafe Sonoma is a direct reflection of that journey: a warm, welcoming neighbourhood space built on honest food, exceptional coffee, and a room where you can always stay a while.

The Prepd problem

When we first talked about Prepd, the question was never whether Jon could cook the food. It was whether the food could survive the box — cooked on the day, chilled properly, and still tasting like it just came off the pass when you heat it two nights later. That's the problem he's been solving ever since, plate by plate: thirteen so far, more every month, every one of them out of the Sonoma kitchen in the morning hours before the café fills up.

The rule

His rule for the menu is the one we hold every dish to: if he wouldn't serve it across the counter at Sonoma to someone he knows, it doesn't go in the box.

How the kitchen runs on a Prepd day

Orders close at 8PM the night before each delivery day, and a few minutes later the kitchen gets its run sheet — every plate to cook, totalled, plus every order with its window, its swaps and its allergens. Jon's team cooks in the morning, before the café fills, from that one list. Plates with a swap — no dairy, no gluten — are cooked separately and labelled. Everything is chilled fast, portioned, sealed, and packed per delivery window, and the moment a window's boxes are marked packed the drivers are booked.

It's a rhythm that fits a café: production in the quiet hours, service in the busy ones. That's the whole idea behind the Prepd model — a menu that a good local kitchen can cook in its off-peak time, to a standard we set, with ingredients we supply.

Come and see

Cafe Sonoma is at Roeland Square, Gardens. If you collect your Prepd box rather than have it delivered, that's where you'll pick it up — and if you've got a few minutes, the coffee is worth staying for.