Maroon Rising: Kwame Onwuachi’s Afro-Caribbean Revolution in Vegas

By DaMarko Webster

Chef Kwame Onwuachi, the James Beard Award-winning culinary force behind New York City’s Tatiana and Washington D.C.’s Dōgon, has set his sights on the West Coast. His latest venture, Maroon, opens at SAHARA Las Vegas, marking not only his debut in the Las Vegas culinary scene but also a bold new chapter in Afro-Caribbean fine dining. Known for blending storytelling with flavor, Onwuachi treats cuisine as a living narrative—one where every dish speaks to ancestry, struggle, resilience, and celebration.

Maroon is more than a steakhouse; it’s a cultural statement. Rooted in the layered flavors of Caribbean cooking, it pays homage to the resilient spirit of the Maroons—formerly enslaved Africans in 17th-century Jamaica who escaped colonial rule and built autonomous communities in the Blue Mountains. In his cookbook My America: Recipes from a Young Black Chef, Onwuachi recounts how these freedom fighters lived off the land, cultivating native herbs like wild thyme and allspice while developing the distinctive jerk technique that would become a hallmark of Jamaican cuisine. That legacy now finds a home on the Vegas Strip, plated with precision and reverence.

“Bringing Maroon, a Caribbean steakhouse, to SAHARA Las Vegas is an incredible opportunity for me to honor my Jamaican heritage, provide exciting flavors, and tell my story to an entirely new audience,” Onwuachi says. “It’s beyond overdue to have more Afro-Caribbean restaurants on the Strip, and I’m grateful for the platform because this will mean so much to so many.” That platform—glitzy, high-stakes, and competitive—becomes a canvas for innovation under Onwuachi’s hands. Maroon blends the raw spirit of the islands with the polish of fine dining, creating something entirely new yet deeply familiar to anyone connected to the diaspora.

Designed with intention and alive with rhythm, the space at SAHARA Las Vegas matches the culinary experience: elegant, bold, and unafraid to take risks. As a standalone within the resort known for its independent spirit and rich history, Maroon carves its own lane in a city saturated with spectacle. Onwuachi, ever the visionary, isn’t just opening a restaurant—he’s building a legacy. This is not fusion; this is future history being plated, one course at a time.