Dovid Bierer is a talented young man. He just graduated early from Beth Tfiloh, runs a sourdough business and has worked a handful of catering and restaurant jobs in addition to generally being a lover of food.

For that reason, when Kosher restaurant Yossef’s Laffa-milia opened its first physical location this spring, former employee Bierer was asked to come in and try some of the food, as it had done before. A few weeks ago, it asked him again.

But this time, he was welcome to bring a friend.

All of a sudden, Bierer had an idea. “We could make an Instagram [post] out of this to help kosher businesses in Baltimore,” he said.

He also happened to have two perfect friends for the job. Like Bierer, Raphael Eagle and Sammy Franco are entrepreneurial young Jews who love to eat and are funny and sociable enough to do well on camera.

From there, the Instagram and TikTok account Baltimore Kosher Eats was born.

Fast forward a few weeks, and the teens have three full-length reviews up, plenty more scheduled and people stopping them in public to shout out the page and their efforts. What started as a way to help local businesses, wrangle some free food and have fun with each other has turned into a full-on passion project.

“I just thought it would be a small little fun thing we could do, but I was on the other side of town last week and Raphael and I had random people coming up to us and saying ‘you were on my For You page,’” Franco said. “I had a teacher tell me, ‘I went to Yossef’s Laffa-milia because of you.’ We have restaurants commenting on our posts, telling us to review them. That was all only with two videos, so who knows what’s possible.”

Basically, the format is this: the three young men, and occasionally other friends, venture out to a Baltimore kosher restaurant and get a selection from the menu. Out of the three so far — Yossef’s Laffa-milia, a Kosher Dunkin’ Donuts, and Chik’N Dip — some have offered it to the boys on behalf of the publicity, while others have treated them like normal customers. From there, they try the food on camera, crack jokes and recommend what viewers might want to try if they go to a given restaurant themselves.

Likely up next are David Chu’s China Bistro and Tov Pizza, with plenty more to come. The daughter of the owners of Tov Pizza knows the boys, and offered to make the three of them sweatshirts to wear in their videos.

For the three boys, the videos serve a lot of purposes, but in many ways they’re just another way to hang out together.

“They’re not super serious videos,” Bierer said. “People in the community think they’re funny.”

Bierer, Franco and Eagle all get along largely because they all have an entrepreneurial spirit. While Bierer runs his sourdough business, Franco is a successful barber with his own online presence and Eagle sells cologne.

“All of my friends, our parents don’t give us money or anything like that, we’ve all been working since we were young,” Bierer said.

Franco agreed.

“We’re all able to have a good time, but we’re also pretty locked in,” he said.

That combination has allowed the trio to kick off this venture with success, something they hope to continue into the future, even as Bierer goes to Israel next year for an extended period of time. What some would look at as an obstacle, the Baltimore Kosher Eats boys see as an opportunity. During that time, Franco and Eagle will take over the bulk of the duties, with plans of a visit to Israel and reviews of Israeli kosher spots — including any owned by ex-Baltimoreans — are being floated, too.

Bierer said that the Baltimore Kosher Eats story is also one that can serve as a reminder that social media isn’t actually all bad. There’s still positive, lighthearted posts that can be found. While algorithms might aim plenty of negative stuff at someone’s feed, you can always do your part to avoid it, at least somewhat.

“I think a good message could be that it’s all about how you use it, and what you use it for, like you could easily do what we do, and social media could be appropriate, could be healthy, like our account,” he said. “We don’t follow anyone [we don’t know]. If there’s a comment and we want to reply, we’ll reply, but like if someone says something about Gaza or antisemitism, we don’t even think twice.”

Franco said hat the journey that he and his friends are on has been a rewarding one in multiple ways. What started as a fun idea with a seemingly-far off mission has quickly turned into one that is being fulfilled with each and every post.

“We get to help smaller Jewish businesses grow in the Baltimore area. If you live in Baltimore and you’re Jewish, you hear all the time, ‘hey, where should I go to get food from,’ so being able to help people and guide them to restaurants that either need or would love to have that business, it’s pretty great,” he said.

aguckes@midatlanticmedia.com