Saturday, May 17th, 2025. COMPLEX Family Style Food Festival. Industry City, Brooklyn. — We cleared our calendars at the Knockturnal to hit up Casamigos’ partnered event with COMPLEX for their exclusive summer Family Style Food Festival in New York City, a celebration of food, culture, and community.
The biggest highlight of the day was Casamigo-style margaritas and testing out their fresh take on cocktails. What borough is best suited to bring together the hottest chefs, cult streetwear brands, and all your foodie faves in one cultural mash-up event other than Brooklyn? This live event started at 1 PM and ended at 9 pm in Industry City, with the lines wrapping around the block. Social media influencers, artists, creatives, food enthusiasts, and fans of American social media personality, Food Critic and mixed Martial Artist, Keith Lee, host of the event, waited patiently in line to try the featured restaurants, grab the eats, peep the fits, and enjoy the scene. 
My good friend, Track & Field Trainer, Coach Stephen Gitten, who just completed his half marathon, worked up quite an appetite and accompanied me to the event to help eat all the good grub. We made our way into a private entrance, where we were warmly greeted with special wristbands, issued a complimentary AMEX card for food, and a BITE Card with exclusive spots grab tasty bites at spots like Rockstar Chicken, Regina’s Grocery, and more, to collect free samples from choice vendors, and entry into the VIP section.
Not only were lines wrapped around the entrance outside, but they were wrapped around every single food station and bar. It was evident the guests were eager to get their hands on this infamous Casamigo Margarita. We made our first stop to try the featured drink, CASAMIGOS MARGARITA, the official 2025, summer BBQ and Rooftop drink, blended with 1.5 oz Casamigos Reposado or Blanco, .75 oz fresh lime juice, .5 oz fresh orange juice, .25 oz agave nectar on the rim with equal parts salt, sugar and orange zest, and to top it off, a juicy lime wheel to serve as garnish. Best shaken, not stirred, we got our drinks poured over ice, sipped in the fresh, smooth blend, and promised that if the lines allowed, we would attempt to repeat the visit for a second serving.
With our refreshing beverages in hand, we made our way to Rokstar Chicken and ordered the Sweet Chili flavor. The food and drinks were in such high demand there that the restaurant had run out of the sweet chili sauce. So, we opted for the spicy garlic chicken sauce instead. We were gleefully impressed by the savory boneless chicken, satisfying portions of their honey butter fries, and gently fried dumplings in our handheld bucket that we two-stepped while we ate to the live DJ spinning on the 1’s and 2’s from DJ Venus X.
Deciding that we would get all the food that we wanted to get and then finish it off with another refreshing Casamigo Margarita, we made our way to the second vendor on our BITE card, Regina’s Grocery, which served us up a delicious Italian sausage, sautéed with green and red peppers and onions on a firm baguette. My plus one, still plagued by post-run hunger, had a hankering for more tasty bites.
We hopped over to L’Industrie Pizzeria, Brooklyn’s celebrated Pizza shop, serving up classic old-world slices and pies, with inventive flavor combinations. We grabbed a slice of their popular, delicious Margherita pizza, cantaloupe gelato for him, and a Pistachio gelato, drizzled in olive oil, for myself. Carmen’s, another honorable mention on our food map, served up flavor-packed Beef, Chicken, Black Bean, and Beyond empanadas, in which we richly indulged. We wrapped up our outing with lemon-flavored Italian ices and more pizza from Lucali’s. We were unable to get our hands on Jonny’s pizza to pair with our tasty margarita’s On our way out, we happened upon a surprise appearance from the host, Keith Lee, who waved from the 3rd-floor fire escape above. A great time was had by everyone in attendance.
Honorable mention goes out to the restaurants: L’industrie Pizzeria, Katz’s Delicatessen, Lucali, Russ & Daughters, Bonnie’s, Fish Cheeks, Dhamaka x Rowdy Rooster, Scarr’s Pizza, Win Son, Ayat, Double Chicken Please, Kato (from LA), Kith Treats, Chef Kwame’s Patty Palace, Potluck Club, Nowon, HAAM, Forsyth Fire Escape X Nom Wah, Raku, Soothr, Cosme x Esse Taco, Henry’s Pizza, Regina’s Grocery, Aunts et Uncles, Phoenix Palace, 7th Street Burger, Cellar 36 curated by Hugo, Mendoza, Rokstar Chicken, Losers, Apollo Bagels, Greenberg’s Bagels, Shmackwich, le gaz, Chama Mama, Carmen’s Empanadas, Café Colmado, The Sandwich Board, Rocky’s Matcha, Jonny’s Pizza; curated sounds by: Andre Power, Venus X, Levar (DBA), Va$htie, Odalys; and merchandising collaborators that were present: Awake NY, Verdy, Kids of Immigrants, Billionaire Boys Club, VandythePink, Happy Memories Don’t Die, Barriers Worldwide, Jae Tips, Bricks & Wood, Brigade, Staple, Extra Butter, ButteryPat, Taller da Rafa, Laams, Martine Ali.
