Four years after she fulfilled a dream by opening a Jamaican food stand in downtown Syracuse’s Salt City Market , Latoya Ricks is ready to expand.

Ricks plans to open a full-service Jamaican restaurant and bar called Erma’s Bistro by the end of next month. It’s at 325 S. Clinton St. in Armory Square, the location that was occupied by the Modern Malt diner until it closed in February.

Erma’s Bistro is a spinoff of Erma’s Island, which Ricks opened with her mother, Gloria McCubbin, in 2021 . It was one of the Salt City Market’s original food stall vendors.

“It’s exciting to think that we can do so much more,” said Ricks, who emigrated from Jamaica at age 19 and found her first job in Syracuse working at a McDonald’s on Erie Boulevard. “There’s so much good food that we haven’t been a

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