The Glamorous Life of A Restaurant Owner / Restaurateur

Molto Mario and my most Ballsy Decision Yet!

2012-02-20T13:07:00.000-08:00

My bi-polar roller coaster ride continued for years. Ups anddowns, daily struggles and the almost financial ruin was felt weekly. My chefhad moved on and a few others chefs came and went. Some stay for a short jauntwhile others lasted a year or more. Through all of this I finally discovered asilver lining…my innate ability to taste, transform and pair flavors. I wasactually quite good at it -- it came naturally.

I started spending more time dining out and experiencing thefeel and concept other restaurants. I enjoyed talking with many other chefs andtasting their foods. I remained very close with my old chef and we wouldfrequently head into Philadelphia and bounce from one restaurant to the next.Sitting at the bar having a drink or two and trying as many different plates atas our fat bellies could fit. I started to see a whole other culinary world andI was getting hooked.

I invested more time and money into my new-found interest.Each morning my day would start with a cup of Joe and a reading from mycookbook du jour. My collection ofcookbooks and my insatiable thirst for knowledge continued to grow. I neededmore. I seemed to be drawn to flavors of Spain and Italy. My financialsituation didn’t afford me the opportunity to travel and experience thiscuisine on native land….so I turned to Mario Batali (on TV, that is). My DVRwent into overdrive and I recorded every episode of Molto Mario I could find.

I would sit and watch all the different shows as much astime would permit me. I was so intrigued by Mario’s vast knowledge of Italiantraditions and micro regional cuisine. I wasn’t watching for recipes as much asI was watching for a new-found understanding of how the Italian lifestyle workedand its direct correlation to the cuisine. It was my new obsession to learn asmuch about Italy as I possibly couldwithout visiting the country and Molto Mario was a wealth of knowledge crammedinto a half hour.

Meanwhile, I started noticing my latest of many chefs wasburning out. Now was the time. Scared shitless and not very confident I made mymost ballsy decision since deciding to buy a restaurant….I was going to takeover the kitchen!

Smoke and Mirrors

2011-10-20T05:52:00.000-07:00

I was about as clever as they come…or so I thought. The gameof manipulation lies and bullshit can quickly become consuming and verydangerous. I began to live and breathe all the bullshit I was spewing.Non-fiction becomes muddled with fiction, invincibility sets in and you becomesuperman.

My marriage was solid, business was getting better and mykitchen was running great. The new chef was kicking ass, the line cooks were fallingin line and the customers were happy. The menu was streamlined, cost was downand everything was going to be just fine.

Did it really matter that a few lawsuits were being thrownmy way for some outstanding purveyor bills? Absolutely not! I was living in themoment and the moment was good. So what if each week a new major financialissue came up? I would prioritize the issue, finagle my way out of what I couldand paid what was most pressing. Thebest part was no one had any idea what was going on. The staff was verycomplacent and anytime I couldn’t pay them for a few days or they couldn’t casha paycheck, I always had a valid excuse (it was the fault of someone else).

PRIORITY ALERT! Phone company just turned off the phone…noproblem pay the bill, get it back on…tell the staff and customers it was abilling mistake. PRIORITY ALERT! Electric company shut us off.” Just use yourimagination John”…Gas leak we have to shut down for a few days. “Pay the bill,get power restored…move on. No one wasthe wiser because I was so damn clever.

While at work one day I was approached by one of my lineguys. At that time a line kid, just 18 years old. He was a giant, gentle teddybear who stood 6 foot tall, a body builder who also dated one of the kitchenline girls. He was very quiet, usually kept to himself and did his work. Thisparticular day his demeanor was going to be a little different. Without reallyknowing it at the time, he was going to say something to me that would have aprofound effect that I would never forget.

He pulled me aside to chat about some issues. I don’tremember what the argument was about (Probably me not paying him or his girl ontime or a bounced paycheck), but things became pretty heated. This wasn’t thefirst time I had a heated debate with an employee …but it was the first timethat I was exposed for the con-artist I was. As the argument started to settleand nothing was being resolved he said a line to me that to this day we stilljoke about. “John Brandt-Lee, you are all smoke and mirrors” and he walkedaway….Wow so astute for young man…dead on. This super hero just got his asskicked with some verbiage kryptonite! I guess I wasn’t as clever as I thoughtor maybe my staff was that much smarter than I gave them credit for.

The Interview That Changed My Life

2011-08-30T05:47:00.000-07:00

One week after the chef announced that he was moving on and promised to help with the transition, he left me all alone -- on a Friday night. “No call/ no show,” as we say in the business. It’s common in the hospitality industry, but to this day it still boggles my mind. Although it was stressful at the time, I now realize it really wasn’t that big of deal. The chef was useless in the kitchen and didn’t have a good work ethic. Work ethic is something that you either have or don’t and usually can not be taught. He didn’t! After he left us in the lurch, I utilized the staff I had to pull off the weekend the best I could and began my hunt for a new chef.

I placed one ad in the Sunday paper and received about 100 resumes. I started weeding through the deluge of applicants not really knowing what I was looking for. I narrowed the field down to what I considered the 5 best and brought them in for interviews.

I was about the worst possible interviewer. I had limited knowledge of food and how to run a kitchen… let alone a restaurant. I picked what I believed were the best two candidates to come back and cook for me. The first one came in and looked to have what I thought was some nice ingredients. I was excited and invited another friend who was a chef to sit in on the meal and help me judge. I knew we were in trouble at the first course. The chef came to the table to deliver a raw tuna appetizer. As he put the plates in front of us, I couldn’t believe what I saw. The tuna was served in a bowl that had a fishbowl for the base and a live Beta fish swimming around in it. I felt like troglodyte eating raw fish while watching its cousin swim in a cage. Needless to say this wasn’t the chef for me.

The second chef came in on another day and prepared a very solid meal. Although I didn’t feel any real social connection with this person, his skills were good and I believed he was the best choice. Just as I was about to hire him, , I received a few more applications and one did stand out. The name was familiar to me. It was chef that my old chef had spoken about often and I knew he was highly regarded. I figured what could it hurt? So I brought him in for an interview.

He was very refined, charismatic and extremely knowledgeable. We hit it off instantly. He asked me questions that no other chef had asked. He was the first chef to ask about the kitchen and if he could take a tour. Walking around the kitchen he opened and inspected every refrigerator and freezer. In a very thorough but thoughtful and informative manner, he pointed out many of the former chefs short comings. . As he continued his probe I saw him shaking his head in disgust as he found boxes of quick fix mixes and containers of instant bases. He informed me that my former chef worked for him for years and he was very disappointed in how he handled his kitchen.

He finished his tour and we sat back down to chat some more. He told me he had been cooking for years and mentioned some big name French chefs he worked with. He was trying to impress me but I had no idea who they were. He said he was in the middle of a rough divorce and that he had been bartending for the last two years. He was ready to get back in the kitchen and thought that a suburban restaurant would be a good fit to ease back into the scene. I told him my story and how I was stuck in a difficult situation. Then he said something to me that I will never forget. He said “I am not interested in being here long-term. I can only guarantee I will be here for 1 year. But, I will bring you into the kitchen and teach you what you need to know so you won’t get screwed again.”

I had a really good feeling and I decided to have him come back and cook and for my wife and me. He prepared a five course tasting. I don’t remember everything I ate that day, but I do know it was food I had never tried and any ort(remaining crumb)left on the plate was only because I missed it. I remember eating scallops, lobster and oxtail. I remember flavors and textures that blew me away. I remember for the first time being so excited about food I wanted to explore more. I remember the start of new-found passion and a relationship that would grow from applicant to chef to mentor to best friend. Needless to say I was totally enthusiastic about hiring him and beginning a whole new journey.

Screaming and Yelling!

2011-06-01T20:02:00.000-07:00

This is my story of owning a restaurant from Day One. It starts back in 2002 and includes all of my heartaches, triumphs, ups and downs, sacrifices, financial struggles and more.

Fighting a customer in a full dining room had to be the epitome of my frustration -- a frustration that would push me to do some really stupid things. With the chef leaving, my wife pregnant and the restaurant’s first-year anniversary looming, things were looking pretty grim. Every dollar coming in the door was as important as the next. So I decided to no longer honor gift certificates that had been sold by the restaurant’s prior owner. I had accepted his gift certificates for the first year I was open and I felt that was ample time for someone to redeem them. We received no money from the old certificates and I couldn’t afford to give away any more free meals.

It was Saturday night and we had a full house. A server came up to me and said they had a table trying to pay their check with an old gift certificate. I told her to explain to the customer that the gift certificate was not ours, it was from the prior owner and we gave everyone a year to redeem theirs. I said to tell them we were sorry, but unfortunately we could no longer accept them.

The server already had accepted the gentleman’s gift certificate and his credit card to pay the balance of his check. She went back to the table to explain the situation. The guest became irate and asked to speak with management.

My wife, Michelle, approached the table and tried to explain our reasoning for not accepting the certificates. She explained how we received no money for the certificate and that we simply couldn’t afford to take the loss any longer. He didn’t want to hear it, and berated her for embarrassing him. He then proceeded to lectured her on how we accepted the Avalon name and we have to honor all that comes with it. He said he owned businesses in the same town as us and he would never treat a customer this way. My wife, wanting to keep peace, offered to split the difference, stating that we would honor the gift certificate at half its value. This just made him more irate and he absolutely refused to pay anything additional.

I was in the kitchen when my wife and the server came to me and explained what was going on. The server still had the gift certificate and the credit card, so I wrote down the gentleman’s credit card number in the event he left without paying.

I am only 5’5” and I have a severe Napoleon complex. My nickname is “Pesce,” as in Joe Pesce, and I am about to tell you why.

Just as I was writing the credit card number, the customer came through the kitchen doors and said, “Give me my credit card, you little shit.” That was all it took. It was a like a light switch went off. A year’s worth of frustration just boiled over. My chef quitting, constantly robbing Peter to pay Paul, too many sleepless nights, no money, a pregnant wife and now an arrogant customer was calling me a “little sh*t” in my own kitchen. I lost it.

I grabbed the 6-foot man by his shirt, pushed him the through the double swinging kitchen doors into the full dining room and slammed him into a wall. I went off -- he received all my pent-up aggression. The full dining room fell silent and my kitchen staff came running out, scooped me up and carried me off. Everything was sort of blurred and moved in slow motion; it was like being in a movie. Fortunately my staff had grabbed me before I punched him. All I remember of the actual fight was me yelling, the fear in the man’s face and his wife screaming.

I never received a dime from that table. The man from the table called the next day to try and reason with me. He wanted to pay his bill (less the gift certificate). I refused his money, telling him we would have to agree to disagree. I never saw him again.

This was just one of the many stupid moves I would make over the years. I don’t adhere to the policy that the customer is always right, but in this case I pissed off a table over a $75 gift certificate and ended up with no money. I embarrassed myself in front a full dining room and sent four customers out my front door with a bull horn screaming, “this place sucks!”

Floundering & Prophecies

2011-05-17T20:35:00.000-07:00

This is my story of owning a restaurant from Day One. It starts back in 2002 and includes all of my heartaches, triumphs, ups and downs, sacrifices, financial struggles and more.

Confused, overwhelmed, exhausted, fat, tired, in debt and just plain looking like shit… I didn’t know where to turn. I had done everything my chef asked me to do. I brought the right people in for training, I worked very hard to make this place successful and yet I continued to struggle. For the first time I had no real sense of direction.

At this point the restaurant was opened 6 days a week and my only day off was Monday. My wife’s verve and ability to stay true to the course hadn’t wavered. Her faith in me was immeasurable and she was always there for support. We had three children who had sacrificed so much and I was about to ask for more….Sunday brunch. Eggs, bacon and pastries…how could we go wrong with that.

I can safely say that I had not one fan of this decision – not family, not staff. After lots of convincing it was time to open up for our first brunch. We had a simple menu that was a combination buffet and sit down ordering. You could order appetizers and entrees while enjoying a buffet table of pastries, fruit salads, and breads.

I was there at 7:30 a.m. excited and ready to go. The staff was instructed to arrive at 8:30 a.m. and brunch was set to start at 10. I spent an hour or so creating a beautiful buffet table with multi level displays and fresh cut flowers. As the rest of the staff slowly arrived, most were late and partially hung over, but functional -- everyone except the chef. When he finally arrived he looked pretty banged up and not ready to cook at all. The biggest indication was when I found him fast asleep on the dirty kitchen floor. I nervously laughed and woke him up. Looking back I find it hard to be believed that I was that submissive with this chef. I had balls of steel and never did I take someone’s shit. But when it came to chef, my lack of restaurant knowledge created real insecurity. I later found out he and some of the servers were out partying pretty hard ‘til 3 a.m. He showed up at one of the server’s houses at 7 a.m. still drunk. He hadn’t slept and asked her to make sure she kept me away from him.

But, the show must go on and with the helf of my other “inmates” – it did. The first table was seated and I noticed it was a well known, local French chef. He had somewhat of a celebrity status in the Philadelphia area and was considered one of my competing restaurants. I informed his server to make sure special attention was given and service was spot on. It was important to me that a good impression was made. My ego could really use a boost and a well known restaurateur and chef giving the nod of approval was just what the doctor ordered. As I stood at the table saying hello, my hung-over server grabbed his bottle Dom Perignon champagne and proceeded to open it. As she “popped” the cork the champagne started spewing everywhere. She stood stupefied, like Hermione just hit her with a spell in a Harry Potter movie. The now clearly annoyed French chef quickly reacted. Grabbing his glass and holding it under the now fountain of champagne in order to save any he could. Over a quarter of the bottle had spilled to the floor before the champagne geyser stopped. It was the ultimate in embarrassing moments. As I stood there red in the face I tried to make light of the situation with a nervous laugh as I helped clean up. The chef gave a smirking “it’s ok” smile (which was clearly a “ leave me the hell alone” smile). I felt the pit of my stomach rise to the back of my throat and with my tail between my legs I headed to the kitchen. As if spilling his champagne wasn’t bad enough, we were now going to serve him food that the inmates prepared --since my chef was basically propped up in a corner of the kitchen and useless. At the end of the meal he was somewhat polite. He never said anything bad, but was clearly not impressed, at all. I am sure it made him feel quite elated to go into his competitor’s restaurant, have his champagne dumped on the floor in front of the owner and then be served sub-par food. I sat thinking to myself, “Could life really get any worse than this?”

Brunch wasn’t the answer. If I had a bigger budget for advertising (any budget really) and the ability to sustain food and labor losses for a few months it could have been successful. Unfortunately I was not in that position and my already profusely bleeding restaurant took another hit. Another small vein was now bleeding weekly. Suffering from costly additional payroll and wasted product.

And then, another prophecy: My chef gave his 2 weeks notice and my wife gave me 37 weeks notice – she was pregnant.

Relieved, Excited & Scared

2011-04-25T17:53:00.000-07:00

This is my story of owning a restaurant from Day One. It starts back in 2002 and includes all of my heartaches, triumphs, ups and downs, sacrifices, financial struggles and more.

So I knew that The Philadelphia Inquirer’s food critic had been in the restaurant, but had no idea what he thought, or how many bells he would give the restaurant. I felt relieved, excited and scared. A few weeks later, I was in the restaurant on a Saturday morning doing some clean up. The phone kept ringing with people making reservations. I was confused, but happy for the business.

Then, a colleague called to discuss my review in the paper. I didn’t know that it was coming out that day. And the bastard wouldn’t tell me what it said! I dropped what I was doing and ran to the nearest drug store for an early copy of the Sunday paper, but no luck. Two stores later, I finally found it.

Hallelujah! We earned two bells, the equivalent of “very good.” The worst thing it said was that we were young, stiff and we tried too hard. There were a few nods to the food and a couple pokes (every review has to have a poke.) For the most part, it read very nicely and was enough to entice new business.

I was relieved, I was excited and I was scared. From what I heard, a review like this meant a restaurant would be packed for weeks. Every night would be like a Saturday, for a month. This was just the economic boost we needed.

I thought all my hard work was finally going to pay off. The entire puzzle was now in place: new menu covers, new menu items, re-designed dining room and lots more staff. I had experienced at least one super-busy holiday failure and I had a professional consultant properly train my waitstaff. This was my time to shine.

Well, the clouds must have been out that day. Although the review did bring in business (more than we had ever seen), only a fool could truly believe that one review and a month of increased business was going to erase an entire year of failure. By late October, the review buzz had died down and business was back to normal (my kinda’ normal, read previous posts to understand.) Dinner business was so-so, we stopped serving lunch and each month I struggled to keep the lights on.

It was 4 a.m. on a Sunday when my cell phone rang, and I knew this couldn’t end well. It was one of the tenants who lived above the restaurant. He said there were people inside the restaurant and it sounded like a party. Since the restaurant was alarmed and monitored, I knew it was someone with a key and the code. I arrived only to find my drunken chef, a few other line cooks, a bunch of girls from a bar and multiple lines of cocaine laid out on the kitchen cutting boards. It was at this moment I knew my new idea -- Sunday brunch -- was going to be a problem …

Serving The Food Critic

2011-04-09T04:39:00.000-07:00

This is my story of owning a restaurant from day one. It starts back in 2002 and includes all of my heartaches, triumphs, ups-and-downs, sacrifices, financial struggles and more.

With my apron tied around my waist and my kitchen staff quaking in their clogs, I opened the restaurant for lunch. It was the summer of 2003 (when I was robbing Peter to pay Paul) and I had the bright idea that that we needed to start serving lunch. I figured lunch would answer all our problems. It increased our hours of operation; therefore, it increased our potential revenue. I needed an extra set of hands in the kitchen, so I figured this would be the perfect time for me to learn a little about cooking.

I am not going to go into a long, drawn-out story about lunch other than to say this: It’s a slippery slope. On the surface, it makes sense for struggling restaurants to open for lunch. But, when a restaurant already isn’t filling its seats and is having cash-flow issues, extending the work week to six days means the restaurant is overextending itself in the hopes of making money. It’s just not a good business plan. I quickly learned this when I started paying increased payroll, buying extra product and paying higher heating and air bills, just to fill a few seats. It didn’t come close to covering my costs. Also empty seats are almost a sure sign of larger problems … poor service, bad food, bad location, etc.

I’ve since learned that the key to success boils down to what I call “penning.” Penning is creating demand by being open fewer hours – not more hours. The 10 covers you lose on an off night will be offset by the decrease in your overhead. Plus, by moving some of your potential off-night reservations to open nights, you will create a fuller dining room filled with buzz.

But I didn’t know that back in 2003. I remember one day serving lunch with no server and no kitchen staff. I would go to the table take the order and then go in the kitchen, cook it and serve it. Talk about being over extended and cutting corners! Fortunately for me, we averaged only about four covers day. But one lunch shift sticks out more than any other. I was in the kitchen once again cooking by myself (even though I barely knew what I was doing), when my server came to me and said there was a strange gentleman eating in the dining room by himself. The man sat alone in an empty dining room reading a book and taking notes. He politely told the server he didn’t like his table and asked if he could move to another one. Then, he ordered quite a few courses. For the most part he just stayed to himself. My server said, “There is something about this guy; I just can’t put my finger on it.”

A few weeks later, that server came to me and said the phone was for me and “you are not going to believe who it is… The Philadelphia Inquirer’s food critic.” I instantly turned white, remembering the single man taking notes during lunch. I picked up the phone for a grueling one-hour interview. Although I turned out the chef’s food for lunch, I knew so much was riding on this interview -- what I said and what I cooked!

The interview went well (in my opinion) and he was very nice on the phone. After he was done with me, he interviewed the chef and set up a time for photos. He never once gave an inkling as to whether he enjoyed his meal. He left us a nervous, confused mess. We had to wait four endless weeks for the review to come out. We knew that his review could make or break the restaurant. The Philadelphia Inquirer uses a bell system, with four bells being the best. How many bells for Avalon? You will have to wait and see…

Robbing Peter to pay Paul

2011-03-09T08:51:00.000-08:00

This is my story of owning a restaurant from day one. It starts back in 2002 and includes all of my heartaches, triumphs, ups-and-downs, sacrifices, financial struggles and more.

In a college town like West Chester, Penn., where Avalon is based, most everyone goes home for the summer, making it a slower time for businesses. It was 2003, and we had been running our new menu for a few months. The response from customers seemed pretty good. Weekdays were still very slow, but weekends were consistently busy. To me, the kitchen still seemed rushed, but I managed to convince myself that this was the norm for the profession.

The restaurant’s financial situation, however, was a whole different story. Every day was critical and there couldn’t be any missteps. You see, my new business model was to rob Peter to pay Paul, pay Peter back tomorrow, then rob him again the same day. It was like living the life of an embezzler: You can never look away, not even for a second; you must always be two steps ahead of everyone else, and never a day off. One bad weekend of business and I could be finished.

Each day started with me getting out of bed, grabbing a cup of coffee and running to my computer. I logged into my bank account, not to see how much money I had but to see how negative my account was. I would look to see what checks were being presented to my account that day. Then, I would decide which checks I could afford to let bounce and which ones meant I needed to run to the bank and make a deposit to cover. I quickly became a master of banking (for people with no money, that is.) I learned which banks gave me extra time by re-depositing bounced checks twice (this means I give you a check, you deposit it, it bounces but your bank gives me a second chance before letting you know.) I also made sure I befriended the right branch personnel, so I could make deposits in the morning after the checks were presented and get the bank to still pay them.

Each day I would take the money from the prior night’s receipts and make a deposit. This was usually enough to get my checking account just on the positive side. The next day, new checks would again drain the account to a negative amount and I would repeat the process all over again. If I wanted the checks to bounce (because I knew they would get re-deposited a second time and I could use the money for something else) I would make the deposit later in the day, after the checks were returned. This way, I could use the little money I had for the most gain.

Oh yeah, did I mention that the bank would charge an additional fee of $30 per bounced check? At 5 or 6 checks a day, that added up.

This is a perfect example of how desperation in this business causes you to live in the moment. How we can easily end up in vicious cycles that cause us to be blind to a much bigger picture. I would manage each day to get new product in the doors, pay checks with no or very little money and never think twice about paying almost $2,000 a month in overdraft bank fees. My own solution was creating a much bigger problem. With one week of really bad business, the domino effect could be devastating.

Each day presented a new battle that I needed to overcome. I would revel when Saturday morning arrived. You see, Saturday had everything to offer: No checks are presented to the bank over the weekend, the electric and phone company won’t shut off service on those days and most importantly, I would receive a small cash injection that would (hopefully) get me through another week.

By Monday morning, after finishing my weekday banking routine, I’d be wondering why business was so good over the weekends and so slow during the weekdays. My food must be good, otherwise why would so many people come on the weekend? I realized that I needed something to boost the business, something that would bring in more business during the week. I needed that extra cash injection that would break this cycle and free me from the jail I was living. Some type of quick fix. Later that day my prayer may have been answered. I received a phone call from Philadelphia’s most important food critic….I was being reviewed!

In addition to being an irreverent blogger, John Brandt-Lee is chef/owner of Avalon Restaurant in West Chester, Penn.. Don’t worry, over the past 9 years, he’s learned many lessons and grown into a successful restaurateur. He just announced that he’ll be opening a second restaurant, Avalon’s Pasta Bistro, in Downingtown, PA in the Spring of 2011. Keep reading for more about how he went from a clueless restaurant owner (in 2002) to a thriving restaurateur, today.

Gotta Have Hand

2011-02-16T04:21:00.000-08:00

From Seinfeld:
George: She has the hand; I have no hand. How do I get the hand?
Jerry: We all want the hand. Hand is tough to get. You gotta get the hand right from the opening.

That quote from Seinfeld shows sums up my relationship with my chef. Not knowing where to turn after I nearly lost my restaurant in a sheriff’s sale, I decided to have a sit-down with him. Let me first say that attempting a sit down with no balls, no plan and basically no clue is a bad idea. You can’t confront someone and hold them accountable without pure confidence in what you’re saying. Otherwise, you put yourself in a position to be quickly manipulated.

To any seasoned restaurateur, the kitchen is a really good place to start when trying to fix a huge debt-to-income ratio. To a newbie restaurant owner like me, running a cost-effective kitchen was a tremendously difficult task -- almost impossible to complete when we couldn’t even keep our kitchen clean!

But I was desperate to get my restaurant on track and could feel my frozen blue lips slipping beneath the surface. I didn’t know how to fix the problems. Unfortunately, I was seeking advice from the core of the problem itself, the chef. Our conversation started with a careful explanation of the situation. I said we were bleeding financially and we couldn’t pay the bills. I asked for his suggestions for fixing the problem. Like a dummy, I just opened myself for manipulation-- I gave him “hand.” Instead, I should have said, “Your kitchen is a screwed-up mess, your staff is disorganized and every night the trash cans are filled with usable product. This is completely unacceptable, especially while I am taking one call after another asking for the money that you just threw away.”

Once again my lack of experience left me in a position of ignorance. The chef turned to me with a smile. He said the menu and the restaurant were too big for the number of staffers we had. He said we needed to redefine who we were. He said we needed a new menu and that we needed to update the décor. In my head I was thinking, “You have got to be kidding me! This restaurant is in the crapper. I can’t pay the bills and you think increasing payroll, buying some new decorations and a smaller menu are going to fix the problem?” But not having an answer of my own, I moved forward with his ideas.

So, I buried my head in the sand. I borrowed some money from bank Italiano (let’s just say cash in a brown bag from Vito), changed some decorations, bought new menu covers and brought an extra set of hands into the kitchen. Now it was time to unveil the chef’s new menu, and if all of the calculations were correct …. problem solved!

The Sheriff Wants to Sell my Restaurant for Me

2011-01-20T08:13:00.000-08:00

No tourniquet could possibly be big enough to save the restaurant from the geyser of blood spilling out and its impending doom. Although business was good on the weekends, the weekdays were slow and the debt continued to mount. It was August 2003, a little over a year into my new venture and more money was going out than coming in -- never a good business model. As I switched from one purveyor to another (leaving a large un-paid balance with each) I found new ways to justify my blind eye to the current financial state. Payment plans extended some time, followed by COD deliveries and lastly payment with bad checks. I pushed the envelope for as long as possible before being cut off. As a personal justification to never paying, I would initiate a fight mounted with lies, stiff them on the bill and just kept trucking along, self blinded.

As time went by and I continued to fool everyone (mostly myself), I noticed the game began to get harder. Did purveyors actually correspond with one another? Did they discuss their accounts -who was good pay and who was a deadbeat? Did Joe’s Fish Company tell Billie’s Produce market that I gave them a stiff one and then told them to go screw themselves. YES THEY DO! And, one day while sitting at the restaurant two deputies from the sheriff’s office came walking through my front door. I cordially said, “Hello” and they cordially said, “You have been served.”

I wasn’t concerned that my restaurant was being offered on the public auction block for a $15,000 seafood bill. I thought that with a phone call, some money down and a payment agreement we could have this matter resolved quickly. Far from the truth…I had finally met my match. I wasn’t dealing directly with the purveyor anymore but rather a collection lawyer who worked for all the purveyors. He was good at what he does. We exchanged a few phone calls and tried to come to a resolution. (I didn’t have nearly enough money to pay the debt off.) During one phone call he said “Mr. Lee, you have one week to come up with the money and, as a courtesy, I won’t call any of my other clients and let them know they shouldn’t sell you anymore….see you at the sale.” I can probably count on one hand the amount of times the words “me” and “fear” had come out of my mouth in the same sentence.

My encounter with this lawyer was one of the most pivotal moments in my career as a restaurateur. He used tactics I was unfamiliar with and they scared the shit out of me. With a sheriff sale looming just days away I began to beg borrow and steal (by steal I mean robbing Peter to pay Paul) as much money as possible to offer some sort of payment. I didn't come up with nearly enough, but the lawyer was willing to work out a payment arrangement (something I now think he knew all along he would do) and finally let me off the hook -- 24 hours before the sale. Never had an affirmation been so clear…I was a bad and blinded businessman. I needed to re-evaluate my entire business model in order to stop the bleeding. I needed to change my business practices in order to restore my reputation. So I called every purveyor, apologized, and made what I thought could be affordable arrangements to pay them all back. Some hung in there with me and some told me to go screw myself. My inexperience could no longer be a crutch, things needed to be fixed—fast! But was I already in way too deep?

Time to Take Off the Rose-Colored Glasses

2011-01-10T05:01:00.000-08:00

“…I screwed myself—and, eventually, had to work hard to get un-screwed. And I am not going to tell you how to live your life. I’m just saying that I got very lucky. And luck is not a good business model.” – Anthony Bourdain

Anthony Bourdain was talking about his drug addiction when he said that, but in my life, this quote applies to the bad business decisions I made early in my career as a restaurant owner. I now know that with some of my decisions, I screwed myself, and like Anthony, I was using luck as my business model.

Despite our Valentine’s Day disaster, we were able to get our act together and run a functioning dining room. But we were already in a financial hole, and the slower summer months were now upon us. I was lucky enough to have the opportunity each day to keep my restaurant open, but it was definitely time to clean up the business model and stop the bleeding … time to get un-screwed. I had made some bad decisions and owed quite a bit of money. I needed more money to continue to run my business. Purveyors were starting to give me crap, and keeping fresh, new product coming through the door was a real challenge. Making sure my employees remained calm became as important as making sure the mounting debt went away.

Unfortunately, with my lack of restaurant experience, I had absolutely no idea where to start. The businessman who sold me the restaurant (to whom I made a large, late mortgage payment every month) suggested I look at the kitchen. He said he noticed it was extremely disorganized and I had lots of money -- via spoiled product and usable scraps -- going in the trash. “That is your money being thrown away and one of the main sources of your bleeding,” he said. My kitchen did always seemed to be scrambling, still prepping when the first customers were seated for dinner, running out of product and, well, simply put… always in the weeds.

On a typical Saturday night, we served an average 80 covers with four people in the kitchen. It was like watching a human tornado. Sauces splashed all over the place, sheet pans were thrown all over, dirty sizzler platters, wrappers and papers were everywhere. If it could be thrown, crumbled or squished, it was on the floor. Even cigarette butts.

For two blurry hours the staffers ran frantically, always two steps behind. Customers’ emotions were mixed. Some were happy, some were quiet and some complained. In the end, everyone received average service and food at best, yet, the staff felt great. The general consensus each night was that we’d won the battle and lived to serve another night. Unfortunately, I believed this too.

When Saturday dinner service was complete and everyone was coming down from the high of dinner rush, the line cooks would give the equipment a quick scrub-down (stepping over the immense pile of refuse and dirty pans on the floor), do a half-assed wrap-up of the remaining product and rush out the door to find the next high. Then, after everyone was gone, I would watch a Mexican guy use a push broom to clean the kitchen line for $8 an hour. He would work meticulously while shaking his head in disgust. His objective, non-jaded view allowed him to see things clearer than the owner, even though he didn’t speak English. If I took off my rose-colored glasses, I would see what he saw … a screwed up restaurant!

But this was all I knew; this was how I thought a kitchen was run. Customers seemed to be happy - for the most part – and I had a good, capable chef. So why would I think otherwise? We may have won the battle, but the war was just beginning and my luck was running out.

Valentine's Day more difficult than we had anticipated

2010-12-30T09:10:00.000-08:00

The date was, February 14, 2003 - Valentine’s Day, an extremely busy restaurant day. This would be our first really challenging shift as restaurateurs.

We had only owned the restaurant for a few months and after hiring our new chef and kitchen staff, my wife and I were busy concentrating our efforts on making sure the main dining room ran properly. We quickly realized this was going to be more difficult than we had anticipated. We needed help. Our chef knew of someone who had been in the business for years, worked in the big city and was willing to come out a few nights a week to give us some pointers. Wow! After just one visit we learned that everything we thought was right -- was wrong. “Why are your servers carrying dirty glasses through the dining room with their fingers in them, gross? Do you know your servers are not supposed to take bottles of wine away from the table? Your server just introduce himself by saying you guys, does he know that the person with the make-up isn’t a guy? Do your customers always eat their dessert without utensils?” Let’s just say we really needed the help!

So with our big night ahead, a couple months of training, and a new kitchen staff, we were ready to take on Valentine’s Day-- the busiest restaurant night of the year. We had been a little slow the past few weeks and could really use this boost in business. I set the prices higher than normal (‘cause this is what we restaurants do on holidays), prepared a limited menu, added lots of tables for 2 in the dining room and booked twice the number of reservations we had ever had in one night before. My wife was dressed to the nines, a large beautiful flower arrangement was delivered for the dining room along with 12 dozen long stem roses to give away to the lady customers and everyone was excited about the prospect of an evening of really good revenue. Everything was perfect! What could go wrong?

The first customers started coming promptly at 5:30. They were greeted and seated, handed menus and roses, and everyone was very happy. Then 6:00 came and more people came and then 6:30 lots more and 7:00 so many more that the greeting and seating had stopped. The line of people waiting was growing out the door and down the block and people weren’t so happy anymore.

Servers were now becoming frazzled. The emphasis became getting customers out and tables reset, rather than taking care of the ones who were seated and still eating. It was a domino effect that just kept spiraling out of control. By 8:00 the line was down the street. My wife was hyper-ventilating in a brown paper bag (this is true, she couldn’t face another angry customer yelling at her). The beautiful flower arrangement was knocked to the floor and smashed by an angry mob by the front door trying to find out when they would be seated. Most customers who were waiting ended up leaving and the few that were seated were so angry that there was no pleasing them.

Later, as I sat having a few drinks and smoking what by now would have been my second pack of cigarettes of the day, I pondered the evening. I was angry at everyone’s mistakes and how poor the night went. I thought was a strong leader keeping everyone directed and the chaos to a minimum. As both my adrenalin and rage decreased I realized that this was far from the truth. In actuality, I was afraid, screaming at everyone else to do the things that I either didn’t know how to do or was scared to do. I didn’t want to deal with an angry mob waiting to be seated, so I said I was too busy & yelled at my wife and told her to do it. I should have taken a stand, humbled myself, made some quick platters of hors d’oeuvres, and gone to the front door. I should have listened, said I was sorry and that the wait was going to be a bit, that we had screwed up. I should have said, enjoy these hors d’oeuvres and we will be with you as soon as we can. Instead I was a coward who sent my wife in to do the dirty work, un-armed no less.

It wouldn’t be until years later that I would learn a valuable lesson from the night. A lesson that would help me to grow from a restaurant owner to a restaurateur. I realized that being a restaurateur is so much more than just owning a restaurant. It means taking personal responsibility for the quality of your staff, service and food. I can’t think of better demonstration of the golden rule (Do to others what you would like to be done to you). I learned that being a restaurateur is being a leader and your staff is a direct reflection of you and how you treat them.

Our First Menu

2010-12-28T06:45:00.000-08:00

Take a ton of money, ask someone to give you two quick kicks to nuts, grab the money and throw it out the window. Take two aspirin, apply ice and repeat in the morning. This is the best analogy I can come up with to describe my experience creating the first menu from our newly crowned chef.

Running a small BYOB restaurant can present many challenges, one of the biggest being food cost. Not that designing the menu isn’t difficult for a restaurant serving alcohol, but for a BYOB, not having those extra points from alcohol profits means labor cost and food costs have to be dead-on at all times. This is a simple concept to grasp now -- eight years later -- however, back then, building a house with some nails, a hammer and some two-by-fours would have been an easier concept to understand. So once again, with my lack of knowledge, big ego and immense stupidity, I sat down with my new chef to create a menu.

Let me preface this with a clear understanding of what style menu we were already serving. Oh wait, it wasn’t a style, it was a cop out: American continental, aka the ubiquitous term used by every chef/restaurant owner who really hasn’t honed in on a concept or style of cooking. It includes wonderful sliced prime rib (king and queen cut, of course) or a chicken roulade with spinach and goat cheese, maybe something Italian, like a pescatore or scaloppini of some sort. We would round out this “beautiful” presentation with a superfluous garnish, such as an inedible orchid and a beautiful carrot and parsley confetti strewn all over the rim of the plate (They aren’t teaching this style of presentation at cooking schools anymore...right?). The menu was huge, but easy. Everything was served with mashed potatoes and a mixed veggie, and a special sauce that started with a roux or Minor’s chicken base. It was old, it was stuffy and it was all I knew. This was what a good restaurant meal was to me.

Before all you chefs from the ‘80s who are now teaching at cooking schools get your thongs in a bunch and fire nasty comments at me, let’s get a few things clear. I know this style of cooking had its place once, and that it even made a little comeback as comfort food. I am also aware that celebrity chefs like Jose Garces have opened restaurants using the term American Continental. But, I can assure you, they all have morphed into more modern concepts with an emphasis on home-style cooking that not only has foundation, but also their creative twists.

Back to my meeting with the chef. He brought me a menu with about six appetizers, two salads and maybe eight entrees. I looked at it and said to myself, I have no idea what any of this shit is. Where is the fowl section? (I actually spelled it “foul” on my first menus) The meat section? Where are all the choices? What the hell is a hanger steak and why isn’t there a filet mignon (served six different ways?) I know this guy was from the city and he did a more French menu but to me, this was just unacceptable. I needed more choices, more variety more…..American Continental! The stinger was when he told me that I shouldn’t be showcasing a dessert tray to tables. He said that this was a fine dining establishment with white tablecloths…not a diner. He said we needed to make a dessert menu. So I ordered some menu sleeves and printed DESERT MENUS (Yes, I spelled dessert with one “S” on my early menus too – which was pretty embarrassing when a customer asked if it meant that all the desserts were dry).

After a few go-rounds, we agree on a menu that was about 25 percent smaller than what I wanted but was about 50 percent bigger than the chef wanted. Now, it was time to unveil the menu and learn some very, very valuable lessons about food costs, labor costs, cross utilization and sheriff sales! I would say “good luck to me,” but looking back there isn’t a triple seven anywhere that would have helped me from going through the hell I was about to go through.

No Chef...No Clue...No Shit!

2010-12-28T06:41:00.000-08:00

So there I was: no chef … no clue … no shit! I was handed a restaurant with no papers signed, had just fired my drunk chef (with no replacement) and really had no clue as to what I was supposed to do moving forward. Anyone with even a small amount of restaurant knowledge would have said I was doomed … period. Fortunately for me, my one really good attribute is my ability to make things work under pressure. The more pressure there is, the better I seem to perform. Just to be clear, I am not saying that living a stressed-out life, always being two steps behind and doing daily tasks that have to be done because they were yesterday’s priority is a smart way to live. But I will say as a small, independent restaurant owner who wears many, many hats and is very involved in his business … this is just the way it is.

So new restaurant owners, be wary, because you’re going to be weary. With that being said, and the pressure on, I set up a kitchen meeting. In my meeting I learned that one of the line cooks had worked at Le Bec Fin, a nationally acclaimed Philadelphia restaurant run by legendary Chef Georges Perrier. The line cook was made the sacrificial lamb and given the reins for that night’s service. I told him to continue to execute the same menu while I interviewed for a replacement chef.

My ignorance was already showing through loud and clear. Could I have been more insulting to this cook? I didn’t think to offer him the job or, at the very least, give him the opportunity to interview. Because of my lack of restaurant experience, I didn’t realize that someone working in a Georges Perrier kitchen for over two years would learn 10 times more than he would have learned at a culinary school. Ironically, now, eight years later as a self-taught chef, I prefer applicants who have not attended culinary school. Now, when I am interviewing chefs, I am more interested in where they worked and what chef they worked under. And, I am always impressed when I see that someone has stayed at one place for more than two years. I, quite possibly, had the perfect diamond-in-the-rough with this kid and because of my ignorance as a restaurant owner, I never offered him the opportunity to shine.

After several very disappointing interviews, I decided to ask a local chef/owner if he knew of anyone. He said his girlfriend had been running his catering business for a couple years and he thought she was ready. I liked these people. I frequented their restaurant and used the catering services and although I was a meat and potatoes guy with an extremely limited palate, I enjoyed their food. For the interview, I asked the girlfriend to come to the restaurant to cook three plates for four of us-- the former owner, his sister-in-law, my wife and me. I can’t remember what she made, but I do remember the meal was hit-or-miss. At the end of the meal she said she didn’t feel good about what she served. She claimed that the ingredients in the kitchen were not high quality and that she would like the opportunity to cook for us again at her boyfriend’s restaurant on a night he was closed.

As we have since learned watching cooking reality shows, a good chef could walk in a 7-Eleven and make a decent meal, but we agreed to the rematch and set a date for the following week. We invited six people. On the morning of the tasting, the former owner called me and said he would like to bring four more guests and told me I should ask if we could increase the tasting from six people to ten people. I finally was able to get in touch with her sometime mid-afternoon and she politely said she would not be able to accommodate the request because she was already preparing everything and didn’t have enough food. To me, this seemed very reasonable… but the former owner was outraged. “If she can’t bend for four more people, how could she possible run your kitchen?” he said. “I wouldn’t even bother going to the tasting - it would be a giant waste of time.” Once again, “Svengali” had spoken and his restaurant experience trumped my lack of. Feeling horrible, I made the call and told this poor girl that if she didn’t make the dinner for ten we were not coming. Now she was outraged and basically told me to go &%$# myself. Eight years later, we’re only just back on speaking terms.

With no hope of finding a good chef and no real contacts to reach out to, I was relieved when the kid running the kitchen came to me and said he had a friend I should talk to. The following week, I met with his friend and did a tasting. His food was very good. I particularly remember a dish of figs wrapped in prosciutto, grilled and served on a bed of greens drizzled with balsamic reduction. The plates looked stunning, and eight years later, I still remember that he came empty handed and utilized only the products in my kitchen. He was hired on the spot.

Interviewing staff is one of the hardest parts of owning a restaurant. Looking back, I think we handled the situation poorly but in the end in it worked out -- at least for that moment. You’ll have to wait for my next posting to see what happened next.

Never Let Them Have You By The Balls!

2010-09-29T12:42:00.000-07:00

“Never let them have you by the balls!” That’s what a friend, who owns several restaurants, said when I first bought the restaurant in 2002. Back then I wasn’t 100% sure what he meant, in the years to come, it was definitely a lesson I would learn many, many times over. You definitely need to learn how to do every job so no employee can ever have you by the balls!

As I was standing in the dining room of the restaurant I had just bought, staring at my drunken chef on the floor, barely conscious, I realized that this was one of those moments. Chef knew that the former owner had no one else who could cook his food, so he did whatever the hell he wanted. He had the world by a string, or at the very least, the owner by the balls. It was at that moment I made a quick decision (one of many self-destructive, impulsive decisions I would make over the years). I walked over to where my drunken chef was sitting, and told him, “I now own the restaurant and you’re fired!” Over the years, I have learned the consequences of impulsive decisions and the benefits of taking your time, finding replacements and, most importantly, the art of not cutting off your nose to spite your face. As of that moment, I had to open up the next day with no nose and now, with no chef.

As the shift came to an end, I asked the staff to stay so we could have a quick meeting. Everyone grabbed seats in the small, private dining room on the second floor. My wife and I told them the news: that the prior owner was no longer involved and we were taking over. We told them that we fired the chef and would be searching for a replacement as quickly as possible, then asked if anyone had any questions. I didn’t know how they would react. No one really had questions. I didn’t know what they were thinking. And then they told me that they just wanted to celebrate -- their freedom from the prior owner and the drunken, nasty chef. They were excited about working for my wife and me. Some even said they had been about to quit, but now they want to stick it out and see where things went.

I felt good. I convinced myself that I had made the right choice and everything was going to be okay. Honestly, I felt… like having a cigarette. For the first time in three years, I wanted to smoke. I don’t know why. Maybe it was to celebrate with everyone, maybe to calm my nerves, or maybe it was just to look cool. But, I felt like to Tony Soprano choking on a big cigar with a sh*t-eating grin...only I did the same thing with a tiny cigarette and “oh-sh*t-what-did-I-get-myself-into” grin! Unfortunately, it would be the first of many “oh-sh*t cigarettes” to come.

Now I can say I Own The Restaurant

2010-09-20T06:29:00.000-07:00

It was the first week of October, 2002. Technically, my wife and I didn’t yet own Avalon. However, we were spending a lot of time at the restaurant, working for free, evaluating employees and worrying about sales. In my opinion, I would say that is as close to owning a new restaurant as one could get without actually owning the restaurant. The kids were back in school (we are located in a college town) and business was starting to pick up from the slower summer months. Paperwork for the purchase was drawing to close and we anticipated making our announcement in just a few weeks.

I was starting to sense the owner’s frustration that we hadn’t yet sealed the deal. For him, a few more weeks might as well have been three years. It seemed to me that Avalon was one giant headache to him and I was the Advil sitting on a shelf – just out of reach. So, one Friday evening in the middle of service (and no signed deal), he looked at me (after yelling at his drunken chef), put a set of keys in my hands and said, “Tell everyone tonight the place is yours” and left.

As I thought about the big employee announcement we would make, butterflies started to kick in my stomach. How would we tell everyone? What would we say? What would they say? The answers to those questions would have to wait -- as my first crisis as restaurant owner was starting to unfold in the dining room.

With only a few tables left to order and the restaurant still fairly full, the chef decided he was going to venture out into the dining room. As I watched him stumble and almost fall down a set of steps, I became curious as to where he was going and what he was going to do. I watched as he went from table to table, talking with guests. All seemed fine until one of the servers said to me, “You need to get him out of the dining room; he is smashed and making no sense.”

As I watched him stumbled to the next table, I knew I had to quickly -- and quietly -- get him out of the dining room and do damage control. This task probably would have been a lot easier if my incoherent chef wasn’t asking a table who hadn’t yet ordered how they enjoyed his food. I told the chef he was needed in the kitchen and without an argument he left the table. As I was apologizing, one guest simply laughed, looked at me, pointed and said, “I think you have a bigger problem.” I turned around only to find that my chef had never made it back to the kitchen. He decided to sit on the very steps he almost fell down, lie back and pass out in the middle of a full dining room.

Standing over him, with my hand in my pocket squeezing my newly acquired keys and looking around at the staff, my wife and guests, my only thought was … now I can say I own the restaurant!

As I look back now, as more seasoned restaurateur, it would be easy for me to point out the shortcomings of the restaurant. All the red flags waving in my face: purveyors weren’t being paid quickly enough, waitstaff was disgruntled and the kitchen was a cluster of drug and alcohol abusers. But to someone young, blinded by ambition and stupid, this felt like the greatest adventure ever.

Svengali

2010-09-20T06:16:00.000-07:00

Before purchasing Avalon, my restaurant, back in 2002, I used my immense knowledge of business and incredible savvy to negotiate a fair market price. Labor reports, sales reports, P&L statements, rent, property tax, pass-through fees, lease type, insurance? Clearly just from me throwing these few terms around, you must I think I was smarter than the average bear. At least smarter than I had appeared in my first blog post. Right? Wrong! I was about as dumb as they come.

I had about three or four meetings with the prior owner before moving forward with the purchase. We always met at the restaurant, and he went out of his way to make me feel special. His staff treated me like I was a king. He had a relaxed, calm, dominating power that is hard to put into words. I always had a list of questions for him that somehow, managed to get averted. I hate to use the phrase “smoke and mirrors” but this guy was a regular freaking magician. For example, I would ask about the sales, (the only real question of substance I had anyway) and he would give a vague answer, something like, “the sales are really good,” then, with a quick-witted diversion, he would go on to say “but if you started doing lunch and open seven days…my God, Johnny, you would make so much money it’s unbelievable, man.” He would then signal for a waitress and suggest that we order something from the kitchen. After dessert, a few cigarettes and a cup of coffee, my concerns about sales passed. He always controlled the conversation without making me feel like he was controlling the conversation, a regular Svengali. Suffice it to say that I left each meeting feeling more and more excited about the restaurant. However, I never learned anything about the business.

At one point in our last meeting, I remember asking him once again about the numbers. Not really knowing how to ask, I simply said, ”So what are the sales?” This time he looked at me, smiled and pulled out his briefcase. As he opened it, he said in his thick European accent, “I don’t know exactly, but I can show you this…” and he proceeded to unveil two rather large piles of cash and a stack of papers. He handed me the first twelve months of credit card deposits from the restaurant sales. Finally, I would get to see some figures in black and white and I was dumbfounded. The totals of the Visa, MasterCard and Amex checking account deposits seemed quite large and that didn’t include the cash sales. One thing was clear to me at this point: He seemingly barely worked, walked around with a briefcase that had a few thousand dollars in cash in it and his total monthly sales without cash were about $50k. There was no way could I screw this up, or so I thought. The rent is $3,000, my loan is $2,900, food cost would be based on sales….this was a no brainer. Cha-ching!

While sorting out the last of the legalities, my wife, Michelle, and I started spending more time at the restaurant. The prior owner didn’t want the staff to know what was going on until everything was finalized, so he introduced us as the new manager and hostess to the restaurant. As the big announcement drew closer, the prior owner had some last bits of advice: “To make the transition smoother, make sure you let customers think I am still involved,” he said. “Better yet, just tell them you’re the new manager and keep the name the same “In fact, if I were you, I wouldn’t change anything. Keep the chef, the menu, the décor and the name.” Since he built the restaurant, had all the cash and seemingly knew way more about the business than me….we decided to keep everything the same. All I can say now, eight years later, is ….how dumb could one person be? Screw the restaurant advice—teach me how to be Svengali!

The Rollercoaster Ride of Being a Restaurateur Begins…

2010-05-17T05:14:00.000-07:00

Very few people know what it takes to be a restaurateur. From the outside looking in one sees only glamour & notoriety. Unfortunately, I was one of those people. I had been friendly with the owner of a small byob restaurant for years. While designing his restaurant's website he confided in me that he wanted to sell. After days of husband / wife negotiating ("you're a dumb ass but you're gonna do what you want, so I guess I am behind you") & with some trepidation, I decided to take stupidity to a whole new level. I was going to be a restaurant owner.

This was it, my big moment. In 2002, I gave up my web design business, re-mortgaged my house and bought the restaurant. My father in law had been in the business for years, his valid warnings of long hours and hard work with little reward fell on deaf ears. With lawyers papers signed, keys in hand, doors open and me knowing absolutely nothing about the business, I could say I was a restaurant owner.

I was married just two years, with two older daughters from a previous marriage and a one year old in hand, our new adventure began. My wife and I, and our very limited palettes set out to find ourselves a new chef. Being naturally inquisitive I started asking everyone who knew anything about the restaurant business, what type of cuisine should I serve. Suggestions ranged from American continental to fine French. A big night out for me was Filet Mignon and mashed potatoes, so when one chef wooed me with prosciutto wrapped figs and a simple balsamic glaze, I was sold. Being an unseasoned restaurant owner, it never crossed my mind to inquire about his ability to manage staff, control food & labor cost, cross utilize product or write a menu. I just hired him, put the fate of the kitchen in his hands and started learning as much as I could about service and ambiance.

…and so began my roller coaster ride of being a restaurateur.