Hospitality Series (Pt. 1): Beard Award Buzz, Top Chef Restaurant Wars, and What Makes a Restaurant Great!!

Adrienne and Joe sit down for part one of our three part series on restaurant hospitality and the role of the restauranteur. They preview our upcoming conversations with Simon Kim and Drew Nieporent, including their James Beard accolades and insights into creating a unique restaurant experience. In this episode, we discuss: Joe and his team were nominated for a James Beard award! What does Joe focus on when he opens a restaurant? (hint: don’t ignore the bathrooms) Top Chef Restaurant Wars memories Lessons from front of the house, including a master class on service Walk In Confession: Adrienne tells us about the time she almost opened her own restaurant after Top Chef Follow the show: @chefscutpod Follow Adrienne: @chefadriennecheatham Follow Joe: @insta.flamm

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Adrienne Cheatham?

  This week on The Chef's Cut, we are kicking off a three-part series on hospitality. So be sure to keep coming back because we have Drew Nieprint, legendary restaurateur, who made Nobu a global name. We also will be joined by Simon Kim, who changed the steakhouse game worldwide with Code Korean Steakhouse and his new concept, Cocodoc. But today, we're talking about Joe's big nomination. Joe, you were nominated for a James Beard Award. That time that he worked front of house for Top Chef Restaurant Wars.

• 0:33Joe Flamm?

  They don't let us take a lot, but this is our guest book from Conifer.

• 0:37Adrienne Cheatham?

  And I'm going to walk in to spill some tea on my restaurant that came this close to happening. The restaurant was under construction. To this day, that space is sitting empty. But before we get started, Chef's Cut Nation, we need you. Please rate and review us wherever you get your podcasts. It really helps and we so appreciate all of your help keeping this thing going. Well, Joe, we haven't done a series in a while. So we are going to make this part one of a three-part series on hospitality. Because coming up, we're going to talk to two of the biggest names in hospitality.

• 1:18Adrienne Cheatham?

  Two people who have created restaurant groups that have a distinct culture, a distinct concept, a distinct identity. And both of them are completely different, right? Drew Nieporent is a fucking legend in hospitality. Helped put Tribeca on the map. Made Tribeca a neighborhood. He partnered with Robert De Niro to open restaurants. But one of the things that Drew did that I was like most impressed by after reading his book was he was the first person to put a chef's name on a menu. Before that, chefs like toiled in anonymity. It was just like, oh, I've got this great chef. Maybe you read about them if a New York Times review comes out.

• 2:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  But he made sure that everybody knew who was responsible for the food. And he picked talents. I mean, he was the first person to bring David Boulay to New York. And then all the way to like Tracy Desjardins in California, who was one of his chefs that he had. He has picked some of the most phenomenal chefs to lead his restaurants and then he built restaurants around that chef.

• 2:24Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, and I think that that Nobu fellow, he linked up with, he did pretty well for himself.

• 2:30Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yes.

• 2:31Joe Flamm?

  And he's still kind of a scrappy up and cupboard, but I think that guy's done well.

• 2:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  How do you forget about Nobu? Oh, my God. I mean, he has an eye for talent and he has such a lasting impact on restaurants. I mean, he was the first person to make you leave a credit card, to hold a reservation, to manage the fact that people would no show and restaurants would lose money when that happens. He just has such a cool story and he is more retired now, but he had like 40 restaurants during his career and not a lot of people nowadays know who he is. But he also won, this is the through line in this series, Drew also won James Beard Outstanding Restaurateur.

• 3:15Adrienne Cheatham?

  And this year, you and Simon are both nominees. So that is our, our Outstanding Restaurateur series.

• 3:23Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. And I think it's cool because like Drew, you have somebody who's done it for over four decades, right? You know, almost five now. And then you have Simon, who's kind of one of the new up and comers who it's like, I think also like always, like at least as an outsider's perspective of New York, like thinking of like, trying to really get into that scene, like build, you know, not just a spot, but a group.

• 3:43Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 3:43Joe Flamm?

  Is like, oh, wow. Like that seems like a massive mountain to climb and like, you know, that Simon kind of burst onto the scene and with something that feels so familiar, but was so outside of the box at the time.

• 3:54Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 3:55Joe Flamm?

  Right. With, with Coe and has built like this just monster brand now that's worldwide. You know what I mean? He has restaurants, you know, in New York and Singapore and Vegas and Miami. Like it's crazy that he's built that and that he was able to see, you know, a need for something that, you know, in retrospect, you know, kind of like we were talking to Nina. It's like, it seems obvious now.

• 4:17Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, right.

• 4:18Joe Flamm?

  Like, but you know, at the time, it was like, well, nobody else saw it.

• 4:21Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. And it's so crazy because in New York, we had people that were innovating with Korean cuisine. We had Youngsik Yim, um, Huni Kim. We have these chefs who were doing new age, modern Korean cuisine and reaching back to traditional dishes and framing them in different ways and applying different techniques in some instances. But nobody thought to do it with Korean barbecue, right? That is something that every line cook in New York, after work, K-Town near Penn Station would be open till 3, 4 a.m. So instead of getting like wings and mozzarella sticks at a shitty dive bar, you could go to K-Town, get bancheon, which comes with all these different vegetables and lettuce wraps. And then the meat is grilled right there. So you actually feel better about yourself, you know,

• 5:06Adrienne Cheatham?

  instead of like taking shots of whiskey and beer all night long.

• 5:10Joe Flamm?

  Shots of soju and drinking beers all night long. I've never felt better about myself.

• 5:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  But you're having much better food.

• 5:15Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, I'm having a much better time.

• 5:18Adrienne Cheatham?

  A much better time because you have better food to soak it up. And you're eating something that feels fresh, not just like, you know, frozen mozzarella sticks that get dumped in a old grease, you know, fryer.

• 5:29Joe Flamm?

  The ones in Chicago used to be open like 24 hours. And I don't know about the ones in New York. I've had a couple of late ones in New York, but there was like some small ones in Chicago where it's like the OG ones, where it's like, they were open late and if you were the only table in there, they'd just lock the front door and they'd let you like smoke cigarettes under the hood, like while you were like partying. It was the coolest.

• 5:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  But Simon created that upscale Korean steakhouse. And he took that concept and identified that missing part in the market. Because up until then, steakhouses were largely, you know, old school, dark wood, red velvet, same format, pretty much same dishes, copy and paste, but you had some updates here and there. And then he came on the scene with Coat, doing something completely new and fresh. And like you said, built it into this global group and then opened Kokodak, doing Korean fried chicken as well. So it's so cool to have the three perspectives from Drew, who's done this for like going on 50 years now.

• 6:31Adrienne Cheatham?

  To you and Simon, who are creating groups now and having an impact in the markets that you operate in. So this is, I'm really excited for this series because this is something that we don't talk about enough is the restaurateur's perspective and the hospitality side. So we've got to get some more front of house people on here, too.

• 6:49Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, I guess we do, huh? I guess we got to show some love to those.

• 6:52Adrienne Cheatham?

  I know, right? My mom worked front of house. You've got front of house experience. Like, you know, we got to get our brethren up in here. It's like, I see, I see front of house, like pastry. You don't need to specialize in it, but you need to have some skills in that arena. No matter what kind of cuisine you cook as a chef, you need to have a working knowledge of pastry and you need to have a working knowledge of hospitality.

• 7:16Joe Flamm?

  Right. Tony used to say, you gotta know just enough to be dangerous.

• 7:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  Ah, I like that.

• 7:21Joe Flamm?

  You know, it's like, you don't really got to know it, but you know enough to be dangerous.

• 7:30Adrienne Cheatham?

  I don't know if our listeners are all aware of this, but there was some really big news announced last month. Joe, you were nominated for a James Beard Award for Outstanding Restaurateur.

• 7:40Joe Flamm?

  I was. That was absolutely insane. I mean, just wild, right? And I was actually on the phone with you when I found out.

• 7:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yes.

• 7:50Joe Flamm?

  We were, we were on a, on a call, me and you. And so that was really, really funny. So it's kind of like we got nominated together at the same moment.

• 7:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  I know. I'm totally nominated. I mean, I'm, I'm a restaurateur.

• 8:01Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, I assume, you know, if I make the shortlist, you'll be sitting there next to me. So.

• 8:05Adrienne Cheatham?

  A hundred percent. Congratulations.

• 8:08Joe Flamm?

  Thank you. And I love the idea of a hospitality series. I think it's such a fun part of, an important part of what we do. You know, thinking of myself as many things, but I think like restaurateurs is kind of the last one that comes to mind of like what I do, even though it is what I do, right?

• 8:21Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 8:22Joe Flamm?

  It's like, I think of restaurateurs and you think of, you know, the big ones, the greats, Simon Kibbe at Coat, who's going to be on, the Rich Melman's, all these people out there. And it's like, so it's like, you know, it's still, I think, sometimes weird to be like, oh, like I'm a chef who's considered in a realm of other chefs. And I know you feel the same way.

• 8:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  I mean, that's so cool, but it's. So different because you're not just a restaurateur, you're a chef restaurateur. So I'm really glad that we're going to have your perspective, but also then talk to Simon and Drew Nieperin because they both have completely different perspectives because they find the talent for the chefs that are going to run their restaurants where you are the talent. So we'll get into that a little bit later, but Joe, I really want to know because it is kind of like a nebulous term sometimes and it, there's no like one definition, but to you, what is a restaurateur?

• 9:16Joe Flamm?

  For me, it's like, you know, you're driving it, right? You're the creative behind, not just like, there's one thing about being the creative of a menu. When someone tells you, you know, we've both run other people's restaurants before, right? You know, whether it was, you know, Red Rooster, when you were running for Marcus, it's, you know, Marcus coming to you and saying, hey, we're going to do a 30-seat fast casual chicken restaurant in Harlem, like gives you all the checks and you're like, all right, cool. I know how to write a menu for that.

• 9:45Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 9:45Joe Flamm?

  It's one thing, I think in the restaurateur, it's like you're the one creating the box. You're creating everything. You're, you know, building not just a menu, but you're building a space. You're building like a vibe. You're building a whole little mini world of like, this is what this place is going to be. Getting to create a restaurant from the ground up, what is that bathroom going to be like?

• 10:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 10:10Joe Flamm?

  You know what I mean? What does the front door feel like? What is the music? What is the interior? And, you know, luckily I have great partners who, you know, we all work on that together and we have our things that we're all, you know, weirdly specific about. My two partners, Frankie and Kara, like their thing is the lighting.

• 10:23Adrienne Cheatham?

  Lighting. Kara is all about lighting.

• 10:25Joe Flamm?

  Right. They're both, they're both. It's like lighting, lighting, lighting, lighting. And I'm like, do all the lights have light bulbs in them? Great.

• 10:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  What's the thing that like gets you going? Is it food related? Is it front of house related? What is like your obsessive point?

• 10:40Joe Flamm?

  I think for me, like, I'm obsessed with the hospitality of it. Like, obviously, I'm obsessed with the food, but that's like, you know what I mean? The bare minimum, that's a chef, right? Like, of course, you're obsessed with the food. But for me, it's like hospitality, I think, is number one of like, making sure it's like, we're just being like kind when people walk in the door. The two biggest things that are like, probably not on a lot of people's radar, and they don't realize that I obsess about is like, the host stand and the bathroom.

• 11:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, you mentioned bathroom tile and the host stand.

• 11:12Joe Flamm?

  And I think like, you know, the host stand, like, you know, just from like, somebody always being up there to like, you know, when we get backed up up there. One of my managers, they'll see me looking at the door because I'll see like a crowd gathering. And they're like, wait, you know, we got two tables getting up, we're moving them in. Like, before I could even ask, because they know, they know exactly what I'm thinking.

• 11:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's true. I, I hate when you go to a restaurant and there's nobody there because you're standing around like, can I just go to the bar? I don't know, like, it's like this moment of like, okay, I'll wait, but how long is it going to be? And it kind of sets the guest experience in a, in a weird way when they first walk in the door. You're right.

• 11:49Joe Flamm?

  Right, it's like walking into somebody's house and you can't find them. You're just like walking around, you're like, hello, you told me to come over, like, where are you? It's such an important first impression. It also lasts impression. Whenever I'm up there, I'm always like, hey, thanks so much for coming in, have a good night. And I'm sure we miss on it sometimes, but it's one of those things that it's like, I obsessed over. And then like the bathrooms, and it's like, I do this in other restaurants bathrooms, where it's like, and the hope of like, it's a good karma paying it forward thing. Like, if I went into your restaurant and there was like water on the counter on the sink.

• 12:21Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, yeah, I wipe it off.

• 12:22Joe Flamm?

  I'm wiping it down. I'm picking up the extra paper towels off the floor, throwing them away.

• 12:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  I grab a paper towel and pick everything up from the, yep, I do that too. That's crazy because my mom used to do that.

• 12:32Joe Flamm?

  You know, because I'm like, maybe someone will do this for me one day. You know what I mean? Maybe that, you know, that, that kind stranger out there will see, you know, give it a little, a little wipe.

• 12:43Adrienne Cheatham?

  The bathroom karma will come around.

• 12:46Joe Flamm?

  But those are the two where it's like, I think it's like really weird things for me. Just completely crazy about.

• 12:52Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, I mean, that makes such sense though, because it's like, you're right. When you have a guest at your house, and that's how restaurateurs, and that's how people in hospitality, that's how they look at guests coming into a restaurant. It's like, I'm inviting you into my home. You're my guest. I want to provide this incredible level of hospitality to make you feel welcome and warm and transported from whatever your day was like into our environment. I don't care how many times you've been to my house. I'm not just like, bye, peace.

• 13:18Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 13:18Adrienne Cheatham?

  You know, and then you just see yourself out.

• 13:20Joe Flamm?

  You know where the door is.

• 13:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 13:22Joe Flamm?

  One of my crazy things is like with my crew, like with like friends and stuff. If they come in and they don't say hi when they get there, like for dinner.

• 13:29Adrienne Cheatham?

  Mm hmm.

• 13:30Joe Flamm?

  Like if you're coming in on your day off and you're having dinner and like you sit down and you're getting there and I'm like, what's up? You don't come say hello? Oh, you're busy. It's like, so what? Come say hi.

• 13:41Adrienne Cheatham?

  But see, I'm apprehensive about that, too. Like when I come to Rosemary.

• 13:44Joe Flamm?

  Crazy to me.

• 13:45Adrienne Cheatham?

  Everybody's on the path. I'm like, I'll walk by like, kind of like quietly, like, hey, guys, or I'll wave from a distance. Like, I'll see JoJo like at Bar Tutto, or I'll see somebody in the background. Um, who's the guy who looks like Daniel Day Lewis?

• 13:59Joe Flamm?

  Oh, Sean.

• 14:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  Sean. I saw him at Bar Tutto and I'm like, he was cranking back there. I didn't want to interrupt service. So I just like, you know, I'm, I'm looking back at the kitchen and he caught me looking and I just like gave him a big wave across the room.

• 14:12Joe Flamm?

  Listen, I understand that, and that's what people always say. But this is, this is my counter to it. If you came to my house, you would not like have dinner first before saying hi to me. It would be an insane thing to do. You wouldn't like walk in, eat something, use the bathroom, like do a bunch of things and then be like, oh, hey, what's up, Joe? How long have you been, how long have you been at my house? You're like, oh, like two hours. It's like, what do you, say hello, you weirdo.

• 14:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  You're putting the kids to bed. I'm not going to bust up in your kid's bedroom and be like, hey, guys, like, no, I'm going to wait till everything is settled down.

• 14:47Joe Flamm?

  If I'm putting the kids to bed, why the hell did you just show up at my house?

• 14:52Joe Flamm?

  That's like, yeah, like if we're closing and you're like, oh, I'm going to like bust in, it's like, dude, like it's too late for this shit. What are you doing?

• 14:59Adrienne Cheatham?

  I tried, I tried to justify my behavior and the behavior of other people. But from now on, I will just come straight to the past.

• 15:12Adrienne Cheatham?

  You've always been very hospitality minded. I remember when we did Top Chef and we were getting into Restaurant Wars. And it was like, who wants to work front of house for Restaurant Wars? And they tell you when you're like, what should I bring for two months in this city that I don't live in? They tell you, bring one decent outfit, just in case you make it to Restaurant Wars. And just in case you have to work front of house. So like, I mean, I had a dress, but I was like, I'm, I don't think I'm best suited to working front of house. And when we sat down with our team and you talked about it, you were like, I can do this. Tony made sure that like, we are well versed in the hospitality side of it. I will take that responsibility because that's a big one.

• 15:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  Exec chef and front of house manager, like on Restaurant Wars, those are the two that could get cut if anything goes wrong.

• 16:03Joe Flamm?

  Those are the two that go home.

• 16:05Adrienne Cheatham?

  So you were like, no, I got this and you crushed it. So you've always had like, you know, that hospitality sensibility.

• 16:13Joe Flamm?

  So the two funny things about that, I think I was like, one, I came up in front of the house. So you know what I mean? I feel comfortable out there. You know what I mean? I feel comfortable talking to people. The other thing is I did not read that part of the thing before we went of like, oh, you should pack a nice outfit. So I didn't know that that at all. And so they had to send somebody out to go buy that shirt and jacket for me.

• 16:37Adrienne Cheatham?

  Are you serious? I thought you had that.

• 16:39Joe Flamm?

  No, I had to like, give them cash out of my pocket and be like, yo, this is my size. Somebody go to like Nordstrom Rack and they bought me a suit coat and, uh, and like a button now. Cause I didn't have any stuff. All I had was like jeans and white tees. Cause I was like, I'm just wearing a chef coat every day. It doesn't matter.

• 16:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, right. Yeah, that's pretty much what we all had. I had like two pairs of Converse and that, that was like the, except for that one dress.

• 17:04Joe Flamm?

  So like, I didn't have any stuff, but like, I knew I could do the front of the house thing. But it was funny, you know, cause like, I think what people don't realize too is like, when we're on the show, like how little interaction we have with the judges. Like, I think that's what people are always like so surprised to learn, cause you know, it's like, when we were doing it, like, remember like, when they'd walk into the room, they'd walk us out of the room. They'd never let us talk to them off camera. So our only interactions with them were at judges' tables or quick fires or whatever. So like, they really didn't know us at all.

• 17:34Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 17:34Joe Flamm?

  Like especially, you know, only halfway through the season, they only got the glimpses of us. And like, they weren't watching all our cooks and shit, like, you know what I mean? So they didn't know, and they weren't watching like our home time at the house. So like, when I said I was gonna do it, I remember like, watching it back and Todd was like, oh, really, Joe?

• 17:51Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 17:52Joe Flamm?

  Know me.

• 17:53Adrienne Cheatham?

  And that's what everybody thought.

• 17:55Joe Flamm?

  And like, you guys were all like, yeah, man, like, have you like, met Joe? Like, you know, and it was really, really funny.

• 18:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  People on the other team were like, Joe's doing front of house for y'all, we're like, yeah. Yes, who else would? Me, Carrie, Bruce, like, no, come on.

• 18:09Joe Flamm?

  Fucking juicy Brucey out there, baby, let's go. But, uh, but yeah, I thought that was, that was like the funniest part of it, but they had, they had to go buy me stuff. I had no stuff.

• 18:17Adrienne Cheatham?

  I had no idea, that is wild. Uh, you did a great job, though. One thing that I remember was like, the seating. Because with Restaurant Wars, you have a certain amount of time. And when we sat down to go over the flow of service, I was like, let's kind of middle or backload it. So that way, me and Carrie are working the line. Bruce was like, filling pasta damn near to order for me and Carrie to drop. Cause the prep on the pasta, the filled pasta was behind. We were like, give us a little time to like, get used to the pickups on the dish. And then when we talked about it, you were like, well, maybe we can practice the pickups a little more before service starts, but I really think it's important to front load service. Because if there's any delays during, we're gonna run overtime.

• 19:01Adrienne Cheatham?

  And that turned out to be perfect, because the other team did what we had thought initially and backloaded their service, and they went over by like, an hour. Forty-five minutes, it was something crazy, so that.

• 19:13Joe Flamm?

  My turn times were on point, baby, we were rolling.

• 19:15Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, we were, we got them in, got them out.

• 19:18Joe Flamm?

  We were rolling.

• 19:18Adrienne Cheatham?

  Peter Dunn.

• 19:19Joe Flamm?

  We had that book bumping, we had that room going, the energy vibes were high at Conifer.

• 19:23Adrienne Cheatham?

  Speaking of, on the Nina episode, you said that you still have that book.

• 19:29Joe Flamm?

  This is so I don't, you know, I don't have a lot from that season, you know, they don't let us take a lot, but this is our guest book from Conifer, which is, um, luckily Hillary-

• 19:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  Is that printed on the front? I can't see.

• 19:40Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 19:41Adrienne Cheatham?

  Does it have the logo?

• 19:42Joe Flamm?

  It's the logo of, of, uh, of the restaurant. But it's got, you know what I mean? It's still got in it, the like seating, which is pretty cool. You know what I mean? Like it's, uh, like I haven't, I probably haven't opened this book since we got back, but it's been sitting, you know, it's been sitting on a shelf for, you know, I mean, man, it's been nine years age.

• 20:04Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my God, has it been that long?

• 20:06Joe Flamm?

  It'll be nine years in May. That's when we left.

• 20:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  It feels like so long, but still so not long ago at the same time.

• 20:15Joe Flamm?

  Yep.

• 20:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  Wow, that's crazy. I love that because I remember that was Carrie's concept, Conifer, like the name, the concept was like a neighborhood place, a nice place in the neighborhood that you can come to with friends. Anytime it was like, I was, we were all like, great. We love it. That was such a cool experience. I'm so glad you had it.

• 20:32Joe Flamm?

  We all had to pretend like we knew what a conifer was when-

• 20:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 20:35Joe Flamm?

  Carrie was the only one. We're like, oh, a conifer.

• 20:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  We're all kind of elbowing each other like, what's, what's a-

• 20:40Joe Flamm?

  We're like, what kind of fur? She was like, no, conifers. You're like, okay, is that French for flying goose duck? She was like, no, that's like the kind of trees that grow out here. We're like, yeah.

• 20:54Adrienne Cheatham?

  Wait, wasn't it like a collection of trees?

• 20:56Joe Flamm?

  Uh, you know what? It's funny. I have, I haven't written, I've written down in here because I wrote it down because I didn't know what it was. Conifer, any one, any one of a large group of trees or shrubs that bear cones.

• 21:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, okay. Never mind. I was way off.

• 21:12Joe Flamm?

  I wrote it down because Carrie said it and I had to pretend like I knew what it was. And so she, she, she told me, you know, being Carrie, the nature woman, um, and knowing all sorts of outdoorsy things that you and I were not privy to.

• 21:29Adrienne Cheatham?

  Speaking of hospitality, because clearly you learned that skillset in hospitality and how to run front of house from somebody. Like, we all have a front of house person that we've connected with, that's given us lessons, and they are such a big part of our industry. And you're right, like, hospitality is equally, if not more important, sometimes than the food. I've been to a restaurant, you know, with my sister, eating out, and like, wow, this is an amazing experience. Came back another time, and the food was the same food, but the experience wasn't that good because the front of house hospitality service wasn't as good as the

• 22:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  person who we had been cared for by first time. So that hospitality, like, somebody has to kind of explain that to you, especially as a chef. Somebody has to tell you the importance of hospitality. For chefs, we're always like, no, the food is the most important, like, you know, service, yeah, you gotta do what you gotta do. You go through the steps of service, you go through the motions, but it's the food that brings people back. And yes, that is kind of true. It is the food that brings people back, but people remember how you make them feel, and they remember that experience. And my mom worked front of house, so that was always something that she talked to me about, but I just wasn't confident being in front of people. I didn't feel comfortable. So, front of house just was something I kind

• 22:52Adrienne Cheatham?

  of shied away from. But there were people later on at La Bernardine, like Tommy Jalaliya, Ben Chakrune, like, two of the best to ever do it, who taught me a lot about hospitality. What's like, a hospitality lesson that you learned from someone in your career?

• 23:09Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, and I, you know, I'm crazy fortunate. I worked for some great ones, even from like, you know, the first place I worked at, I worked at a bar and grill for my best friend in high school's dad, who's a guy, Pat Doherty, and just like, Pat, like, understood it. And just like, from the connection of the restaurant to the community, he was really big on that, and like, got it, and the regulars. And then when I worked at Table 52, I worked on the front of the house before the kitchen, because I didn't have enough kitchen experience, and all the front of the house people there had all come from Trotters. So it was- Was like militaristic front of the house. Like, you know what I mean? It was all these steps of service I'd never even heard of, like, you know? Um, and they were really incredible. And then to, you know, when I opened Girl on the Goat and like, poker group was still, you know, blossoming then. It was still a young, small group.

• 23:51Joe Flamm?

  And like, watching Kevin Bame work a floor, whatever it is, this guy has it.

• 23:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 23:57Joe Flamm?

  Like, you know what I mean? Just could move through a room, like, knew where to be. Like, you know, when you watch great chefs work a line and they know where the pressure's coming and that they're ahead of it. And they know who's stationed to hop on. Like, you, you watch Kevin do that in the front of the house. You'd watch him make a guest connection like that, like make people feel good so quickly. But really, when I went to Spiaja, that was the true masterclass. I mean, they were so good. You know what I mean? The captains there were incredible. Like, we had one captain there who, he had started there six months before I was born.

• 24:28Adrienne Cheatham?

  Wow.

• 24:30Joe Flamm?

  Ernesto, who was just the best, you know what I mean? So he had seen every era. He had worked with, you know, so many incredible chefs. And so he was one of my favorite people to talk to, but they, you know, Spiaja, it was every little detail. You know what I mean? If they noticed someone was left-handed, like pivot, like, everything went to that person's left hand. When you dropped, you know, espresso cup after dinner, you made sure you put it on the left side, but you also turned that handle of the espresso cup so that it was facing their left hand. You know what I mean? So they could just pick it up and they would not have to adjust that cup themselves because they shouldn't have to. Those, like, they were so good at that. You know what I mean? Of not asking, but just being ahead of you, of just noticing what you were gonna need and it was already there.

• 25:15Joe Flamm?

  You know, I think one of the great things I learned from Ernesto, and I took this into restaurant wars, was like, I remember when I first started running the pass in the dining room, I went out to talk to a table and I was talking to a table. And as I was walking off the floor, he pulled me aside and he said, chef, can I speak to you for a moment? And I said, of course. And he said, listen, he goes, you went out and you talked to 32, that's great. They're having a great time. It's amazing. He goes, but if you go out and talk to 32, say hi to 31 and 33.

• 25:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  Hmm.

• 25:41Joe Flamm?

  He goes, they're all paying the same money. They're all in the same room. He's like, otherwise those tables around them are going to be like, why aren't we special?

• 25:48Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 25:48Joe Flamm?

  Why aren't we getting attention?

• 25:50Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yep.

• 25:50Joe Flamm?

  So when we did Restaurant Wars, I didn't focus on the judges' table, which was in the middle of the room. I focused on the tables that were all right around the judges' table. And I made sure I hit them super hard. I made sure they were having the best time. I made sure their food was coming out on time. So that when every time, you know, Gail Tomer Padma looked left or right, they were all like, everything's going perfect. Because the tables that are all in my peripheral are laughing, they're eating their food, they're enjoying themselves, they're surrounded by it.

• 26:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  And do you remember when Pete Wells reviewed, um, might have been Per Se or Danielle or something, he mentioned the service that the tables around him were getting. And so people noticed that, like, everybody else is getting lackluster service, but they're fawning over me. And that's diminishing everybody else's experience. And that's never something that you want to feel like, you know, you're causing. And for front of house, that's so important to pay equal attention to everybody.

• 26:51Joe Flamm?

  Right. So it's just, you know, that was like, one of those great lessons. I mean, there was a million I learned at Spiazz, just, you know, it was truly a masterclass in hospitality from so many people who worked there, from, you know, the wine program, from Rachel Lowe, what she was doing there, to Tony, to, you know, his wife Kathy Montuano, uh, who just, like, it was just all the little things that just made you, and it made you excited to like, try to push it and be like, okay, what else? What else? What else can we think of? What's another like, warm, nice thing we could do? You know, like, when it would snow super hard, and you know, you remember that room? It was like, sitting in a snow globe there on Michigan Avenue. So if it was like, a slow snowy night in January, and like, you knew tables were done, but like, you knew it was going to take them

• 27:34Joe Flamm?

  a while to get a car or a cab or whatever. And like, even if they had their check ready, we would just drop them arrows. And be like, why don't you just sit and sip it tomorrow and watch the snow for a minute?

• 27:42Adrienne Cheatham?

  Aww.

• 27:43Joe Flamm?

  And it was like, you know, it's like, costs us nothing. But it's like, it's magical. It's like, it's like, hey, you don't need to leave yet. Like, soak this in for a second. Like, it's really special.

• 27:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  One thing that you mentioned that I think goes back to our conversation about restaurateurs and hospitality is a big part of being a restaurateur is also raising money.

• 28:12Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 28:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  Like, that's, that's something that like, we've talked about together, like you and me, and we've talked about with other friends of ours, raising money to open a restaurant is a huge part of it. You can be a chef who can cook killer dishes, run service like nobody else, build a team operationally, super solid. But if you can't raise money to open that restaurant, you're not going to get to restaurants.

• 28:41Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, I mean, like, you gotta sell the dream, right? You know, and one, like, a big part of, like, you know, kind of how I run my teams is like, one, like, my chef's going to talk at pre-shift, like, when we're doing new dishes, you know what I mean? They're going out to talk about those new dishes. And I'm like, hey, you gotta, like, sell this dish to the front of the house. I got something new to sell, something that's great. This is fresh. This is delicious, you know, get them to buy it. And so, like, that's part of it. And, you know, I always talk to them about it, and they're like, oh, you know, I don't, you know, a lot of chefs will be like, I don't like talking in front of a big group. And I'm like, listen, if you can't learn how to, like, stand and do a pre-shift for just your cooks, and be able to speak to them, and say what you need to say, or stand in front of a room full of servers, because one day, you know, if this is what you want to do, if you want your own place, you're gonna have to stand in front of a

• 29:26Joe Flamm?

  room full of people and say, this is the idea.

• 29:30Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, you're gonna have to pitch yourself.

• 29:31Joe Flamm?

  This is the concept. I'm gonna open an Italian Croatian restaurant, and it's gonna be awesome. And you're gonna give me a whole bunch of money to do it, even though you don't know me that well.

• 29:45Adrienne Cheatham?

  And even though you've never heard of Italian Croatian cuisine before.

• 29:48Joe Flamm?

  Even though you've never heard of Croatian cuisine, they know what it is. But like, you, I'm gonna get you to believe you can't lose. That's, that's a huge part of it. You know what I mean? Because, like, you have to go find that money. And it's like, you know, in the arena of restaurants where it now, even if you want to open something small, you know what I mean? If you want to buy a bar, take it over and flip it on the South Side of Chicago, it's gonna cost you at least 300 grand for that bar, just to buy a building. And then it's like, you're gonna have to put a half mil into it. So now you're 800 in the hole.

• 30:20Joe Flamm?

  Plus operated expenses, all that. So it's like minimum. So it's like you need a million bucks. And it's like.

• 30:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  A million doesn't go as far as it used to in, uh, in most of these.

• 30:31Joe Flamm?

  Coming off Top Chef, you know, people are like, oh, you know, did you use that money to open a restaurant? It's like, I want 135 grand before taxes. Like, I couldn't have bought a hot dog cart.

• 30:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. Maybe I could have paid for the napkins.

• 30:43Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. It's like, you know, it's like, no, I had, you know, nobody to put into a restaurant. I've been, you know, a working chef, line cook for years. It was like, you know, that just gave me enough money to like, put it, you know, down payment on like buying a house.

• 30:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. People have this like misconception about what it's like right after Top Chef. And don't get me wrong. It is a completely different world out there. There's so much more visibility after. It does help your career in so many ways, but people have this, this like romantic idea that like, oh man, if you come in first, second, third on Top Chef, you're going to be turning down offers to open restaurants. You're going to have people coming up to you left and right. I never had that problem. I wanted that problem. It just never presented itself to me. And after Top Chef, I was like pitching to open a restaurant. And I started pitching before the season was airing because I knew that it would take a while.

• 31:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  I was pitching lots of different people, president of a restaurant group to bring me in under the restaurant group, people in finance. I was pitching a lot of different people to raise money to open a restaurant. Now, it was just me by myself. I didn't have partners. I didn't have a front of house counterpart to help me in this. But I was like, why won't anybody give me money? What is the disconnect between the food that I want to do and the concept that I have and people writing checks for it? And I had so many offers. People are like, oh, I invest in this restaurant group or I own this restaurant. I would love for you to come and be our chef.

• 32:12Joe Flamm?

  Right. Because they're already in the hole on that one and they want someone to bring it up. Now, if you go in and I think like, you know, when I was pitching people pre-Top Chef, it was a lot of that. It was like, you'll be like, listen, if you come in, if you run this restaurant for us and it goes well, then we could talk about opening your restaurant. Cause everybody, I think when it comes to opening restaurants, it's the biggest thing they want is proof of concept.

• 32:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 32:35Joe Flamm?

  So even like winning Top Chef opened a lot of doors for me, but it didn't open every door for me. And then it was like, once we opened Rosemary and Rosemary did well, even that, because it was just one.

• 32:48Joe Flamm?

  People weren't banging down the door of like, you should open another restaurant. But then when we opened too, when we opened Carchofo and like that started going well and we were doing well with that. Then a lot more things opened because now we had proof of concept time to do of like, oh, you guys open cool concepts that do well and makes sense, right?

• 33:07Adrienne Cheatham?

  You know this, it's not just one where everybody's like scrambling to just plug the holes every day. It's like, clearly you have systems in place and I feel confident investing in you if you can do two successful places.

• 33:19Joe Flamm?

  Right. So it's like the, you know, and it's like the fucked up thing of like everything, right? Where it's like, the more you have, the easier it is to get.

• 33:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, right.

• 33:28Joe Flamm?

  And it's like, one is the hardest to get. And it's the same idea of like, kind of like when you're a line cook and you're trying to become a sous chef. It seems impossible to become a sous chef until you, until somebody lets you be a sous chef.

• 33:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 33:39Joe Flamm?

  And then once you're a sous chef, you can go be a sous chef anywhere, right? You know, but it's like, somebody has to let you do it. And so, you know, like for me, it's like, we talk about these other restaurateurs and like, they're scouting talent. Like I was kind of, I had to scout partnership. I had to scout, you know what I mean? Like, you know, well, how do I get this money? You know what I mean? How do I find people who are going to give me money, but also give me partnership? Give me ownership. You know what I mean? I wanted to be a part of a group. I wanted to start something. And so finding, you know, and that's how I ended up with my partners is like finding people who, you know, one, all had a skill set that I didn't have, you know, from, you know, having a partner who, you know, a background in accounting

• 34:21Joe Flamm?

  to, you know, Cara with her background in PR and marketing and, you know, working in the restaurant world in that space. To, you know, Frank and legal and all of that and real estate.

• 34:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  Massively important parts of opening.

• 34:34Joe Flamm?

  Massively important parts. It's not the cool sexy stuff.

• 34:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, right. Nobody's like, oh, he crunches numbers like a boss.

• 34:42Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, like man, like that Steve, this QuickBooks game is like, you know, next tier.

• 34:48Adrienne Cheatham?

  But if you have somebody, if you don't have that, that, that skill set working with you, you're spending a ton of money on it. And also if you get somebody bad, you're fucked.

• 34:58Joe Flamm?

  Right. Well, you're spending either a ton of money or a ton of time up. You know what I mean? So it's like, you know, I dropped out of an accounting degree for a reason. Didn't want to do it. So it's like finding people who are good at the things that, you know, and it's not always like, you know, I feel like you talk to chefs a lot and they're like, well, I can do that or I will do that. It's like, yeah, but like, is that the best use of your time?

• 35:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 35:23Joe Flamm?

  Is the best use of my time like sitting in front of a computer for nine hours, like trying to do all these things, trying to understand all these things? Or is it being in the restaurant, being on the floor, being on the line with my cooks? You know what I mean? Pushing the next menu development stuff. You know, thinking of concepts, you know, and it's like, you know, so it's like, we all have our part and like all try to like, you know what I mean? Like set ourselves up to be able to like focus on the things we're really good at from like building the teams around us. You know what I mean? So, um, so it's like kind of an interesting path of me as like a restaurateur because it's like, I had to go find that other part of it and I found three people who they needed that other part of it. Right? They needed that chef. They needed that restaurant person.

• 36:08Joe Flamm?

  They needed, you know what I mean? That. And so it was just, you know, where it worked out, but it's, it's one of the hardest things to do to find that capital. Because it's like, people are like, oh, you know, this is what I want to do. I'm going to go just open this restaurant. Cool. Like, where are you going to get that money?

• 36:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 36:22Joe Flamm?

  A lot of people tell you like, oh, if you open a restaurant, I got you. And then it's like, okay, cool. Write me a check. And it's like, well.

• 36:29Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, you meant like real money. Like when I said I got you, I meant like.

• 36:33Joe Flamm?

  I don't know if I can write you a check for like a half million dollars right now. But like, you know, like I'll come when you open.

• 36:42Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. When you're open, I'll, I'll be there all the time. I'll bring people in. Huge difference, huge difference.

• 36:48Joe Flamm?

  And it's like, hey, you need both. You need both.

• 36:50Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 36:50Joe Flamm?

  No doubt, but it's, it's just, I think it's a crazy part of it that, you know, people don't realize that it's like, it's, it's, it's hard. It's hard and you have to really sell that dream of like, hey, and not just like, hey, this is a good idea. And this is what I want to do. And it's going to win awards, but like, when you give me this money, this is how I'm going to get it back to you.

• 37:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 37:10Joe Flamm?

  Like you gotta do that math. You have to have that written out. You have to know that per person average. You have to know how many covers you think you're going to do. You have to know what labor percent you think you're going to run, what food costs you think you're going to be able to do. Like every little thing, like this is what it's going to cost us. This is how many years I think it'll take to pay you back. This is how many years, you know what I mean? I think till we get a profit. And it's like, the more you can speak to those things. And so it's like, something I spend a lot of time talking to, you know, my chefs about of like, the more you understand all these things, the better chance you have at convincing someone that like, you're a good investment.

• 37:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. People are like, you could be a great chef. You could be a not so great chef. I just really care that you will be a good steward of my money. Like, that's, yes, I want the place to be cool. And I have confidence that that again is the baseline. But I want to know my money's taken care of and you know what you're doing. And if I feel like you don't know food costs, if I feel like you don't know labor costs, you don't know how to manage those, you can be running crazy numbers that don't make sense and losing money year after year with no possibility of paying anybody back.

• 38:22Joe Flamm?

  I see it happen all the time.

• 38:24Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, I'm not, I'm not cutting the checks for nobody.

• 38:33Joe Flamm?

  All right, Age.

• 38:34Adrienne Cheatham?

  Is it time?

• 38:35Joe Flamm?

  So I think it's time. Take a trip to the walk-in. And I believe it's, it's, it's your turn. It's your turn to grab, grab, grab the deli container, sit down on the milk crate.

• 38:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay. Yeah. Bring a deli. I got a story to tell. Um, okay. Well, since, since we're talking about restaurateurs, opening restaurants, I do have a walk-in confession that you may know part of the story, but I don't know if I've ever even told you the full story about this. But, you know, like I said, after Top Chef, I was pitching, I was trying to raise money to open a restaurant. It wasn't happening. I could only spend so long being unemployed pitching. And at the time, I had started working at ICE, the culinary school that I went to, teaching classes so that I could have some income during that time. So I'm pitching, I'm teaching class

• 39:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  a few days a week. And then all of a sudden, I was like, okay, I'm going broke. And this is going nowhere. I've been pitching for a year. Something's Not connecting. I just gotta give it up. And that is when I got the offer when Chef Repair called and said, would you do private work? And I was like, hell no. Um, and he said, Adrian, you're crazy. You'll make good money. You'll be home by nine o'clock and you'll be off on weekends. Do it for a year or two, save some money, then open your restaurant. I was like, you know what, chef? That's great idea. So that's when I started doing private work, thinking I'm going to save money towards opening my restaurant. Because as a chef, it's kind of like when you're a kid, you're told like, oh, you get married, you have kids. It's like when you're a chef, you're told, oh, you open a restaurant.

• 40:15Adrienne Cheatham?

  It's like, that's the natural path of a career for a chef. So in 2019, after pitching and kind of giving up on that, saving up money, I got an offer from a restaurant group to be the chef partner of a restaurant that was going to open uptown in Harlem. In my neighborhood, I can walk there and love the neighborhood, know what the neighborhood needs and what I could contribute to the culinary landscape in my own neighborhood. I was so excited. I was so excited, in fact, that I said, instead of just sweat equity and putting in my name and time and hiring the staff and building the team,

• 40:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  I'm also going to put in money. Steven and I were going to put up money for the restaurant as well. And I was this close. I gave notice to my private client. I was finding a replacement. That's how close I was in 2019 to opening a restaurant. Construction was underway. And then we're negotiating, and Steven was a lawyer and he was a contract lawyer, mergers and acquisitions. So we're negotiating and we're reading over the contracts and there were a few things that just we couldn't come together on. The restaurant group would not let me be a 50/50 partner.

• 41:34Adrienne Cheatham?

  They wanted to retain 51%, which means I will get overridden on any decision. That if we're not seeing eye to eye, I think this is the concept for the restaurant. They can take it somewhere else. I want to do this and hire this person. They can take it somewhere else. So I was like, I'm not comfortable with this. I'm putting in time, money, energy, love, everything. I'm putting my all into this, including like real money, and you won't let me be 50/50. And so I walked away from it.

• 42:11Joe Flamm?

  Damn.

• 42:12Adrienne Cheatham?

  I was like.

• 42:13Joe Flamm?

  Did you have a name?

• 42:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  The name was, was in the works. The name was in the works and I'm not going to put it out there yet.

• 42:21Joe Flamm?

  No, no, no, no, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna press you like that. Maybe if we were actually in my walk-in, I would press your ass, but, um, but.

• 42:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  I was that close in 2019 and I, I told, when I told my private client that I was gonna leave and find a replacement, he offered me a bump, a, a pretty sizable bump in salary to consider staying. So I was like, I'm not gonna do it. I don't care. I didn't get into cooking for the money. Nobody starts cooking food because they want to become, or maybe some people do now.

• 42:57Joe Flamm?

  Well, I mean, we're so goal oriented in this business where you're like, I'm doing this thing to get to the next thing. I'm being a line cook to be a sous chef. I'm being a sous chef to be exec sous, to be CDC, to, you know, to open my restaurant. Like everything's a step on the journey, right? And it's all about getting there.

• 43:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah. And I thought this was gonna be the thing that got me there. And I was like, man, I'm finally gonna open this restaurant. I'm going back through notebooks that I had for years. I'm writing different menus. I was like so pumped, so excited. But it, you know, it's, we go on vibes. I'm sorry. Like chefs, when something doesn't feel right, we don't.

• 43:34Joe Flamm?

  Yo, a partnership is a marriage too.

• 43:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 43:37Joe Flamm?

  You know what I mean? It's like getting into it. It's like, it's not a casual, like, oh, we just work together now. Like we are not coworkers. Like we are, we are, you know, we like, it's a blood bond of like, you know what I mean? Like we are, we are in this together. Come hell or high water. And if the high water comes, shit's gonna get real weird.

• 43:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  So yeah, it was, it got real and I was still thinking about doing it. And then the crazy thing, right? The restaurant was under construction after I said, you know what? This isn't gonna be the partnership for me. But I knew a couple of friends who were looking for an exec chef role. So I referred them because I thought they would actually be a good fit as a non-equity chef partner to open this place. So I referred a couple of people. And one of them became the chef of this restaurant. And let me remind you, this was 2019. Construction's going, something happened and the designer was like, oh, we don't like the way this looks. Let's push back construction by three, four months so we can order new tiles and replace this entryway. Then COVID hit.

• 44:44Adrienne Cheatham?

  To this day, that space is sitting empty.

• 44:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Like, I mean.

• 44:52Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, no. It'd be like that.

• 44:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  It be's like that sometimes. I, I dodged a bullet in a lot of ways on that. And as much as I wanted it, I'm glad that I listened to that little voice that said, something's not.

• 45:08Joe Flamm?

  This ain't it.

• 45:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  This isn't the thing. This isn't it.

• 45:10Joe Flamm?

  I truly believe so much of this industry is feel. It's like walking into a space and like no one. Like, ah, this isn't it. I think about like walking into work there and what it would feel like. Like, it's not a measurable. It's not concrete. It's not some analytical data.

• 45:26Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 45:27Joe Flamm?

  Where you're like, oh, you know, this makes me feel this percentage of good. So it's going to be a good investment. It's just like, I don't know, dude. It's fucking vibes.

• 45:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  Total, total vibes.

• 45:36Joe Flamm?

  All right. So, so, so the, so, I mean, the million dollar question though, that comes with all of this is. Are we gonna see an Adrian Cheatham restaurant one day? Is that someone to knock it? Is that something you want? Is that something still at this point in your life where you're like? I want, or it's like, if the perfect opportunity arises, I consider it. But it'd have to be like, just perfect moment, perfect time. But I'm not like, looking at business listings, you know, once a month.

• 46:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  No, I mean, there was a good five year period. I was, I had brokers calling me, this space is available. Chef, I think this would be a great, you know.

• 46:24Joe Flamm?

  They always get us. They, those guys are always like, oh, you would do so well here.

• 46:29Adrienne Cheatham?

  You would kill it here. This is a great space.

• 46:32Joe Flamm?

  Here, oh.

• 46:34Adrienne Cheatham?

  The hoods are already in place. The build out, you would just have to do cosmetic changes.

• 46:38Joe Flamm?

  Oh, it's turd key.

• 46:41Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, right, right. That's how they try to get you. Oh, that's how they get you.

• 46:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  I don't know.

• 46:46Joe Flamm?

  Maybe a coat of paint. Maybe a coat of paint.

• 46:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Move the host stand closer to the front door.

• 46:52Joe Flamm?

  I don't even know.

• 46:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, man. Yeah, I don't know. Honestly, that's, that's a tough question. If it were a perfect confluence of all those elements, yes, absolutely. Is that still something that I think about? Yes, I would be lying if I said I don't think about menus occasionally or see seasonal new dishes that I would put on my like dream, you know, my dream restaurant menu that it's still something I think about. But it's like, I don't know. It's never too late. I mean, the chef in Philly of Calaya, Noc, she opened her restaurant at 50. You know, I've, I've still got a ways to go before I get there. So you never know. Like, it's never too late.

• 47:37Joe Flamm?

  I don't think, I don't think Missy opened Lilia till, I want to say she was 48, 49, which isn't like old by any stretch of the imaginations. But I think it's like, we just have such a skewed perspective of this industry. Cause then there's like, uh, who's that kid in New York with like Jem? Where it's like, he opened that at like, you know what I mean?

• 47:53Adrienne Cheatham?

  Flynn, Flynn McGarrett.

• 47:55Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, you opened that at like 18.

• 47:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, right.

• 47:57Joe Flamm?

  Then you're like, what? What do you mean, dude?

• 48:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 48:01Joe Flamm?

  I was like.

• 48:01Adrienne Cheatham?

  I didn't even, I didn't even know what I wanted to do with my life at 18.

• 48:04Joe Flamm?

  Right. We're just like smoking cigarettes and throwing beer cans at each other. Like, so it's just, it's such a skewed thing. You know what I mean? So many people do it at so many levels. Like, there's no right time. You know what I mean? There's no biological clock of restaurants.

• 48:17Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. If the right thing came up, I would definitely do it. I would definitely do it. I can't say that I would pass up if a really stellar opportunity came up. I don't think I would be able to pass it up if everything felt right. All that, because it is still something that I.

• 48:35Joe Flamm?

  If I'm wrong, I feel like what you're saying is if you found the perfect space in Chicago.

• 48:42Joe Flamm?

  You would do.

• 48:44Adrienne Cheatham?

  Or New York.

• 48:46Joe Flamm?

  Chicago?

• 48:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  Or, or New York, you know, or Miami, should you know, the markets shifted these days. New cities are, are doing their thing when it comes to food. So I'm not, I'm not nearly as wedded even to like one city. Of course, yes, it would be great to have a place in Chicago so I can see my family all the time. I don't know, Joe. I just don't know. We'll put a pin in that one, though.

• 49:08Joe Flamm?

  All right. Well, Paige, this was a blast. I always love talking restaurants with you. Always fun.

• 49:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  So great to hang out, Joe.

• 49:15Joe Flamm?

  Maybe we'll even cook a little next time you come to Chicago.

• 49:21Adrienne Cheatham?

  Ah, that is it for this episode of The Chef's Cut. Be sure to subscribe wherever you're listening, especially if you're watching us on YouTube, where you can find full-length videos of every episode. And follow us at The Chef's Cut Pod on IG. For Joe Flamm, I'm Adrian Cheatham, and this has been The Chef's Cut: Life Beyond the Past.