Michael Anthony’s Gramercy Tavern Legacy, His First New Restaurant in 20 Years & a Skyline Chili Debate!!

Adrienne and Joe are joined by acclaimed Chef Michael Anthony to talk about his time at the iconic Gramercy Tavern, and what he hopes to achieve at his new restaurant, Lex Yard at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel. Plus, we discuss: His biggest mistake after taking over the kitchen at Gramercy Tavern The most exciting things about launching at the Waldorf Astoria and why its history is so important His journey from Indiana to Japan, then to France, and finally to New York City What it means to have “courage” in the kitchen and whether or not the industry has gotten too soft (hint: it hasn’t) Reinventing and updating the Waldorf Salad Fork It or Forget It: Skyline Chili (compliments of Michael's hometown) Walk In Confession: Mike finds an emergency hire and somehow doesn’t live to regret it Follow Michael: @chefmikeanthony 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.

• 0:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  This week on The Chef's Cut, we have none other than Michael Anthony, the executive chef of Gramercy Tavern, a New York icon, and the exec chef and partner of the newly opened Lex Yard at Waldorf Astoria. This week, he's going to tell us about the biggest mistake he ever made at Gramercy Tavern.

• 0:19Speaker 01

  I, despite hearing all that good advice, impulsively changed a signature dish.

• 0:24Adrienne Cheatham?

  His take on the iconic Waldorf salad.

• 0:27Speaker 01

  It's tough making celery sexy.

• 0:30Adrienne Cheatham?

  And Chef Michael's opinion on the controversial Skyline Chili.

• 0:34Speaker 01

  Every time I'm back in my hometown, it's almost impossible not to just go and have a plate.

• 0:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  Let's bring Chef Michael in.

• 0:43Adrienne Cheatham?

  Chef Michael, thank you so much for joining us here on The Chef's Cut. It is so good to see you.

• 0:49Speaker 01

  Thanks for having me. I'm excited to chat.

• 0:51Adrienne Cheatham?

  Well, Chef, we are going to get right into it. So we have a segment that we like to call Fork It or Forget It. And Fork It means that whatever the food item we're talking about is something that you like or want to try. Forget It means you're kicking it to the curb. Now, we know where you're originally from, and we know there's a very controversial food that comes from that city. So Joe, what do you got today?

• 1:17Joe Flamm?

  I always think of you as a New Yorker chef, but I didn't realize that you're actually, you're a Midwesterner. You're a Cincinnati, a son of Cincinnati, if you will. So we gotta, we gotta ask. Fork It or Forget It? Skyline Chili.

• 1:31Speaker 01

  Fork It.

• 1:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  Now, for anybody who doesn't know, can you describe Skyline Chili?

• 1:40Speaker 01

  You know, it's an interesting story. It's a bit mysterious, but the history, the brief history is a family, I believe back in the late 50s, mid 60s, opened, you know, an innovative, small, low-key restaurant where they designed it like an old-school diner. And then they created, I don't know, maybe they had a family recipe where they created a recipe for chili with a fine ground beef and

• 2:09Speaker 01

  Who knows what's in it, but a little oregano and cinnamon and, you know, stuff. And they were really smart and they hold it out on these steam tables and invented some simple tools to serve things quickly right in front of the guest and fast. And they strangely or interestingly decided to put it on a thin spaghetti and, and then top it with a very finely shaved cheddar cheese.

• 2:39Speaker 01

  They finish it or the guest finishes it by sprinkling oyster, salty oyster crackers over the top. And then you have, originally you had a couple of choices. Do you want minced onions with that? Do you want beans with that? So that's what describes their signature three-way, four-way, or five-way setup. And yeah, I mean, you can't not love it. I mean, people who hate on Skyline, like, there's some part of them that's just sad and lonely and they, you know, need to complain.

• 3:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  It's a controversial.

• 3:16Speaker 01

  It is a real mystery for people on the East Coast. I'm sure on the West Coast too, they're just like, what, what is that? And, but we, you know, growing up, we had, we had great times there. You, you grow connected to it. Why not? Hey, what's the problem? Like, why not? Why not love it? And I'll tell you, whether it's good or not good is not the question, you know, from a culinary perspective. But every time I'm back in my hometown, it's almost impossible not to just go and have, have a bite. By the way, I didn't say anything about the cheese conies. Same story, little mini hot dogs on a steam bun with the same chili and cheese. And I can get them in there with like about two big solid bites.

• 3:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  Ooh, okay, I'm down for that one.

• 3:58Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 4:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  Like a mini chili dog?

• 4:02Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, that sounds awesome.

• 4:03Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yes.

• 4:04Joe Flamm?

  I was unaware of the mini chili dogs. I didn't know that was part of the lore.

• 4:07Speaker 01

  Having said that, I want to make it clear that I grew up in Ohio, but I went to Indiana University.

• 4:14Speaker 01

  Friday night, Indiana University.

• 4:15Joe Flamm?

  This is, this was my next question. This was my next question.

• 4:19Speaker 01

  For all you Buckeyes out there.

• 4:20Joe Flamm?

  This was my next question. I was like, I was like, you know, when we were talking about this, wherever the prep call, I go, there's two interesting things about this that I didn't really know about Chef. And one was that he's from Cincinnati, so we got to talk about Skyline Chili. I go, the second is, he's an IU guy. And I was like, Age, I don't know if you know, but IU is on a historic.

• 4:44Adrienne Cheatham?

  I had no idea. I didn't know this was going on right now.

• 4:46Speaker 01

  One of the greatest sports stories in history.

• 4:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  I love it.

• 4:50Joe Flamm?

  Awesome. I love it.

• 4:51Adrienne Cheatham?

  We're going to get into a segment that we call line check. And this is pretty much where we're just going to be asking you questions about your career, your leadership style. So we know that you just opened your first restaurant in 20 years, Lex Yard at the Waldorf Astoria here in New York. Um, we're going to get into that, but we want to take it back a little bit to some of your origin story. So after graduating from Indiana University, where you studied, also, I didn't see this coming, Japanese and French.

• 5:24Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 5:25Adrienne Cheatham?

  You moved to Japan.

• 5:26Speaker 01

  I also studied business and I told my parents that, you know, I had this all worked out. The reality of it is, is that I loved being a student. Obviously you heard how much I love IU. Had a great eye opening, uh, life changing experience being in Bloomington. Part of it included spending time in France. You know, during that time I met some kids from Japan. And when I graduated from school, I, I moved to Japan immediately. And I really didn't have a, you know, an overriding game plan. I wasn't dead set on working in the restaurant business. I, I had worked in restaurants in high school, you know, for money and fun. But I decided while I was a long way from family and friends, that I was going to kind of take that leap.

• 6:08Speaker 01

  And it's a good story. I, um, I was, you know, alone, like a lot of people, you know, you get over there and get set up teaching, uh, English. And I had, you know, some subsidies worked out on my housing and ability to stay in the country. And I was studying the, the language and paying really close attention to the food and culture. I wrote, um, an email to a guy out of the clear blue sky. And this is, this is a good, um, lesson for, for young people. It's just like, I wasn't sure what I could do. I wasn't sure what what might happen. But I wrote the guy and said I was interested in pursuing becoming a culinary student at the Tsuji Cooking School in Osaka. And I had I needed some practical experience in a restaurant.

• 6:51Speaker 01

  I, you know, was very clear and and open that I didn't have professional experience, but I had a lot of heart, could pay attention to the language, I'd follow rules. And I asked if he might introduce me to a Japanese chef that would let me in their kitchen. And that's kind of like asking like, hey, is there a room on the next rocket to, you know, moot the boat? Yeah. And it's it's a hard thing to do, and I didn't really have high expectations. But the guy wrote me back. He he was the culinary critic for the English-speaking newspaper back then in the 90s. And he um, he wrote me back and he said, look, I have somebody who I think is eccentric and extraordinary, and I'd be happy to introduce you if you want to follow the lead. And I was like, I'm in.

• 7:33Speaker 01

  And so I met a chef named Shizuka Yoshima, who owned a small iconic restaurant in Roppongi called Bistro Shima. And, you know, all of this is an unlikely story. You know, you can imagine me sitting there, kind of like wide-eyed, promising to do everything the chef said. The reality of it is, is she accepted me as kind of like, you know, an apprentice, a stagiaire, or something in between. I don't know, a punching bag is what it turned out to be. And I did not know what I had gotten myself into. I love her even today. She, you know, is a very formative figure and kind of my story. She has since retired, but it was very tough.

• 8:16Speaker 01

  And she was a tough chef, and her point was she would teach me that, like, the restaurant business is not all about romanticism, it's about grit. And it's about determination. It's about smarts, about thinking ahead and fighting through every obstacle. Because she had, as a woman, very rare to own a restaurant, especially in Japan during the 80s and 90s. She had lived and worked in a three Michelin-starred restaurant in France against all odds. And, you know, we in this business, sometimes for better and sometimes for worse, we we project our greatest fears and our, you know, kind of strongest convictions.

• 8:53Speaker 01

  Onto the people that we, you know, work with and live with. And we have to be a little careful and cautious of that. We as chefs and managers, colleagues have a responsibility not to just bombard people with all of that baggage. We, we have to, we have to dish it out in ways that it can be helpful for people. But it's something that I think the industry has, has done. And, and it shows a sign of evolution of our generations on this industry. It's different than it used to be. It's not as, not as tough.

• 9:26Adrienne Cheatham?

  So you're of that generation, but you're also on, you know, kind of more into our generation also. And I have a lot of friends who have worked for you over the years at Grammar C, at Untitled. And one thing that I've always heard about you and your leadership style is that you never led an abusive kitchen. And this was at a time when I was in New York, that kitchens were still largely brusque, brutal, abusive verbally, sometimes physically. And you never led your kitchens in that way. But one thing that I found really interesting is that I heard a question that you like to ask new employees or people that you're interviewing. And that's, do you have the courage to add to this story?

• 10:08Adrienne Cheatham?

  And what does courage look like in the kitchen to you?

• 10:12Speaker 01

  Well, courage is kind of a big word, but just simply like, are you willing to, do you have the confidence in yourself? The self-confidence, the ability to not doubt yourself at every moment, not just keep your head down at work and do what you're told. But are you able and willing and excited to show your natural sense of curiosity? Our kitchens work well when we talk, when we ask questions like, why? Why are we doing it this way? Because if there isn't a good answer for me or sous chef or anyone in the kitchen, we should be rethinking what we're doing. And so that, that courage is kind of like just a, a nice way of saying like, do you, do you have that drive?

• 10:56Speaker 01

  Are you, do you want to be a part of this group? And I think that's what it leads to is in this business that I've also said it in another way is like, there is a certain part of, you have to fall in love with, whether it's the food, the style of cooking, the, in some ways, just the kind of aura of the restaurant. In order to desperately want to be a part of that team. If you want to be a part of that team and you're capable of, you know, looking past your, your own ambitions, then there's something interesting like that. That's what we're looking for. And that's how I've always tried to build teams. So it takes a certain amount of audacity,

• 11:37Speaker 01

  but it also requires a certain amount of humility in order to be a good team member.

• 11:43Joe Flamm?

  One of the things I love what you said was talking about your time in Japan is just that it's not all about, you know, the romance of it, right? Like that, like grit, I think is just like such a big part of what we do and like resilience. And I think like the people who've had longevity in this business, I feel like that's the thing I always hear from, from chefs or restaurateurs is like the resilience, the grit, you know what I mean? Of like, what a big part of what we do is just staying in the fight, right? Being able to pick yourself up the next day. And I think that idea of like courage and confidence. And I feel like I have that conversation with cooks a lot of like, you gotta believe. Like, we're in a business of hope and beliefs and like believing that like tomorrow, people are going to show up again and

• 12:25Joe Flamm?

  eat our food. It doesn't get any easier. The belief trade, the higher you grow up of like, you know, like, oh, I'm gonna open a restaurant and I gotta believe it's gonna go well.

• 12:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 12:37Speaker 01

  Hey, at, at, at every single level, that's a tough thing to wish for. And one, one thing that I think is worth saying, sometimes what people need is not the war stories of, I'm gonna run you through the obstacle course and only the toughest are going to survive. Sometimes people just simply need to hear, they've got all the tools already. They need to hear that you can do this. You have the ability to get past this tough moment. I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna make the obstacles go away. They're here, right? That's part of our world. You gotta, you gotta work hard. You have to learn. You have to have talent. You have to bring something to, to the story, but

• 13:20Speaker 01

  I'm also here to say that, you know, the restaurant business can be fulfilling. It's produced lifelong friendships for me that in some cases, I'm thankful that from early on, people are still willing to be my friend. And, and right on up to today, like, you know, I'm, I'm thrilled that the people I work with, even the people who will show up this week, you know, for their first shift, I'm going to learn something from them. And so I think sometimes like in this, it's not about softening our industry. The expectations that we set are just as high and maybe higher than ever. But it's the way in which we teach these lessons and encourage people to, you know, fight through the obstacles.

• 14:03Adrienne Cheatham?

  Now, speaking of adapting and entering new environments, when you came in as the exec chef of Gramercy Tavern, that was, was it oh five or oh six?

• 14:15Speaker 01

  Oh, six.

• 14:17Adrienne Cheatham?

  And it had been open for a while under Tom Colicchio and then you took over. And how do you join a restaurant that's already been open and add new chapters to the book without rewriting the narrative?

• 14:32Speaker 01

  So it's interesting, a great question. And I'll say this, that it's an understatement to say that people knew Gramercy Tavern. It might've been one of the most beloved restaurants 12 years into its history, 13 years into its history. And so it was a question mark as to how to do that for me. And when the idea came up, I was certainly intimidated by the idea of stepping into a restaurant that was already so beloved and so well understood. What's another chef, a young chef gonna add to that story? How are we gonna, how would I put my imprint on it? Would I always be living in the shadows? What did ownership, Danny and his partners and the team want from that restaurant?

• 15:17Speaker 01

  I was really most interested in would we have the resources and the open highway to continue to make it better? And ultimately Danny being one of the, you know, best leaders that we've ever known in this industry.

• 15:32Speaker 01

  Wanted exactly that is to see the restaurant continue to thrive, to add to its own story, to evolve. And it was an amazing gift in a way that he allowed me to enter that company. And I spent time in each one of the restaurants, getting to know the chefs, the GMs, understanding how the places worked before putting on whites. And then, once I was in the kitchen, you know, the encouragement and the solidarity and support that Danny and team showed me was really incredible and surprising. You know, you will have to make difficult decisions that are not going to please everyone, but don't do it all at once. Make sure you're doing it for them, not to them. So a good example is I,

• 16:16Speaker 01

  despite hearing all that good advice, impulsively changed a signature dish. The it was a grilled fillet of beef on mashed potatoes with balsamic onions. And I said, who wants to eat this anyway? Like, why, why is this still here? It's been here forever. It's overly simplistic. It, it's not teaching the staff how to work with meat. It doesn't say anything about sourcing. And yet, without telling people that I was plotting to set up a whole animal butchery program and source beef from only three small family farms in New York State, I took that dish off the menu. And as it turns out, there were several thousand people that were really

• 16:57Speaker 01

  upset that their signature dish and their favorite, you know, thing to experience at Gramercy Tavern, coming from cities around the country with their kids as a, you know, a celebration of being together in their favorite place. It was an anchor for them. Not to mention that the longtime staff were like, hey, what are you doing with our livelihood here, man? Like, you know, people love this. And now you're messing with it. And what it took was not, not to be too shy or too close minded to just leave that signature dish on the menu. Danny said, you know, make the dish. If people love it that much, it's easy. Give them, you know, what has always anchored them to this. Place, but tell them about what you're dreaming of. Give them a taste of the new dishes

• 17:42Speaker 01

  that you're putting on the menu. Listen to what they say, like, you know, ask them to engage. Then that is, you know, there are many secrets to the sauce at Gramercy Tavern over the years. But that is a very interesting and big one is that guests have never really been treated simply as customers. I mean, the word guest implies that there's a certain amount of hospitality involved in how you see them, but it goes way deeper than that. And so many people over the years have felt like they belong to Gramercy Tavern and maybe even vice versa. Gramercy Tavern is their special place. There's a sense of connection and ownership that comes from talking to people in that way. And, and it was certainly a very helpful way to get myself out of the weeds

• 18:27Speaker 01

  in because I had gone in like a bull in a china closet. And, and it taught me that by projecting, you know, it's the opposite of right, playing basketball. You have to telegraph where you're going to pass the ball or what you're where you're headed. And if you don't explain your ideas to your team and to people who are fans, how are they going to follow you?

• 18:49Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 18:51Speaker 01

  So it was a tough and easy lesson, but you know, I stepped in a couple of cow pies along the way.

• 18:58Joe Flamm?

  Man, I gotta say, it's, it's, you know, it's one of those things that I love when we get to talk to chefs like yourself on here because it's like hearing that because it's like when I took over Spiaja, a restaurant that had been there 33 years and had existed for six months longer than I was alive. And I did the same exact fucking thing. And I got destroyed. I got absolutely bodied. And it was like, made that first step and I pulled a dish and I got destroyed.

• 19:26Adrienne Cheatham?

  You took a signature dish off too?

• 19:28Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. And I remember Tony, he just comes back and he goes, you should just put the fucking dish back on. I go, yeah, I think you're right, chef. I think that's a good idea, you know? And it was just like, but it was, you know, like, I- I wish I would have had this conversation with you about about 10 years ago and like, you know, for you to say to me like, hey, like, just do it slow, you know, the old like, how do you eat the elephant, you know, and it's, and it's just like, but I think as young chefs, we come in there and we're like, I'm gonna get my arms around everything right away. And it's like, so you get your arms around nothing.

• 19:58Speaker 01

  I think what, what Tony and, and I heard, you know, Danny say to me is it's gonna be okay. This is gonna work out. And that kind of confidence to say, look, let's make some adjustments. Let's listen to what's going on around us. Don't be so dogmatic about each one of these decisions. There's never really an absolute right and wrong. You're gonna get through this. People are gonna love what you do as long as you do it passionately and as long as you give them a chance to, to love what you do.

• 20:27Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, Adrian and I talked about that with Eric a little bit, but just like, you know, that trust he had in you age and like what that did for you and the trust Tony had for me and the, you know, the trust Danny, Danny Myers had in you and like what that, that trust does for your confidence at that point in your career where it's just like having someone say like, hey, I know you got this. You're not making all the right decisions, but I know, I know you're, you're, you're not the wrong person. You just made the wrong choice.

• 20:54Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, like when I became exec sue at La Bernardette, it's like, you don't get everything right. You don't get everything right. But when you get it, you don't go backwards. You continue to be consistent with upholding that standard. And I trust you enough that I know you're gonna make some bad decisions, but the worst decisions that you've made, you've already made. So from here, you've learned enough to, to get better instead of get worse. And that meant a lot to be able to, you know, uphold a standard when people who had been the chefs for 20 something years were not in the kitchen and they trust me to maintain the standard of that restaurant day in and day out. Like, you know, other chefs would travel with repair and I was the stay at home mom. So I, I watched the kids,

• 21:37Adrienne Cheatham?

  you know, all day and make sure that the standard is being upheld and having that trust from the person who is the top of it, having them tell you like, do the simple things right. Chef, you're also very well-known for kind of bringing in and ushering in the farmer's market, completely seasonal, deceptively simple also cuisine here that flourishes across the US and now we kind of take it for granted. But your style is also, I like to say deceptively simple because it looks like it, but there is so much attention that

• 22:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  goes into each component. So how do you define the difference between simplicity and easy?

• 22:28Speaker 01

  Let me say something about the market too, that's the starting point, is that, and when I moved to New York City, I had never lived in the city, so I was completely unfamiliar with the landscape. And a few years into it, after working at the restaurant Tanyel, I moved to my first job as sous chef at the restaurant March, which is by the way where I met Missy.

• 22:51Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, we talked about March with Missy.

• 22:54Speaker 01

  Line cook there and we worked there for a couple of years together. But at March, we worked under an amazingly influential chef, Chef Wayne Nish, the owner of the restaurant, along with his partner Joe Scalise. It was an amazing place, it was in a townhouse in the East 50s and kind of like a little under the radar, but had a really great reputation within the industry. And there was something extraordinarily charming about it, ahead of its time, timeless. But long story short, whereas I thought that I was going to work there to try to rekindle some of the Japanese influences in my cooking, Wayne is half-Japanese.

• 23:37Speaker 01

  Three months in, I realized that that is not at all the way he, why he hired me, nor the way he looked at food. He was a true New Yorker and that he had grown up in the city and he was expressing something of the magic, the melting pot of New York, the access to culture and ingredients from around the world at a finger snap. For him, he was way ahead of his time in terms of saying, I want to put something on the plate that isn't copying either a classic

• 24:10Speaker 01

  Style of cooking from France or Italy or Japan, nor do I want to imitate other chefs. I want to put something original on the plate. And it was one of the really most eye opening experiences I had. And so I thought that those would be the guiding lights. You know, Wayne was interested in every single ingredient coming from the airport, not spending all that much time at the green market. And yet it didn't, I don't know, something about that didn't resonate in terms of the flavors and the kind of food that I wanted to put on the plate when it was my turn. And so when I started working at Blue Hill as the co chef, it was a natural to, you

• 24:52Speaker 01

  know, look to the green market as our greatest resource and to generate menus from, you know, the evolution, natural evolution of what we were seeing in the market, products of conversations with our favorite farmers, looking deeper into how, you know, food is grown and where it comes from and sharing the backstory and the interesting, you know, Herculean effort that people make in bringing that, you know, those foods into the city and giving us access to that stuff. So it was more of a style of cooking based on the natural flow of things, you know, a little bit of Alice in California style of looking at food that that took over.

• 25:33Speaker 01

  And, you know, all of that, all of that has continued to inspire the way we look at food at Gramercy Tavern and now here at Lex Yard in the Waldorf Astoria. Yes, I have always said that like when asked, hey, what like, how do you describe the food you make? And every, most every chef will say something to the effect of it's simple because we're looking to, you know, not overwhelm people, we're looking to distill, we're always looking to clarify and focus, sometimes concentrate flavors and ideas. And then for every working chef, there is, you know, whether we say this out loud or not, there's always the practicality of this.

• 26:16Speaker 01

  Okay, had a great idea, think this is a great dish. How the hell are we gonna make thirty-five of these excellent, in an excellent way, every night without falling apart? So what I've asked our teams over the years to think about, how can we make you remember this dish? So it's an indelible quality, more than the kind of restriction of what like, how many ingredients on the plate, or how many steps to a dish, or how complicated the, you know, the prep and process is. It's about when you eat, when you look at the dish, taste it, and then look up. Is that something that you can name? Do you know the name of the thing you're eating? Can you recognize it?

• 27:01Speaker 01

  And does it grab you? Does it link you to this moment in this place? And then can you turn around and tell your best friend, your family, uh, somebody on a podcast? I remember eating the smoked trout with chipollini onions at Gramercy Tavern. And you know, those are three things. You'd think that that should be simple, but in our business, we all know how hard that is. It's tough to get a front of the house team to remember three things about a new dish on the menu. And it's even harder to get a customer to remember three things about a dish they ate. That's what it is all about. So, you know, in terms of the complications, I like to cook tasty food. Uh, I am very interested in telling the story

• 27:46Speaker 01

  of the ingredients and where they come from. And I will say one more thing is that, you know, what has always resonated the most, the meals that make me fall deepest in love and that I have the most vivid memories of are the ones that are anchored to a specific season in a very particular place. That's what I love personally, but I'm, I'm a big fan of the restaurant business.

• 28:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, it was interesting to hear you talk about that and how you, you don't necessarily like to pare it back and stuff, because I think it was, oh God, it might have been a Frank Bruni review or, or something of Gramercy Tavern after you had been there for a couple of years. And it said like, you know, Michael Anthony's cooking is like, he got a basket at the farmer's market and a lot of those ingredients made it into one dish, but he's one of the few people that can make that work. So it's not like you pared it back and you did minimalism, but you celebrated the variety of what was at the market. And I always run into your chef day cuisine from grammar see a reta. I always run into her at the farmer's market.

• 28:52Adrienne Cheatham?

  So clearly that is something that you pass on to to the chefs that you work with as well.

• 28:58Speaker 01

  Listen, it's not a religion. It is a bit of a mantra. I think it works. Grammar's Tavern is a couple of blocks away from the grain market. We're getting ready to celebrate the 50th anniversary of grow NYC this year. It has changed the way we look at food across the country. We're not alone. Obviously, this story started long before we got to the, you know, to the kitchen. We're building on these ideas that came before us. We're not reinventing, we're not inventing anything brand new. We are just simply continuing to, you know, try to uphold, you know,

• 29:38Speaker 01

  our work in the kitchen with integrity, to try to continue to produce it with a lot of enthusiasm. I think it's, I think it's really cool. We're lucky. I think we're really lucky to be American chefs in a moment like this. For as nuts as the outside world is, you know, in our own little kitchen world in the bubble here. It's a, it's an important time for us to keep working hard.

• 30:01Adrienne Cheatham?

  Speaking of growing with your new restaurant chef Lex Yard at the Waldorf Astoria. This is the first restaurant. I mean, you know, you opened Untitled at the Whitney before, but the first restaurant.

• 30:13Speaker 01

  Shout out to Untitled.

• 30:15Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yes.

• 30:15Speaker 01

  It was, I think it was a great restaurant. I'm sad.

• 30:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, that was a great place. The work you and Suzanne cups were doing there was, was really great. I do miss that place. Another place I'm trying to get to hopefully soon is Lex Yard at the Waldorf Astoria that you recently opened. I mean, 20 years is a long time to wait essentially to open fully a restaurant now. And why now? What made this different? What made this opportunity something that you had to be a part of?

• 30:50Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, the answer to that question is very straightforward. It's a historic reopening. The Waldorf Astoria, which was the center of social life in New York City, originally opened in this location in 1931. It has a history that dates back all the way to the original twin mansions from the Astor family, when they were put together in the 1890s to create Waldorf Astoria at 34th and 5th.

• 31:18Adrienne Cheatham?

  I never knew that.

• 31:19Speaker 01

  Where the Empire State Building is now. You know, is a great story. We probably don't have time for that historic part of it. But eventually, those buildings were destroyed for progress. So in 1931, unbelievably, in the midst of the Great Depression, they built this glorious place. It was the biggest building in New York City. It was the largest hotel in the world. It was one of a kind. And, you know, fast forward to kind of our lives. Every night when I would come home from Gramercy Tavern, I'd be in a cab and the cabby would say, you know, they're going to reopen this place. I'm like, when?

• 31:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  When, right. It was renovating, I mean, for years. I'm like, when is this going to reopen?

• 32:02Speaker 01

  And, yeah, I live in this neighborhood. And like every New Yorker, waited on pins and needles to see this happen. And, you know, five years out of the pandemic and going through all of that uphill battle of bringing our restaurants back into full speed. And, you know, some of them didn't make it. Some of them have thrived. But the timing was great. The amount of autonomy that I was given to create a new concept in this legendary and historic place is kind of unbelievable. The fact that ownership wanted to see a neighborhood restaurant,

• 32:45Speaker 01

  a new addition to the landscape of New York City dining. It just happened to be located at the corner of 50th and Lex. Kind of an interesting thing. And so I heard them say they wanted to open an American restaurant. And I said, what does that mean to you? And. I started in with the questions of like, what's wrong with this story? How can this be true? And the reality of it is there was nothing wrong with it. It was, it was, it was a great moment in which they wanted to see the warmth of hospitality, the expression of seasonal local cooking, live up to the excellence and the elegance of a venue like this. And I have been dreaming of this moment.

• 33:28Speaker 01

  And, and this, this is the kind of restaurant through our pricing and through our style, and especially through the level of hospitality, is intended to make people feel welcome. That should not be revolutionary, but I think it's hard to find these days.

• 33:43Joe Flamm?

  I know, I couldn't agree with you more. I think it's so, you know, like, you know, as you talk about like restaurants coming back when we came out of the pandemic, I felt like, not just like restaurants having a hard time, but like hospitality, like genuine hospitality, felt like we've been fighting for that right now. Really getting people to buy into the natural warmth of hospitality again, of just that, you know, of like, hey, we're excited you're here. Whether we're busy, whether we're slow, whether whatever it is, like, it's a big deal that you're here. It's a big deal that you decided to come here. You could have went anywhere, you could spend money anywhere, but you came here.

• 34:21Speaker 01

  27,000 choices in this city alone. And then, you know, you look, and, and I'm not a, I'm not a curmudgeon, or I, I'm about the solidarity in our industry. I like to see what's happening around the country. I mean, you know, I, I, from growing up in Cincinnati, I've always looked up to Chicago and love to see the evolution of our industry there. Look across the country, as a young cook, you can get great training in so many markets that were considered to be medium sized or small sized restaurant markets. Now, you don't de facto need to go to a big city in order to get great training and get yourself, you know, um, in, into this business. But the reality of it is, is that whether we're working here at 50th and Lex, or, you

• 35:05Speaker 01

  know, in Memphis, Tennessee, I think that the question that has to, that we all signed up to ask ourselves is, are we for real?

• 35:16Speaker 01

  And, and when restaurants can answer that question, wholeheartedly and with a smile, man, something good is happening.

• 35:24Adrienne Cheatham?

  I know something good is happening when I saw that the Waldorf Astoria was finally reopening, because when I first moved to New York, it was still open and I was lucky enough to go to some events there back in the day with friends who worked in finance and they had parties to go to. And I would just tag along and I was so pumped to go because I grew up watching Coming to America. And there was that scene where James Earl Jones was like, to, to Arsenio Hall's character was like, you will confine yourself to our suite at the Waldorf Astoria. And it was this gorgeous suite and the hotel and you had all the pomp and circumstance. And so that was always something that I was so excited about. Living in New York when I moved here was like, oh my God, that's the Coming to America hotel.

• 36:07Speaker 01

  It's an amazing place and to be a part of this reopening is, I mean, I, I just, I can't get over it.

• 36:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  How does it feel to like, on the menu? I mean, there are some classic and iconic dishes, like, I mean, we can't ignore the Waldorf salad. I mean, how do you thread the needle between making those things and honoring that legacy that you have there to uphold while also kind of making it more modern?

• 36:33Speaker 01

  It was clear that, um, reworking some of the classics would be part of the nature of the menu and part of the job. A friend of mine, Garrett Oliver, was, uh, kind enough to give me a copy, an original copy of the 1896 Waldorf Astoria cookbook.

• 36:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my gosh.

• 36:50Speaker 01

  And, uh, first thing I did was flip into, you know, through that book to see, is it really such a thing? Was there really such a thing as a Waldorf salad? Sure enough, there it is. Now, we, I think people eat differently, you know, back then, over a hundred years ago, but it was fun actually and, and kind of challenging to think about like, all right, there have been many chefs over the years in many places, home chefs and professional, famous chefs that have. Reinterpreted the Waldorf salad. So it's not like they're, I'm the only one that, you know, was tasked with this job. It's like, there are a ton of Waldorf salads out there. And so I decided ultimately, after thinking really carefully about it, to try to make a craveable seasonal salad. I mean, not shocking, right?

• 37:34Speaker 01

  I'm gonna stick to my guns and try to make something that eats well, that has all the prerequisites. It's tough making celery sexy. Like, tough, tough ingredient. And one of my former sous chefs loves Lovage. And I think he's like, you know, would always work wonders with that, those tough flavors. The celery is, you know, kind of like, not the thing that leaps up on everybody's table and in your mind when you're writing your new menus, but- Yeah, it's like, what are we gonna do with celery this, this season? We gotta get it in, you know? That's a part of it. So I, I also decided that I would lighten, obviously, you want to lighten it up a little bit. The original salad was made by mixing these ingredients with mayo,

• 38:17Speaker 01

  and it was kind of clumpy. And then lastly, I said, instead of just doing this once, let's make seasonal changes to the salad. So you recognize it. It's still the Waldorf salad, but you see that thing, like our menu, evolving from season to season. So right now, you know, along with the regular components, there's some celery root, there are toasted pumpkin seeds, there's some grated cheddar, New England cheddar cheese over the top. So there are some things that, you know, for anybody who's really paying attention, you know, anchor you to this moment, to this place. And at the same time, I think a lot of the executives of this company, looking at the P and L, have been surprised at just how many Waldorf salads

• 39:01Speaker 01

  we've sold since we reopened in July. I've been pretty surprised too, but it's cool. It's fun. It's more fun than I thought it would be. So there are a few standards. You know, Jeff Bell was tasked with coming from, Jeff Bell from PDT, brilliant bartender mixologist.

• 39:18Speaker 01

  Excellent historian of American food, really, really great guy. Jeff and I have never worked together before this project, but he curated the cocktail lists in Lex Yard and in Peacock Alley, where we also do the menu, which is a cocktail lounge in the center of the hotel, extremely elegant. And Jeff, you know, like any, any good creator, just straddled that with ease, turning, you know, the, the raw broil was conceived here or popularized here and, you know, making some of the kind of most interesting and elevated takes on, on those classics. The

• 39:59Speaker 01

  pastry chef Jenny Chu has done the same with things like the red velvet cake. And we were never strapped with the necessity to serve old fashioned food. It was just a way to have fun and keep the legacy alive. And that'll, that'll continue. Those things will-

• 40:15Adrienne Cheatham?

  What's old is new.

• 40:16Joe Flamm?

  I think that stuff's so fun. Like I geek out over that stuff, like the, the old menus. I have like a book behind me that's just old menus from the early 1900s. And it's like, one of my favorite things is just like, you know, scanning through that. And I think it's so, you know, I don't know. It's so, it's like mind blowing to like to take that, make it, you know, new again. I think it's so special.

• 40:35Speaker 01

  I want to give a shout out to John Doherty, who was the longtime executive chef of Waldorf Astoria. And he also produced a great cookbook, which I have on my desk right now. And I have loved, even, you know, I'm a year into doing nothing but dream about this restaurant. And, and flipping through his book and seeing, you know, his take on these things from, you know, from a few years ago is, is really interesting. I, I feel lucky to, you know, to be part of this story.

• 41:04Adrienne Cheatham?

  Our last segment is one that we like to call walk-in confessions. And this is where we get honest about a funny story or something from earlier in our careers that might not have worked out. We might've shot for the moon and landed in a mud puddle. You know, we, things didn't always go our way, but either you adapted and overcame, or it taught you a very valuable lesson that you took with you throughout your career. So let's go to the walk-in chef and you give us one of your confessions from earlier in your career.

• 41:38Speaker 01

  I like this. It's a very Chicago-like theme to this story of being-

• 41:44Adrienne Cheatham?

  You know, we're all self-deprecating.

• 41:47Speaker 01

  I don't know, I'll, there are a lot. I mean, there's nothing but mud puddles in everybody's story, but we were talking about March Restaurant, so I'll pick up on that theme. I learned a lot in my first job as a sous chef and a lot, I learned a lot from the mistakes that I made and not only just the blatant mistakes that I made, but the mindset that I had. And just to comfort Missy Robbins, this is not a tell-all moment. I am not going to go there. We're friends and I want to keep it that way.

• 42:21Adrienne Cheatham?

  She gave us a good walk-in confession, so don't worry. And it was from that same era. It was, yeah.

• 42:26Speaker 01

  Nice. Well, but the angle that I'll tell you is that it was the first time I was responsible for hiring the staff in the kitchen and supervising them. We had a kid that came through, a culinary intern who came to March Restaurant and I'm not going to say his name out loud, but if he's listening, he will know who it is. But he had a great academic background and a love for jazz music and a very interesting and cool person, but not a very good cook. And the guy completed his externship and I was kind of happy that

• 43:07Speaker 01

  we were getting to the end of the time period. I signed his papers with glee and said, good luck. And I don't know, month or two goes by and like a lot of kitchens, all of a sudden the tides turn and we found ourselves deep in the weeds. And I needed like three people on the line yesterday. And the guy reaches out to me, just being, you know, friendly and he was busy watching a film festival of old movies and listening to records. I'm like, that's great, man. I'm glad things are going well for you. And he goes, by the way, I'm kind of looking for a job. I'm like, oh, well, when are you available? And he's

• 43:50Speaker 01

  like, anytime. I'm just, you know, listening to music. I'm like, how about tomorrow?

• 43:57Speaker 01

  And so he shows up and on day one, I realized that that is not the way out of those kind of hiring problems. You get only deeper and deeper. But I'm only trying to like make it a little lighter because what actually happened was, and I had no, I didn't have a hint of this, the possibility of this story turning around. I was just flailing and I'd made a poor decision hiring someone that was clearly not prepared to work at the level that we were expecting. And yet, all of a sudden, his work sucked. He was terrible. He made so many mistakes. It was so frustrating. But his intelligence kept coming through and

• 44:42Speaker 01

  he never gave up and he kept asking really good questions and he asked me tough questions. He put me on the spot all the time and my reaction was, I wanted to lash out, like, who do you think you are anyway? Like, you're not the least bit invested in this troubled story. You know, the reality of it is, is he kept pressing. The good thing is, I got lucky. I kept listening. And maybe about a year into it, what I realized was this person had learned enough skills to be an active and engaged member in the kitchen and certainly saved my ass from, you know, from a day-to-day kitchen point of view. But more importantly,

• 45:21Speaker 01

  what became of it was a good friend and somebody that I realized probably had no business whatsoever, working as a cook in that kitchen. But what he did was persist and he continued intellectually to expect the most out of me, not the least. And I just realized that when you find people like that, And really, we don't have the luxury of not investing in people. When you invest in every which way with the people you work with, many times, they blossom into relationships

• 46:01Speaker 01

  and, you know, great collaborators. As it turns out, a few years later, as, as, you know, we had, we live in a bit of an incestuous industry, that person went on to become a lead runner and then eventually a captain at Gramercy Tavern. When I showed up at Gramercy Tavern, lo and behold, he became the greatest ambassador and one of the most important keys to my success of getting to know that new team. And he was sitting right there waiting for me. You know what he did in the first week? Mike, we gotta go downstairs in your office, close the door. I have some things to tell you. And he started in with the, he started right back in with the, here's, you're gonna hear the business from me. And I said, I'm all ears.

• 46:47Adrienne Cheatham?

  Ah, that is so cool. I love how that came full circle, too. I'm glad he, uh, found a place outside of the kitchen because it sounds like that might not have been his best fit, but our, our industry will, your skillset will fit somewhere. And it sounds, it sounds like he found his place.

• 47:03Joe Flamm?

  That's awesome. That's awesome. It's so funny how like people just come back into your life of this industry too, where you're just like years and years later, you're like,

• 47:11Speaker 01

  Can't do it alone.

• 47:12Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. You walk in and you're just like, what? You're like, you're here? They're like, you're here? Like, oh, this is awesome. Chef, thank you so, so much for your time today. This was absolutely fantastic. Just, um, absolute pleasure talking to you. Um, so we really appreciate it. I know you're super busy. So thank you.

• 47:30Speaker 01

  Thanks for inviting me on the podcast. I like what you guys do.

• 47:33Joe Flamm?

  Can't wait to come by for a Waldorf salad next time I'm in New York.

• 47:39Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's 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 video of every episode. And follow us at The Chef's Cut Pod on Instagram. For Joe Flam, I'm Adrian Cheatham, and this has been The Chef's Cut, life beyond the past.