Fine dining chefs opening comfort food restaurants

[DanM]

Good afternoon,

I have noticed a new growing trend where fine dining chefs have been opening low cost comfort food restaurants. For example, Bartolotta has opened a burger and custard shop in Milwaukee, the Rathburn brothers have opened Rathburn's Blue Plate in Dallas, and locally Zinc, one of New Haven's finest, has opened a pizzaria. I'm not sure if this trend is due to the economic slow down, or a return to the basics. What do you think of this trend?

Dan

[jsmeeker]

Good afternoon,

I have noticed a new growing trend where fine dining chefs have been opening low cost comfort food restaurants. For example, Bartolotta has opened a burger and custard shop in Milwaukee, the Rathburn brothers have opened Rathburn's Blue Plate in Dallas, and locally Zinc, one of New Haven's finest, has opened a pizzaria. I'm not sure if this trend is due to the economic slow down, or a return to the basics. What do you think of this trend?

Dan

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When I saw this topic title, Ken't Rathbuns 'Blue Plate' came to mind right away. I haven't had a chance to check it out yet, but I understand it's really popular.

[David A. Goldfarb]

I've been to Tom Colicchio's 'wichcraft sandwich place down by NYU any number of times, and I like it. The food is decent and modestly priced. The place is spotless (out of curiosity, I checked the health department website for various places I like to eat once, and it gets unusually high marks regularly). Conveniently for an area with a lot of students, you can sit there with a coffee and read or do some work for as long as you like, and there's no pressure to move along.

As to why the trend for these kinds of places, I suppose it's a combination of the economy and the general drive to diversify one's business to include things other than luxury dining, whether it be lower priced restaurants, prepared and frozen foods, or chains like the Wolfgang Puck's places you see in US airports.

[Qwerty]

This is actually not really a new phenom. A lot of Michelin starred chefs in France/Europe open Bistro's once the starred place is established, in an effort to cash in on their name in a place they don't "have" to be in the kitchen in on a daily basis.

Thomas Keller has Bouchon and Ad Hoc, Bolud has Cafe Bolud, DB Bistro, etc. The list goes on. It's an effective way to expand the brand without doing another 3 star place that costs millions to start up, years to pay off, and requires ungodly hours.

If you think a lot of those nouvelle french guys, like Bocuse, Loiseu, Savoy, etc all have bistro style places.