Musings of a Chef....

...which is good, because I'm not sure how much longer I could've physically kept up the pace we've been running at for the last couple of months. I mean, sure it's great to be busy, but there are different levels of busy, and lately, Angela and I have been literally running from one thing to the next to try to get set up for lunch and dinner every day. Even though she possesses a seemingly inexhaustible supply of enthusiasm and energy, in my case it's the trouble I get from my knees from going up and down the stairs and my back from constantly bending over to get things in and out of the reach-in cooler and oven. I guess that's why they invented Aleve, and also why I continue to be grateful to work with others who also put in long days without complaining.

Anyway, it's been a pretty fun week. I learned a long time ago at The Metro that you never know who'll you'll meet when you walk out in the dining room, and it was very nice to see Sen. Russ Feingold and a few associates eating lunch here on Thursday. I've always respected the senator for standing alone opposing the Patriot Act in 2001, even though it was clear there would be a lot of negative political fallout from doing so. He seems like a pretty nice guy and said he enjoyed his lunch- maybe he was heading down to Irish Fest and didn't want to go on an empty stomach... My good friend Sean "The Crusher" Jones, a chef who is as proudly Irish as anyone I've ever known, used to jokingly maintain that Irish cooking was little more than boiling the daylights out of things that no one else would eat, then drinking enough whiskey to make it taste good. We used to work in a small restaurant next door to an Irish pub in Delafield, and though there may be some truth in his observations, I'll still admit to liking a good Shepard's Pie, lamb of all sorts in fact, and pretty much anything having corned beef in it. Maybe that comes from the Irish on my Mom's side?

Well, even if it's not acknowledged for it's delicious cuisine, Ireland has given us Guinness and hurling, and that's a lot to be proud of right there. Even though I'm pretty sure you can't get a Guinness at Irish Fest, you can still check out the Milwaukee Hurling Club's booth there and get a taste of the "fastest game on grass". I used to enjoy hurling several years ago, when I worked days and could make the practices. It's a lot of fun and the hurlers are good people to hang out with...

But I digress. Getting back to the restaurant, we're now starting to have a few open tables on weeknights, and lunch is coming back nicely since we stopped taking reservations. We've hired Adam, Kira, and Nina in the front of the house to help out in AJ's absence and to fill the positions left by Brandice and Yesh. I've been told that Brandice may be moving to California but I don't know whether or not that's true, and Yesh has taken a job in Chile and will be moving down there in a week or two; I wish them safe travels and hope they are both very happy in their new jobs. AJ brought her baby boy in this week, too, and told us she'll be coming back soon. We're all looking forward to that; it seems like she's been gone a long time even though it's just been a few weeks.

Some really nice dairy and produce has been coming in from Dave Swanson and Braise RSA lately; it's good to see that it's a productive year for the local farms and the quality looks great. A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of meeting a professional mushroom forager, and he brought me some beautiful chanterelles and hedgehog mushrooms- a sure sign of the changing seasons. I'm really looking forward to Fall, and starting to work out the next menu in my head. The salmon out of Alaska is fantastic, so it may make a comeback, replacing the walleye, which is getting a little scarce right now with the warmer water temperatures in Lake Erie making them head for the deeper areas of the lake to keep cool. Halibut season typically winds down in November, so we'll see how that goes. Maybe we'll bring back the osso bucco, or add another steak. So many choices.

All this talk of food is making me hungry- I've got no food here at home but I'm pretty sure there's a Guinness in the fridge.

Now that's what I'd call a good Irish breakfast!

Last week I received a call from a gentleman who wanted me to know how frustrated he was with the way he and his wife were treated on three occasions when they had tried to dine at Pastiche. The first time they came was within the first few weeks we were open. They had decided to come for dinner but had no reservation and were turned away because we were full. They came again a second time, a month or so later, but it was on the spur of the moment and again they had no reservation. When they walked through the door they were asked if they had a reservation and when they said no they were given attitude from the server who made them feel foolish for even thinking that they could just walk in and get a table without a reservation. The third time was just a couple of weeks ago. The gentleman's wife, knowing that he still wanted to come here, called on Monday and made a reservation for his birthday dinner on Thursday. She was so excited that she wrote about it on her Facebook page, and even called and confirmed on Wednesday. On Thursday they arrived at the proper time and were told by that same server that we had no reservation for them and no table to seat them at.

In talking to him, I could tell not only how disappointed he was, but also that he was still burning from being treated that way.

I felt, and still feel, ashamed and embarrassed that anyone who came to my restaurant would be treated this way not only once but three times. Of course, I couldn't change what had already happened, but Angela and I talked at length about how we can change reservation procedures to make sure this doesn't happen again, and we are working with the servers to provide them with positive ways of interacting with customers in these situations.

Reservation mixups happen for a variety of reasons; some are within our control, and we've implemented systems to minimize them. They can be as simple as having someone answer the phone who can count to ten. We only have ten tables, and you would think it's a pretty simple thing to do (I've messed up a couple of times myself), but we've now implemented a new system to keep better track of reservations and turns so that we can seat guests at the correct tables, on time. We've also made the commitment to have a dedicated host on the floor during dinner service- Angela has joined us full time now to do that, as well as to supervise the front staff to insure that our service is up to par.

When there's a problem with being able to get someone down on time for their reservation, it usually has to do with our ability to turn the tables. "Turning the tables" is how we refer to the process of serving a series of guests with reservations at the same table at different times during the evening.

Getting tables turned is a real, ongoing challenge in every small restaurant, everywhere. People have every right to expect to be seated within a reasonable period of time. There are a lot of different perceptions about why people get seated late; most of the time I hear it's because they think the restaurant wants to make more money by having them buy cocktails at the bar before being seated...

...I remember an experience I had years ago, at a well-known downtown steakhouse that had a reputation for doing just that; it was clear when we arrived that our table was set, watered and ready to go, with the server not otherwise occupied, yet still we were told that we had to wait at the bar- we were seated promptly after we'd finished our second round of drinks. I can't deny that may happen some places, but definitely not here. In fact, on busy nights, we'll take guests cell numbers, send them next door to The Palm and call them when their table is ready.

You don't want to have to wait for your table. That's why you make reservations, after all. Sometimes, though, things happen that prevent you from being seated on time. The most difficult turn is seven o'clock. To begin with, many of the five o'clock tables arrive late- anywhere from fifteen minutes to a half hour. We do everything we can to get their orders in, cooked and served promptly, without making them feel hurried, and most of the time we can get them contentedly on to whatever else they're doing that evening in time to have the table ready for the next reservation at seven. If the seven o'clock reservation is late, and we don't have another turn on that table, it's no big deal. If they are, we usually start thinking ahead to maybe moving that next reservation to another table if we have one available. Seven o'clock and later reservations sometimes tend to linger longer because they are there for the evening and may not be going anywhere else.

We want everyone to enjoy their dinners in a comfortable and relaxing way, and never ask for anything more than their understanding if indeed there is another group of guests waiting to be seated at the table they are occupying. In that case we'll simply ask them please if it's not too much trouble would they mind continuing their conversation and after-dinner drinks at the bar?

We believe that you should reasonably be able to expect to be seated within twenty minutes of the time you reserved, and are also willing to hold your table for that long should you find yourself running late. If we can't seat you within that time frame, I've asked Angela and the staff to offer you a glass of wine or a drink in appreciation for your patience. Having said that, though, if you're not here on time and twenty minutes goes by, and you haven't called to let us know you're running late, please don't expect us to hold your table for you if there is someone else who is waiting. We'll find you another table as soon as one opens up, and I think that's fair enough...

As for the gentleman I spoke with on the phone, I could do no more but express my regret that he'd been treated so poorly, give him my cell number to call should he decide to give us another chance, and my promise to do everything I could to personally see to it that he has a great experience. I truly hope he calls me and gives us that chance. He and his wife seem like nice people; exactly the kind of people anyone would want to have dining with them.

As with anything I do, I prefer to be straightforward. I've written about bad customers, and I'll never hesitate to write about us when we are bad, too. It's all part of the big picture. We're always going to be a work in progress. So far, people have been really cool about telling me both the good and bad things we do. Sometimes we change, and other times we don't. We still don't have high chairs, and we still don't serve Sunday Brunch. We do serve lunch, though. That's a big one, and that was your idea. We'll continue to evolve and improve, I promise.

As I stood at my saute station last night, enjoying a few moments of inactivity between orders and looking out the little kitchen window at the neon Miller High Life sign and the smokers across the street at Lee's Luxury Lounge, I was trying to think of what to take off the menu for Summer.

I've been so busy it's been nearly impossible to find the time to rework the menu, and it's become embarrassingly late in the season to be still trying to get it done. The truth is that there just aren't many things to change. It's not broke, so I think that if all we do is tweak a couple things that's probably for the best. I'm leaving the appetizers alone, adding walleye, and changing the tiramisu to a strawberry version to reflect the availability of good fresh berries. The mix of what's been selling has been all over the board, which is really nice, and also tells me that it's a solid menu, lending weight to my feeling that it's better to leave well enough alone. Barring anything weird happening, we should have it on the tables this week sometime.

One other thing you'll notice is that I've added a short note in the space above the salads that says, more or less, that we make lower acid dressings because they have less of a negative effect on the flavors of the wine you may be drinking and to allow the flavors of the salad ingredients to come through and stand out. I've had a few comments from people who want "more zip" in their salads, so we've upped the EVO to vinegar ratio a point or two, from 8 or 7:1 to 6 or 5:1 ("traditional" vinaigrette can be 4 or even 3:1), depending on the dressing; still fairly gentle and food friendly, but a little more assertive. European wines have an inherent acidity that is able to take on a little more vinegar in a salad than, say, wines from Napa or Sonoma. The note concludes by saying that we're always happy to add a little more vinegar to your salad if you'd like.

We had a nice review in The Shepard Express last week; thank you Jeff Beutner and Lindsey Abendschein for the nice article and pastiche of photographs of the restaurant. We were even featured in another national magazine called "The Week" last week, and had several people comment on how cool that was. It is cool, and also a little surreal. Having people come from out-of-state just to eat dinner can be a little unsettling. We've had people drive up from Chicago, take the ferry over from Michigan, and even a couple from Santa Barbara, heading to Chicago, who diverted to Milwaukee for a day to come and eat dinner with us. Being so busy is nice, but it also puts extra pressure on us and on the restaurant and equipment.

I realize that people make reservations a week or two in advance, and are really stoked about coming out to eat with us. I know that many look on the website at the menu and are excited to have something they see there. We are constantly making navarin and cassoulet, two of the biggest sellers. Rabbit legs are almost always going in the slow cooker, and I get fresh fish delivered almost every day from Milwaukee and Chicago. I try really hard to not run out of anything, but the restaurant kitchen is only so big and we only have so much storage space. The little walk-in cooler in the basement fills up with deliveries every morning then empties out as we process all the food for dinner service.

We seat 40 people at our ten tables and 8 more at the bar. In an average week we go through, more or less, about sixty to eighty pounds of lamb, maybe eighty to a hundred pounds of fresh fish and scallops, twelve to fifteen gallons of heavy cream, five to ten pounds of Callebault chocolate, thirty pounds of shrimp, two dozen ducklings and about as many chickens, two hundred pounds of potatoes, fifty pounds of onions, seventy five dozen eggs, and butter. Lots of butter. A hundred and twenty pounds or more, every week. We roll about twenty pounds of fresh tagliatelle, and make enough lemon tarts to blow through two or sometimes three big cases of lemons. We buy around a thousand dollars a week in fresh produce, not even including what I get from Braise RSA or the Farmer's Market, all of which has to be strategically jammed one way or another, along with the prepared food and desserts and cases of beer, into the tiny 8' by 10' cooler. It keeps everything fresh and rotating, for sure, but it is a logistical challenge every day to make sure nothing gets overlooked. The wine storage is a little better, though.

We'd originally had the wine stored on one side of the basement, but it was too near the cooler and freezer compressors (which generate a certain amount of heat) for it to be comfortable, so we moved it to the other side, cut a couple of small ducts in the air-conditioning stacks, tied a blue tarp up around it, and voila! The Pastiche Makeshift Wine Cellar and Chef's Office remains at a comparatively cool temperature and is much easier to keep organized.

I also bought a couple things last week that I'm kind of excited about- a new slicer for the kitchen and another new ice maker for the bar. The secondhand slicer I bought to open with made me pretty uncomfortable because it was all but impossible to use it with the hand guard in place and still get a reasonably decent result- the parts didn't fit together properly and I was always worrying that someone was going to get hurt, so I bought a nice, shiny new Globe that is much easier to use and clean. Because we've been so busy, and also had a little interruption of service with our ice machine a couple of Saturdays ago, we've been buying a lot of ice. I'd originally hoped that we could bag ice during down times and keep it in the freezer to use when we were busy but since we've opened for lunch and been so busy for both lunch and dinner, there really are no down times and that idea isn't working well at all. So I ordered another ice machine that we'll put in the basement and that problem should be resolved. The guy at the Marathon station will probably miss us, but I think the boys will still buy enough 5-Hour Energy drinks there that he'll be just fine.

So anyway, I didn't mean to go off on such a long jag, but that's why it's been a couple of weeks since I last had the chance to sit down and write. I'm going to try to do this every Sunday, because that's the only time I really have. Last Sunday I would have but we participated in an event down by the lakefront called "The Big Taste" which was pretty fun. There were a lot of restaurants there and it was cool to hook up with some good friends I don't get to see much of anymore. Because of the lack of time and storage space at the restaurant, we couldn't really make anything too fancy for the 300 or more people who were at the event, so we set up a little oyster station and Nick and Bobby shucked about 550 fresh oysters and got to meet a lot of nice people. My thanks to them and to AJ Dixon, who organized and supervised and talked me into doing the event in the first place. She's taking some time off right now to have a baby- we miss her at the restaurant and eagerly await her return in the Fall.

So look for the "new" menu this week (I'll change it on the web site, but maybe not today because I've got to get to the restaurant and pay some bills), and please let me know what you think when you come to dinner. I try to get to every table but it isn't always possible, so if you'd rather, send me a note at mike@pastichebistro.com and tell me. Good or bad, it matters to me.

After the last table had gone last night, I took a quick look at the Micros reports before going down to the basement- it had been another busy week; our busiest yet, and by quite a bit, too. I was expecting a slow week; post-Summerfest, with the Water Frolics and Bastille Days going on. Not so.

"Being so busy is a good problem to have" is what people keep telling me, and though I know from a certain point of view they're right, I'm not sure I agree a hundred percent. I'm not in the restaurant business to make a fortune, or to get my "name out there". I love the work. I'm grateful to make a modest living, to pay the bank and bills, and be able to help my boys through school, the same as most people. People call and tell me to advertise in their paper, and to take advantage of the good press to market the restaurant and grow the business. There's a lot I don't know, for sure, about marketing a restaurant that's already as busy as we are. I do know that every time I see someone walk out the door, shaking his or her head after being told that we're sorry, we're all booked for the evening, I feel really bad- not (as more business-savvy people will tell me) that there are dollars walking out that door, but really that there was someone who thought enough of our restaurant to want to eat there and ended up having to go somewhere else. Should we expand upstairs? I don't know. Will the wave of business, fueled by good reviews, subside so we can establish a more realistic and sustainable business pattern? That's the real question. Time will tell, and then we can make some decisions and go forward. Right now, it's all I can do to try and keep food and wine coming in the back door so it can go out the front. We have so little storage space we have to get almost everything fresh every day. Sounds good, but it's still very difficult to predict with any degree of accuracy what's going to sell each night. One night we'll sell twelve chickens and three pork mignons and the next night that'll reverse itself. It's the same across the board, especially with the fresh fish. It makes ordering a challenge, to say the least. Don't get me wrong, that part of being so busy is a good problem to have. I just wish there were a few more hours in the day. If I just had a little more time, I could let my brain relax a little and be more creative. I could get working on the Summer Menu before it's time for the Fall Menu, and I could enjoy the time I spend working with the cooks and front staff so much more.

Right now, even just sitting here, I can't really follow a thought through from beginning to end without being interrupted by the work voice that says it's time to get going, there's so much to do and tomorrow will be here before you know it. Quiche crusts need to be made and rolled, bills need to be paid, payroll needs to be done, fish, meat and produce need to be ordered and I need to see if I can fix the front doorknob better so it doesn't keep coming off when people pull on it. The ice machine broke down yesterday, so I need to call my repair guy and leave a message to see if he can get out here tomorrow morning, and I need to leave Mario a note to let him know that the ADA access door on the South side of the building is sticking because the wood from the ramp has warped and the door scrapes against it. I just about throw my shoulder out every time I have to open it from the inside- I can't imagine how hard it would be in a wheelchair or with a walker from the outside. Then there's the stack of unopened mail on my desk... from the City of Milwaukee to the Sisters of St. Francis; you get pretty popular when you're in the restaurant business...

I love it, you know, and really can't imagine doing anything else. It's better than I'd ever dreamed, and being able to work every day with my boys, Angela and her son Frank, and the rest of the crew is more fun and rewarding than anything I've ever done before. Being able to share that with everyone who comes out to eat is an amazing feeling, and the times when I get to come out and visit with people make it all come together. The rest of the day recedes into the back of my head, the work voice quiets, and I just relax and soak up the happiness of the dining room. For a guy like me it just doesn't get much better than that.

I met my friend Scott Williams and his wife Shannon at the South Shore Farmer's Market yesterday morning. Scott is the GM at Lake Park Bistro, and I first met him and Shannon when we worked together at Bartolotta's Catering. The Farmer's Market on a beautiful Saturday morning may seem an odd place to be talking shop, but we're restaurant people and that's what we do, pretty much.

A good review of your restaurant is a blessing; and three in as many weeks has brought a whirlwind of activity to our door that's been very difficult to deal with. In addition to the crush of calls for reservations, the phone rings off the hook with people trying to sell me everything from matted and framed copies of the review to noise suppressing fabric panels because the review said the restaurant gets noisy. People order all the dishes mentioned in the review, and it skews the normal menu mix dramatically. Customers pull copies of the review out of their pockets and purses to compare notes. Some take snapshots of their food with their phones; God only knows what they do with them.

The vast majority of the people who've been coming out to the restaurant have been totally cool, and get what we're doing. They'll be back and if we keep making them happy, will become loyal customers. Others come in to "kick the tires", and may or may not come back because we may not meet their expectations. Most of these people seem to think we're a fancier place than we are. Then there are the "one percenters", who just come in to rip on everything and everyone they can, which brings me back around to my original point in bringing up my conversation with Scott yesterday.

Every once in a while we have to 86 a customer. Telling them to not come back; they are not welcome, knowing full well that they will waste no time and spare no effort relating to all who will listen about how awful your restaurant is, is not easy or pleasant. It's not really a choice on our part, because the person in question has behaved in such a way as to put us in the position where we need to do it in order to restore order in the dining room and not let what's happening have a negative effect on the rest of the customers. We had our first one last week. I felt really bad about it, but this person was rude to the staff, disruptive to our customers, and clearly not happy with the food, drinks or service, so I picked up the tab for him and his guests and asked him not to come back in what was the most apologetic and courteous but firm way I could muster the energy for. I was telling Scott this, hoping he could give me some advice because he's been handling situations like that for years and is really great at everything having to do with the front of the house. He told me that the best line he'd heard for that type of situation came from Joe Bartolotta's brother Paul, who was Chef at Chicago's Spiaggia restaurant many years ago. "Please don't give us another opportunity to disappoint you". Respectful and just indirect enough to make the person think about it for a second or two, that's a great one, Paul. I just hope it's a long time before I need it again.

That aside, it's been another fantastic couple of weeks.

Ann Christiansen wrote a wonderful piece about the restaurant in July's Milwaukee Magazine. I've always enjoyed Ann's writing, and have always appreciated her criticism because she goes to great lengths to be accurate and fair. I can honestly say that in the case of both Ann's and Carol's reviews, the quibbles and criticisms were right on. Some things we've changed or may change, others we'll try to do better, and a few will remain because, well, that's just the way we do it. I couldn't be happier or more grateful because the reviews have brought in so many new people to our restaurant. I hope most of them come back many times and are always happy.

For those who aren't, all I ask is for the opportunity to address and correct whatever it is they don't like, and for those who won't be pleased, well, there's always that little gem from Chef Paul...

One last thing- to my Dad and all the Dads... have a happy Father's Day. I feel like the luckiest guy in the world because I get to work with and spend time with my sons. It's why I do this, and my reason for getting up and going in every day. I'm so proud of them, and so grateful for their presence in my life. I hope we can have a long and successful run, and that the restaurant will help provide them with experiences and income that will enable them to have opportunities to live their own dreams. What could be better?

Thanks, Carol, for the nice review and kind words- Pastiche remains a work in progress, and we'll work very hard to deserve the praise and even harder to correct our flaws and minimize our mishaps. Even with the incessant ringing of the phone, I couldn't be happier...

It's been a crazy week, for sure. We opened for lunch on Tuesday and by Friday we had a full house. Of course, Friday the review came out so the phone was ringing off the hook all day and night. Unfortunately, we'd already been booked for most of the weekend, and only had a few early and late tables available. On Saturday we had the same, with the addition of a note slipped under the front door by one of our neighborhood friends who couldn't get through. With a little juggling and some understanding from our customers, we were able to accommodate many of them and as far as I could tell we made it through the weekend with most people leaving happy and full.

On a side note, today is the 66th anniversary of D-Day, the Allied Invasion of and consequent liberation of France. As someone who holds all things French near and dear to my heart as well as having served in the 82nd Airborne Division many years ago, I'd like to say thanks to our WWII veterans...

... and I found out this week that one of my best friends' sons was wounded in Afghanistan- my best wishes to Steven for a safe trip home and a speedy and complete recovery.

Thinking about the big picture, our restaurant world seems small indeed... but the food doesn't cook itself, so I need to wrap this up. In the next few weeks, I'm looking forward to the Farmers' Markets and all the good things I can find there. In the mean time I'll be here at the restaurant, breaking down cases of chickens and ducklings (thanks to the review), and trying to juggle everything else without dropping any balls... or stepping in "le merde".

Heading into Memorial Day Weekend and it looks like it's going to be a little slow. That's alright, though, because we have a lot of prepping to do in order to be ready for lunch service to start next Tuesday.

We've had a very busy couple of weeks. The reviewers have been in. Following the first review by the Bay View Compass earlier this month, onMilwaukee.com posted a nice piece on us this week, the Journal-Sentinal will be featuring us next week, and Milwaukee Magazine will have us in their July issue.

I'm grateful that the food writers think our restaurant is worth spending their time on, and even more so for the kind words they've given us. One of my favorite writers and critics was Roy Andries de Groot, who wrote for Esquire and died in 1983. He was blind and was always accompanied by his seeing eye dog, which may have been why he made no effort to dine anonymously. He told the restaurant when he was coming and to give him their best shot. I think that sounds like a fun way to do it.

Of course, I understand the anonymous approach, too. Ruth Reichl, when she was writing for the NY Times in, I think, 1993, wrote a famous review of Le Cirque in which she described the difference in dining there as a "nobody" versus after she was "made" as the NY Times Restaurant Critic.

Just like chefs, writers are all different and each brings his or her own art to our business. A good review can make a huge difference in our lives, and a bad one seems to hang like an albatross around our necks forever.

I try to just take it all in stride, and most importantly, not lose focus on what it is we're here to do. After all, we only have ten tables, and we've been quite busy. I'm concerned with all the day to day things I have going, and now that the last photographer has packed up and gone, I'm happy to be able to concentrate on getting ready for this weekend and lunch next week.

We're closed on Monday, to honor Memorial Day and to allow our staff to celebrate the day with their families and friends. We'll open at 11am on Tuesday for lunch. I'll be working on getting the luncheon menu posted on the website as soon as I can, but as I said before, we've been really busy and there just aren't always enough hours in the day...

Have a very happy and safe holiday weekend!

Midnight, sitting on the couch watching "Office" reruns with a bowl of mac and cheese and a half bottle of Premier Cru Meursault that a friend had left for me at the restaurant, I was turning things over in my head...

We'd had a busy night. In fact, if you'd have come in between maybe six and seven, you'd have been told that we were sorry but had no tables available. We'd set three tables aside for a reservation for ten that never called or showed up. By the time we finally decided that they weren't going to show and pulled the tables apart, several groups who'd wanted to eat with us and had been told we were sorry but couldn't accommodate them had gone somewhere else, disappointed. I was told that we'd turned away six or seven tables during that time, and felt very bad about that. Not so much from the point of losing business, but more because those people had thought enough of us to venture out in the rain and come to our restaurant, only to be told we had no table for them even though we had those three reserved tables that no one was going to be occupying.

With only ten tables, each one counts, even on a slower night. We normally wouldn't have taken a reservation for a group of ten people, but when the gentleman called last week, we had nothing else on the book and it seemed like it wouldn't be a problem. Well, we got burned, and so did those folks who came out and weren't able to get a table.

So, what do we do? We can do like other restaurants and take a credit card number for larger (6 or more) groups, or just not take those tables at all. I keep going back to the idea that we are trying to be just a small and simple neighborhood restaurant. It doesn't seem very cordial or neighborly to insist on taking someone's credit card number so you can charge them if they don't show up. On the other hand, it's a little inconsiderate to make a reservation for a large group and then no call-no show.

This is part of our business; it happens frequently enough to be a problem, and cause us to try and come up with ways to deal with it. One way is the credit card charge. I want to give it some more thought, and maybe some time to see if it continues to be a problem. There's also the possibility that somewhere along the line we got our wires crossed, and that those ten people will walk in the door tonight, or even next Tuesday. Who knows? Stranger things have happened.

It was still a really good night, though. We had a table of wine guys, one of whom was French, having a great time. At the end of the night my friend Chef Jeff stopped by for a glass of wine and some frogs' legs. I joined him, and sitting at the bar, listening to the closing sounds of the restaurant- the slight clinking of silverware being polished and glasses being put away, the Velvets on the stereo, the French gentleman and the wine guys talking about great food and wine, and the staff talking about going out after work, I really felt like it was a good day after all.

It usually takes me a few days to recover from Sundays. The restaurant is closed, so that's when I go in and do paperwork. After going over the weekly reports and doing payroll, I get out my checkbook and pay bills.

Even the most carefully prepared business plan can't take everything into consideration, and there will always be costs that can't be factored in because there is no way they can be accurately predicted. In our case, for example, energy costs. Because the building had never been used for a restaurant, there was no track record of how much energy it would require for a month of operation. I called around and got estimates to use for my planning, but when I opened my first WE Energies bills last weekend they were about 25% higher than I'd figured... and that's without even having the air conditioners installed yet (the landlords have promised me that they'll be putting them in soon). Last night I got my monthly charge from the company that processes our credit card transactions and it was over $900. And so on, with one thing after another; I'm sure you get the picture.

Of course, this isn't any different from what everyone else I know has gone through in opening their restaurants, and I've experienced it with every one I've opened as well. It's also not the end of the world. It's just a problem that needs solving, and with a couple of late nights and a little help from my friends, I'll figure it out and deal with it.

Anyone who knows this business knows that we don't get in it to get rich. You work your ass off every day just to be able to break even, and consider yourself lucky if you make it through your first year. There are so many things that can trip you up that you can't lose focus for a minute, and as soon as you think you're gaining ground, a refrigerator compressor breaks down on a Saturday night, or a new ordinance requires you to rebuild your handicap ramp, or a volcano erupts halfway across the world or oil spills in the Gulf and the prices of fish and shrimp go through the roof. No, you do it for love. For the passion you have for the food and cooking, the wine, the people who come out to enjoy your restaurant, and the people you work with. You don't have to beat people over the head with how passionate you are, either. They can see it and taste it. Me, I'd rather drive my old truck, wear jeans and sweatshirts and not have two nickels to rub together if it means I can buy good coffee, real butter, fresh fish and vegetables, Penzey's spices, and good chocolate. Belgian chocolate.

So, I try to balance out the additional bills by cutting down on some of the variable costs- the same as everyone else does. In a short time, we'll have another month of business under our belt, most of the initial and non-recurring costs will have been paid for, and we'll be able to refine things even more.

The important thing to me is that I want to keep my operating costs as low as I can so I can keep the menu prices as low as possible. We're not making money right now; in fact, we're still losing a little, but at least it's a little less than I'd figured. Since we opened two months behind schedule, it's going to take that much longer to recover, but it could be a lot worse. We've been doing great business and everyone has been really cool about sending their friends to check us out. With a few more busy months, things will be right back on track.

In the mean time, we're going to try something that's been working for other local businesses; asking people to please consider using cash instead of their credit card when they pay their bill. Help me keep the prices down, and keep as much of our money in the local economy as we can. Any little bit helps, and to show my appreciation, you'll receive a 3% discount off of your dinner bill whenever you pay with cash.

And by all means, keep coming out to dinner. People keep asking me why I came to Bay View to open a restaurant. There are a lot of reasons, but it all really comes down to the people who live there. When you are surrounded by people who like and appreciate good food and wine, and are so fiercely supportive of their local businesses, how could you go anywhere else?

...and I could be wrong, but it also seems that there isn't a single person here who's on South Beach, Atkins, or any other diet of the month, so even if there were nothing else, that alone would be more than enough reason for me!

Life is good again, and it's only Wednesday...

We rolled out the new Spring dinner menu last night to good reviews. We've replaced a few of the more cold-weather dishes with fresh fish, rabbit risotto, a couple of new salads, and several new desserts. Even though I'd intended to take the cassoulet off once the warmer weather came around, so many people told me to keep it on that I did, and will keep it on as long as you want me to.

We're going to open for lunch in a few weeks. I've always wanted to serve lunch here, but thought I'd be better off getting the dinner business established before trying to tackle that, too. With our evening business in full swing and the weather getting nicer, I believe it's a good time to make the next move. From 11-2 on weekdays we'll have a menu that features many smaller portions of our dinner items as well as several salads, soup, three or four sandwiches, and a quiche and omelette of the day. Maybe even a burger... what do you think, yes or no? Let me know the next time you're in or drop me a quick note.

Thanks again for your continued support- our first month was very successful and I couldn't be happier with all the people who keep coming back for more. I'm very grateful for your kind words and even for your criticisms as they all help us get better and let us know what you want.