Start the Fire: How I Began A Food Revolution In America by Jeremiah Tower

Author:Jeremiah Tower [Tower, Jeremiah]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2017-04-04T04:00:00+00:00

THE KIND OF STARS

I saw a different future, but with doubts. Breaking the rules at Chez Panisse and the Santa Fe had been lauded, but would the public understand our choice of site? I saw a restaurant to which you would drive up, give your car to a valet, come in for a drink or oysters, walk a block (escorted by my staff) to the performance, walk the block back two hours later with the crowds, have dinner or a snack or dessert, then pick up your car at the valet and leave. I knew people would come to see beautiful dancers or famous opera or ballet stars, so I would subsidize the young dancers and court the stars. I wanted people to feel as if they owned my restaurant, as if it had everything for them rather than something for everyone. San Francisco didn’t need another “special occasion” restaurant, it needed a great “regular.” A home away from home, a place one could casually drop into for a glass of champagne, a business lunch or dinner or meeting in the bar, or a four-hour gourmandizing meal. I had visions of a place full of lawyers and city politicians selling us all down the river at lunch, afternoons at the bar full of glad victories or unhappy defeats from the law courts next door, the cocktail hour with all the office workers in the area, the pre-theater crowd, a full house for dinner, and then after 10 P.M. the restaurant full again with the stars of the performing arts eating oysters and drinking champagne, the fans coming by to ogle the lithe young bodies of the corps de ballet. Filling the place four to five times a day was the dream. Reality was the pro forma at the bank that said three, and a “best possible” gross at $3 million a year.

Meanwhile, there was a restaurant to build.

Pushing aside the lawsuits against my partner as thick on my desk as the rats had been on the floor of the abandoned restaurant, I got to work. The sheer weight of our press (from the Newport Astor mansion, the American Institute of Wine & Food festival, and many other Santa Fe national and international events) was enough to convince the Crocker Bank to set a meeting to sign loan papers. Then our banker left Crocker, sending us into a scramble to find another who would hand over $350,000. Our ace in hand was the very favorable and valuable lease I had negotiated before I met Doyle. Then a lawsuit from one of Doyle’s partners forced a public auction of the lease, our only asset. Few showed up to bid, and those who did were scared off by the Apache Doyle in his Eddie Bauer sunglasses, which he wore throughout the session. His expression in victory was not one of joy but one of bloodlust. “If we ever have a problem,” he assured me, “I am more than willing to step aside or buy you out.

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