Bygone – Baltimore Magazine

Hunger Games

Aaron Hope — Mon, 25 Mar 2019 08:30:00 +0000

By Jane Marion
Photography by Justin Tsucalas. Lettering by Bagus Sudrajat.

Business & Development

Hunger Games

With 11 restaurants and counting, Alex Smith, along with his brother Eric, is out to conquer the baltimore dining scene.

By Jane Marion. Photography by Justin Tsucalas.

Chances are, even if you’ve only heard of Alex Smith, you have a strong sense that you don’t like him. And he’s well aware of what you think: private school lax bro, grandson of the late H&S Bakery billionaire and Harbor East developer John Paterakis Sr., and, more recently, owner of some of Baltimore’s trendiest, spendiest fine-dining restaurants, not to mention their sister spots in other states. Among them: Loch Bar, Azumi, Bygone, Ouzo Bay, Tagliata, The Elk Room, and Italian Disco (plus Harbor East Delicatessen & Pizzeria and the Häagen-Dazs in Harbor East).

But here’s the thing about Smith: Your opinion of him only fuels his desire to be better. “When people don’t know me, they hate me,” Smith is the first to admit. “I’ve had people walk up to me in the restaurants and they go, ‘You’re a manager here?’ And I go, ‘Yeah.’ And they go, ‘How do you feel working for a guy like Alex Smith? I’ve met him a couple of times and the guy’s a complete jerk.’”

Smith leans in a little closer and delivers the denouement, which he does with a certain pleasure. “And then I’ll say, ‘I just want to introduce myself—my name is Alex Smith.’”

Smith is 34, and his brother Eric, a co-owner of Atlas Restaurant Group, is 28. Together, they are the youngest restaurateurs in the country to own so many high-end dining establishments. In 2017 alone, they opened four eateries. By the end of 2019—with the planned spring opening of The Choptank, a stylish crab house in the south shed of the historic Broadway Market, the summer opening of a Latin fusion restaurant on the former site of the Four Seasons’ Wit & Wisdom, as well as third locations of Loch Bar and Ouzo Bay in Houston, Texas, and two new places inside the soon-to-be-built Moxy Hotel in Washington, D.C.—Atlas will employ more than 1,100 people. And the ambition doesn’t stop there. Smith’s long-range goal for 2020, he says, is to rack up $100 million in sales.

Veteran Cunningham’s chef Cyrus Keefer, who has worked in many restaurants throughout the city, compares Smith to another restaurateur who opened a record number of restaurants up and down the East Coast. “When [James Beard Award-winning] restaurateur Stephen Starr kept opening restaurants in Philadelphia, no one hated Stephen Starr for being Stephen Starr—and that’s who Alex is going to be in Baltimore,” says Keefer. “The city needs the kinds of restaurants he’s opening.”

While it’s axiomatic that everyone loves a winner, it’s also true that success has a way of making you a target, too. And though total strangers like to engage in trash talk about Smith, it’s that public perception that that eggs him on and gives him the smallest chip on his otherwise broad shoulders. “Do I have to work?” he asks. “I have to work, because that’s all I’ve ever known. I don’t want anyone to say to me, ‘Big deal, your grandfather and father had money. You haven’t accomplished anything.’”

Corporate pastry chef Jacqueline Mearman had heard some of the more colorful nicknames for Smith: the Terminator and Darth Vader. Despite that, she interviewed for a job at Atlas. “What I knew was that he was under 40 and had more restaurants than anyone,” she says. “I went in for that interview thinking, I’m not taking the job—and then I met him.”

ALEX SMITH is fired up AT his cigar bar

Growing up in Timonium as the oldest of three boys, Smith had no such struggles as the son of doctors Vanessa Paterakis Smith and Frederick G. Smith (who also founded Gerstell Academy, a private school in Carroll County and is a co-owner of Sinclair Broadcast Group, one of the largest independent television broadcasting companies in the country). “I was friendly with everyone in high school and college,” he says. At Boys’ Latin School of Maryland, he was a model student, in possession of both brain and brawn. He was captain of the debate team, president of the honor board, student body president, and an elite athlete who, as a junior, led the school to the Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association championship in lacrosse and to the ranking of number-two team in the state.

Of course, it didn’t hurt that his bedroom was outfitted with a turf mat, points out his fiancée, Christina Ghani, a national sales and sports manager at Visit Baltimore. “He would roll out of bed and practice,” says Ghani, who was fixed up with Smith by mutual friends a few years ago. “He’d train, train, train in his room for hours—that tells so much about him.” Through sports, Smith learned not only how to play the game, but how to win it. “I’ll never forget when I was in sixth or seventh grade getting into the car after a day when I wasn’t playing well,” he recalls. “And my dad said, ‘Do you even want to be here? Is this something you want to do?’ And I said, ‘Of course it’s something I want to do.’ And he said, ‘Then here’s what your mentality needs to be every time you go out there: If you don’t get the ball, you’re not going to eat tonight. You’re not going to have a place to sleep. You have to go out there and do everything you can to win.’”

It might sound like tough love, but Smith rose to the challenge.

As a college freshman at the University of Delaware, where he majored in business administration and marketing, Smith remained fiercely competitive. “I was very goal-oriented,” he says. “I printed out all the NCAA lacrosse records, and I would break them and then cross them off with a highlighter. It’s the same in business. You have your goals and what you want to do and how you want to expand. And then you cross them off with a highlighter.”

The highlighter approach worked. By the time he graduated in 2007, the Blue Hens’ team captain was regarded as one of the greatest face-off men in all of collegiate lacrosse and held multiple records for it, more than any other player in the history of the sport at that time. While some kids wander aimlessly for a few years after graduating from college, Smith had a clear sense of purpose. While still at Delaware, he made plans to open his first business, a Häagen-Dazs franchise in Harbor East. “The year before I graduated college, my grandfather said, ‘I’m building a movie theater and we need an ice-cream store to go down next to it,’” says Smith. “I said, ‘I don’t know anything about the ice-cream business, but how hard can it be?’”

In 2007, the store opened with a mural of Smith in his lacrosse gear painted on one wall. He worked as his own general manager and put in upwards of 70 hours a week making milkshakes and scooping dulce de leche ice cream. On weekends, he played major-league lacrosse for the Rochester Rattlers.

From the outset, the business was a family affair. He hired Eric and some of his classmates from Boys’ Latin to work behind the counter. By 2010, he opened his second venture, the Harbor East Deli, located just down the street.

Working hard and keeping business brisk came naturally to him, but even then, he endured insults to his face. “Funny story,” he says. “A guy wearing a Legg Mason badge came into the deli, and I’m ringing him up. He orders a slice of pizza and soda, and I say, ‘Small or large?’ And he says, ‘Small.’ And I say, ‘For 50 cents more, you can get a large.’ And he says, ‘Okay, a large’—and then comments, ‘I was just upsold by the pizza boy.’” Smith pauses before getting to the real punch line. “My grandfather owns the building he works in,” he continues. “And he has no idea. I just smiled and didn’t say anything—I’d made my 50 cents.”

Brothers ALEX AND ERIC carry on the legacy OF THEIR GRANDFATHER H&S Billionaire John Paterakis Sr.

Back in his neutral-toned condo—a stone’s throw from the President Street traffic circle that bears his grandfather’s name—Smith seems totally at ease. He’s most comfortable here, amidst the décor that reflects his love of the outdoors, a passion he picked up from spending time with his family on their farms on the Eastern Shore and in Montana. There’s a mountain photograph he shot in Montana, a Peter Lik panoramic Alaska landscape, and a leather chair with an animal skin slung across the back. Although she keeps her own busy schedule, Ghani, who is getting ready for a business trip, sits adoringly by his side. He’s clearly relaxed in her presence. (Months later, they’ll add an Australian Labradoodle, fittingly named Atlas, to their nest.)

Here, at his dark wood dining-room table, looking out over the expanse of Harbor East from the 25th floor, he doesn’t have to be “on.” And it’s often this place where he does his most creative thinking. Back when he was coming up with the concept for Tagliata, for instance, he paged through an Italian dictionary and debated close to 200 names before settling on the lyrical word meaning “chop house.” He also studied 50 different fonts before finding the perfect shaped “T” to grace the menu and logo.

Insomnia, not surprisingly, can be an issue.

“I have a tough time sleeping at night, because I’m thinking of all the different scenarios that could play out,” he says. “If you ask me a question about a business and where we are going, I’m going to give you 20 different ways we can improve. I’m planning for contingencies all the time. Who’s my number two or three person if this or that person leaves? I’m prepared.” And when he can’t give in to sleep because his brain is brimming with ideas, in the wee hours of the morning, he relaxes by watching shows about space or turns on The History Channel. “I watch a lot about military history,” he says. “I love learning about World War II and the Korean and Vietnam Wars, and the ancient stuff, too. What’s fascinating to me is that one moment or another can change the course of history.”

In Smith’s life, the moment that changed everything was in 2000, when his Greek immigrant grandfather decided to invest in the then-desolate neighborhood of Harbor East, and, in doing so, changed the landscape of the city. It’s a torch that he and Eric now happily continue to bear for their beloved grandfather, who also passed along his strong work ethic—even from his hospital bed in the last days of his life. “I would visit him in the hospital, and he’d always tell me to get back to work,” recalls Smith. “He wasn’t an affectionate man, but the night before he died, I was in his hospital room, and I said, ‘Pappous, I’m going back to work,’ and he nodded his head. ‘But before I go, I want you to know that I love you.’ And he looked at me and said, ‘I love you, too.’”

Long said to be the “favorite” grandson, Smith was the recipient of a gift passed down from his Pappous—a ring bearing an antique Greek coin of his namesake, Alexander the Great, a powerful ruler and one of history’s most revered military minds, who established the largest ancient empire the world had ever seen. On weekends, Smith wears the ring on the fourth finger of his right hand and removes it only to show that the gold band is slightly bent, having been molded around his grandfather’s finger. “When I put it on, it fit perfectly,” says Smith. “He wore this every day for 50 years.”

It’s an apt heirloom, as Smith sees himself as the defender of the family. When his grandfather’s second wife, Roula Paterakis, sued his children (including Smith’s mother, Vanessa) for her “rightful share” of the family fortune, Smith was the one who most fiercely guarded his grandfather’s coffers. “I’m really trying to protect the family” is all he’s willing to say on the subject. “I’ve taken on the role of protector.”

The same can be said of his relationship with Eric, the youngest of his two brothers, whom he affectionately refers to as “E.” Although they didn’t attend Delaware at the same time, Eric also played college lacrosse there. After graduation, Eric worked in construction for a time, and then Smith brought him on as a bartender at Ouzo Bay. Now, the two co-own the Atlas Restaurant Group, and Eric has been tasked with overseeing the multimillion-dollar beverage program at all of their properties.

“He’s my best friend,” says Eric of his older brother. He’s more reserved than Smith, though, physically, the resemblance is strong. “I always looked up to him when I was growing up,” he says. Together, the former lacrosse team captains are still leading the team. “We never got a chance to play lacrosse together,” Eric says, “but this is our game now—that’s how I see things. We are athletes. I always knew that we’d be a deadly combination.”

ALEX AND ERIC smith at work—and play—at The Elk Room’s private cigar bar

Ever the competitor, Smith tends to view the world of food service in terms of face-offs and showdowns. On the last Saturday before Labor Day weekend, he has geared up for what feels like an evening battle, which typically begins at 4 or 5 p.m. and ends some 10 or so hours later at The Elk Room for a round of pool and drinks with his top team members—an ad hoc all-boys club including Eric, managing partner David Goodman, Tagliata chef-partner Julian Marucci, and Smith’s director of operations, Brian McCormack.

Like a modern-day warrior, dressed in a burgundy jacket with a silver “A” pin (for Atlas), a custom Tom James gray-striped shirt, his favorite J. Brand jeans, and blue leather Gucci loafers, Smith sips a shot of double espresso from Ouzo’s kitchen and gets pumped for the night ahead. As he rounds his Harbor East properties, Ouzo is his first stop of the night. He checks the fish case, pointing out the mammoth langoustines from Norway, discards a wrinkled menu, and checks the evening’s reservations, noting that there are two sets of regulars he’d like to greet when they arrive. “On the first walkthrough, I’m mostly checking tables and chairs and that displays are set up,” he says. “I say ‘Hi’ to the chef, and the second time I swing around, I’m greeting guests.’”

Still at Ouzo, he points out a newly installed DJ booth, part of the “program” in which Atlas spends approximately $300,000 a year for music, such as the live jazz at The Elk Room or the piano player on the 1926 Steinway at Tagliata.

“I don’t want anyone to say to me, ‘Big deal, your grandfather and father had money. You haven’t accomplished anything.’”

More than anything, he loves talking about the restaurant business—about his restaurants, other Baltimore restaurants, and restaurants he’s eaten in from Miami to Tokyo. “You want to know why restaurants are closing?” he asks. “They are closing because the restaurant business is evolving—and the restaurants are not evolving with it. So when you see places closing, or these places that have been in business for 25 years providing decent food in an okay atmosphere, that’s not enough for businesses to be successful anymore. Millennials go home and get on Grubhub or Uber Eats if they want a turkey club. To get the millennial off the couch, it’s not just about the food anymore. It’s about the entertainment, it’s about the experience. Restaurants in Baltimore are dying because they are doing the same thing they did 20 years ago.”

Prior to opening a restaurant, Smith has been known to do painstaking research. For Tagliata, he ate his way through the great chophouses of America, from New York to Houston. For Azumi, he traveled to some of the country’s top-tier fish palaces—Nobu, Morimoto, Zuma—and recently took a team of staffers to Japan for new elements such as a robata grill and soon-to-open teppanyaki table. For Ouzo Bay, he drew on what he knew from frequent family trips to the Greek homeland and dined at chichi Hellenic hotspots like Milos in New York.

And he approaches it all as if he’s still on the turf field of his childhood. His father’s words—Go out there and do everything you can to win—likely looping over and over in his head. “No one is going to outwork me,” says Smith, as he continues his swing across Harbor East. “I check in with every dishwasher. I talk to the runners, and the bussers, and the hostesses, and the managers, and the chefs. I make the rounds and greet the guests and am in the kitchens every night. It’s a grind, and you have to have the will to do it.”

After Ouzo, it’s on to Loch Bar, a 2,700-square-foot, upscale seafood house he says is one of the highest-grossing restaurants on the East Coast per square foot. “Even higher than Le Diplomate,” he says, referring to Stephen Starr’s popular French bistro in D.C. Then he’s off to Harbor East Deli, where he makes sure that former mayor Sheila Dixon’s catering delivery to the Marriott Waterfront for her daughter’s wedding party went smoothly; to Azumi, where Smith speaks with chef Andy Gaynor about the 200-pound tuna they hauled in last week from Japan for a glossy Atlas promotional video; to Bygone to talk about a new chef’s coat and aprons with executive chef Matthew Oetting; and to The Elk Room, to walk the floor and remind a staffer to have a new employee sign a nondisclosure form for the private cigar club.

MAKING THE DAILY ROUNDS IN HARBOR EAST.

The last stop on the rounds is Tagliata, where he throws on the spotlight over the piano (“They always forget to do that,” he says.), before hitting the street to hug some of the valets standing outside Italian Disco and rounding back to Ouzo Bay again.

“With each concept, we are giving something back to the city,” says Smith as he walks briskly down Fleet Street. “We are trying to bring unique experiences to town. In our own small way, we are making a difference, and that’s why we keep going. Part of the drug-like effect for me is seeing people walk onto the properties and say, ‘Wow, look at this. Can you believe we have this in Baltimore?’”

As the night wears on, Smith is increasingly energized, engaging in a new version of one of his favorite pastimes—crunching numbers (once, for fun, he figured out that his grandfather had sold enough bread each year to make it to the moon and back) and checking the restaurant’s “stats,” using his dining analytic apps to look at such things as the number of guests dining at each restaurant, real-time sales figures, photos of the dining rooms, VIPS, even a customer’s favorite drinks. “Look at this,” he says, gesturing to his phone. “We’ve served 300 at Azumi, 250 at Ouzo, 300 at Bygone, 350 at Tag, then there’s Disco, Elk Room, Loch Bar, that’s about 1,800 to 1,900 sit-downs.” He cites some impressive off-the-record sales figures and sums up, “Just say that we are selling a lot of food.” When he’s not in the “back of house” with his staff, Smith is in the front with customers, shaking 200 to 300 hands each night by his own estimate. Inevitably, he says, pointing to his shoulder, “by the end of the night, my jacket will have all of this lipstick and make-up on it from the hugs.”

On any given evening, those hugs and handshakes might come from “regulars” such as Maryland Public Television stalwart Rhea Feikin, Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti, Maryland Shock Trauma chief Thomas Scalea, or Sun shutterbug Sloane Brown. On this night, that includes schmoozing with the executive vice president and CFO of Exelon, Joseph Nigro, and his wife, Melissa.

While Smith see himself as the great protector of the family, he also sees himself as a defender of the city that he loves—one that tends to get a bad rap. “I care about building something,” he says. “These restaurants will not be here in many years to come, so it’s not about the bricks and mortar, but an idea. They are important to the culture of the city. It’s important that Baltimore be thought of not just as a place with a bunch of crab shacks. I want to make an investment here and see the city grow.” Late at night, after the rounds have been made, after most of the patrons have headed home, inside The Elk Room, Smith leans on a leather wingback chair and is feeling contemplative as he talks about his love of the cosmos and the constellations. In his tired state, his mind starts to wander. “I love to think about the unknown,” he says. “It’s why I love space. When astronauts come back from space, they describe this sense of euphoria, this feeling of awe that they get at looking down and seeing the 7.5 billion or so people who live on earth.”

On a more micro level, it’s the feeling he gets when he sees people eating in his restaurants. But while he’s a bigwig in Baltimore, he holds no delusions about his place on the planet. “We are dust down here,” he says. “I’d love to go to space and get that feeling of euphoria.”

It could happen one day, since for Smith—like his grandfather—not even the sky seems to be the limit.

Source

Puff Daddies

Jess Mayhugh — Tue, 17 Apr 2018 08:30:00 +0000

Michael Byers

Navin Dass loves the smell of tobacco in the morning. It’s 10 a.m. on a cold January Monday, and the owner of Cross Street Tobacco in Federal Hill, the granddaddy of Baltimore cigar shops, is puffing on a Macanudo Inspirado. The store has just opened, and at a time when many people are in their office cubicles, slogging through emails and on their second cup of coffee, a handful of stogie lovers file in and light up. For years before he bought the place in 2015, Dass was a customer. Listen to him describe the pleasures of a good cigar, and it’s clear—even through the cloud of fragrant smoke—why more and more people are indulging in them at retail stores, lounges, and private clubs across town.

“A cigar is a very intimate thing. When I draw from the cigar, I let it out through my nose,” he says of the practice called retrohaling, which he demonstrates with subtle ease. “That changes a cigar from being a Ford to a Bugatti. You taste the country, the earth.” Like almost all cigar smokers, he doesn’t inhale.

Cigar enthusiasts discuss the varieties of tobacco leaves used for wrappers, fillers, and binders the way wine buffs gush over grapes. Prices can vary as drastically as vintages of pinot noir. Dass sells sticks ranging from a few bucks to $64 for a Padron 59th anniversary reserve. Is it worth it? “At that price it’s a celebratory cigar,” he says. “So it depends what you’re celebrating.”

Almost everyone who enjoys a premium cigar (loosely defined as handmade, using only long leaf tobaccos) says what makes the pastime a passion—and one way to explain its recent uptick in popularity in Baltimore and beyond—has less to do with what you’re smoking than it does with the act of smoking itself. The camaraderie, they say, is key.

“I’m a truck driver. I deal with speeds of 75 miles per hour all day, so when I get out and light up a cigar, I can relax and leave everything behind,” says downtown resident Mike McCoy, a Cross Street regular. “There’s a very diverse, interesting group of men and women who come through here. You could be sitting next to a fireman, attorneys, anybody. It’s very welcoming. The first time I came in, a guy introduced me to some of the regulars. Next time I came back, they referenced me by my first name. I thought, ‘that’s special.’”

The origins of the cigar are hazy. According to a brief history published in Time magazine, a ceramic pot discovered in Guatemala that dates back to at least the 10th century depicts a Mayan puffing on tobacco leaves bound with string. The Mayans may also be responsible for the object’s name, the story says: their term for smoking, sikar, likely led to the Spanish cigarro. In the United States, cigars were nearly as common an accessory (for men) in the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries as cell phones are today. Despite their perpetual presence between the lips of iconic figures such as George Burns, baseball legend Babe Ruth, and President John F. Kennedy (not to mention criminals like Al Capone), the practice fell out of favor as Americans became more health conscious. It wasn’t until a boom in the early 1990s that they reentered pop culture.

“A decade after being left for dead, the expensive foreign-made cigar is back,” The New York Times reported in 1995. “They are gaining [popularity], discovered by men and even a few women in their 20s and 30s. These new cigarophiles are puffing and twirling at more than a thousand dressy smoke-ins held around the country and are seeking out newly opened cigar bars and fine restaurants that welcome them. There, they say, brandishing a cigar is a statement of cool authority and elegance.”

Like all bubbles, the cigar one eventually burst, but in the ensuing years a hardcore group of smokers remained. Today, the industry is experiencing a rebirth, with thousands of smaller, boutique brands joining heavyweights like Padron, Rocky Patel, Ashton, and Romeo y Julieta in humidors everywhere. “Business has been going up fairly steadily in the last three or four years,” says David Giambelluca, manager of Mount Vernon Tobacco on West Read Street. “In the ’90s, there wasn’t enough product to meet the demand. That time it seemed much more fad-like. This time it seems more social.”

In 2011, the Quintessential Gentleman started The Office Lounge at The QG, a private cigar club in its Calvert Street building downtown, and in late 2014, Davidus Cigars opened in Little Italy. Both, like Cross Street Tobacco, not only sell cigars, but offer customers a comfortable venue in which to smoke them. All have leather chairs, televisions, intricate exhaust systems, and allow patrons to bring their own booze. “There’s certainly a trend in recent years of high-end lounges and clubs opening,” says David Savona, executive editor of Cigar Aficionado. “In the old days, a cigar shop was strictly a place to go in, buy a cigar, and leave. Nowadays, shops have evolved into more of a cigar lounge where people tend to meet their friends and linger.”

According to a report in the magazine, the United States imported 315 million premium cigars in 2015, an increase of 2.3 percent over 2014. The annual import numbers were below 300 million from 1999 to 2011, but made a comeback in 2012 when 304.7 million were shipped to the U.S. The numbers have stayed above 300 million since.

It’s probably not a coincidence that this resurgence has come at a time when our lives feel busier and more plugged-in than ever.

“When you light a cigar, you’re looking at spending anything from a half hour to more than an hour smoking it,” Savona says. “It can’t be hurried.”

As the elevator doors open to the third floor of The QG, the smell of tobacco is faint. It’s only when you walk around the corner, past the racks of smoking jackets, and enter the private club that the creamy, spicy, and sweet aromas fully materialize. “The flavor profile of a cigar can vary widely,” says Mitchell Liebeskind, The QG’s director of client services. “It’s similar to the way you drink. If you’re into gins, you want a Connecticut wrapper—they’re lighter, a little more floral. If you drink 18-year-old Scotch, you better get something much darker.”

The club has never been more popular. As of mid-January, just one of its 112 slots was available. For $300 up front and a $75 monthly fee, each member gets access to the lounge, with its comfy chairs, card table, three TVs, two Xboxes, wet bar, and fridge filled with mixers. Each smoker has their own humidified locker in which to store their cigars (and liquor if they’d like), and, of course, their own smoking jacket. The black, velvet coats are used mostly by the members of the after-work crowd who don’t want to go home smelling like smoke. The club also maintains a walk-in humidor with cigars for sale. It curates its selections as meticulously as a sommelier does a wine cellar, offering a variety of flavors and strengths.

“Everyone’s palate is different,” says Ramon Burris, The QG’s cigar brand ambassador. “Some people won’t touch a lighter cigar, they prefer something bolder, with notes of chocolate or cinnamon. Our clientele is very eclectic. We have people who are aficionados, but we also have the new, younger cigar smoker who wants to get into it and add it to their daily routine.”

Well-known brands, such as Arturo Fuente, coexist along smaller, boutique ones like the Boca Raton, Florida-based LH Premium Cigars in the retail humidor. Nicholas Syris, owner of LH Premium Cigars, hosted a tasting at the Baltimore club in January.

“Right now we are in the renaissance of cigars,” says Syris, who is also the company’s master blender. He uses Ecuadorian wrappers and filler from Peru, Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, and Brazil. “There are thousands of brands. If you don’t have a good cigar, you’re not going to get very far in this market. Clubs like this, where you have your man cave away from home, are great places to smoke. Where else can you have a bricklayer and a physicist sit down and immediately have common ground?”

While the majority of cigar smokers are men, more and more women are enjoying the pleasures of a nice stogie, as well. Lori Harris felt the allure from the moment she started smoking at The QG’s club, which she joined in December. She’s one of the only female members, and aside from the sticks themselves, loves buying accessories such as lighters, cutters, and cases. “The fact that it takes a long time to smoke a cigar inherently makes it a social activity,” she says. “The guys here are great. It’s a lounge, not a locker room. The nice thing about it is you can socialize the way you feel comfortable. There’s no pressure on any front.”

That come-one, come-all vibe—The QG even allows nonmembers to buy a day pass by purchasing $30 of cigars—stands in stark contrast to the Elk Room, the exclusive new Harbor East speakeasy and cigar club that opened late last year and prefers to shroud itself in a smoky haze of secrecy. The Atlas Restaurant Group, which owns it (along with Bygone, a new restaurant in the Four Seasons Hotel that has an outdoor patio for cigar smoking), declined to comment on it, saying only that it is a “private, members-only club.”

In February, The Other Corner Charcuterie Bar owner Bernard Dehaene announced he was transforming his Hampden establishment into the Elmwood Social Room, a new members-only martini and cigar club. While the private clubs certainly meet the needs of one clientele, Baltimore has no shortage of friendly, membership-free places to puff. Navin Dass felt that warmth when he first discovered Cross Street Tobacco, and he strives to maintain it today.

“When you walk in that door, it doesn’t matter who you are, where you’re from in life,” he says. “Everybody in here is on an even playing field. There are people from all walks of life that become friends because they met here; if they had met somewhere else they would have never become friends because they look different, they talk different, they walk different, they come from different backgrounds. But cigars really bring people together.”

Rodney Ferebee nods in agreement. A city firefighter, his overnight shift has just ended. At a time when most people have the brunt of their day ahead of them, he pours a small shot of whiskey, takes a pull off his cigar, and sits back in his armchair, content as can be. Not a bad way to end a day.

Source

Review: Bygone

Jess Mayhugh — Fri, 06 Apr 2018 08:30:00 +0000

Even before you head up to Bygone at the top of the Four Seasons, the restaurant sets the stage with a dress code posted next to the elevator entrance. Just in case there’s any doubt that you’re about to enter a splendored world of hand-blown Zalto wine glasses, custom gold-rimmed Lenox china chargers, and arrangements fashioned from flowers and feathers, the style strictures—“Collared shirts are required for Gentlemen,” “Ladies may not wear baseball caps or beanies”—set the record straight about fine dining in Harbor East. And as you ascend 29 floors up to this rarified world (with an assist from a top-hatted elevator operator), there’s one more thing you need to know: Hold on to your wallet—sitting in the lap of luxury doesn’t come cheap.

With panoramic views, and soaring nearly 314 feet from Earth, Bygone takes the term “haute cuisine” literally. And the impact is dizzying—despite the oversized retro clock at the entrance, you’ll likely lose all sense of time and space when you dine and drink here. You might even forget that you’re in Baltimore altogether, except for the fact that beyond the towering walls of windows, Charm City glimmers with all of her unmistakable landmarks below—the Domino Sugars sign, the Key Bridge, and Camden Yards.

Welcome to Atlas Restaurant Group’s latest foodie fantasy, established in December of 2017, but, as the name suggests, seemingly out of another era, like a lavish set piece for Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby, complete with gueridon trolley service and yards of velvet curtains that separate many of the seating nooks and add to the theatricality. If it’s an escapist dining experience you’re after, beeline for Bygone.

The décor takes a cue from the glamour of the 1920s and ’30s, but the menu is a nod to the nouvelle cuisine of the ’60s, created as a more delicate alternative to traditional French cooking, with lighter sauces (though plenty heavy by American standards) and ingredients and flavors that had not been combined before. While Cordon Bleu-trained executive chef Matthew Oetting is interested in the past, he brings vintage dishes into the present in the form of respectable riffs such as scallops bourguignonne, a squab and foie gras eggroll, and duck flambé with lavender honey glaze.

Lobster Diable and a bow-tied server. —Justin Tsucalas

Our dinner at Bygone began with drinks at the dimly lit bar, which is a mandatory stop for anyone investing in a meal here. Bar manager Will Escalante presides over an unprecedented whiskey selection (more than 600 bottles), though we went for a couple of classic vodka martinis served in delicate coupe glasses and garnished with gargantuan green olives. We could have lingered at the bar forever, but once we were seated for dinner, the opening bites of both the house-baked gruyère and pretzel rolls continued to lay the foundation for a mostly wow-worthy meal.

The house-cured gravlax starter with dill crème fraîche and “everything” spice with brioche toast points is a killer combo full of flavor and interesting textures. The tuna ravigote starter (made with canned tuna back in the day), gets recast as crudo with sashimi-grade fish, freshly grated horseradish, a cucumber fan, Champagne-marinated cherry tomatoes, and traditional ravigote sauce—a mixture of herbs including chervil, shallots, and tarragon. Entrees are similarly reimagined classics.

Take the grand Beef Wellington, a seared piece of house-butchered prime rib wrapped in Rainbow Swiss Chard and shitake mushroom duxelles, all tucked inside a pocket of pastry. Though the puff pastry was more doughy than delicate, the meat was incredibly tender and juicy. Swiss Chard is also employed as bedding for a delicate, pan-seared piece of golden Dover Sole Meunière, freshly flown in from Holland and served with a sauce of capers, lemon, and roasted chestnut-brown butter that adds notes of nuttiness and makes the flavor profile more modern. The golden-crusted fish was exquisite, and almost too much for one person to eat, but prepare yourself for sticker shock—the à la carte dish is a jaw-dropping $95.

If you’re watching your dining dollars, a lunchtime visit is still a splurge, but less so than dinner. The menu focuses predominantly on soups, salads, and sandwiches. Consider the Crab Louie, clumps of Venezuelan crab meat mounded on a simple salad of romaine, topped with hard-boiled egg and avocado, and dressed with a creamy and kicky dressing. On the more indulgent end, we enjoyed a marvelous, but messy, lobster club, including Bibb lettuce, tomato, red onion, fried shallots, and six ounces of Maine claw meat spilling out of a house-made brioche bun slathered with honey mustard and avocado mayo. Don’t miss the sweet and smoky lobster bisque. My companion’s comment that she wanted to “lick the bowl”—as she came up for air between sips of the cognac cream broth—said it all.

Service was unerring, though overly eager at times. During dinner service, as if on cue, our waiter said, “May I?” a few too many times as dirty dishes were cleared and new ones arrived. Several times, we caught him peeping out from behind the velvet curtains to gauge our reactions, but it’s hard to fault someone for caring too much. As we headed to the elevator with our parting gifts in hand—chocolate truffles nestled in a tiny gold box—we looked forward to an encore performance.

BYGONE 400 International Dr., 443-343-8200. HOURS: Lunch: Mon.-Sat. 11 a.m.-3 p.m.; Dinner: Sun.-Wed. 4-10 p.m.; Thurs.-Fri. 4 p.m.-midnight; Sat. 5-midnight. PRICES: Appetizers, soups, salad: $10-44; entrees: $24-95; desserts: $9-16. AMBIANCE: Retro glamour.

Source

Bygone Chef Matthew Oetting Talks New Restaurant and Nouvelle Cuisine

Jane Marion — Wed, 28 Feb 2018 14:29:00 +0000

Matthew Oetting was initially hired by the Atlas Restaurant Group to oversee the kitchen at Bygone, but first worked as executive chef at the group’s Loch Bar for two years, while waiting for the fine-dining restaurant to open at the top of the Four Seasons. With the recent restaurant debut, Oetting, who came to Baltimore from kitchens in Miami (Scarpetta) and New York (Telepan, The Modern), talks nouvelle cuisine, vintage menus, and the local restaurant scene.

I know you did a lot of research as you were conceptualizing and creating Bgyone’s menu. What was your process?
When I was doing research, I was having a hard time finding menus from the mid-19th century. I reached out to the research librarian at [my alma mater] Arizona State University and he put me in contact with a colleague named Chris, who specializes in culinary history—he was an amazing resource. He started sending me menus from the period. The first few that he sent were from the ’20s, ’30 and ’40s— he ambiance of The Great Gatsby was the era they were going shooting for when they were conceptualizing Bygone.

But the menus that came through were extremely bare bones. In the era of the ’20s, ’30s, and ’40s, the menus aren’t all that impressive, not many had composed dishes with the protein, the starch, the vegetables, the sauce all on one plate. It was all very broken up—there was the vegetable section, there was the potato section, the chop section, and the seafood sections. Some of these menus had 15 different sections on one page. Chris said to me, ‘You have to remember what was happening in history at that time—they were just coming out of the Depression and then World War II. People weren’t spending money in late ’20s, early ’30s and through the war.’ Eating out wasn’t really a focal point.

So how did you arrive at this particular menu full of French-inspired classics?

Chris said, ‘If you want to look at menus from the ’50 and ’60s, you’ll see something a lot different, so he started sending menus from that era, and they were incredibly impressive. It was the dawn of nouvelle cuisine, and chefs started putting together composed plates. People were going to restaurants after World War II and had money to spend—that’s where the inspiration for the menu started to take shape. I had 40 menus in these huge, three-ring binders that I used as a basis for the Bygone menu.

You’ve said that this is the food that speaks to your heart and soul. Can you elaborate?

A lot of the preparations are very home-style. Cooking dishes like whole roasted duck and chicken and roasted brisket come from the heart. A lot of the dishes have long preparations that take two, three, four, five, six days. Preparing these kinds of dishes gives me a warm feeling. Being able to transform it for the modern palate is what I’m about.

Are there any menus in particular that spoke to you?

One of my favorites was The Golden Lion in Seattle. It had a lobster section like we do at Bygone, it had frog’s legs and crab legs and medallions of veal Oscar, and all of these great classic preparations. I was also inspired by menus at The Oak Room in the Plaza Hotel in New York. I collected menus from the Beverly Hill Hotel menu in 1956 and the 21 Club’s 1961 menu.
The food from this particular period was flexible.

There’s a lot of nostalgia here for an older crowd, but there are younger people for whom this will be new. Do you hear that from customers?

Yes, there are a lot of millennials coming in, and I think they like the throwback—they recognize that it’s a throwback, but don’t know what it’s a throwback to.

Did you draw on any other inspirations for the menu?

New Orleans at that time, and still somewhat today, was a culinary mecca. French Creole cooking was extremely popular at the time. I put Creole snapper blackened and served with crawfish étouffée and dishes like Cajun fried cauliflower on the menu as an homage.

If you’re a chef, even if you’re opening a New American spot or a steakhouse, you need classical training. Why is that?

It’s the foundation of everything you do modernly. How could you know how to make Hollandaise foam if you can’t make Hollandaise? How could you know how to make a preparation using Bordelaise sauce, if you don’t know how to make Bordelaise sauce? That’s what makes Bygone so cool. It takes dishes like tuna ravigote and vichyssoise and brings them back to the forefront. These are dishes that people have forgotten about for 50 years—now they are new and exciting again. Without the understanding of what nouvelle cuisine was at that time, we wouldn’t be anywhere. Paul Bocuse just passed away and his impact on the culinary community was huge. Without him, we wouldn’t know how to make some of the things that we have today or have some of the chefs that we have today.

These dishes are really complicated—it’s not like working somewhere where you’re just flipping burgers on the grill. Has that made it hard to find people to cook?

We’ve had a lot of cooks come through, and I’ve had to let a lot go. I’ve had to say, ‘Listen, I’m sorry, it’s not that you’re not a good cook or can’t cook, it’s just that you’re not ready for this particular kitchen.’ This is high end—you have to be very skilled and have a very strong foundation to know what you’re doing here.

When you get out to eat, where do you like to go?

I just went to Alma Cocina Latina. One of my cooks works as a sous chef there. I went there and had great arepas. La Cuchara is really great. I also like McFaul’s IronHorse Tavern near my house—there’s always good food and everyone needs a local spot.

How have you seen the culinary community change since you moved here?

I’ve seen the culinary community change in the two years since I’ve moved here. I see our community of chefs getting bigger and more prestigious. I don’t know what my direct impact on that is, but it’s a great feeling to know that you’re in a blossoming community.

What’s the most valuable piece of advice you ever got from a mentor?

When I asked to move from my externship as garde manger to a paid line cook at the pasta station at Union Square Cafe, Chef de Cuisine Sandro Romano at told me, ‘You don’t become an astronaut overnight.’

Source

Open & Shut: The Melody Cafe; Shake Shack; Firehouse Coffee Co.

Lauren Cohen — Thu, 21 Dec 2017 15:43:00 +0000

OPEN

The Melody Cafe: With the holiday season in full swing, it seems like everyone has presents on the brain. Especially local dad Darryl Strange, who recently took over the former home of The Room in Mt. Vernon as a Christmas and graduation gift for his 17-year-old son, Juwuan Davis. “We took him to see the space after he graduated, but he didn’t realize what was happening,” Strange says. “We went inside and I just said, ‘Here it is, it’s yours.’” Davis recently completed Harford Community College’s culinary arts program in conjunction with his work at FreeState Challenge Academy in Edgewood. He is putting his cooking skills to the test at his new cafe, which is currently in soft-opening mode serving coffee and pastries. Strange says that he hopes to add salads, sandwiches, and soups to the menu by the official grand opening after the New Year. Locals can also look forward to family-fun days, karaoke nights, art shows, and open mic performances. 800 St. Paul St.

Moby Dick House of Kabob: This highly anticipated Persian palace has finally opened the doors to its 23rd eatery, located at The Rotunda in Hampden. You can’t go wrong with the array of dips, colorful salads, falafel sandwiches on house-baked naan, and namesake kabobs in varieties ranging from spicy chicken and tender beef to marinated salmon and grilled lamb. Moby Dick joins CineBistro and MOM’s Organic Market in the mixed-use development, which will soon house a new location of Federal Hill favorite The Local Fry. 727 W. 40th St.

COMING SOON

Back Yard: Regulars were at a loss when Patrick’s of Pratt Street—lauded as one of the oldest Irish pubs in the nation—shuttered its doors in the Hollins Market neighborhood last year. But now, two local bartenders are stepping in to revive the spot. Lara Sumerson and Mike Cavanagh, who met working at The Elephant in Mt. Vernon, plan to transform the bar—as well as the space next door that will connect to an adjoining courtyard—into a new concept with an outdoor beer garden this spring. The bar will offer 18 local brews, craft cocktails, and a wine program headed up by Cavanagh. Stay tuned for more updates. 934 W. Pratt St.

Bygone: Atlas Restaurant Group has done it again. The company behind Harbor East hotspots Ouzo Bay, Azumi, Loch Bar, and Tagliata will soon reveal its Gatsby-themed concept on the 29th floor of the Four Seasons Baltimore. “There’s something really intriguing and cool about that era,” Atlas owner Alex Smith tells us. “It was a carefree time. Human beings were different back then, especially in the way that they socialized.” Aside from the Prohibition-era cocktails and 360-degree views of Baltimore and beyond (you can see as far as Towson if you look closely), the French-influenced menu will be a huge draw for diners. Executive chef Matthew Oetting presents everything from fried lobster tail and Maryland crab cakes to Amish chicken and rotisserie duck flambé for two. The spot is celebrating its grand opening, fittingly, on New Years Eve. 400 International Drive.

Shake Shack: Though The Mall in Columbia boasts plenty of dining options, a burger and fries can be tough to resist. Now, shoppers can enjoy the classic combo at this beloved burger joint, which opened near the mall’s outdoor plaza earlier this week. The spot offers all of the Shake Shack favorites including double-stacked burgers, flat-top hot dogs, crinkle-cut fries, and hand-spun milkshakes. 10300 Little Patuxent Parkway, Ste. 3040

NEWS

Cross Street Market Goes Retro: Earlier this week, Towson-based developers Caves Valley Partners gave locals a sneak peek at the renderings for the massive revitalization project in the works at Cross Street Market in Federal Hill. Slated to be complete in 2019, the remodel will yield an updated interior, stalls with takeout windows, and plenty of al fresco seating. The retro design aesthetic will harken back to the early 1950s, when the market was rebuilt after a fire burned down the original structure. Vendors—including new pop-ups like Smoke, Prescription Chicken, Cookie Dough & Co., and Sundays Bakehouse—will remain open throughout construction. 1065 S. Charles St.

Victory for Food Truck Owners: Last year, local food truck owners Joey Vanoni of Pizza di Joey and Nikki Marks of Mindgrub Cafe teamed up with the Institute for Justice to challenge legislation banning mobile vendors from operating within 300 feet of a brick-and-mortar business selling a similar product. The case headed to trial in August, and earlier this week, Baltimore Circuit Court Judge Karen C. Friedman ruled that the ban had a “lack of standards” and was “too vague for the city to enforce.” Friedman is giving the city 60 days to stop enforcing the law. “I’m happy that this ruling will let me operate more freely in the city,” Vanoni said in a statement. “But I look forward to a day when laws like these no longer exist.”

Baltimore Tops Zagat’s List of Exciting Food Cities: The Charm City dining scene got some well-deserved recognition this week, as Zagat ranked us among the country’s 30 most exciting food cities of 2017. The piece specifically calls out old gems like Charleston and Woodberry Kitchen, as well as new concepts including Rye Street Tavern, Tagliata, Sandlot, Dylan’s Oyster Cellar, and Ida B’s Table.

SHUT

Firehouse Coffee Co.: Come 2018, O’Donnell Square will lose this longtime coffee shop. Owner Evan Dilks recently told The Baltimore Business Journal that he chose not to renew the lease on the property, stating that he and his family are pursuing other ventures in the New Year. It’s unclear whether a new coffee shop will move into the space, which sits inside an early 20th-century fire station and has long been a go-to for pastries, pour-overs, smoothies, and sandwiches. 1030 S. Linwood Ave.

Metropolitan Coffeehouse & Wine Bar: Federal Hill locals are already mourning the loss of this 13-year-old South Charles Street spot, which will host a closing party on New Year’s Eve. Owner Bruce Dorsey took to Facebook earlier this week to announce the closure. “We are heartbroken by this decision,” the post reads. “But the last few years have been difficult for our business, our city, and our neighborhood.” Locals say that they’ll miss the breakfast and coffee service, top-notch beer and wine program, and inviting neighborhood vibe. 902 S. Charles St.

Source

Bygone Offers Spectacular Views and Dishes From Yesteryear

Jess Mayhugh — Thu, 21 Dec 2017 11:13:00 +0000

The Atlas Restaurant Group‘s new Bygone at the top of the Four Seasons Baltimore is certainly staying true to its title. With silver-plated platters of caviar, gold-rimmed Lenox plates, hand-blown Austrian crystal stemware, Champagne, flambé and cigar guéridons, and the state’s largest whiskey bar, the opulent new space on the luxury hotel’s 29th floor, evokes what co-owner Alex Smith calls a “Gatsby-era grill” that’s something straight out of a period piece by designer Baz Luhrmann.

“We were looking for a use of Harbor East that the neighborhood doesn’t already have,” says Smith. “We thought high-end, classic American grill, not quite a steakhouse or a seafood house, but something to offer the best of both worlds. We wanted to go upscale because it’s the rooftop of the Four Seasons, and we thought it would be cool to have this classic space on top of a modern hotel.”

The space certainly evokes the luxury Gatsby-esque aspect, as well as offers panoramic views of the city—looking east to the Key Bridge and north to Towson. There’s a certain nostalgia here, like you’ve stepped back into Windows to the World in New York City or SkyCity at the top of Seattle’s space needle. But the Domino Sugars sign and Camden Yards reminds us where are, indeed, in Baltimore.

The menu itself, developed by Atlas corporate chef and Bygone executive chef Matthew Oetting, also harkens back to an earlier time, with dishes such as Lobster Newburg, duck flambé, Beef Wellington, and Dover Sole Meuniere front and center on the menu. A rotisserie oven for cooking ring-necked pheasant, ham porcelet, and hand-carved rib roast is a centerpiece of the open kitchen. Desserts are equally impressive and rich, crafted by pastry chef Cynthia Ruane.

As Oetting proudly shows off an inspiration binder of menus from classic restaurants such as The Empire Room in Beverly Hills and The Golden Lion in Seattle, Oetting explains that his menu and recipe development were many months in the making.

“We’re not trying to make a French restaurant here,” says the chef, “but in the research I did most of the prestigious restaurants in America at that time were manned by French chefs and there was a lot of French influence on their menus.”

For the classically trained, award-winning chef, a “continental” menu presented a unique opportunity. Although Oetting has always had a love for classic French cuisine, his culinary training at Le Cordon Bleu was at odds with what was actually happening in restaurant kitchens.

“Cuisine had become more modern with molecular gastronomy and sharing plates,” he says, “but I had a love for what was traditional French technique and cuisine and put that on the back-burner as I made my way through my culinary career.”

Now that’s finally able to exercise his passion, the challenge for Oetting has been to blend the old with the new. “The question becomes, ‘How can we make that a little bit better and still preserve the era of the late ’40 early ’50s,’ but still make the food modernist enough for the modern palate?” he says.

The bar program also echoes retro stylings with a contemporary and luxurious twist. Bar manager Will Escalante moved over from Ouzo Bay to head up the cocktail program at Bygone, which consists of a horseshoe-shaped bar with incredible waterfront views and a mezzanine bar above it that boasts dark woods, a library ladder, and an unprecedented whiskey selection.

In fact, Bygone will have the largest whiskey selection in the state with 775 total bottles including some rare finds like more than a dozen varieties of Armagnac brandy, an Absinthe fountain for four, and two tableside cocktails inspired by vintage recipes. There will be a menu of 18 classic cocktails, with history and anecdotes for each.

“I studied recipes in the Savoy Cocktail Book and guides by [bartender] Jerry Thomas,” Escalante says. “Some of these cocktails people might not be familiar with at first, but they each have a unique story to tell.”

With 450 reds and 250 whites, the wine selection is mostly French—pairing well with the cuisine—and is poured in hand-blown Zalto glasses. Smith says the champagne collection is the “largest in the state,” which will be on full display at Bygone’s New Year’s Eve bash, a sort of grand opening for the restaurant itself.

Bygone is the Atlas Restaurant Group’s eighth venture, including Habor East hotspots Ouzo Bay, Azumi, Loch Bar, Tagliata, The Elk Room, Harbor East Deli, and Ouzo Bay in Boca Raton, Florida. Smith says that Atlas plans to open three more properties “within a two-mile radius” of Harbor East in 2018.

“Our restaurant group is my love letter to Baltimore, because I love the town so much,” Smith says. “We are trying to raise the bar by creating unique experiences for the people of Baltimore that they can only get in other cities.”

Source