Dream restaurant

It’s the type of place that doesn’t really feel like a restaurant. You walk in whenever you want. Wearing whatever you want. And sit down without the prerequisite formality of most dining experiences. It's somewhere between the atmosphere of a diner or Waffle House and that of a high school cafeteria. You’re there to eat. Hang out. Share some good times with friends or family. And you leave with the feeling that you’ve gotten way too good of a deal. Both monetarily and in terms of the food experience. Your boss will love this place for a business lunch. Your mother-in-law from Cincinnati wants to eat there while visiting over the holidays (and that sounds better than having her cook). Your kids won’t feel out of place. Your husband won’t think it’s too fancy. Professionals in the restaurant industry will return to their own workplace and say it was all right, but not good enough to be that busy. That’s when you know you’ve succeeded. A little competitive smack talking is healthy in this industry.

It’s my dream restaurant.

Although that imagery is very serious to me, I’ve also come up with a few not-so-serious ideas through conversations in the walk-in, long plane flights, and bar stool shit-shooting.

Oy! Dios mio! One of my all-time favorites, from a long time ago. It’s a true fusion concept that merges the best Lower East Side delicatessen with that of an authentic Oaxacan taqueria. Although, the initial thought might sound silly, corned beef tongue tacos and matzoh ball pozole don’t. Well, to me at least.

Impasta. It’s a gluten-free pastatoreum. A noodle bar where every dish impersonates noodles of some kind. Whether slightly modified by substituting brown rice flour for wheat or completely reconfigured by using gums, enzymes or hydrocolloids. It’s the type of place where you can feel a little lighter after slurping en masse on one of my favorite foods.

You can’t get lighter than our untitled South Beach project designed solely for supermodels, and those who aspire to be. Here, meals are absolutely non-caloric. Only aromas are consumed. Tiny viles arrive on mirrors, and are uncapped tableside to be sniffed. Roast chicken and apple pie in a snort. Like gourmet snuff. It’s a scene. Maybe that’s the name for it?

New Deli. Originally a from-scratch charcuterie shop, focusing on Indian flavors. This was quickly shot down by a much-more-Indian-than-myself friend who questioned some religious issues we may have with trying to find national investors to get behind making prosciutto and bresoala. Since then, we have of course re-envisioned it as a molecular soup and sandwich shoppe. Honestly, I kind of still like this.

Feedback, a name I’ve adapted from a friend in L.A., is a true vision. But we couldn’t get past our nonprofit goals of feeding the homeless, and simultaneously having them rate the experience using social networking devices. This turned out to be a very bad business plan from the point of many investors. OK, all investors.  Maybe a TV show, though. …

There was of course Blaisia, but this didn’t get much bite. Which reminds me of Byte, which of course is a virtual restaurant that you download takeout food from and print it on edible paper using edible ink.

Current. A high energy, modern seafood shack.

Food Grade. Not even a restaurant, but a culinary school (of course). In it’s original conception, it was a way to beat labor costs. Wait ... what if the staff pays us!

Then there’s Meet Market. A prime dry-aged steakhouse and oxygen bar. Possibly also offering milk-fed veal, and cougar of course!

And I guess that’s the thing about dreaming and brainstorming. Creative thinking yields a rather high percentage of bad or misdirected ideas to stir up one that is actually applicable, genuine, and passionate. Strikeouts aren’t any worse than flying out on the warning track. As long as a few balls make it to the bleachers from time to time.

And home runs fill the seats. And filled stadiums, or dining rooms in this case, encourage faith and trust from financial investors and partners. And then new restaurants are built, and more ideas surface during the groundbreaking. And the cycle of a restaurateur begins anew.

Wait, Anew?

Genius!