Ryan DePersio on Vision and Tenacity Behind Culinary Success

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
the-restaurant-guys_2_09- (00:11):
Hello everybody, and welcome.
You are listening to theRestaurant Guys.
I'm Mark Pascal and I'm herewith Francis Shot.
Together we own stage left incapital Lombardi, restaurants in
New Brunswick, New Jersey.
We're here to bring you theinside track on food, wine, and
the finer things in life.
Hello, mark.
Hey Francis.
How you doing?
I'm doing great.
I'm looking forward to welcomingour friend Ryan de Perio.
Chef Ryan de Perio will be onthe show as our guest today, a

(00:33):
little later on.
I've said this a lot of times, Ireally love having guests that
we are friends with, right?
Yeah.
That's, that's it.
It makes it more fun.
It makes it more interesting.
And we know the little tidbitsWell, the little, the little
insider baseball stuff.
Well, it's funny'cause we, wesay the show is like the
conversation we would have atthe end of a shift, sitting at
your bar after you've locked thedoors.
And what, we've actually donethat with Ryan De so it's, it

(00:55):
will be just like that, Ipromise you.
It's more fun.
Uh, so I wanna start the showwith, uh.
I, I guess something that annoysme a little bit.
Oh, is it me?
I said a little bit.
Uh oh.
Okay.
Okay.
Old man.
So, somehow on Instagram andFacebook and all these things,

(01:17):
I, I'm obviously in thealgorithm of, I get all the
pundits and consultants andthey, fill up my, Instagram.
Yeah.
Okay.
With advice.
Yep.
Restaurant advice.
Yep.
How to run a restaurant, how toteach your employees, all, all
these types of things.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And occasionally I get goodlittle tidbits from, from those.
Mm-hmm.

(01:37):
But so frequently I'll getsomething that makes me say,
that's so wrong.
Oh, okay.
Okay.
Like, like something is on yourmind.
What is it?
Something is on my mind.
So one of the things that, uh.
Came up in my feed was upsell,upsell, upsell.
Always be upselling.
You gotta, that's, that's whatmakes a restaurant is upselling.
Yeah.
I've seen a bunch of these.

(01:58):
A, a bunch of those.
Mm-hmm.
I think you sent me a couplewhere the guy will be giving
staff notes to the staff and Iwant to jump through the screen
and be like, no, no, don't, no.
Not like that.
So.
there's a place up in Saratogaand it, it happened to me just,
it happened to me again thislast trip.
And all the entrees on the menuare 28, 30, 30$2.

(02:20):
And the, and the waiter comesover and says, you gotta have
the veal chop.
The veal chop is amazing.
Now I'm in the business.
I ate a lot of veal chops.
Right.
I know the veal CHOP's gonna be70 bucks, right?
Yes.
Gotta be.
Yeah.
So, but I always like to ask.
Oh, so wait, so there's no cardwith a price on it?
No card, no nothing.
No nothing.
It's, it's an old school Italianrestaurant.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

(02:40):
And so, okay.
Uh, how much is the, the vealchop.
Oh, it's$89, but it's, it's bel,you know, and again, I'm in a
restaurant with$30 entrees,right?
And you're offering me an$89entree without telling me the
price.
Makes me crazy.
Anyway, upselling, upselling,upselling.
What you need to tell your staffis teach them about the great

(03:03):
things On your menu.
Yeah.
Let them recommend the greatthings on your menu.
People are coming to you becausethey wanna have the things you
have.
Well, and the other thing islike veal chops, for example.
So maybe you don't wanna have aveal chop on your menu and you
wanna have a veal chop specialbecause when people call and say
what are, what are your entreesrange from?
And you say, oh, there.

(03:23):
25 to$35 or you get this coolspecial thing, right?
You get black truffles from,from Parago, France.
You wanna have'em on your menu.
But even if you have it all thetime, I can see you might wanna
leave that off the menu.
'cause most of your entries arebetween 25 and$39.
And so you wanna be able to saythat when someone asks that
question.
And you can have a$79 special ifsomething, it's worth it.
You got a special meal chop thatyou need to tell people you and

(03:45):
why we have the bi, the card onthe table.
And, and I think that's fine.
And if you don't care, you don'tcare.
Right.
But you, there's the card on thetable, and I'm sorry, wherever
you are, if there's no card onthe table, you have to say the
price.
Especially if it's an outlierfrom what the other things in
the restaurant normally are.
Alright, so here's the realconsulting tidbit if you're in

(04:06):
the restaurant business, okay,good.
Convince your waiters, tell themwhat you have.
Okay?
Because people are coming to youbecause you have special things,
right?
Okay.
And for the most part, if you'recoming to a restaurant like
this, you're coming for thespecial things.
Okay?
Once they know about the specialthings, people are gonna like
those things.
Um, what's the single Thing thatIncreases their check average

(04:27):
and increases their tippercentage.
The single thing is number oftimes you're at the table
talking to your table.
Yeah.
Be present at your table.
Why is, why are those thingstrue?
They're true because people havecome into your restaurant for an
experience.
They've come into yourrestaurant because they want.
What you have, they chose you.

(04:49):
They want what you have.
And if you're at the table andyou can tell'em about all the
cool things you have, thenthey're going to participate.
Most of your customers are gonnaparticipate in the cool things
you have, and when you bringthem the cool things that you
have.
They tip you a higher percentageand they say, thank you very
much for, for showing me thisthing that I can now have.

(05:09):
Well, yeah, and I think thatthere's a big difference there.

Francis (05:11):
Okay, so there's the technical, the absolute truth of
the restaurant business.
And frankly, that winds up inupselling.
If you have cool stuff and yourwaiters at the table and you
trust them and they like food,and you like food and they're
trying to bring you somethingyou like, and as a result of
check average goes up, that'sgreat, but that's different than
the sleazy car salesman upsell,right?

Mark (05:29):
People are not coming to you because they need a new car.
They're coming to you'cause theywant the experience of coming to
your restaurant.
don't have the sleazy used carsalesman mentality.
It's, it's, it's antithetical towhat we do.
The difference though, I wannatalk about the what is do use
Carl salesman mentality.
The, the purpose when you goover to the table is, I know I'm
gonna get the checkup.

(05:49):
I'm gonna, I'm gonna sell thesepeople more stuff, whether they
want it or not.
So, you know, some of that isthe veal, that's too expensive.
Some, you know, I love those oldtricks that used to go again,
mostly were in Italianrestaurants.
Mm-hmm.
I remember the, the waiterrestaurant in town locally, the
waiters.
They would say, oh, so, uh,you'd order the entree and
they'd say, um, and so do youwant the spinach or the broccoli
with that?
Right that what, implying thatit was included and then you'd

(06:13):
be like, what's this charge forspinach on my check?
And I remember the name of thatrestaurant, which even, even
though it's not even openanymore, we're not gonna mention
the name of the restaurant thatused to do that.
That used to piss me off somuch.
And, and you, if you say thatthis or that, and you make
somebody assume that it and youslam them with a bill, I hate
that.
I actually hate that.
So a little bit off topic, butwe talk about veal chops and one

(06:34):
of my favorite veal chop storybecause.
I'm a restaurant guy.
I have a favorite veal chopstory.
We're out at a restaurant withour, our mutual friend Anthony.
Yeah.
And whenever Anthony's out, heorders the veal chop.
Right.
He doesn't get a lot of vealchops in his life.
Right.
So when he is at a nicerestaurant and again doesn't
care about price, this is awhile ago.
He orders the veal chop.
So we're at this nice place youwere there and he orders the

(06:58):
veal chop and we all place ourorders and the, the waiter goes
back and out comes for Anthony,a pork chop.
I do remember that.
I do remember that.
And not that Anthony doesn'tlike a, a good pork chop.
Yeah.
But he loves a great veal chop.
So he is disappointed.
Yeah.
And he turns to the way and hegoes.

(07:18):
Excuse me, you, you brought a apork chop and I ordered a veal
chop and the waiter goes, well,I'm sure you ordered the pork
chop, sir.
Oh, okay.
Now again, I know Anthony for amillion years.
I know he ordered the veal chop.
Right, right, right.
Because he doesn't not order theveal chop plus.
I was at the table.
I remember morning the vealchop, right.
Anyway, so Anthony's kinda like,I'm pretty sure he ordered the

(07:40):
veal chop and the waiter's justlike, no, no, no, you did not.
You ordered the pork chop andinstead of just bringing him a
veal chop, which is what heshould have done exactly, he
leaves the table and now hecomes back.
He doesn't come back with a vealchop.
Okay?
He comes back with his littlepad and he said, look, you
ordered the pork chop.
I wrote it down right there.

(08:00):
See?
Yes, yes.
You wrote it down.
See where you ordered the porkchop On my little pad, it says,
so here.
It must be true, dude.
That is the, um, that is a.
That is a, that is a lesson.
That's another, that's anothergreat lesson.
It's just a life lesson, but it,it, it manifests in restaurant
is like the importance of beingRight.
It's overrated.
Yeah.
You don't need to say that guywas right all along.

(08:21):
You know, and that's why even ifhe was right, and that's the
thing we realized in therestaurant business then, and we
try to teach, especially youngpeople, especially, I think I
was more of the angry young manthan you were when we were
younger.
And, and I had to learn in thisbusiness.
I forget who was who said forthe first time to me, you know,
being right is overrated.
Wouldn't you rather be happy andget, move forward and get things
done?
And do you need to be right andconvince someone else that

(08:43):
you're right?
And when I let that go, I'm, I'mglad you remember.
That that was said to you?
I'm a little sad.
You don't remember who said itthough?
Somebody besides you said it.
You might have said it a bunchof times, but I didn't Listen,
but I don't listen to you.
I don't listen to you.
It needed to come from somebodyelse.
No.
Or otherwise I was gonna ignoreit.
Yeah, but it, I forget.
Maybe it was, I don't know.

(09:04):
It was me.
No, me.
Wasn't you somebody?
It was freaking me.
I think you're wrong and I'mgonna prove it to you.
Okay.
Hey, wait.
Hold on a second.
Look, I wrote it down on mylittle pad right here.
Wasn't marked that that saidthat I, I don't know what you're
talking about.
Anyway, I think we should stopthis nonsense and talk to Ryan
de Percy, who's much smarterthan either one of us.

(09:25):
We'll be back in just a moment.
You're listening to theRestaurant, guys.
You can always find out moreabout
us@restaurantguyspodcast.com.
That couldn't have been better.
I wrote it.
Good luck.

Speaker (09:34):
Hey there everybody.
Welcome back.
Our guest today is Chef Ryan dePerio.
He's an old friend and he alsohelms the kitchen at some of our
favorite restaurants right herein the Garden state.
He's talking to us.
If you are seeing any clips onsocial media with a background
of, uh, the city of New York,the skyline from his restaurant
Patello in Jersey City, we'revery jealous.
He's an Italian American cheffrom Nutley, New Jersey, like my

(09:56):
partner over here.
Hone his craft cook in Italy andFrance worked in the US with the
likes of Jean George and DavidBole.
He's a James Beard Award nomineeand an old friend, and we're
super happy to have him on theshow.
Ryan Perillo, welcome to theshow, buddy.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
Gentlemen.
Gentlemen, thank you for havingme.
I appreciate it very much.

Speaker (10:13):
You win the award for best, uh, backdrop for anyone
who can see the,

Speaker 2 (10:18):
and it's real.

Speaker (10:19):
I know.
Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3 (10:21):
Exactly.
So, Ryan, I, I gotta start with,you know, as Francis mentioned,
you're from Nutley.
I'm from Nutley.
We got Jamie Knott as anotherfamous restaurant owner from
from Nutley.
It seems like most of the top 40restaurants in New Jersey are
owned by people from Nutley.
So is it like the well water?
What do you, what do you thinkis causing the, that degree of

(10:43):
restaurant, uh, success?

Speaker 2 (10:46):
I was gonna say it's the Italians, but we know Jamie
not, is not Italian whatsoever.
Uh, it might be the, uh, largeamount of misfits that couldn't
figure out what to do with theirlives as well and started
washing dishes at a young ageand fell in love with the
cooking.
And that's really what it wasfor me.
It was just.
My mother was my influence.

(11:07):
And you know, I, I hated school,you know, so I was watching the
Food Network at 16 years old.
Um, and I was washing dishes atrestaurants and, but I loved
money and I wanted to makemoney.
So at 17, I had four jobs.
I was working six days a week.
I, I have really a hustlerspirit.

Speaker 3 (11:26):
I don't know, man.
I loved school.
But when I graduated, I hatedthe desk.
Mm.
Took me eight days to realizethat I, I do not belong behind
this desk.
I, I belong, you know, back inrestaurants doing, doing the
things I really love.
Uh, so just a different pathway,but I, it's just weird that.

(11:47):
A town that actually doesn'thave any of those top 40
restaurants, has all of thesefamous restaurants from people
who, who, who just grew up inthis town.
I think it has to do more withthe, it's a very family oriented
town.
It's a very, you know, you eatwith your parents, you, and it's
very Italian

Speaker (12:05):
American.
Very Italian American,

Speaker 3 (12:07):
but, but again, Jamie's not, but it's, it was
just, just a lot about.
Being with other people and, andliking other people and, and
liking that part of life.
It's a town that bore that

Speaker (12:20):
kind of hospitality.
I, I'm not Italian either, butall the smart Irish kids got
invited over their blackfriend's house of their Italians
friend's house for dinner.
'cause your moms knew how tocook.
This is true.

Speaker 3 (12:32):
So we have some more parallels in our life, Ryan,
besides being friends for thelast 20 years, you did
something.
And, and I've heard you talkabout it on other shows about
how eye-opening it was.
Spending a summer in Europe,spending some time doing that.
And you did it two times?
I did it once as a, as a20-year-old, uh, spent the
summer in Europe.
Just there's, there's nothinglike that as far as like whole

(12:57):
world.
There's nothing like that as, asfar as whole world education.
Right.
To really, I, I like to say allthe time that summer I spent in
Europe, I learned more than allfive years at college.
And that, yeah.
I said five years at college, Idid.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
It's, it's okay.
But it just, just the differencein me after a summer in Europe
was I, I thought was fantastic.

Speaker 2 (13:20):
So, um, when I say this, I don't say it in a, in a
bad way to Nutley, but you know,you grew up in an Italian
American family, you know, thereis not a lot of openness to food
you're eating.
Spaghetti and meatballs and youknow, stuffed artichokes and
clams, oreg, and these are oneof my all time favorite foods

(13:41):
of, uh, you know, in my life.
Mm-hmm.
But you, it is hard to open yourmind when it comes to eating.
And my traveling around theworld is what really got me to
open up my eyes and say, youknow.
And I'm not even talking aboutit, you know, being in Italy, in
France, but also just learningabout sushi.

(14:01):
You know, my very first, youknow, meal at.
An upscale sushi place was atNobu at 18 years old.
And, and then you go to, youknow, a place like Baltazar and
you're like, I've had my, at 19years old and I had my, my
first, you know, oysters on icewith like a crisp riesling, you

(14:21):
know what I mean?
Your parents were eating tableItalian, red wine.
They didn't even know what aRiesling was, you know?
So traveling is my.
All time.
Number one suggestion to everyyoung chef.
Unfortunately, they're alltrying to be a chef before
they're actually, you know?
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (14:41):
Gotta be cooked first, right?
But,

Speaker 2 (14:42):
but save your money.
Get a hookups figure a way toget to Europe if you can't even
get into a kitchen.
Just go and, and, and for fourweeks and, and, and just eat
downloading to your, your belly.
You know, the most amazing foodthat you'll never try in your
hometown here in New Jersey.

Speaker 3 (15:02):
You know, it's, there's a relationship when you
go to Europe.
They have a differentrelationship with food and meals
than we do.
And, and again, Italian Americancoming from Nutley, we, we, we
circled around the table.
That's, that's, that's similar,but the thought of, we're gonna
make this the focal point of ourday.
Lunch is the focal point of the,uh, of the day when you're in

(15:24):
Europe and, and I thinkAmericans just don't think about
food the same way and it's, it'sreally educational and
eyeopening to spend some timethere.

Speaker (15:31):
I walked into the frog in the peach, which was the
first fine dining restaurant atI ever worked in, and, uh, I had
never been in a fine diningrestaurant as a guest and.
It.
I just felt like I was more of acitizen of the world, you know
what I mean?
Like, I knew that this wasbigger than New Brunswick, New
Jersey.
It was bigger than a collegejob.
And there was something herethat was a language here that

(15:52):
trans transcended the barriersof just my little place.
And I think that's what greatfood, and especially great wine
and great spirits, that's whatit's all about.
You can save time in a bottle.
Man.
That's, yeah, it, it's, it's aperspective that.
And it's a perspective, it's away that somebody who maybe
doesn't do great in school anddoesn't, isn't in finance or,

(16:13):
you know, a lawyer can travelthe world.
And I think that being, youknow, cooking food or being a
sommelier.
We find ourselves in someamazing company with, you know,
senators and governors andbusinessmen and really cool
people.
Be people who do great things inother much more important
fields.
Um, yeah, and we get invitedbecause we're food people and

(16:35):
that's pretty cool.
You, you've had that experience.
I know.

Speaker 2 (16:39):
Yeah, for sure.
I mean, the industry, uh, hasdefinitely pulled in a lot of
influential people because I'dsay that once you kind of become
successful in life, one of thethings that people kind of get.
Uh, have find a love for is foodand wine, right?
Mm-hmm.
And when they go to a restaurantand, you know, get to meet the

(17:01):
chef, um.
We, it's very sweet for usbecause, you know, they wanna
meet the chef, they wanna tellthe chef how much they loved
everything and ask questionsabout the food.
And, you know, they want to askyou about your family.
And it's a, it's a specialfeeling, but that's what it's
all about.
It's not, it's not just aboutcooking.
It's about being entireencompass of the experience at a

(17:24):
restaurant.

Speaker (17:25):
And when you were a chef of your own place for a
sommelier or a bartender, whenyou travel the world.
It's open arms.
If you, if you are a food personwho appreciates their food and
bring something of your own.
The restaurant industry,wherever you are, loves you
farmers.
Wherever you are, love you,winemakers love you, and just
people who are interested infood.
It's, it's, it's a tremendouslypowerful and weird passport to

(17:49):
the world, don't you think?
A

Speaker 2 (17:51):
hundred percent.
I, uh, I think that, you know,my experience in Italy and
France were a little different.
Um, tell us about It wasn't so Iworked for, um, bill Opan, um,
at Jus and Grill.
Mm-hmm.
In New York City.
I was at the time, yeah.
I was 21.
The sous chef at Jus and Grill.

(18:13):
He hooked me up at a restaurantin that he worked at, it was a
one star Michelin, uh.
I wish I could remember thename.
I don't even remember the namebecause I ended up not staying
there.
They, they put me on the pastrydepartment.
For like Uhhuh three weeks ortwo weeks.
And I didn't love it if, youknow, all the restaurants are
only open five days.

(18:34):
They're closed on Sunday andMonday.
Um, so I would kind of walkaround and walk into restaurants
and try to get into another one.
And I ended up getting into thisplace called Lere.
It was a one star Michelin aswell.
And it was being run by, oh, theone that, the first restaurant
was Tabla down there.
That's the name of it.
Okay.
And then the second one waslaps.

(18:55):
It was.
This older man that did all thecooking with like two
assistants.
His wife was in the front.
She was a sommelier.
It was a really cool, close knitgroup.
Or I should say like.
Family of people that ran thisrestaurant, um, together.
And uh, I just kind of assistedthem on, on prep work and stuff

(19:16):
like that.
And then two years later I endedup going to Italy and it was
like, hey, it was open arms andit was, you know,

Speaker 3 (19:25):
it is a very different hospitality mentality.
And I guess that's, that's partof what I was getting to
earlier.
It's just you're, you're morehospitable to your fellow man.
And in this country where we'realways rushing to the next
thing, the only thing they everrushed to in, in Italy or France
is the next meal lunch.
Right.
It's, that's they're not,they're not rushing back to

(19:46):
work.
They're not.
It's, no, not at all.
I

Speaker 2 (19:48):
mean, let's talk about family meal.
When I was there, I mean, you,we did two services, right?
We'd walk in at 8:00 AM right?
Mm-hmm.
We prepped.
We would do family meal at rightaround 1130.
Right.
And family meal, you know, atour restaurants, you know, it's
like, you know, we do trays offood and people kind of grab it
and they eat some, most of thechefs are eating in the kitchen

(20:10):
while they're prepping.
This one.
You know, they made, they madean appetizer, they made a
protein, they made a, they makea starch, which is the, oh, you
know, and Italy was a pasta.
They made dessert and everybodysat together at the same table
and we ate, they even pouredwine, you know what I mean?
Like you're not supposed to bedrinking on a job, but that was

(20:32):
like an everyday thing in Italyand people didn't really over
drink.
It was like it was anaccompaniment with the meal.
Right,

Speaker (20:38):
right.
It was food.

Speaker 2 (20:39):
So you, so you, you ate this th you know, these
three or four course meal andthen.
You got a 20 minute break,everybody goes outside, has an
espresso, and you come in at 1230, 12 45, you do one seating,
right?
And then you're done.
2, 2 30, 3 o'clock.
You have another two, you have atwo hour siesta.
And then when you walk in to,you know, uh, your next shift

(21:03):
that day, family meal, 5:00 PMsame thing, appetizer, you know,
protein, veg, pasta, dessert.
And then the first sitting wasat six 30.
Sometimes we do like one and ahalf seatings and then you were
done.
11:00 PM you go to bed andthat's it, and your next day is
repeat.
Same thing.

(21:24):
And it was, it was beautifuland, and the most important
thing was, is all the food wasso natural that you felt like
you're eating too much.

Speaker 3 (21:31):
I'm a fat guy who eats his face off every time he
goes to Europe.
I lose weight every time.
I, every time I, I, every timeI, it's wild.

Speaker (21:38):
It's wild.
It's crazy.
Well, I think that there's a lotof re there's a lot of
literature out there that saysthat the nature of the grain
itself that goes to make thestarches is.
It's different.
I mean, the food is so differentthat you can't, you can't, if
you're trying to eat healthy inAmerica, you still can't eat as
well, um, for your health.
When you go there, and I say thesame thing, I go to Italy, I go

(22:00):
to France, and I'm going to thebest restaurants I can, and I
want to try all the food I can,and I lose pounds every time I
go.
What did you bring back fromyour experience so that you
brought back to yourrestaurants?
How were you able to translatethat back to your restaurants
and what you're doing now as achef?

Speaker 2 (22:16):
So I was, I, I've been in love with Italian, you
know, food for my whole life,and, but I've also been in love
with.
You know, modern cuisine, youknow, I got to work for David
Bole, as you know, and and JarGeorge and Bill Tallan, who Bill
trained with Danielle Blu.
I feel like I was able to takethe modernized style of cooking,

(22:37):
use Italian ingredients, andcompose these dish dishes
together my own way.
You'll see Piata and.
You'll see stuff like that on mymenus, but they're not done
traditionally.
They're done in a modern way,meaning I'm using the
ingredients from those dishes,right?
Um, but the dish is also, uh,very seasonal forward, you know?

(23:00):
Um, so you'll, you'll see in thefall, um, you'll see the
squashes and the mushrooms andthe parsnips and the celery room
and stuff like that.
Then when we, you know, fastforward to spring, you know, the
morels, the English peas, theasparagus, the rhubarb, it'll
all be, all those ingredientswill be integrated in an Italian
way.

Speaker (23:21):
You know, I'm a big fan of your food.
We eat your restaurants all thetime.
Mark and I say something when wewalk into restaurants, right?
We're, we're definitely,definitely restaurant OGs, and
we always look for individuallyowned restaurants wherever we go
in the world.
But I, I think when you go intoa restaurant.
And you hang out there once ortwice, you know, if there's a

(23:41):
sense of community in among thatrestaurant staff.
Do you know if the owners orwhoever's running a place is a
nice person or a good person ora fun person or brings it
together?
You, it's the feel it comes fromabove.
So is is a good leader at the

Speaker 3 (23:54):
very

Speaker (23:54):
least.
I, yeah, I mean,

Speaker 3 (23:55):
and you know, I, there are some, there are some
guys who maybe I don't love asmuch as I love Ryan.
Who I think are good leaders.

Speaker (24:02):
Yeah.
But if you walk in and, and thewaiter's a jerk and they're
trying to close up early, andthey, and they're not really
paying attention.
Like if they're making goodnatured mistakes, but they're
nice people, that's one thing.
But if they're just jerks, youknow, the owner's a jerk.
Right.
But yeah, you, you have, um,among your staff, wherever you
run the place, you, you know,you have a nice, you have a
sense of community, you have alot of nice people.

(24:22):
Is that something you broughtback from Europe?
How do you build that in arestaurant staff?
I.

Speaker 2 (24:28):
No, I wouldn't say that came from Europe.
I think that came from years ofexperience building teams.
My first restaurant, FAU andMontclair.
We had multitudes of employeesthat worked for us for 10 plus
years.
And what happens is, is, youknow, as you guys know, one, as
you become a multi-unit, uh,restaurant operator, you can't

(24:49):
be in one place, right?
And then two, as you grow andsay, be, have, you know,
friendships and family.
You also want to figure a way torun these operations with being
able to live your life, right?
Mm-hmm.
So you have to be able to teachthese teams to.
Get to know these customersthen, you know, part of the

(25:11):
family.
Um, so yes.
Um, I know that, you know, youguys used to, or Francis, you
know, who comes here often atKitchen Step in Patello, you
know, used to see me a lot moreoften, but now that I have
mm-hmm.
A new place that's, you know, inhour and 15 minutes from my
home, I'm spending more timethere.
So you don't get to see me, butyou know.

(25:33):
The, the next person that'sthere gets to know who you are
and learn who you are and, and,and greet you the way I greet
you.
That's the community part.
Learning, learning your guests,um, and having your employees
learn your guests and trying tobuild a team that stays with you
for a long time.

the-restaurant-guys_2_09-04- (25:52):
So being a, a regular at your
restaurant for many, many years,I noticed that, and it's
something that we do as well.
We also have employees who'vebeen with us for 10 and 15 and
20 and 25 years.
Um, but when you have, wheneveryou have a new hd, uh, always,
either Corey, your partner orthe old HD introduces me to the
new person and you have acrossover there.
And I, that is so important andso many restaurants miss that.

(26:15):
It's that personal connection ofI know you by name.
This is a human interaction andyou guys do a great job at that.

Ryan (26:21):
Thank you.
Appreciate it.
We take a lot of pride in it,that's for sure.

the-restaurant-guys_2_09-04 (26:25):
you have to not just take pride in
it though.
You have to enjoy it.
Yeah.
If you don't, if you don't likemaking those connections, if
that's not part of who you areas a human being, then it comes
off as fakey.
Fake.
Yeah.
Right.

Ryan (26:36):
Oh, a hundred

the-restaurant-guys_2_09-04-2 (26:37):
a real connection.

Ryan (26:38):
I have a lot of guests ask me, they're like, Hey, we should
hang out.
We should go out to dinner,blah, blah, blah.
It's hard.
It's like I want to, I amfriendly, friendly with these
people and friends with youguys, but it's like, if I'm not
working, I'm, I'm exercising.
'cause you guys know I love to,you know, work out.
I'm running the New YorkMarathon for the fourth time

(26:59):
this year.
Um, I, um.
Small plug on, you know, themarathon.

Nice.

Ryan (27:06):
Um, and, um, and then, you know, I have three kids.
blah, blah.
Trying to relieve my wife of allthese duties is really hard.
Um, and then get a date night inwith her as well.
So it's pretty wild.

You know it, what's, one of the
things that's very interestingis the balancing of family and
being in the restaurantbusiness.
So your partner Corey, used tocome actually hang out, wind up
in my living room occasionally,or having a drink on the roof or
whatever.
And then you know, you peoplehaving your damn kids.
You know what I mean?
You're just no fun anymore.
Mark's kids finally grew up andhe's fun again, but there was

(27:39):
like 30 years in there where hewas no fun at all.
But even now, you know, my kidsare older.
I'm still reserving Sundays, youknow, half of the Sundays a year
to get my family together, It's,it's those, the numbers, when
you start playing the numbersgame of, of connecting all the
relationships, it's really hardto do in this business because
we spend so much time doing thebusiness of our business.

(28:02):
We're gonna take a quick break.
We're gonna come back on theother side and I'll talk about a
pretty interesting businessmodel that you and your partners
have brought to, uh, Jersey Cityand to the restaurant industry
in Jersey.
We'll be back in just a moment.
You listening to the restaurantguys, you can always find out
more@restaurantguyspodcast.com.
Hey everybody.
Welcome back.
We're here with Ryan De Perio.
Ryan Francis was, uh, about totalk about patello, the

(28:24):
restaurant you're sitting inright now, and what a, what a
cool restaurant model you havethere.
You, you do two things in yourrestaurants that I'm jealous of,
I'm gonna talk about the firstone right now, and that is in
Patello, you're able to run an ala carte restaurant Monday
through Thursday, Friday.
Sometimes if there's not anevent No Saturdays ever.

(28:47):
And because you're doingweddings and events on the
weekends there and you have a lacarte dining whenever there's,
there's not a big event takingover the place and it's such a
cool model.
And you've trained most of us.
Okay.
For me, Saturdays don't matter,right?
'cause I'm here in myrestaurants.
Uh, you created such a coolmodel where people know I te us

(29:09):
the place I go during the week.
I'll go out to some otherrestaurants on the weekends, and
then I'll have my wedding atPatello, or I'll have my, you
know, hundredth birthday partyfor a great-grandpa, at patello
and, and have this grand eventright on the water.
it's a really great model, in aspectacular space.

Ryan (29:28):
Yeah, no, it is.
I have to say that the, Coreywas the brainchild behind this
idea.
Um, and it, this model, uh, isprobably the best model, uh, for
a business in, in this industry.

Just so you know, Francis has a
smarter partner as well, so youdon't have to be, you don't have
to be jealous of that.
Yeah.

Ryan (29:50):
Yeah, but you know what?
There's one with talent.

Oh, thank you buddy.
Thank you.

Ryan (29:57):
Uh.

So, I think just to, to, to boil
that down for people is the ideaof like, you have a wedding
venue and the thing about awedding venue is you only have
it on the weekends, but weddingsare where the money is and then
you have a fine diningrestaurant.
Problem is fine.
Dining restaurants a la carteare not where the money, you
gotta be really busy all thetime.
'cause how many people arecoming?
What do I have in the kitchen?
What's my staffing?
It's all different.

(30:19):
You have both.
You have a.
A wedding venue that's full onthe, on the Fridays and
Saturdays, and you have duringthe week, a restaurant to fill
in when it's not.
It's crazy.
We play this game in JerseyCity, we guess whether or not
you have a, a wedding on aparticular Sunday, we're like
brunch chip patello.
He is free today.
You know, it's a cool

Ryan (30:36):
Yeah, it's amazing.
I mean, honestly, we're veryfortunate.
I do believe that, uh, thismodel that we're talking about,
restaurant slash event space,definitely needs to be, um, in a
beautiful location.
you see a lot of our, peoplethat we know in the industry,
opening a lot of restaurants,you know, year in and year out,

(30:59):
where every two years they'reopening a restaurant.
And you, you, we haven't donethat.
You know, we've taken time toopen restaurants.
Um, and I think it's becauseit's, uh, strategically planned
around locations, making surethat the location is the right
one.
Uh, Patello is on the HudsonRiver overlooking New York City.

(31:20):
Um, so one thing that you'llknow is, and, and no, no knock
to any restaurants, but a lot ofrestaurants that are on the
water are usually mediocre togood.
Right.

Mark (31:31):
Funny.
I was just gonna say that exactsame thing.
The what I respect about.
Patello.
What's different about Patellois you're doing these events and
honestly, probably the rightbusiness model is to offer fine
food four days a week and justlet people come and be in this
beautiful place,

Ryan (31:49):
Yeah, I mean you guys, you know that like all these
waterfront properties, and Iwon't say all of them, I'd like
to state that blue on the Hudsonis one of my favorite
restaurants.
They're doing an an incrediblejob.
but there's definitely a few outthere that are.
You know, they're buying frommass produced, you know,
corporate companies instead of,you know, your local vendors, to

(32:09):
keep their price point down.
Um, and we don't do that.
You know, we're still buyingfrom the same vendors that I
bought at Fasano.
My little BYO restaurant in, inMontclair, New Jersey.
And you know, we're buying fromlocal farms.
We're using harvest drop, whichis obviously a very hard thing
for restaurants to do, right?

(32:30):
'cause no farms deliver.
how could you get.
produce and, and productslocally.
Harvest Drop offers that, youknow, you go on their website,
you click from whatever farm youwant, the item you need, and
that you get those deliveriestwice a week.
You have to be strategic aboutit and plan it in advance.
Um, but that's all about who youhire to do your ordering and

(32:52):
stuff like that.

I wanna talk about your space and,
and, uh, not to neglect yourother spaces But Botello is
really one of my favoriterestaurants to be in.
It is mostly glass.
It is not just on the water.
It's in the water.
Okay.
So it's at the end of a piersticking out into the Hudson
River with a beautiful view ofNew York.

(33:14):
There's some, there's from, uh,yachts docked alongside there
It's unbelievable.
You're like, and you know thething about New York, they say
is if you really want abeautiful view of the
architecture of New York, you'vegot to be.
Across a river, right?
Because it's also closetogether.
So, um, the restaurant'stremendous.
It's mostly glass.
You have an outdoor area fornice weather.

(33:37):
Um, you got a bar where you cansit at.
So if there's no wedding goingon, it's, it's really friendly.
A little hard to find.
Your Uber driver's gonna miss itthe first time.
Um, he's like, I drive outthere.
Yeah.
You know, I was like, yeah, youcan drive out there.

Ryan (33:51):
Yeah.

so, but you, this location, you have
paid dearly.
Uh, in, in blood, sweat, andtears to be in this location.

Ryan (34:00):
Yeah.

you mind sharing with us the story
of, and this was, this is aniconic restaurant story we need
to tell, so you're on a pier.
You've taken this restaurant, itexisted.
Another restaurant that theydidn't, didn't do so well, they
didn't do a great job.
You take it over, you make thisgreat restaurant.
It becomes one of my favoriterestaurants and a huge wedding
hall.
Then you had a problem.

Mark (34:21):
I love the, I love this story you're about to tell,
because it, it reallyencapsulates the life of a, of a
restaur, right?
It is.
You know, everybody sees theshining moments.
Everybody sees the full diningroom.
Everybody says, wow, you, youknow your life.
I want your, I want your life.
How many people said that toyou?
So tell us, about life on thepier.

Ryan (34:43):
yeah, I'm glad that you kind of brought that up because
I do get a lot of young cooks.
like reach out to me, likethrough Instagram and stuff like
that, and they'll, say like, ohmy God, like, you know, what do
I gotta do to get to your, yourlevel and stuff like that.
And I'm like, you know, you haveto sacrifice.
That's number one.
Um, and two, you need to, youknow, accept the losses.

(35:05):
Everybody sees Ryan Dipper'swins, you know?
Right.
But no one saw the losses.
Right.
Um, you know, Barra never.
Didn't fail as a restaurant, butit didn't make enough money so I
had to sell it.
Right.
Um, and then we, uh, you know,and then we had the story that

(35:29):
Francis is talking about.
We were rolling into year three,2017, and our landlord comes up
to us and says, um, we're gonnaclose you in seven days because
the peer.
Has moved and it's not safe tobe on the pier and we have to
redo it.

(35:49):
And we're like, I'm, I'm sorry,what?
We have, we have weddings bookedfor the next 18 months.
And they're like, yeah, yougotta cancel'em all.
So, um, whatever you could thinkthat eight, you know, 18 months
of weddings, deposits are,that's what we had to come up
with to hand back to everyone.
we closed in seven days.

(36:10):
Um, we were told that we'd beclosed for 90 days.
We were closed for 16 months.
this is a story not just about,you know, learning about your
losses, but also, um, how youcould survive together.
I could have easily, you know,went off and got a job or a
partnership somewhere else, but.

(36:32):
Corey, Joe and I, and Dominique,um, the four of us, knew that we
were an incredible team togetherand we decided to, figure a way
to stay together.
how did we do that?
You know, me personally, I lostclose to a hundred thousand
dollars of my own cash that justpaid for my life for that 16

(36:54):
months, uh, to stay in thispartnership.
I'm sure and, and I'm sure theydid too.
Um, and then on top of the moneyloss, we decided to gamble and,
uh, buy a restaurant down inBrielle.
Uh, I don't know if you guysremember that.
So after we closed in 17, byMarch of 2018, we were in the

(37:17):
process of negotiating buying arestaurant, Brielle.
we closed the, the, the deal,the week before Memorial Day
weekend.
So we had no time to renovateit, so we ended up opening the
restaurant.
Uh, we ended up opening therestaurant a week later, keeping
the old staff.
Running it as is kind of like amenu that I would do, but dumbed

(37:41):
down.
Um, you know, just doing likegrilled steaks and grilled
lobster and keeping it veryseafood shore forward.
Uh, we were doing 5, 6, 700people a weekend.
Uh, Cory, Joe and I rented, uh,a house across the street
because we all lived up north.

(38:03):
I was the only one with kids.
I'd like to say it was hardeston me because, you know, listen,
Corey, Joe and Dominique, andeven Corey's wife now, Amelia,
they got to live at that shorehouse.
And yes, we all worked very,very hard.
But I stayed there with themthree days a week, sometimes
four days a week without seeingmy family for half the week.

(38:25):
Yeah.
So it was very, very hard.
Um, and then we were, after thesummer was over.
Um, we were supposed to closeand renovate it, and this was
going to be like, almost likethe shore version of Patello.
We are gonna have an event spaceupstairs, have the restaurant
downstairs.
We are gonna create the nextbest waterfront property in New

(38:48):
Jersey by the JCR HospitalityGroup.
And our partners ran out ofmoney and we didn't know

Uh,

Ryan (38:55):
another loss in a year, in another loss.
So that project didn't end upcoming to fruition.
and then finally, you know, 16months after the closure of
Patello, we finally startedseeing that we, uh, were going
to be able to reopen Patello andwe ended up reopening in January

(39:17):
of 2019.
Uh, walked through a very longfire together, um, and came out
shining.
Restaurant was Packed, packed.
Packed.
Packed.

I remember when it reopened.
I think people are interested inthe details of that.
We gotta fill some stuff inhere.
So the pier moved the peer, didsomebody move it?
What do you mean?
The pier moved?
Like, well, what happened?

Ryan (39:44):
So the, um, pilings that the pier sits on.
We're being eaten by, um, amicroorganism called a boar,

I believe

Ryan (39:57):
correct, yes.
Yes.
And um, it was eating away atthe pilings and it moved two
inches.
And that created it to be waytoo dangerous to be there.
Uh, and they had to redo it.

the-restaurant-guys_2_09 (40:12):
we've, we've known each other a long
time, so I know a little bit ofthe intimate details here, so.
In your lease, there was a, a, aprovision, a proviso for the
landlord that basically if youshut down, you know you were
covered by all these insurancesunless your peer was attacked by

(40:33):
marine Boers and that would voidyour insurance policy.
Is that true?

Ryan (40:38):
It wasn't like direct marine boars, but it was like, I
think it was like amicroorganism or something like
that.
yeah, it was, it was noll andvoid.
So we actually, you know, we'rein a lawsuit with the insurance
company for a very long time,and uh, we got no money out of
it.
Uh, I mean, you have no idea theamount of losses that we have,

(41:00):
experienced here and the hardwork we put in.
We deserve the success that thisplace has.

Francis and I talk about this a lot when
we're talking about restaurants.
We talk about, you know, you'rea salmon swim and upstream, and
if you don't make it, you don'tprocreate.
You don't have a next year, youdon't have a next, you know,
offspring.
It, it just doesn't happen.
And that's, that is therestaurant business and the
wherewithal.
And, and I, one of the thingsgreat respect that I have for,
for you and your group and yourpartners, and we love Corey, and

(41:30):
Joe, the wherewithal to overcomethose.

Ryan (41:37):
Yeah.

gonna happen.
There's no, there's no way inthis business, I've been here 33
years, we should have closedfour times.
There are four times wheresomebody smarter than me closes
the restaurant.
but if you, if you really wannamake it, you, there's a, there's
a hill to climb and there it'scoming, it's coming.
Whatever the, whatever the, thegrenade is, it's coming.

(41:58):
And the best rest tours or the,I don't wanna say the best, but
the ones that have longevityhave something in them that
says, now I'm gonna keep going.

Ryan (42:06):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, and most important, one ofthe things I always like to say
is, is don't be greedy.
Pay your employees first.

Yeah.
so the, the landlord comes toyou and says.
You're closed, you're closed inseven days.
You own all this money.
I, it's, it's kind of a rest,like a day in the life of rest
if you're like, oh shit.
Right.
So you could have walked away atthat point, like, is there, is
there, how do you, what's themeeting like with you and your
partners where you say, Hey,we're, we're gotta move all our

(42:36):
shit out.

Ryan (42:39):
Uh, you know, it was tough.
You know, we had to go to allthe investor partners and be
like, by the way, you need to,you know, whatever your
percentage is, you need to comeup with.
This amount of money.
Um, and, and we had to give thatmoney back to all the brides
that weren't able to give that.
And then on,

on, Hold on.
So.
Here's the thing.
I'm like, uh, I owe$9 million,but I gotta call the bride who's
gonna get married here nextSaturday and be like, you know
that wedding thing?
How do you do that?
I think that there's the humanstory.

Ryan (43:14):
it was a nightmare to, you know, a lot of the brides ended
up, or coming back with a datelater.
Um, and then a lot just wentsomewhere else.
I think the most important thingwas, is that we gave their money
back, you know?
Um, I think that if that was notan option, uh, we'd be dead in
the water, you know, punintended, you know?

(43:37):
Uh.

I, I think a lot of people would've
declared bankruptcy and said,sorry, I'm out.
You know, and then started a newcompany later on.
So there's a lot of integrityin, in giving all those people
their money back.

Ryan (43:47):
Yeah.
There, it, I'd say most of it isintegrity, but also we saw the
vision of the place and thetrajectory of Patello from the
beginning was so wild.
we just couldn't give up.

It's amazing.
It's an amazing,

Mark (44:03):
give up is the frame of mind you have to have.
Right.

Ryan (44:07):
yeah.
We're not quitters.

So you come back, you came back and
it's going like gangbusters.
You're doing a great business.
Uh, and what year, when, whendid you open again?
When was the reopening?

Ryan (44:17):
Uh, January of 2019.
I know where you're gonna gowith this a year later.

So January of 2019, you have 14
good months.
Quick complaint.
No, no.
So, so we, January of 2019,you've just done this great
thing.
and I'm gonna tell you where Iwas.
When the very next year theworld shuts down for
restaurants.
It was my birthday, it was March14th, 2020.

(44:42):
I was in your restaurant with aAugustina, Hobbes, Matt Hobbes,
her uncle, and a bunch of otherfriends of ours, and our friends
called us when they shut therestaurants in New York down and
we are getting drunk, And I amgetting drunk.
I dunno if they were gettingdrunk at for my birthday.
And we're like, they're shuttingthe restaurants down.
And then a couple of friendsfrom New York, Chuck and Ed, who

(45:05):
worked in New York, they cameand joined us at the restaurant
in New Jersey at your place.
we heard the governor wasshutting New Jersey down and
then we But it was just gonna befor two weeks.
Yeah, just two weeks.
But then we went back.
But then we went back to myhouse.
We grabbed a couple of bottlesof wine from your restaurant,
and the last thing we did beforeCOVID was Leave your restaurant
and go back to my house and, uh,have a little, uh, the last

(45:28):
party of the world.
And then we all sat in ourliving rooms alone for a while.
It's crazy.

Ryan (45:31):
Wild.
Wild.
We were very fortunate here atPatello.
You know, they opened outdoordining.
Um, what was it about?
Uh, 90 days.
So when they opened the outdoordining, um, as you know how big
the pier is, uh, we put, we put200 plus seats outside.

(45:52):
We started the seats from thefront door and ran around

Oh

Ryan (45:58):
all the, all the way to the kitchen door.
On the other side,

yeah, I think I sat.

Ryan (46:04):
I am telling you, Monday nights at 10:00 PM there were
people still walking in to havedinner here.
We were packed.

Yeah, that's, well, that's, that's,
you know, again, you deserve it.
Right.
You all, the rest of the stuff,you, you deserve that, Let's
talk about you.
You have a new project going on,right?
near Patello.
There you, you gotta tell ourlisteners, first information on
what's going on there in JerseyCity.

Ryan (46:31):
we're very excited about it.
So.
And when you walk onto the pierat Patello, the very first
building used to be a boatgarage.
Um, now when the pier closed,the actual, uh, yacht club that
was here disappeared.
so no one is in that garageanymore.
No one rents it out.
It's been empty since 2017.

(46:52):
And, um, our landlords came tous and said, Hey, I wanna let
you know that we're gonna beputting up a space, uh,
available sign in the, in theboat garage.
Um, but you guys have first orright refusal to come look at it
and rent it.
We really weren't thinkingabout.
opening another place because wejust opened something less than

(47:14):
two years ago.
Mm-hmm.
And, uh, but we also don't wantanother location,

25 feet from my other location.
Yeah.
Right.
We did it.
By the way.
It can work.

Ryan (47:26):
Yeah.
So, I've been really taking alot of time over the last two
years making pizza.
I've never been professionallytrained, uh, but I do come from
an Italian family and I'veeaten, uh, you know, just as
much pizza as, as probably youguys.
So it's, it's, it's anincredible thing that will never

(47:48):
get old, right?
Pizza will never get old.
Um, now there is a littlemethodical thought behind this
space.
Um, Patello, because it's soldout so often for large events,
we say no every single day to20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80,
maybe even a hundred people.

(48:08):
micro weddings is the new thing.
People are getting married, ahundred or less people.
So we never get to say yes tothose.
So think about this.
We said we need to come up witha concept.
Cory's like, listen, you've beenreally like working hard on this
pizza thing.
We can't really cannibalize whatwe do at Patello.
Pizza and Wine Bar would beperfect where we don't do

(48:29):
entrees.
We're gonna do pizza,sandwiches, salads, and small
plates.
Everything's gonna be shareable,right?
Super, super casual.
And then on top of it.
We'll sell that space to all thepeople we've been saying no to
for events.
So we're basically creatinganother restaurant and event
space right next door.

(48:50):
we're utilizing the samepartners at Patello, so we're
really just growing thisbusiness.
And, um, it's gonna be exciting.
We're building a open kitchen.
I'm, I'm gonna end up having aMar forny, beautiful tiled, gas
and wood assisted oven.
Um, so that open kitchen's gonnabe so exciting to watch these
guys slinging dough.

(49:11):
And then right above it, we'rebuilding a stage for bands.

That's awesome.
Wow, that's great.

Ryan (49:19):
so, I'm very excited about, Joe and Corey are super
excited about it.
Our partners are, and I knowJersey City's going to really,
really, just love what we'redoing.

I'm sure you'll be embraced by the
locals for sure.
You know, being a local

Ryan (49:33):
I'm scared, Larry.
Hold on.
I'm scared.
You know,

Oh.

Ryan (49:37):
is the king of pizza

Oh yeah.

Ryan (49:40):
and he's right around the corner.

so, so Dan Rich, our mutual friend
owns Rza Pizza and he is likeone of the best pizzerias in
America.
Wouldn't it be wild if we hadtwo of those in, in the same
city in Jersey City?
That'd be amazing.
The thing that I want to letpeople know, if you are
listening to the show and you'renot from around here, the pier,
it's super accessible from NewYork City.
I mean, you can take the pathtrain and you know, if you're

(50:05):
visiting New York City, youdefinitely have to get out of
New York City somewhere.
I always say at least take aStaten Island ferry ride.
for New York, you need to be onthe water to see it.
And, uh, probably the best placeto do that is, at your place at
Patello.
I'm looking forward to all thenew things coming on there.

Ryan (50:18):
Thank you.
Appreciate it.
We're excited.
And you know, we're, uh, we'reready to put in the hard work
that always entails a, a brandnew restaurant.

And I'm ready to eat the pizza.
So, uh, we we're all at ourparts of play, Ryan.
Yeah.
No one's more excited thanFrancis who lives, uh, you know,
a mile and a half away from your

Ryan (50:34):
I'll make a deal with you.
I'll bring my home pizza oven,uh, over the next month or so
and I'll pick a day that youguys can come and try my pizza.

I, I'm in.
That is a deal.
I'm in.
That is a deal.
I'm open.

Ryan (50:48):
Okay?

the-restaurant-guys_2_ (50:48):
Alright, so we only have a little bit of
time left.
And I really did want to spend,uh, the majority of our time
talking about Patello and themarine borrowers.
Man, I know what they are and Ishouldn't the ring's in my head,
but you've got Ember and Eaglegoing on, so you move to a
different part of the state.
What's happening with that?
What's Eber Eagle about?

Ryan (51:07):
Let's be very clear that I moved three months before we
decided to do this deal or heardabout this deal to Wykoff, which
is Upper Bergen County.
I'm 10 minutes from New York,right?
And.
Uh, Corey comes to us and says,Hey, I have this amazing
location on a golf course, andif you guys know Corey, and you
know Joe absolutely love golf,right?

(51:28):
So this was for them a nobrainer.
Even though we've been workingso hard, they've, they've barely
been playing golf.
Um, but.
This location is on Sun EaglesGolf course.
Uh, the partner, uh, SalMarelli, who has become a very
close friend of ours and now apartner, brought us in to
operate and manage, the entirefood and beverage program.

(51:50):
Uh, we have four locations inone.
So starting off we openedFilling House, which is the
event space.
Um, we can fit up to 400 peoplein the event space, Is double
the size of Patello, right?
So we had to figure out how to,you know, copy and paste, but,
but on a, on a larger scale,right?

(52:11):
So we opened that, two yearsago.
And this October will be twoyears that we opened Ember and
Eagle, which was a, uh, Italianinfluence steakhouse.
Right?
So you guys know how much I lovemaking pasta.
It is one of my favorite things,and I'd like to say that, you
know.
I'm one of the chefs that I'vebeen known to, you know, really

(52:32):
take that next step in creating,you know, not just a red sauce
joint, but really taking pridein what style of pasta, uh, from
all different regions of Italy.
So our pasta is in there, a lacarte meat courses, uh,
seasonal, um, uh, fish disheswith local fish during the
season.
Um.
And then we have our raw bar,which we obviously are very

(52:54):
known for here at Patello aswell.
So it is the, uh, meat versionof Patello.
And it's called Amber and Eaglebecause, um, we're on Sun
Eagle's golf course.
right now we are inside ofTilling House on the second
floor.
Um, but we are going to build abrick and mortar next door, uh,
eventually once we catch up fromthe first investment.

(53:16):
Um, and we'll have live firecooking, which is what the Ember
came from.
So, but we've been there, uh,like I said, almost two years
now, and we've just rated top 40in the state.
Patella was rated top 40 in thestate.
mama County has really, uh, youknow, fell in love with us.
Um, and then I didn't even talkabout the two other locations,

(53:37):
which is.
Private for the golfers.
We have the bunker bar, which isin the basement.
It's an all day restaurant.
And then we have a halfway houseout on the golf course that
serves your burgers, your brats,your dogs, your soups, and, and
obviously drinks'cause golferslike to drink.

you told me a story that, uh, really
moved me one night when I cameinto dinner at your restaurant,
and I had no idea.
So it was early on when I cameto Patello before the first,
before the marine borrowers, andyou told me a story about the
first time you had dinner at myrestaurant.
And I'm sorry to say that Ididn't remember you, but I know
you now.
when you tell the story.
I love that story.

Ryan (54:11):
So my brother went to Rutgers and, uh, my parents, you
know, being the parents thatthey are, that always made us,
you know, eat together.
We ate every Sunday at mygrandfather's house.
We were a family that atetogether, you know, Monday
through Friday if my brother hadfootball practice, we waited for
him to get back.
he went to Rutgers and stayedthere.

(54:32):
Um, so even though he is 45minutes away, every two months
we would drive to, um, you know,new Brunswick and have dinner
and we ate at Old Man Rafferty'sand um, I can't even remember
the other places.
'cause the truth is this is theone place.
That I remembered I was 17.
I was, I was washing dishes, Iwas working a salad station and

(54:53):
delivering pizza at threedifferent locations.
Uh, but I knew that I wanted tobe in the industry and I ate at
stage web.
with my parents and my brotherand it was an experience, you
know,'cause we were juststarting to eat at upscale
restaurants.
My parents were taking us to NewYork City, you know, once or
twice a year and eating atGotham Bar and Grill and

(55:14):
Gramercy Tavern and Union SquareCafe and, at that point, I felt
like I was only getting thatexperience at those restaurants
in Manhattan.
And then I ate at stage left andI felt the same thing I felt at
a place like Go and Bar andGrill.
And it just really, uh, was acore memory for me on what?

(55:36):
Upscale dining, you know,refined service and, and, caring
about what was going on theplate.
Um, and, and that was 30 yearsago.

That's wild.
That's wild.
Well, I, I gotta tell you, youhave changed the landscape of
New Jersey dining.
Yeah.
Uh, I'm gonna say that I'm proudof you.
you've done some great thingshere and You've increased the
level of respect that peoplehave for New Jersey dining,
just, just by being here anddoing the things you're doing.

Ryan (56:03):
I really appreciate that.
'cause you know, to be honestwith you, you kind of feel like
sometimes when you're amulti-unit chef and you have
chefs at every location,sometimes you feel like you,
you've lost a little bit ofthat.
Um, but, I only do that in myown mind because I just always
want to evolve and get betterand, and push, push the

(56:24):
envelope.

so that's Ryan de Percy.
Everybody.
You can find out more about himand his other restaurants that
we didn't talk about and how tovisit Patello in this.
As yet, unnamed new project,we'll put all the information in
the show notes and you canalways find out more about

Francis (57:04):
I love Ryan de Perio.
Yeah, he, he is a great guest, agood friend.
I love having friends in thisbusiness.
Ryan mentioned something inpassing that I, I think that
people in the business recognizeif you're in this business, he
said.
Pay your employees first.
Yeah.
You know, at the beginning ofthe show we talked about the

(57:25):
online consultants and how theyalways have this, this advice
and some of it's good and someof it's less good.
Well, all of those onlineconsultants say you gotta pay
yourself first.
You gotta pay yourself first.
Yeah.
But if you're a mom and poprestaurant, it simply doesn't
work sometimes.
No.
we opened this restaurant and,you know, we couldn't pay
ourselves in the beginning,although we did pay ourselves.

(57:48):
Well, sort of, yeah.
So you had this same experience,that I did.
There was a stack of checks inthe drawer for about the first
year and a half.
We were open.
Of my paychecks that I wasunable to cash.
Right.
Because you wanted to payyourself and you had to pay the
taxes on that as well.
And you wanted to be employedand, you know, have, be in the

(58:08):
social security system.
But you had checks that, and Iremember we, we'd take two
checks and be like, can't cashthese either.
Gotta go out on the credit cardthis week.
And then as we became solvent,that.
Pile of uncast checks would, howmany checks can we cash?
So like, I can cash two checksthis week and you'd catch up
slowly over time.
I do remember, and the statuteof limitations has run out on
this, I wanna share this story.

(58:28):
Um, we didn't know anything, butthere were a hell of a lot, you
didn't need to know as much backthen.
But 1992 were set up our creditcard account, we accepting
credit cards.
And the way that used to workis, you know, you'd have a cash
register that was just a.
An adding machine, basically.
And then you would go and you,you'd type into your credit card
machine the amount that was dueon the credit card, boop, boop,

(58:50):
boop boop.
And then that would appear inyour bank account less than 5%
they keep or whatever.
And we were gonna, we werehaving trouble making payroll.
As we did for the first year anda half and we're like, you know
what?
We'll just swipe our own creditcard.
We'll just put it on our creditcard.
Why take it?
Why take a cash advance?
Yeah.
If we'll get the money in twodays.
That's a great idea, mark.
Don't just swipe our own creditcard.
So for$3,000, we each put in$3,000 on our own credit cards

(59:12):
and we, and the credit cardcompany, you can't do that.
Evidently they were, the nextday we got a phone call from,
they were mad company.
Oh.
And yeah, it was a phone callIt, it was a phone call from.
Hello.
This is MasterCard and Visa.
We're like, what?
Like, yeah, you swiped yourcredit card yesterday.
Don't do that.
Don't ever do that.
No, they didn't just say, don'tdo that.
They said, don't ever do thatagain.

(59:32):
Or you will lose the ability totake Visa and MasterCard in your
restaurants forever.
Yeah, that that was a one ofthose early, early lessons.
I hear.
I hear you.
Yeah, I hear you loud and clear.
hope you guys have enjoyed yourtime with the restaurant guys.
I know that we certainly have.
I'm Francis Shot.
And I'm Mark Pascal.
And we are the restaurant guys.
You can always find out moreabout

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know

Dateline NBC

CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Ryan DePersio on Vision and Tenacity Behind Culinary Success

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}Stuff You Should Know

Dateline NBC

CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist

All Episodes

Ryan DePersio on Vision and Tenacity Behind Culinary Success

Stuff You Should Know