Global Dining Trends

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1:10Here today, roam tomorrow. Join now at Sonesta.com. Terms and conditions apply. This dog salon? Operational excellence. Thanks to genius from Global Payments. Scheduling? Personalized. Checkouts? Instant. Absolutely genius. Big League reliability for any business. That's genius. Bloomberg Audio Studios. Podcasts. Radio. News. You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Tim Stenevek on Bloomberg Radio. Well, speaking of the weekend, it might be good to go out to eat. Yes, yes, and yes. How's that? Well, our next guest is behind nearly 20 different restaurant concepts in cities in nine states and the Middle East.

1:58We're talking Dubai and Riyadh in the Middle East. Even on a Ritz-Carlton yacht, we're talking bourbon steak, international smoke in San Francisco, wit and wisdom in Sonoma, and many, many more. We've got Michael Mina with us, chef founder and executive chairman of the Mina Group. Welcome, how are you? Wonderful, thank you. Thank you so much for having me. Nice to have you. Wow, you didn't bring food, which is okay. But looking at your website, we are just like, okay, we need a steak right now. You have so many different concepts, range from seafood to a lot of different variations of steakhouses.

2:34What would you say is the concept that ties everything together that people should know you for? Well, I think part of the allure and part of the great part about being a chef is being able to be creative and to be able to work with your team and come up with great concepts. But the concept that we have the most outlets of is bourbon steak. And so we have the most bourbon steak restaurants. And so it's probably the one that I'm most known for. And it's also the one here in New York at the Essex House. And so it's probably the one that I'm most known for. But I started out in 1991 with a restaurant called Aqua in San Francisco.

3:15And that was a fish restaurant. And that was kind of the launch restaurant. And the second one ended up at the Bellagio. when the Bellagio opened. And now that is Michael Mina. It's not an easy industry. You know this, I don't have to tell you. And yet you have variety, you know, in terms of what you offer. How do you kind of keep it going? How do you, again, like in an industry where margins can be tight and slim costs are high. We talk about higher food costs. Like it's a tough, tough business. It really is. And, and I'm, you know, I, I wouldn't sit here and say that, I have the answers. I have all the answers.

3:55I think that anyone that thinks they have all the answers in this industry will wake up one morning and realize that there's a lot. That's what's so great about it is it's constantly evolving and it's constantly changing. And you think about it, in our industry, you have to really try to work very hard to stay relevant in this industry, but you also have to work really hard to build loyalty. And I would say that one of the biggest factors of success in this industry is loyalty. And we're three generations into it, and I have close to 40 restaurants, and I'm very blessed in that, in the fact that we've just had so many great loyal customers, and that's what gets you through the down times.

4:46Yeah, that's the thing that I thought was really interesting during COVID. It's just even well-known restaurants and chefs and groups, how difficult it was because it is such a kind of slim margin business and it can be really tricky. And it just, I thought, oh, the successful guys will be no problem. But it was amazing. Well, you also got to remember, I mean, you're in an industry where shiny objects, you got very creative people that love shiny objects and love to chase shiny objects. And I'm one of them, right? And so getting really disciplined about what your business plan is going to be and then sticking to it, I would say that's just as hard because there's an allure to like, oh my gosh, look at this beautiful project that somebody's offering you and everything else, but it might be way outside of your scope.

5:36And I've made those mistakes and look back at them. And I'm like, OK, you know, I think kind of unfortunately, I have to say with age now, I kind of have learned to not chase the shiny objects and say, OK, this is our lane. This is what's going to be best for us. One of the reasons we wanted to talk to you is because you have this footprint around the U.S. and Washington, D.C., ranging from Hawaii to Arizona to California to New York, restaurants in Florida, too. I'm wondering about sort of regional strength that you're seeing right now in the U.S. Where are the pockets of boom towns right now?

6:10You know, what's interesting is you see cities that that I'll tell you, like I have 14 bourbon steaks. Our number one bourbon steak is in Nashville. It's number one in the company and number one by a little ways as well. And, you know, you'll see, you know, and obviously, like, you know, if you're going to go compete in a city like New York or a city like San Francisco or Los Angeles, there's a lot of competition. They're always great cities. And they're always going to be, there's always a big upside to being in those cities. They're great for your brand. They're great for your clientele. Why is the Nashville one so successful?

6:53You know, it's really interesting. It's a lot of times you get to a city right at the right time. And I think we got to Nashville, you know, close 10 years now. And we got there at the right time. It's at the top of the JW Marriott. And it was really interesting because when we opened it, everyone was like, you're coming to Nashville and you're opening a steakhouse. There's a lot of steakhouses in Nashville. I said, but there, you know, but you have to say, OK, I believe in what we're doing. And this is how we're going to do our steakhouse, if that's what you're doing. and we happened to really hit, I think, hit a real niche there that was missing in their steakhouses.

7:34Can you tell us, you know, you talk about just some of the things that you guys have to deal with, and we're thinking about your exposure over in the Middle East, Dubai. What can you tell us about what this war has done? It's done a lot. I mean, we're at the Four Seasons. We do all the food and beverage at the Four Seasons in the DIFC, which is the financial district of it. And the hotel had to close. And, you know, and so it definitely, there's an impact, obviously, on travel. There's a major impact on travel. But, and I think that, you know, uncertainty is never good for our industry. It's, you know, it's never good for, I guess it's not good for a lot of industries.

8:21but just, and I know more about mine. And so I would say for ours, uncertainty is not good. And I think that, you know, people don't necessarily want to be out celebrating as much during those type of times. What about more domestic challenges like beef prices here in the U.S. and sourcing beef at a time when cattle herds over the last couple of years have been smaller, beef has been more expensive. if you have this challenge with the president now wanting to import beef and those tariffs not hitting those beef importers. Yeah, beef prices have gone up. Beef prices have gone up. And also, too, when fuel prices go up, beef prices go up.

9:04Where do you get your beef? All over. So it really depends regionally, so depending on where we are regionally, but we'll buy Japanese beef, we buy American beef, We buy from many different ranchers. We'll buy regionally, depending on where we are. We'll buy certain cuts from certain farms and certain ranchers. But really, we don't say, okay, this is what we're going to use across the country. Because I think for us in particular, sometimes it's really enjoyable to get to work with a particular ranch and really get to spend that time with them when they're localized. I'm just hungry. Okay, I got one for you, Carol.

9:52Oh, you do? What's the best way to cook a steak at home? At home. Yeah, at home. Well, I'm going to tell you how we do it at Bourbon Steak. Okay. Can we do it at home? You can do it at home. Okay. It takes a little bit of a commitment. Okay. It takes a little bit of a commitment. Okay, so you can get some ghee or some clarified butter. Okay, and... We have ghee on the stove all the time. Okay. But you can freeze it so you don't think you're going to throw it away. So the best way to do it is to take it and make what we call like a double boiler. Put it into an oven at 120 degrees in the oven. And slow poach the beef for about 30 minutes.

10:33If it's a steak, slow poach it and it will stay under rare. And you can put some herbs in it, some shallots in it. and then strain that and throw it in the freezer with that butter so you can reuse it. And then after you slow poach it, then grill it on a really hot grill or sear it in a really hot pan. And that'll keep it from shrinking. And it doesn't saturate the meat at all. You won't even know that the meat was actually slow poached in the butter. It gives it a great flavor. And so it tenderizes it, keeps it from shrinking. Great with filet. So double boiler. in the oven. You can do it on a double boiler or you can just put it in your oven but just keep your oven really low and keep a thermometer in the butter and don't let the butter go over 130 degrees.

11:18Boom. There it is. Not as difficult as I thought. I think I'm going to actually try it. Yeah, or you can, like if you want to make a tiny investment, you can get a, you can go to Williamson and get a chocolate melter and it'll do the same thing. You just put the butter where the chocolate would go. Yeah, oh my God. Michael, come back soon. Oh, thank you so much. This was really sweet. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Very sincere and just fun to hear what your world is up to. It sounds busy. I know you're going to go cook. Yeah. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. You bet. Michael Mina, he's chef, founder, and executive chairman of the Mina Group, joining us, of course, right here in studio.

11:55When you're running a business, the best days are the ones where priorities stay on track. For midsize and large companies, risk can affect multiple parts of the organization at once, from property and liability to cyber and regulatory challenges. At that level, managing risk becomes an ongoing discipline. At the Hartford, the focus is on helping businesses manage risk before it turns into something more disruptive. And when losses do happen, that work is paired with insurance coverage shaped by years of underwriting, risk engineering, and claims experience. Learn more at thehartford.com slash risk mitigation.

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