739: Flynn McGarry Was a Prodigy. Now He’s a Pro.

28:51And so that was, I wanted to build a space that was, we could host brands who were in the retail world because they felt that they were in this retail space. But we could, you could come and do a pop-up for the day and then we could cook you a dinner. So it was actually really both this venture into retail, but a venture into how do we kind of dig our feet deeper into this event world. I mean those buyouts too. Like, you know, it's a sliding scale too. So your margins can really increase. Yeah. And just, you know, I think being – that was my question. How do we create a space that can consistently be an event space?

29:28Because our problem at Cove is we book a month out. So if someone says, can I do a buyout tomorrow, I have to call 100 people and cancel them. But that's where Gem Home is a daytime business. So if you want to book a 20-person dinner tomorrow, we move the schedule around and we can do it. What about the products, like the food products you're selling there? I mean, how are you buying those? So it's between me and a woman, Hannah, who works for me. She was a server at Original Gem and then went to go be a produce buyer in L.A. at a grocery store. And so her and I collaborate a lot on the products that we're selling there.

30:08A lot of it is products from farms that we work with. Specifically, we're picking them up from the farmer's market. I really wanted the space to just, I mean, the idea was that what we sell is what we cook with. And what we sell is what we serve food on. And it made it really easy, honestly, to choose the items. Because it was like, we would put a salad on the menu with these amazing dates from California. So we would sell the salad and we would also sell the dates. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's the thought process behind everything. It is, you know, the olive oil that we use in the dish, we also sell.

30:43And it was a way that I think now I always really do believe that people more and more so, if they love a restaurant, if they have a great experience, they want to bring that into their home in some way. And so what I think we're trying to show with Jem Home is you can bring that home in some of these. we make some, you know, some of our own things and, and the dates that we have, whatever, if you want to cook the version of what we're doing at home. But also if you want to, if you love the coffee cup that you're drinking out of and you want that, we can take it that much further. Cause I think that's, that's an area that in this sort of chefs going CPG, I think people forget a lot about is that as much as I want to eat something from one of these restaurants that I love at home if I just had Ikea plates it's not gonna feel the same oh definitely we we we have we eat with our eyes and yeah it's part of the plates are absolutely essential I mean are you have you done your own cbgs I can't no we I'm I'm holding off on yeah because like to me that that is this world that it's like yeah I've talked to people in it it's very difficult yeah it's much easier to work with a ceramicist to make cove plates and sell those than it is to make a line of conservas or whatever.

31:59All of those kinds of things. And, you know, I really love, I see it as I'm more of a curator and less of a maker there. Because there's way less of you, like chefs with like aesthetics and like good eyes than like chefs who can make cool CPG. Yeah. I feel like that's like your true. And that's been my, I always say like my role at Gem Home is curating. We have a baker who's amazing. We have, you know, people in the kitchen on the savory side who are really great at what they do. We have Hannah who buys amazing things. I come in and kind of make sure that it all fits in a specific world. But there's no world in which I want people to walk in there.

32:38And it's like everything is one synonymous brand. So, Flim, let's talk about Cove. I really, again, love my meal there. I want to talk about the format. You know, you've like rebuffed the tasting menu nickname or moniker. um i i see that in the in the service it's not um really a tasting menu traditionally how do you describe how this meal unfolds in the eight courses or the four course whatever you decide on so it's actually the time that we're going through a transition right now going into spring which is kind of something that i i was excited to bring up because we've been in this period of you know we opened with this idea that was to me honestly an experiment of I do believe there is value in set menus in terms of from an operation side, from a guest side, what we're able to give you from a, you know, these very sort of nerdy sides of how Resi works, how these systems work that we have to.

33:40Not too nerdy for here, man. We can talk about Resi. But it's just like, you know, as a guest, I have a million things to figure out how I can give you the best experience. and what we've just kind of came back to time and time again is that a version of a set menu is the best way to do that from my perspective. So when we opened, we had, you know, the way that I always saw it was that Cove was like going to a sushi restaurant. There's the omakase counter and there's a la carte. This is not a new concept. except everywhere in Europe offers these two experiences. It's a thing that is not very common in New York.

34:23I think people really go one direction or the other. And, you know, it's something that after years of having just a taste of a menu restaurant and years of having just an a la carte, you know, wine bar, I was like, how do we put these together and find some sort of middle ground? what we've kind of come to see is

34:46the bad word of a tasting menu no matter what we call it no matter what we do around it scares people so badly it either scares people so badly or it attracts a very specific person and people who aren't going to come back like every single week and it's not that they're not going to come back every single week. They want a capital T tasting menu. Got it. I see. And there are not that many restaurants now in New York that have what I would say 10 years ago how everyone had a tasting menu, which is just supposed to be a chef going, this is the way I would like you to eat this menu. A tasting menu now means you're going to get the most expensive thing of everything and that's why you go to a tasting menu.

35:35Is that you're going to get your luxury ingredients or whatever. And that's never been what I've been incredibly passionate about. And so it's honestly, now we've been open for five months, I think, roughly. Yeah, five months. It's something that every month I kind of, at the end of the month, digest our numbers, our how many people did this, how many people did this. We added the four courses, which I know you had. And so now we're sort of, actually next week, launching this new way of doing it that I hope will bridge the gap a little bit. What we did see was four courses does not exist in the fear of a tasting menu.

36:22A hundred percent agree. And I think I made that choice because of time. I had to drive back home. And it wasn't because of expense because I would have loved it on eight and I could have afforded the eight. Well, and so this is the other thing. It's not about price. It's not about price. It really isn't. I think it's about flexibility. For sure. And so now what we're looking at is, which is a little bit what we're doing, you'll get two menus. There's the four course, which has kind of like you came in. It has, you know, a vegetarian entree, a fish entree. And then the meat entree will always be more expensive because meat is extremely expensive.

37:05Even chicken. Even chicken. Even chicken. Everything meat blows my mind how expensive it is. And then we have the a la carte menu, which is we do this kind of, we call it the sampler platter in the kitchen that is with each season even, it's inspired by like the Kaiseki first course that's supposed to show you what the season is. And so we've sort of figured out now that these four things that we do are for appetizers on the a la carte menu. And it's like this is what you can't figure out until you actually go through it. And it's like become actually cool to develop what I think really works as our format for the menu is that on the four course, you get a little bit of all these things.

37:53And on the a la carte, there are those things, but they're full-size dishes. and then you have the mid course and then obviously the entres and then on the a la carte there's a couple other dishes there that fill these gaps. So if you came in and you said we're each going to do a four course and we're going to add the tartare because we want to try that and we're going to add the tempura because that adds this sort of nice mid course between the custard and the entree. you could get up to an eight course menu yeah but it's on your own accord um and that's sort of something that we've seen has been without even we weren't even offering that initially people would just come in off the street say i'm gonna do the four course can we add the beats can we add this can we add this yeah and and i would go that's the same price as the eight course tasting menu yeah and they're like fine like i don't want the it's just that number eight is just not not rocking right now it's not yeah and i think as both the chef but also the business owner i have to you know look at that and go okay how can we make this work with our turn times with our check average yep all these things that we have to kind of consider and so i do think that this can hopefully bridge the gap a little bit between if you between i think my hope is how do we identify the people that want to go all in?

39:24And how do we, when we identify them, how do we give them the full experience? So you can block your time with that four courses, the base. So that's probably a big part of it is to like block these tables correctly and make sure that if you're starting with four and doing three supplements, that you can get in and out in that period of time. It probably speeds things up from the eight courses a little bit. It speeds things up a little bit but it's also this thing of if you don't want to get out in two hours or an hour and 45 how do i not have to kick you out because i can't kick you out if you're doing a set menu right now right i have to serve you your last course and that's what i mean by talking about like all of these systems and that's why you know i love resi is that we can get really specific and how specific tables are designed for like long turn four course people and specific tables are designed for quicker turns and we can move everything around and yeah and we can give a little bit more space over here and we can you know and so that's where we we can use these two dining rooms too between we have the kitchen rooms behind our kitchen and the main dining room very cool how they they are very different energies in each room yeah and that was sort of always idea was that the one tucked in the back we can give you some time and then we also have you know where we do private events that we open up usually that is more of a place for you know eventually maybe some more walk-ins and whatever but where we can really if you're wanting to keep going and have another round of cocktails and keep hanging out we can move you there which is such a luxury to have in new york to be able to not put you out on the street but move you to another part how do you describe the neighborhood because i was i was struggling as a 25 year year new yorker i was struggling to name this neighborhood.

41:10I mean, it's technically called Hudson Square. Is that right? Okay, I knew that. I've said that word, but I mean, it's not quite Tribeca. It's not quite Tribeca. It's not quite the West Village. It's not the West Village, for sure. Which is what attracted me to it because I didn't want to be a West Village restaurant. No. I love Tribeca. I could not afford Tribeca. Yeah. I didn't want to be a nomad restaurant. You know, I was trying to - You got to be below 14, man. Yeah. You're not going to - We had to be downtown, but downtown I went, okay, I can't afford Soho. and we you know found you weren't touching the East Village I was not getting I talked to Eddie Wong about that I was not getting near the East Village you know and like everywhere and I wanted to leave the Lower East Side and we got you know offered this opportunity in Hudson Square and you know to me what was so exciting is that we were one of the first restaurants to open in this neighborhood and now Daniel Hoom is going to be our neighbor a block away oh that's cool He's open, like where, um, and Brasserie was, they're opening this 200 seat, you know, giant restaurant.

42:13And I think as the neighborhood develops, it's going to be really exciting. We've very long lease, you know, but I was really interested in being able to be somewhere that has no reflection of the space. And we've actually started to see that a lot where people, you know, have been very like, I'm a little, I was a little confused walking up and then the space obviously inside is so different than the outside and like all of this was my intention you know i like went from being in a very sort of rundown building and how we how we deal with those architectural you know signifiers and things like that to now we're in this glass office building um but my example always was like you know i love that walking into la bernadine and from the outside it's just a random office building and you go inside and you can do so much in great comparison i think with the art and just like with this with the room like really being a contrast of that like midtown for for the burned end and like this kind of yeah like the grill you're kind of a grittier section of hudson yeah a little bit i mean it's really there's like a post office depot next door yeah but you know there's also the the building on the corner is the most expensive per square foot residential yeah new york definitely so it's like that's the strange thing over there is it's like It's very empty still, and it feels that way at night.

43:34But I think that's also something that's kind of nice about it is it's quiet when you walk up to the restaurant. That's why we love dining downtown in New York. You have these quiet blocks, and you enter this bustling world. I think the grill was a great call, too. That was all of my references. I was like, how do we create this New York kind of restaurant that is not a New York restaurant, and we have to be in a building that feels kind of like you're in New York? Well, this conversation has been really great. It's been completely void of culinary talk, which I think is – it's cool because you've got a great story.

44:06But I really want to focus on food. And I just like – I know you're switching the menu. I know you had the fixed menu for winter. But I want to go through the winter in the northeast in California. It was like a kind of a beautiful assembly of raw seafood and citrus. we're kind of like for me those are like the main focus yeah but like i thought it was just technically really really strong and and just for our listeners who maybe don't even know what cove's cooking is because it is hard to talk about yeah i've i've tried uh and this i have to say like for the third time really excellent restaurant you gotta go what describe this early course so yeah this is a course that we will always do the name will obviously change as the season We're about to go into, you know, it's just March because I think March is such an interesting.

44:57But it is based on, I spent a month almost in Japan just before we opened this restaurant last year. I never really deep dived. And my favorite part of all these Kaiseki menus was this beginning course. Mission statement. It's supposed to show you where you are. Yeah. and I think I kind of went how do we take that and not just serve the exact same thing but how do we show where we are and in you know our first version of that when we opened in September was everything from one farm that we were working with that we were really excited about so the entire plate was everything coming from one farm and it's just to me it's what am I excited about?

45:44What do I want to show you? What's the best thing? Which is also that thing of you got to kind of hit people right from the beginning. Completely. And so it is, what is the best thing right now? And the kind of joke of that course always is showing winter in the Northeast. We're a restaurant in the Northeast. Everyone talks about ingredients in the Northeast. There are no ingredients right now. They're buried under three feet of snow. There is amazing seafood right now. and I think something that I've gotten a lot more comfortable with over the years is I can buy things from California in the winter and it's going to be better the planes coming here anyway but what we'd started to do actually was start to treat instead of just like what's on Baldor or whatever we've started to treat especially from bringing Hanon who came from California we've started to treat these farms in California, the same way that we treat the farms here, that we're buying from specific farms, you know, that have the citrus that I remember buying at the Santa Monica Farmer's Market when I grew up in California.

46:50You got the Weisers on your menu? You got Weisers on the menu. So it's like, how do you... What about Chino? We don't have any Chino farms right now. It's hard to get them over here. Those guys are great. We have a couple people that literally, like, we will direct, you know, overnight stuff to us. Totally. And, you know, we live in the 21st century. Like, yes, but that's where I'm like, all of our wine is coming from, you know, a different country. The planes are coming. The planes are coming. That's the way we got to realize, like, how cargo works. And that was a big thing of, like, in the winter trying to show, like, these are amazing products coming from California.

47:21These are amazing farmers. We want to showcase them in the same. We don't want to hide that we're buying things from California. We actually want to say, you should try this citrus. It's amazing. and so it was I think probably when you came it's changed a little bit but it there is you know various types of citrus with some salsa matcha that we make there was you know but then actually that time I think you came it started with this oyster yeah it did that is a very to me was like a very you know winter in New York like creamy you poach the oysters in chamomile oil there was a chestnut puree apple gelée some horseradish you know like that to me is that like that's the height of winters chestnuts and apples and those kinds of things we had to because none of those things are available anymore and that's what I mean like March it's like in that little bit of like the Japanese like all the micro seasons March in New York is not even winter it's just it's pre-spring yeah we used to call it like the ramp's rampage but it's not even there that's going to happen in April probably you know so March is pre-spring it's the root vegetables are not good anymore.

48:31You have sprouts from a greenhouse and you have early spring coming from California. And so that's like, we're working on that platter right now is how do I show you, even though there's snow on the ground, we're not in winter actually in terms of like winter ingredients because the sun chokes are all soft and mushy and the cabbage is gone. The storage vegetables only go to so far. And so I really also use it as a way with our kitchen team who brings the course out to get diners to maybe understand a little bit of where they are in the season is always, I think, a goal of the restaurant to get you to understand.

49:08Hopefully someone leaves and realizes that March, this is what you can actually eat and this is what's good. And that even right now we've been dealing with, we had to move around the type of fish that we were doing because as much as you hear, oh, cold water is made for fishermen, no one can fish when there's 20 foot waves. Yeah. And so we're getting, you know, tuna from North Carolina right now, which is the East Coast, but that's where they're able to get stuff right now. And that sort of really far image of where are we right now in the season, I think is really important. And the way that we do the dish, it's able to change and fluctuate.

49:50So you'll start with March and then will you transition to a spring? Yeah. A traditional or not even traditional? I would say there's going to be this March one that is what it will be is a little bit of fish showcasing some of these first signs of spring from California. You know, we're getting in these really nice spring onions from there, amazing baby artichokes, those kinds of things that to me are so quintessential spring there. All of these greens, like I'm like dying to eat greens now. But then we're getting pea shoots from a greenhouse in New Jersey and we're going to start getting a little bit more from them.

50:25And as it goes on, the things from California will start to be replaced with more things that are, you know, we'll do a thing with all the maple water when we start getting that in. And it's a way that we can even, which is part of this idea in the Japanese dish, it's showing you the progression of the season two, where it can be something that's at the end of its season and something that's at the beginning. which I think is so rare to be able to see that on one plate of food and actually understand that between the difference. I love it. I can't wait to return. This episode is brought to you by Rula.

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51:42The providers are vetted, and appointments are available as soon as tomorrow. Visit Rula.com slash taste to get started. That's R-U-L-A dot com slash taste. You deserve mental health care that works for you, not against your budget. Please support our show and let them know we sent you. Flynn, on this is Taste We Asked About The Discerning Taste. So to close this interview, here's a little rapid-fire Fast and Furious taste check. Are you ready? Yes. The best fruit? White nectarine. Amazing. The worst vegetable? regular like crown broccoli oh yeah horrible yeah yeah like the ones that are there's much better versions of broccoli we don't need that one anymore fair what is your typical breakfast?

52:28I eat a bun and cheese every morning from Jem Home oh yeah that's a good one you stop by in the morning I live upstairs actually oh cool there you go it's my way to work I had one on the way here nice the best dessert? Ice cream. What flavor? I'm a, or I guess I would go further. I would say gelato. Strachutella gelato is my like kryptonite. Very nice. A restaurant you wish you could bring back from the dead? Chanterelle. Oh, love that. Tell me, what's the connection to Chanterelle? It is a restaurant that I never went to, but it is a restaurant that every single person who has lived in New York for a long time has told me it would be my favorite restaurant.

53:11Have you met Dave and Karen Waltock? I haven't met that. It's literally like the reason I want to bring it back is so I could actually go. Because it's a restaurant that I've only heard like the most insane lore about. And there's little bit about it. You know, there's like little cookbooks here, a little bit here. And it's a restaurant that I could not imagine existing in New York currently. I agree. You know that they still are selling some of the art from the restaurant? Yeah, I've been seeing that. Yeah, it's on their website. I was just looking at it. I was thinking about Dave Waltock recently.

53:41He's actually the first chef I ever interviewed. Huh. 2004. Wow. Yeah. Incredible restaurant. I love that you brought that up. When you're craving fast food, where are you going? Shake Shack. Nice. What's the order? I just do a single patty fries. Are you like a JFK Shake Shack guy? I'm a JFK Shake Shack guy. There's one right by Cove every once in a while. I'll do like a midday runaway. The thing I like about it is that it's a small enough burger that it's a snack. Yeah. Your favorite city outside America to visit for food? I think Kyoto took the reins after going there for the last time. I've never been so happy eating.

54:19That's really fascinating. I mean, it's the city that has such history. It's also been covered as being so over-tourist. It's just everything I ate was the best version of that I had ever had. Last one, your favorite sandwich? BLT. All right. Have you served one in your restaurants? I have not because it's a very hard thing to serve in a restaurant, I think. Yeah. Unless you're like locked in in the kitchen and you have we don't we've never had enough griddle space. So it's something that I reserve for my own time. Flynn McGarry, this has been a great conversation. Thank you so much for joining.

55:00This is taste. Yeah. Thanks for having me.

55:05Chloe Grigri, welcome to This Is Taste. How are you?

55:09Flynn McGarry:I am living the dream. I love it. You're at one of your restaurants right now. We're recording this remotely. You're not in our studio in New York. You're in Philadelphia. Correct. I am in Philadelphia. I am currently sitting in one of my wine bars, Le Cabo. I just want to go over your restaurant. So for our listeners, you know, we love Philly. Like, it is one of our favorite cities. We've covered it extensively. Tell us a little bit about how you're operating, where you're operating. Um, yeah, I've been operating in Philadelphia for more than a decade at this point. I do have Philadelphia roots.

55:46Flynn McGarry:My mother comes from Philadelphia. My father is the French connection, which has kind of influenced everything that has transpired in my career. Um, and yeah, so I operate now. I like to say three and a half because look have always perched above the original restaurant, the good King Tavern. But technically, it is technically four businesses, I would say. So it's Look Evo, Good King Tavern. It is super fully and it is super at the newest addition. Tell me about what's the thread that connects the four businesses? My own personal aging, I feel. I love that. Tell me about it. It's so good. I feel like every time I open a new space, it represents where I am in my life in a way.

56:34Flynn McGarry:But obviously the French thread is apparent and the love of wine is also apparent. So it's clearly all there with the menu. And really, tell me about the Philadelphia Diner. Why were these the right restaurants for them? That's a great question. I feel like I, when we first opened the Good King Tavern, in which my father and I were both very much involved, it was his first venture into the restaurant world as well. And we had, because we had lived in Philly for so long, we had kind of talked about the things that we love in the little neighborhood bistro in France or, you know, the culture around food and wine that was so near and dear to us.

57:30Flynn McGarry:And kind of feeling like there was opportunity in the Philadelphia market for something like that. When we opened Good King Tavern in 2013, like we had friends that were like, absolutely not. Nobody cares about wine. Like everybody thinks that French food is white tablecloth. Like you're not going to be able to open a place that feels like cool and relevant and sustainable. And we did, in fact, manage to do exactly that. I would say that those haters were quite wrong. And this is kind of the movement of American food or restaurants in America. you know, like the wine bar style, the brasserie style from informed by France, but done within an American way.

58:10I mean, it's you're so ahead of this way. Yeah.

58:13Flynn McGarry:Yeah, apparently. I love it. I love it. And well, this is the Resi Top Five. And I love this segment. You're well-traveled. You operate many restaurants in different formats. And really, the goal here is we're going to go through your top five restaurants or meals or restaurant experiences that have informed your career, that have really inspired you to open restaurants, or even the restaurant meals you just simply loved? Are you ready to do it? Let's go for it. All right, top five. This was a really hard, this was a hard thing for me because I think, you know, in the restaurant industry, we're all moving so quickly.

58:55Flynn McGarry:We're so reactive. and like one moment changes from the next. And we rarely take a second to actually like sit down and think about the things that affected our next decision, whether it be important or not. So actually sitting down and thinking about, you know, my love of food and wine and the things that have informed where I am in my career today was a really fun little thing for me to do, going down memory lane. So fun. What's your first one? So my first one, I'm going to take it like way back to when I was like 10, 11 years old. And my mom is one of these people who like saves postcards and like business menus and like things like this from all walks of life.

59:41Flynn McGarry:And so I reached out to her and I was like, hey, we used to fly into Paris. My family, my French family is all based in the south of France near Marseille and X. And so we would fly into Paris. I have two younger brothers and the five of us would rent a car. We would drive south and we would meet my cousins in Dijon because they lived in Lyon. And we would always stay at this little hotel. And I actually, I checked today and they're still operational, which is absolutely amazing. But it was like this little auberge in a tiny little village called Hotel de la Poste. And we would stay there for a few days and visit with our cousins.

1:00:21Flynn McGarry:and it was like very remote in the countryside and they had a little restaurant on site. And so we would go out and do our things during the day and come back and we would have these like beautiful meals. And I have had many beautiful meals with family and friends in France, but these were especially special moments because they were just the five of us without any of the rest of our family around. And it kind of felt like our own little secret getaway. and on one of these trips this time when I was about 10 or 11 um obviously you're in the middle of wine country when you're in Burgundy and my my dad has always been an avid uh appreciator of wine and wine culture and he had set up some time to go like to like a grower's house and taste through some wines and it was really low-key and not at all like an organized sort of tasting I think the owners of the hotel had introduced us.

1:01:20Flynn McGarry:And we went to this wine tasting. And, you know, my brothers are, like, kicking rocks and climbing on barrels and doing whatever they want to do. And I was, like, my mom always talks about this moment. And I remember it. I was absolutely fascinated with this wine tasting. My dad was, like, going through, tasting everything with a winemaker. And I just kept asking all these questions because I was like, what do you mean? Like, what do you mean it smells like this but it tastes like this? What do you mean it could taste like something that it absolutely is not? And I was so curious and I asked so many questions.

1:01:53Flynn McGarry:And that experience really stuck with me to the point that heading farther south, seeing the rest of my family, I don't know how it came up. But somebody was basically like, you know, Chloe, like, what do you want to do? What do you want to do when you grow up? And I just looked them dead in the face and I said, I want to taste wine. I love that story. I was like 11 years old. And obviously I've been through, I went to college for political science. I thought I was going to be a lawyer. Like I went through all different phases, but here I am today. Such a good memory. 11 years old. Yeah. But, you know, you were in Burgundy.

1:02:30So that's a good place to kind of set your path.

1:02:34Flynn McGarry:Absolutely. And, you know, I can't tell you specifics of everything that was on the dinner table on a nightly basis in, you know, during our stay. but you can bet that it had something to do with duck and truffle and escalgot and, you know, all the classics that you think of when you when you think of Burgundy. Give us your second restaurant. All right. My second app. I have a lot of France in here. I would expect it. I mean, look at your restaurants and look at your background. I mean, come on. Yeah, I have a lot of France. So I feel like this is a little bit more of a grouping because Good King had been in existence for something like eight years.

1:03:11Flynn McGarry:before Le Cavo opened. And we opened Le Cavo upstairs once we acquired the building that both of these spaces live in. And we opened in November, 2019. So we opened and it was really a function of several trips that I had taken to Paris and the Loire, which was kind of an unexplored region in France for me at the time to go to all the Salon des Vins, which is the big wine fairs that happen for trade for public, but also for the trade. And I had gone for a couple of years in a row. And the first year I'd gone with a bunch of other wine professionals, wine women actually in Philly who were a little bit more well established than I was at the time.

1:03:58And they were like, you have to go open something like this in Philly.

1:04:04Flynn McGarry:Like there is only one person who's going to do it and it's you and you've got to do it. So ultimately we opened in November, 2019. And, uh, obviously we, we, we closed those doors pretty quickly after the fact, um, when the pandemic hit, but we did, we did manage to sneak out a James beard nod, um, in those early days, which was pretty amazing. Um, and a lot of that inspiration came specifically from little wine bars in Paris. We're going to talk about Septim because it's just the, it's the OG Baravan. It's the, it's the first Baravan that I walked into, um, in France when they opened feeling like, oh my God, this is like, this is like everything I want.

1:04:46Flynn McGarry:I feel like wrapped up in a hug. This is perfection. I think I, I think I tasted like a wine from the Auvers and like a skin contact wine from the Auvers and I was like, what? and moving, you know, across the years and through these salons. I experienced other wine bars kind of just tucked away. And in Angers, there is Le Cercle Rouge. And then in Saumur, there is a place called La Tonnelle, where everybody kind of goes after La Dive Boutée. And there's like crepe stands all set up outside. And people are shucking oysters. and they're really spaces that are focused on wine. And then the food is kind of this compliment to whatever you have in your glass.

1:05:35Flynn McGarry:And so when we opened Look Hevo, that was precisely my philosophy. Like how do we get people in the door for frankly, just the wine? And then everything else can kind of just trickle in and play second fiddle to the real star of the show. Let me ask you with that great setup, like how do you speak to a diner who maybe isn't a connoisseur of wine, maybe doesn't have the highest experience level with wine, but, you know, you've got this wine-centric restaurant. So I think I see this as an opportunity. I see it as a bit of a challenge, but it must happen a bit. Definitely. Yeah, I mean, you know, I think it's it is the name of the game in hospitality to be able to read your audience, you know, read the person who you're who you're speaking to.

1:06:25Flynn McGarry:And it's really to me, it's more about a human connection and being able to meet people where they are. Like there are plenty of people who come in to look have. And maybe their date or maybe their friend is like, hey, I heard about this wine bar and I really like wine. And they're like, I don't drink wine ever and I don't care. And they can have a draft Negroni or they can sip on some Mezcal and they can kind of just relax and enjoy the space in a way that isn't all about the wine. So I think it's really about creating or offering options to people and creating a safe space for all levels of interest in wine or none at all, really.

1:07:07That's well said. What's your third restaurant experience?

1:07:12Flynn McGarry:Okay. My third, this is kind of just like a favorite meal of mine. But I feel like I'm trying to think of when it was. It must have been like 20, maybe the summer of 2019. But there was this little restaurant that opened in X. And I don't know how much you know about X, but X is like, you know, they now call it the little Paris of France. It's where all the Parisians go on vacation in the summertime. It's very beautiful. But to be honest, like growing up, I don't have very many restaurant experiences because we were always eating with family. And my family was always like, you know, talking smack on the restaurant scene.

1:07:52Flynn McGarry:They're like, I can do everything better at home. So just stay here. And we had heard through the grapevine about a place that it open in X called Sauvage. It has since, it was kind of short-lived. It did earn a Michelin star just after we had actually died there, which was a cool phenomenon. And it was a chef that had a lot of experience in Paris, but his roots were in X. And he opened this like little hole in the wall, tasting menu situation where he was going to the market every day, getting fresh ingredients. The menu was changing constantly. And two call-outs in how special this experience was.

1:08:37Flynn McGarry:And we were a Franco-American table. There were French people and Americans and me, obviously, who splits the difference. But there was a all-glass-cuff where they had their wine selection. And basically, you could just walk in and choose bottles and bring them back to the table. And they would tell you about them if you wanted them to and also not if you didn't want them to. They would just open the bottle for you, you know? And then the second really fun thing was that he had his mother doing all of the desserts and working the dining room who had absolutely no restaurant experience and had never been doing fine dining desserts in her life.

1:09:20Flynn McGarry:And she was doing these beautiful fine dining desserts and serving tables in this hole in the wall, super special restaurant. Obviously, the chef was super present as well. And, you know, touching tables and interacting with everyone in the room. And when he closed his restaurant, I remember reading an article. I think he I think it's still operating as like maybe more of a daytime situation. But when he closed his restaurant, finally, he he wrote that there was an impossibility to, you know, being able to do things at a level that he wanted to and also have a family and be present at home. And it was a really raw and real explanation for his decision to kind of switch gears after getting a Michelin star.

1:10:02Flynn McGarry:And, you know, it's kind of the cherry on top of the whole thing. Wow. I mean, that move is unique for the operator. Very unique to hear about that. And I love X personally. It's a great little town. And I mean, you've done three in France. so are we we're at number four now are we moving out of france or listen we're all we're moving away we're moving away i didn't think that we were moving away but what is your um we are we're going to mexico city next right and i feel like a lot of what i do and what i try to do is, you know, create something that feels really authentic and really quality in a way that is approachable and casual enough to do it more than one time in a week.

1:11:00Flynn McGarry:And a lot of the things that I've done in more recent years, Super Foley in particular, Super Ed as well, they have been, well, I guess we'll talk about Superfully for a second, but it is primarily a bar and it has a really tight menu that complements. It's the kind of space where you can sort of build a dinner or completely stop in and just have a drink and a snack. We don't take reservations. It's like a jewel box space, really small, really intimate, super dark. And a lot of what went into that space across myself and my husband, who is my partner there, was influences from Mexico City. Obviously, there have been influences everywhere, and wine also plays a big role in that concept as well.

1:11:50Flynn McGarry:But in particular, we're going to talk about Basforo, which was a little mezcal bar in CDMX that was, you had to like, they had like a carpet in front of the front door, and you had to like lift this like heavy fabric and you walked into this extremely dimly lit bar with like mezcal on tap and like millions of mezcal and at this point I was definitely intrigued by mezcal because it felt like a spirit that I could wrap my brain around in the same way that I could wrap my brain around wine um and they were serving like crispy fried crickets and like little bar snacks that were super eclectic. The second floor just had like cushions on the floor and everybody was just sitting there with different little clay cups of mezcal.

1:12:45Flynn McGarry:And it was just this perfect bar, like bar, bar, bar experience. And I feel like we've spent like years trying to find a space that felt that original. And it definitely, definitely had a strong influence in what we tried to accomplish it super fully obviously for a philadelphia market which is not quite um uh the same vibe yeah different different clientele but i think we're all humans and to have that kind of intimacy and warmth uh is something that is universal and i i just love the way they painted the picture of that carpet in front and it seems like that's the kind of spaces you want unique spaces that people will tell their friend about the carpet of your your version of the carpet.

1:13:30Yeah. And something that like, I don't know how to explain it.

1:13:34Flynn McGarry:This is, this is specific to Bosphora, but, um, like something that feels edgy and maybe unfamiliar, but in a, in a way that feels comfortable. Got it. That makes a lot of sense. Kind of pushing the envelope in a way that is, I don't know, subtle and magnetic. Well said really, really this has been so enjoyable let's let's wrap it up with your fifth and final restaurant that has informed your career and i know i know chloe that you have many more i i just like know you have like probably 20 more but we only have five so what's the last one of course of course um i think we're gonna we're gonna fast forward a little bit because soup red is the new sweetheart in the group um and again i i talked about how i feel like my uh restaurants have aged with me I now have a two-year-old at home.

1:14:29Flynn McGarry:You know, while I'm a night owl, it's a little bit trickier to be up at all hours of the night. And so this is the first concept that really stretches the beginning to late afternoon into like a strong kind of apero happy hour vibe. And there is a place in Marseille. So we're going to go south. I know we're going back to France. But there's a place in Marseille called Épicerie L 'Ideale. and it is a little like market all day space. They actually have a little restaurant right across the street that's open in the evening hours for dinner only. And this space is just, it's like quasi market. You get really specialized goods, whether they be house-made or local.

1:15:23Flynn McGarry:um obviously we can't mimic the exact same thing here in philadelphia but we do do a dang good job at getting as much of it as we can in the states um and they also have like little tables outside and little tables inside that feel very casual and you can go and have a great little mid-afternoon snack or full-fledged meal and drink some great wine and have some like really fun kind kind of spritzy cocktails. And at this point, actually, when we had checked this space out, Suprat was already in the works. And so walking into this space and kind of being like, oh my God, yes, this is exactly what we want to bring to Philly was an exceptional, exceptional moment in time.

1:16:09Well, I so enjoyed catching up with you about these five restaurants. Again, you're welcome back on the show to talk more and talk more about the future of your group. It's really inspiring.

1:16:19Flynn McGarry:Thank you. Thank you so much for joining This is Taste. Thank you so much.

1:16:28This is Taste is hosted and produced by Eliza Abarbanal and me, Matt Rodbar. The show is edited by lead producer Clayton Gumbert and supervised by Pat Stango, director of media production and development at Penguin Random House. Thanks to Shalia Harris and the production team at Penguin Random House. Theme music by Steve Rydell. Episode portraits by Louise Zergon Pomeroy. Logo design by Ellie Skirzat and Ian Dingham. Visit Taste Online at tastecooking.com and make sure to subscribe to our newsletter to keep updated on all cool things in the world of taste.