Introduction
FROM THE MOMENT I trained as a waiter (we’d yet been neutered into servers), inexperienced, eager, excited, I fell in love with the restaurant business. Thirty-five years later I’m still at it. I haven’t served a table in years, at least not all the way through, yet here I am, still toiling away, greeting guests, overseeing staff, and doing my best to create an environment of good food and great atmosphere and hopefully bring a bit of sustenance and joy to my guests. Restaurants have served as the family I never had. Nothing matches the feeling I get when I am in a packed dining room, the bar full, guests talking, laughing, having a cocktail or a glass of wine while waiting for a meal. I get comfort from the families who come, the couples, the dates, the music, the dim lights, the laughter, conversations, orders being taken, drinks poured, the clatter of plates, the clanging of silverware, glasses tapped together in toast, a bartender’s shaker—the sound of the ice and liquor slamming against the top and sides of the tin (I still salivate at the sound)—the arguments, the nasty customers, it’s all a grand symphony to me. It’s why I love this sometimes-shitty business and why many others like me are drawn to it.
We restaurant workers are a band of misfits, many of us unable to work a “real” job, one in an office or a factory, or the millions of variants we call normal. Many in the business, especially the front of the house, are transient. I never met anyone who grew up wanting to be a server. Most are there because they needed work in college or something temporary because of a lost position, or they are pursuing other careers and take a restaurant job while they wait for something in their desired line of work. And there are those who do this every day and have made a career out of it. To all of you, I tip my hat.
Restaurant jobs are plentiful, and honestly, what does it take to write down hamburger on a piece of paper, walk to a machine, punch the order in, pick up the food when it’s ready, bring it to the table, drop a check once the meal is finished, then collect the money. You don’t need an advanced degree or to be highly intelligent (though many of those I’ve worked with over the years are incredibly so), though it does take a special sort of person to put up with the long hours, the demands of the customers, the multitasking, the sometimes awful ownership, the shit managerial staff, the abusive chefs and cooks—yet there’s a beauty in all of it. A well-run dining room is an art, a ballet, a confluence of pieces that come together to bring a guest a meal.
Our guests come not just for sustenance, but to celebrate—birthdays, anniversaries, a wedding, a death, a date, friends getting together, the pursuit of sex, love, it’s all happening on any given night, and on any given night most of my working life has been spent in this environment. I am just a piece in the show. For many years, restaurants enabled me artistically, socially, and sexually. I’ve met the loves of my life in restaurants, my greatest friends have worked alongside me, and many are still my friends even though the name above the door has changed numerous times for us. I’ve had trysts, got naked, fucked, laughed, drank, drugged, puked, and shared the gamut of our human existence in restaurants. It’s now time to share these experiences, the people, the food, the insanity of the places so many of us take for granted.
This industry is composed of misfits and losers, artists and drunks, unbelievable beauties, downtrodden addicts, and some of the greediest and most narcissistic people you will ever meet, all counterbalanced with the most generous, loving, hardworking, and creative people on the planet, those of us who create, inhabit, and give life to the hospitality industry. I’ve spent thirty-plus years working with or have been in the company of some of the best this industry has. Legends that turned American cuisine on its head: Larry Forgione, hailed as the Godfather of American Cuisine; Charlie Palmer, who made it elegant and insightful; David Burke, who built gravity-defying structures of food, turned things upside down, and reinvented what we thought was beautiful; Rick Moonen; Buzzy O’Keeffe; the Raoul brothers; Keith and Brian McNally; Thomas Keller—the list goes on and on.
Do I love the industry? Yes. Do I hate it? Fuck yeah. This business helped pay the bills, kept me fueled in booze, drugs, and women. Has given me entrée to the richest, the most powerful, the most celebrated of actors, designers, politicians, heads of state, industrialists, stockbrokers, prostitutes, porn stars, alcoholics, millionaires, and billionaires. I’ve drunk and played with many of them, celebrated with them, fucked some, shared stories, and, most important, welcomed them as who they are—fellow humans with the same desires, drives, wants, and problems we all have. Who am I? I’m your neighborhood waiter, bartender, and maître d’hôtel. I’m the one you come to for a table, the right table, at any time, greeted with a hug and sometimes a kiss—always a smile, treating many of you as if you were my brother, sister, or lover. I love it because it’s real, because I love the people who come to me every night. I want to be in their orbit, and because of my position, where I work and have worked, they want to be in mine. I am you. All of you, and you are all of me; we need to escape, celebrate, run, hide, and live. We give one another life.
What follows is my story. As best I can remember, since many of those days are recalled from when I was under a haze of alcohol and drugs. The restaurant industry is not just about truffles and sweetbreads, caviar and cream, a prime fillet of beef or a freshly caught Dover sole. It’s also about sex, drugs, and an array of misbehaviors perpetrated by both staff and guests. It’s a cutthroat, shitty business, the hours long, the work grueling, at times the only relief being the booze up at the front bar. Sometimes, if you get really lucky, maybe a chance to screw the closing hostess, though that presents its own set of problems. If you’ve ever dined in a restaurant, partaken of food in its all glories and abominations, if you are a foodie, chef, cook, server, busser, dishwasher, or hungry patron, you’ve experienced at least some of this, or, I guarantee, you have been in the proximity of it all. It goes hand in hand, from ours to yours. Those EMPLOYEES MUST WASH HANDS signs are no joke—our hands are dirty, very dirty. Will I offend here? I expect so. Most of this book takes place in a very different age from today. The restaurant industry, as many others, has been rocked by abuses of power, horrific sex scandals, and a complete disregard for women. #MeToo is here for a reason, and a very good one. What I chronicle in these pages was of a time, and I write about those times as they were. To edit what happened or to soften some of the details would not be true, nor would it be a representation of the times, which were both amazing and heartbreaking. This is the way it was for me and many of those I have worked with and for.
The James Beard Awards, Civic Opera House, Chicago, May 1, 2017
THIS IS THE NIGHT the food industry salutes itself, it’s our Oscars, our Tonys, and our Grammys. The night when the best of the best are celebrated. Hundreds of restaurant industry stars and professionals are hugging, kissing, glad-handing, or, in the words of the first great maître d’hôtel I worked with, giving each other “zee beeg blow job.” Le Coucou restaurant, the creation of Stephen Starr and Daniel Rose, that heralded, new bastion of classic French cuisine in SoHo, New York City, is a finalist for the Best New Restaurant in America. Starr is up for Restaurateur of the Year. This is the seventh time he’s been nominated. If he loses this one, he’s destined to be the Susan Lucci of the restaurant world. Daniel Rose is the chef of Le Coucou. Me, I am the maître d’ of Le Coucou. After thirty years in the business, with a failed acting career along the way, this is the closest to the Academy Awards I will ever get.
Paparazzi are everywhere, cameras clicking as the stars walk down the red carpet. Rachael Ray is leading the Food Network stars and is a presenter. The staff of Chicago’s legendary Alinea, as well as those from Blue Hill at Stone Barns, Ken Friedman of Spotted Pig with his posse, unaware of the impending accusations against him, chef Jonathan Waxman, legendary Leah Chase of Dooky Chase’s Restaurant in New Orleans, who is receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award—all are here, the biggest and best of the restaurant world. I walk the red carpet because Daniel Rose doesn’t want to walk it alone. Rose, a kid from Chicago who left his home country for a failed attempt at the French Foreign Legion, eventually ending up in cooking school, spent ten years honing his craft throughout France before opening up his legendary sixteen-seat Paris restaurant, Spring. While a genius of the sauce and a star in his dining room at Spring, he hates the adulation, the crowd. He’d rather be stirring a sauce in the beautiful movie set of a kitchen he helped create in the back of Le Coucou. Yet here he is, me by his side, flashbulbs popping, the smiles and handshakes, the incredible energy of walking the red carpet into the Civic Opera House. So this is what it’s like. I like it. The attention, the acknowledgment. Even if it’s not meant for me.
Once the carpet is walked, we enter the grand foyer of the opera house, whose thirty-six hundred seats are sold out at the steep price of $500 each. Stephen Starr shelled out for at least twenty of them. We are ushered through the lobby and into the gilded and chandeliered auditorium, the space buzzing with the heightened energy of an awards evening. Tuxedoed and gowned, the crowd is befitting of such a grand space. The first inkling that it was going to be a long night was the roped-off lobby, behind which many local restaurants had set up booths to feed and water the crowd. Of the scores of booths, not one was open and nary a bar was in sight. There were rows of unopened bottles, all out of reach and all unavailable. Insanity? Oui, chef! The majority of us, we who each day shove copious amounts of food and booze down the throats of millions of Americans, have our tipple at the end of a shift, sometimes in the middle of the shift, and though some sip throughout the night, we professional enablers couldn’t get a drop. I can’t say I blame the folks at the Beard Awards. Who wants thirty-six hundred or so chefs, cooks, servers, managers, and all the other staff getting wasted? Most would be out in the lobby downing shots and champagne because this crowd never passes up a free drink. They’d only head into the auditorium to see if they’d won or lost. Most couldn’t give a fuck about the others. The business is so fragile that, for many, it comes down to only fifty or so guests a week between you and Chapter 11. Win or lose, they’d just head back to the lobby to drink more, either in celebration of the gold medallion hanging from their necks or, as in Starr’s case, in consolation for maybe losing once again. There’s no in-between in the restaurant business. You’re all in or nothing.
No booze for us. We are instead ushered into the great hall to our seats. Most of the Starr retinue is already there. Two full rows of Starr’s directors, managers, VIPs, and such. I needed something to stabilize the anxiety and suddenly remembered the flask handed to me at one of the pre-parties as a commemorative that I’d stuffed into my jacket. Already fueled by a half dozen glasses of bubbles, I didn’t at the time have the need to see if the party favor was full. I reach into my tux, pull it out, and open it, and the sweet smell of bourbon fills my nostrils. Thank God. This was going to get me through the next couple of hours. Yes, I was anxious, I wanted this. To be here. To be celebrated. I wanted this, for me, for my team, for every single cook, server, manager, busser, dishwasher, and porter who works tirelessly, endlessly, every single day in restaurants throughout the world. Enduring the abuse, the ridiculously long hours, the constant training, the cooking, the serving, the screaming, the hugs, the kisses, sometimes a blow job in the bathroom or a fuck in the locker room. All after a fifteen-hour day and too many drinks at the end. The everything that goes into creating something that most everyone takes for granted: sitting in a restaurant and eating a meal. The something that has a 60 percent chance of failing the first year and of which 80 percent are closed after five years.
Insane? Probably. Addicting? Yes. For most of us here, this night was big. Every major restaurateur, chef, cookbook writer, manager, sommelier, you name it, was in attendance. This was the percent that had made it, and I wanted to be a part of it. I also wanted to give a big fuck-you to the doubters and naysayers. If we lost, there’d be the sniggers, told-you-sos. “All that money and publicity and they didn’t win!” We did have the publicity. Three stars in The New York Times, the New York Post calling us one of the best restaurants of the century, all the magazine write-ups, it seemed endless. Le Coucou is a $5 million gem. A gorgeous restaurant incredibly lit and designed. Staffed with an army of all the necessary personnel it takes to put out an amazing meal at $150 a head. Minimum. Many restaurateurs are unable to do this. Stephen Starr has the firepower, the cash, the will, and the desire to do it and do it big. This creates a lot of resentment. Hence the seven nominations without a win.
In all fairness, this business is full of great people—those who love the business, the insanity of it, the desire to make people happy. In all my years of doing this, in some of the most heralded restaurants in NYC, I’ve never seen a response like that of our guests at Le Coucou: “Amazing! Incredible! Best dining experience ever,” the giddiness of our guests as they savor classic French dishes, the quenelle de brochette ris de veau à la tomate and tout le lapin. I hear the accolades night after night. Some guests wait a year for a table and are not disappointed. Many of those in the audience this evening had been to Le Coucou. We were celebrated and singled out at the slew of pre-parties leading up to the awards. Many Chicago restaurant professionals had dined with us and had positive experiences. We’d hear, “Hey, there’s the Coucou team! You guys are going to win!” and the like from many in the room. Am I contradicting myself? Nah. The ones who hate you always will.
Did I think we were going to win? Nope. Not a chance. I’m figuring there will be a backlash against our elegance, the millions Starr pumped into the restaurant, and the expat chef, famous in Paris, returning to the Big Apple. Stephen’s street cred with the fine-restaurant folk was shit. He is known for big palaces, the Buddakans and Morimotos, his small restaurants in Philly, rip-offs of other people’s ideas, but not fine dining. We had gotten so many words already, so much press, I figured there’d be a huge backlash, and that little restaurant in Brooklyn, funky, interesting, quirky, the one with the garden in back, would take it home.
So. Why am I here? For that we need to go back.
The term maître d’hôtel translates as “master of the house.” It popped up around the sixteenth century and was given to the head servant or butler. We restaurant folk have continued the tradition of servitude for five centuries. It seems the role we currently think of as the maître d’hôtel—that person formally dressed, standing guard at the door, keeping the riffraff out, prowling the dining floor, terrorizing staff, and soaking guests for a good table—appeared in the middle of the nineteenth century. It’s generally accepted that the term was cut to just maître d’ in the 1940s. It seems two accents in one term was too much for Americans to deal with. In Europe this person was usually formally trained at a hotel school and well versed in all aspects of service—from knowing where the fork goes to carving a bird
tableside. In the States the role generally went to someone who’d worked his way up, with on-the-job training, from busboy to captain and eventually the master of the dining room.
My uncles always referred to the maître d’ of the famous Copacabana club as a god, someone everyone needed to know to get a table. To me, becoming a maître d’ was the pinnacle of my restaurant career. The money was great, until, that is, the IRS decided that a maître d’hôtel was in actuality a manager and couldn’t be included in the tip pool but had to be salaried. Given that most restaurant owners are among the cheapest people in the world, this wasn’t going to fly, and overnight, maîtres d’hôtel went the way of the dodo. Though this may actually have resurrected the dodo since the owners then hired mostly dimwits for minimum wage to stand at the door and greet people. What was once the best-paid position in the dining room soon became the least paid, the duties essentially given over to a moderately paid manager and a team of hosts.
Copyright © 2022 by Michael Cecchi-Azzolina
