Hal Holden-Bache

00:00Reopening your restaurant comes with great responsibility. Are you doing everything you can to keep your staff and guests safe? With Trust20 certification, you and your guests can feel confident you're doing everything you can to keep everyone safe. Trust20 is home to the new standard of restaurant safety and consumer comfort. By becoming a Trust20 certified restaurant, diners will know the practices you follow to create a safe and healthy environment. Have confidence you're going above and beyond minimal requirements. Have comfort knowing your practices have been independently verified. To learn more, visit Trust20.co. That's Trust the number 20.co. Trust20 restaurants have access to a suite of resources that include expert led training in four key areas. Individual consultants, communication material and signage. Visit Trust20.co and tell them you heard about them on Nashville Restaurant Radio. Trust20, partnering with you to keep everyone safe. Welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio, a podcast for and about the people of the Nashville restaurant scene. Now here's your host, the CEO of New Light Hospitality Solutions, Brandon Styll.

01:14Hello Music City and welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. My name is Brandon Styll and I am your host. I hope that you had a wonderful Labor Day weekend and hope that you got to celebrate with people that you love or just like to hang out with at a socially distant way. I hope that you are safe and welcome back. Welcome back to work. Welcome back to a new week. Today our guest is gonna be Hal Holdenbache, who is the chef and owner at the Loughlin Table. But he is so much more than just a chef and owner of Loughlin Table. He's a dad, he's a husband, and he is a community giver. He's a guy that just does everything he possibly can for everybody. He's just his spirit of service is amazing and we just love him. This interview, we go for about an hour and have to almost cut him off because we could just talk forever. And I just love people who have such a charitable heart, who want to give back with their blessings. So very cool interview today and I hope that you enjoy it. I'd like to talk to you real quick about Trust20. These guys, hopefully you've called them. If you have called them and you've got certification upcoming, I'd love to know how that process went. They have been such an amazing partner with us and they've been real successful here in Nashville. Lots of people wanting to get certified, wanting to know what they can do to proactively be safe for their guests and their staff. And guests are asking for it. If you're out there going in a restaurant, check to make sure these people are Trust20 certified. It's a great thing to do. Spring Mountain Farms Chicken is a great sponsor for the show.

03:03Join the flock if you would go to their website at springermountainfarms.com. You can enter your email address and they will send you a weekly email with recipes, farm updates, podcast updates, all kinds of updates that are happening in the Springer Mountain Farms Chicken world. And we appreciate you supporting them as they support us and they support you, the independent restaurant tour here in Nashville, Tennessee. So we've got a new video out, our video of BBQ Chefs reading bad reviews, restaurant owners reading bad reviews. It's on our YouTube page. Go check it out. Click that subscribe button so that you get all the videos when they come out as they come out. If you like this podcast, please give us five stars. Also click the subscribe button so you're the first one to get this episode right when it gets released because I release them sometimes at odd times for the subscribers to see when they come out. And we just appreciate everybody out there. We have one more show. We have a show tomorrow with Jensen Cummings. He's the host of the Best Served Podcast and this guy is brilliant. And if you're anybody in the restaurant industry, you're gonna want to hear this episode also. And then we're gonna take a two-week break from interview shows. We will still be doing the roundup, but we're gonna revamp some of the stuff we do here. We're just gonna upgrade everything we possibly can and ensure that you have the best listening experience. And we appreciate you all every single day. So let's jump into this episode. It already starts. Hal and I are just talking and I just hit record and we just jump right into the episode. So I hope that you enjoy it. Thank you all for listening.

05:05And he's my biggest mentor. The day he told me that I was confused because at that point time in my life cooking was the only part of my job, you know. But then as I became a manager, I understood the statement better. Like if all I had to do was show up at work and dice onions and, you know, make gravy, that wouldn't be so bad. But it's everything else, you know, managing everything else that falls under the restaurant from the staff to the orders, you know. That's where things can get complicated, you know. Cooking is fun and to somebody who loves it, it comes easy. But those are great days when all you have to do is cook, you know. So Hal Holdenbaich, welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. I'm gonna use that what you just now said as kind of a opening to this podcast because we're just talking. I hit record and I want everybody just to kind of know about you. So welcome to the show, man. Thanks. Thanks for having me. Thanks for coming to Lachlan Table on a Thursday morning. This is the, I love every time I get to come here. It just makes me happy. I love the feeling inside of here. You got just a cool vibe. Everything is great. This is your third appearance on Nashville Restaurant Radio and it is the, it is the first time that I get to actually sit with you without a time limit and just go. Yeah. And just talk. In person. In person, not over the phone, there's rare live interviews. So let's get back in what you were just now saying. You were just now saying that when you just get to cook, that's the best. Because, is it because, and I've talked about this a lot with really creative people, because when you have to create every single day, when you have to manage, when you have to do all of these things that are in Trends Goal, you have to kind of lead. It's not easy and it never stops. But when you get to cook, there's something you can kind of just do and when you're done, you see a finished product and you go, I did that and there's a satisfaction in knowing I just have to do these things. It's almost

07:08like it's a stream of consciousness that ends. There's a beginning point and then there's an end point. Is that part of it? Well, and you get it daily too. So you get to feed that daily and those, you know, immediate rewards are, you know, a cool part of the job. And also meeting your own vision. Like whenever I start something, I obviously have it all in my head and I have a thought and I have an vision. And when I get to the end, if my visions are close, then, you know, I'm usually satisfied. You know, a nice example would be today, we're currently working on making lunch for the employees over at the Nashville Food Project. I believe they're pretty busy over there and because of COVID, they're not able to have the number of volunteers as usual. And we've heard that they're having trouble maybe feeding themselves because they're so busy feeding others. So I think some restaurants have kind of hopped on board to specifically cook for the staff over there. So I reached out to our friends at Porter Road Butcher and they were kind and shared some pork shanks. And I wanted to make like a gravy for pasta. So I reached out to Nicolettos and they're sending over some fresh pasta today. I'll finish the ragu today and then bring it together with the pasta tomorrow. But you know, the pork ragu was something that I've been thinking about for probably like four days now. And you know, what my what is my method going to be? What are my ingredients going to be? And then the barefoot farmer shows up with all these beautiful Roma tomatoes. And I'm like, well, boom, I'm using those for my ragu instead of a canned product, you know.

08:56It all just kind of started falling into place with the fresh pasta and the pork shanks and the beautiful tomatoes. I braised everything yesterday. And I think after a little bit of reducing today, it's going to be right where we want it to be to where we'll finish it tomorrow morning with some fresh kale and the pasta and a little bit of Pecorino cheese and send it over there and feed the good folks at the Nashville Food Project. But you know, starting the ragu in the morning and having it more or less done by four o'clock in the afternoon. And me and Jason, our sous chef were tasting it and talking about what's next. Salt, vinegar, reduce a little bit more and then ultimately get to a product that, you know, we're happy with and, you know, we'll be excited to share tomorrow. And I hope to have a little bit left for the Lachlan Table kitchen staff as well as they begin showing up to work tomorrow around noon. And we send this out to the Food Project and we all get to start Friday with some tasty pasta.

10:10So I'm blown away by that entire story. Everything about that encapsulates who you are. And it really does. And that entire story is the how that is in my brain. When I think about you, that story is exactly and I want to get into that in just a minute. But I want to start I want to ask you a question I don't ask many people. You said the pork ragu you had four days ago was in your brain and it's been marinating for four days. How does that thought enter your brain? Did you learn about the Nashville Food Project and you wanted to help them and then you started thinking of a dish for them? Or did you see something, try something and then all of a sudden this dish popped in your head and you've been thinking about a dish and then the opportunity came up and you went, this is the dish I want to share for them. How does that process work with you? Well, it might even be a little your fault because after watching the interview with Patrick Martin, I went to Netflix to watch my first episode of Master Class. No, abstract. Abstract, yes. So I'm getting on Netflix to check out this abstract show that I've never even heard of and as I'm trying to find it, I pass over Chef's Table I believe. It was Chef's Table and for some reason I never got to abstract and I started watching an old episode of Chef's Table but I went on a Netflix seriously to watch abstract and I watched the Nancy Silverston, is that her last name said correctly, out in LA, the Chef's Table and I'm also really enjoy Lydia Bustanovich, if I'm saying her name correctly, on PBS on the weekends and I eventually just get really swallowed into certain, you know, genres at times and it's easy to love and appreciate and study Italian cooking because I think it just meets so much of who I want to be as a chef from

12:16being simple, using things for what they are and not manipulating them. Whole vegetable roast in like wood-burning ovens with maybe just the addition of salt, pepper and a good olive oil and a nice vinegar, allowing things to be what they are. We're also doing a St. Jude dinner coming up here in about three weeks so I'm currently also writing that menu and I'm also leaning very heavy towards the Italian side of things on that menu. The homeowner also said that they enjoy Italian food so I'm thinking, you know, pasta there as well but I've always loved making ragu's and gravies, you know, when you braise the meats, the tougher meats with, you know, the stock, the vegetables, the tomato, you know, the fat, the marrow goes into the what becomes the sauce, pull the meat out, you know, zap the vegetables, the stock, the tomatoes into what becomes the red sauce and then pick the meat and pull the meat and add the meat back into it, you know, making it a gravy and then eventually tossing that with the pasta, the kale, finishing with some cheese, you know, should be a very nice dish. Things are cooling down a little bit. We can get away with, you know, smaller portions of heartier foods these days and I always tend to also lean towards pasta when it comes to food traveling or when we're cooking for a lot of people. Like I could make gravy for 20 people or 40 people just as easy as I could for 10 people, you know, just more product. So I think it's convenient when you're feeding a fair of people to go the route of pasta. I think it's also very neutral. People love pasta. So I just chose to do this ragu and, you know, the things I'm thinking

14:24about, like am I using stock? Am I using tomato? Like what is everything I'm going to use in the braise? So, you know, I'm just always playing with those things and enjoying that. But watching you, this is the one thing about being live with somebody. We can have this conversation over the computer, it's great, but looking at you, like when you talk about food, just when you just go, you just go like a stream of consciousness, you start talking. I can see it. I can see your brain working and it's like all of this stuff is just like happening. It's going through your brain but you have a passion for it and kind of what you're talking about when we're starting the show is that when you're passionate about food, you love to create food, but then there's a business side that intersects with that, I imagine that's a challenge for you. I bet you cook at home, don't you? I do. There's a lot of chefs that you talk to like, oh, I cook all the time at work and when I get home, I just don't want to cook. But like that's not you. I can imagine you're the guy when you get home, you're like, hell no. Like this is the part of cooking that I want to do all the time. I imagine when you have to cook and it's a food cost and you're looking at cugs and negotiating, that's the part you probably don't like as much? I don't know.

15:40Do you have to find balance? I like numbers and I like math and you know I am interested in being a business owner that tries to make money. Of course. So food costs, I've always had a lot of pride in that and during these times, I'm even more interested in, you know, maybe margins more so than usual. Like what can we do that cost us less but makes us a good margin? So like our sous chef Jason is good at making gnocchi and he enjoys it. Potatoes are cheap. Let's make gnocchi. Yeah. And then do something fun with a condiment or a sauce. You know, we still have a bit of a limited menu since the tornado and COVID and the reopening. Our menu is not as big as it was, but we're starting to add things back on. We recently brought our pig ears back. Famous pig ears. We love and you know, I recently reached out to Karen at Wedge Oak Farms and asked her what her situation was with chicken liver. Like do you have them? If so, you know, I think we're ready to, you know, start doing those again. Um, and the thing about the chicken liver pate is that we have cream, we have time, we have bacon, we have onions. Um, so we have everything here at the restaurant except for the livers. So we spent a small amount of money on livers and then make, you know, 40 orders. I can spend $40 to make $400. Yeah. So I'm thinking like that too.

17:23Like, you know how, and I don't want to, you know, obviously we're not going to cheat people, but sometimes in food you pay for the ingredients. Other times in food you pay for labor. You know, so those gnocchi that took four hours to make, you know, might be a lower food cost, but we're paying somebody more time to make them. So, you know, there's the money there. Uh, but currently we have the labor, we don't have the extra money. So let's use our skill, use our time, produce things like pork shanks that are cheaper and take longer to cook, but we know how to do that. Um, you know, making gnocchis, um, you know, just doing smart things like that. Um, because I am also thinking about the bottom line and money and, you know, I always jokingly say like the old, you know, devil on the shoulder kind of thing, you know, there's the creative chef and there's the businessman, you know, and sometimes you create a dish merely off of desire. Like I want to cook this particular dish, so I'm going to order the things in to do that. Other times we're like, all right, let's tap the brakes, look around the kitchen, see what we have and create something with what we have primarily to turn things that we've already paid for. Sure. You know, to make the money aspect, you know, part of things work.

18:51So if you could choose like for your future druthers, like the thing that you could just do all the time cooking food is your passion. Like you're saying just like the management piece of it is of course a necessity and you've got to be smart about it because you're a business owner and you want to, you need to be profitable. You want to keep the doors open. Right. But really your focus seems like I think about food all the time. It's a big picture though. I mean like it's the community, it's your, it's almost like your true north is do the right thing. Do the right thing for the people. And you're constantly working with your community. Like community is number one for you. And I feel like you're that way, like with your family. We were talking earlier, I'll just get into your family life. How's your family doing throughout this whole thing? You got soccer starting soon. You're the soccer coach. How's everything happening Yeah, yeah, school's back in and then that's been new for us and things are going well there. I'm definitely having a little bit of a different schedule right now than I did this time last year.

19:56Did you guys have like long arguments and conversations about what to do with school? Was that as hard for you as it was? Yeah, I think about three weeks before school started, it was really kind of stressing me out. Yeah. Obviously talking with other friends that are parents and um and then something happened in our community. Um a family that we know and respect um got covid and they were following the rules. Um they think that they got it from a commonplace. Not sure. But that's what I said to myself. You know, if it can happen to them, it can happen to anybody. Even people who are behaving um could possibly you know get this and that's when we decided full on to to put coal and virtual learning for the first nine weeks. Give the school a chance to get used to the new rules and after nine weeks of things are going well, um then we'll more than likely you know get him back into school you know daily. Um but also like we've been so serious here at Loughlin table about how we can stay open and how we can take care of our staff and how we can take care of our family. And we have to do it at both places. We have to be smart at home and be smart at work. And you know, never been the kind of manager that really gets too involved in our employees life outside of work. But at the same time now we do need to act a certain way and do certain things in order to protect this house and then you know to protect our own house. You know, I can't get sick at home and bring that sickness to Loughlin table or vice versa. It's a big responsibility. It's a big responsibility. I gotta take care of the restaurant and my family. If my wife would get sick that would put me at home as the main parents not being able to

21:59work at all or as much. So really for me to be able to do what I need to do I need to stay healthy and obviously keep those around also healthy. So with all that in mind you know mathematically we've had to you know take the route that we feel is you know the safest. How do you articulate that to your staff? How do you, and I know your staff you guys are all very close, but like how do you how do you let them know this is a huge your responsibility. What you do when you leave this building is as important right now as it is what you do inside this building and you trust them to be respectful and responsible when they're not here that they need to be safe. And I think that you know we had lots of meetings in the beginning. We talked a lot. I think now we've all been doing this long enough to where you know whatever you've been doing is working because none of us have gotten sick. So you know we know how to go to the grocery store. We know how to pump gas. We know how to wear a mask when we're inside. You know we know how to not do large gatherings. You know even when a member of our staff now travels outside of the state for whatever reason they get tested when they come back before they come back to work. We all got tested as a team before we reopened. You know we were 100% that when we reopened everybody that worked here test was negative. Wow. Which was smart you know because when somebody does test positive which is going to more than likely happen it's it's it's quite a situation because you know you got to close down. You got to get everybody tested. You lose one to three days of revenue. You know you reopen. So obviously to keep things going we would prefer to

24:05not have to close down. Of course. But if somebody gets sick we have to follow protocol. Make sure we're taking care of everybody. We're not taking this home. We're not passing it to our guests. So you know there's a lot of responsibility but with the desire and the love that you have for your family and your staff it's just something you have to do. So there's no playbook on this. There's no I joked on a couple episodes ago I said there's no book that says how to close your restaurant due to a forced quarantine and what to do when you reopen. Were these just ideas that you sit at home and you think about like hey we're gonna have everybody come back I'm gonna get everybody we're gonna these are the steps we're gonna do and throughout the entire quarantine you guys stayed open as a beacon to your community. We did. And did food and you leadership throughout this has been very imperative. You know we I just think that you guys have been a perfect example of what a restaurant should do during this time. Now that's not what you set out to be but I imagine there's a bunch of other restaurants out there that followed your lead because you did the right thing. Where does that come from? I think in the beginning like we reopened after the tornado on a Thursday. Today is six months from that day. Today is the anniversary of the tornado. I was just saying before y'all got here with Jamie our patient chef you know I relived yesterday and today yesterday and today at home. You know just remembering what happened the Monday during service the night of the tornado and then how that went into Tuesday morning and then obviously the the loss of power. Everything that happened the week that we did not have power and then we reopened on a Thursday and then the

26:10following Tuesday we shut down inside dining. That following Friday it was mandatory to shut down inside dining and we immediately went into a to-go program with our menu. We were just doing our menu to go. So after you did that Thursday, Friday, Saturday it's like all right like the thing about the beginning of the quarantine was that everything was changing so much so fast. We were having to change thoughts and procedures almost daily sometimes. You know gathered information changing. I can remember at one point time just like my head almost starting to hurt from the amount of thinking and decision-making that was necessary and obviously we're on the phone with each other you know me Karen Floyd discussing things you know not one person really says hey this is what we're doing. You know we have ideas we agree and we move forward you know but back into the to-go program and the quarantine when we eventually kind of settled on doing family-style to-go food and not doing an a la carte menu I can't have four people here every night you know cooking for maybe ten people maybe fifty people you know we don't know it just mathematically didn't make sense financially. So you know eventually we said okay this is what we're going to do we had some appetizers we always had the pizza station open the pizza station was the only station that was live like every night during the quarantine when you ordered a pizza obviously it got made fresh when you ordered it and then like the empanadas the the yeast rolls the chicken wings that we do during

28:16community hour all that stuff we prepared and packaged in order for you to take home and reheat and that allowed us to limit the amount of people that were cooking in the kitchen at one time so we had like two people working from like six in the morning to one in the afternoon and then two other people working or actually three other people working from like one in the afternoon to like seven or eight and that allowed us to social distance yeah in the kitchen and you know have an AM crew a PM crew Jason and myself were really the only two that would work you know both shifts and you know back into like cooking I really became a cook during that time like Jason and I would kind of share family meals and then we would all kind of attack the prep and you know everything was was different like on Sundays I would sit in my garage for maybe an hour or more with pad and pen and Jason and I would come up with the week's menu so that then we could order and get everything here to produce what we were going to do for the weekend we're you know no rules here we can do whatever we want yeah as far as the family meal goes whatever protein whatever vegetables so you know we were doing things that we just thought people would like how important was it for you to continue to support local producers you know you've got people in a pandemic where you have you know I know Nathan Gifford you know who's over here making bacon he's got this huge order for what's gonna be happening and then all of a sudden everything's supposed to close and sorry we don't need his bacon and you know supporting local purveyors and producers of products is so important how important was that throughout this to you it was very important and sometimes you just wish

30:19you could do more yeah and I wish I needed more you know so that I could buy more you know kind of luckily the time of year of the quarantine as far as local farming goes there wasn't really a whole lot going on there was some yeah and we were getting some of what white squirrel farms was harvesting brought in and we would obviously use that on the menu we were doing a daily roasted vegetable as an option on the menu during the quarantine and as our farmer Chris said to me one time that has been published in an article here recently he said you know how these are the nutrients that people are going to want to strengthen their immune system in this these beautiful vegetables that have been grown in this you know beautiful biology that actually have good strong nutrients not just some mass-produced vegetable in some dirt with no nutrients so that kind of fed into everything for me I was like all right well let's focus on that then and let's you know make sure people are eating their vegetables and you know during quarantine how did you eat like did you stay focused on kind of trying to stay healthy or were you kind of here and there a little bit of everything but important for mental and physical health obviously to care about your diet a little bit well I've I've referenced you and many a podcast because I think that when people talk about vegetables and just food I go I don't know what Hal does but his vegetables when every time that you eat his vegetables are the best damn taste and they're not it's not like they're drowning in something they're very it's almost like it's a simple vegetable but that flavor of Hal's vegetables are better than anybody else

32:20in the city I've never had vegetables like that I don't know what he does to him but his flavors are just so damn good and that's a good explanation I have a couple of restaurants that I think do vegetables better than most who are they well I think Rothen dollars has always done you know and now Falk they what they do with vegetables is pretty impressive yes I love the butcher and B they do the catch yo a peppy turnips I believe super awesome and delicious but when it comes to the vegetables and the quality and the taste we used to do the walking tour on Thursdays and I would talk to people about that but you know I would say in any recipe you know first thing is sourcing where you getting your food from and and how is it being produced and what is it eating you know those kind of things then I think number two it's the wood-burning oven I love the wood-burning oven I love cooking with fire we have a beautiful smoker out back that the pig leg porker designed and it was built here in town by Falcon I really enjoy cooking with wood and fire but that pizza oven gets so hot you know we'll get that fired up around noon we'll have all the vegetables loved up really in just some oil and salt and maybe pepper depending on what dish is for and when the pizza oven gets the temp you know we'll put them in there and char them and let them cool and then you know during service it might be finished in a saute pan but it starts in the pizza oven during service or I'm sorry before service and in the pizza oven it's so hot that it sucks that water out of the vegetable so it's evaporating that water out of the vegetable and when you take water out of anything you increase flavor so like

34:22dry-aged beef less water you've you've let it evaporate so that beef flavor becomes a little more dense you know a better product which is gonna cost you more but worth the money same thing in there so like maybe at home your 450 degree oven is taking 2% of the water out of the vegetable when you roast it you know maybe here in this higher heat it's taking 10% of the water and I'm just making these numbers up just to help you understand that as the at intense heat is going to evaporate that water from the vegetable and just make it that much of a better flavor so I think the oven and the fact that White Squirrel Farms are just growing you know phenomenal products is what helps us get to the table in such a delicious way and simple is you know do simple better like one of my favorite hashtags back to Italian cooking like earth table simple means you know simple preparation but wonderful final products you couldn't have said it better that's exactly exactly what I was referencing so cooking with fire you put a post on Facebook last week and you've got the coolest grill and I was like dude where do you where do you get this grill I want one because I'm I have like a fire pit in my backyard that I have like bonfires in and I've talked to Nick Guidry over at Pelican and Pig and his I think his Instagram handle is cooks with fire cooks with fire you know he that's what he does and he's got a really cool grill inside the Pelican and Pig but you you've got this is an Argentinian I refer to it as an Argentinian style I'm not sure if I'm 100% correct when I say that but it's the grill system with the pulley system on it it's nice to be able to you know raise your food up off the fire and tend to the fire if you need to do that you know back in the day like

36:23you have to take the grate off and you know refill it and get the grate back on and you drop your food you know in the yard and you know that's kind of a hard way to to refeed the grill if you're doing like something takes a long time but I love the live fire aspect of cooking I love the human element when I built a fire in the driveway my boys are usually outside with me they enjoy helping Cole loves to like get a stick and like poke at the fire that's not just my kids yeah and like maybe like in downtime we're tossing the frisbee or throwing the football or shooting some hoops because when I built a fire you know it takes a good 45 minutes to you know get the fire base where I need it to then actually start cooking so you know you got to get going on this at least an hour before you want to actually put the product on heats so it's like an event it's not just it's a Sunday evening it's not soulless going outside turning on a gas grill and putting food on it it's a kids come outside we're gonna start the fire you have to kind of manage it I love that yeah and I'll always cook too much on a Sunday when I build a fire because then you know I'm usually working Monday and Wednesday so if there's some extra protein already grilled off and I know that I'm working into the night one of those days then that just helps my wife have something to refer to for a meal while I'm working so I'm helping when I'm you know not at home yeah you know plus you're building a fire so cook on you know don't just put a burger on it like you've spent all this time to build this fire like grill some vegetables you know maybe even if you're not going to use it today grill you like thick cut some onions and grill them and then you know use them in a day or two for you know a meatloaf or whatever you know but it just it's fun and it offers you know

38:26potential use elsewhere but the back to the live fire real quick I do want to say this like like let's say you've got some burgers right on top of the embers and you got a flare-up and a fire starts turn that wheel get them up off the fire now you're not burning your product anymore let the flare-up die down and you can bring your burgers back down you know that's how you control your product control the fire and then also if you're cooking something that needs direct heat like some sausages let's say and we don't want to bust the skin we can go way up high and I've got a I've got a dome lid that I can put over the product so now we're like you know 18 inches off of the fire but as that heat comes up and as that smoke comes up it's getting caught in the dome so now we're kind of grilling and smoking at the same time you know people want to debate about the two like oh I like to grill I like to smoke well they're both great and they're both great at different times but live fire cooking gives you I feel like both in one and both those flavors in the same process is just delicious so you can smoke up high you know and get your smoke flavor and then when you're ready to get that char on your product we can drop it down get that char and you're done and dinner's ready you know so I love that aspect of it too or we could start low and then go high you know either or you know so being in control of the heat I think is key there and and like in a lot of Argentinian homes in like cool Netflix shows that I've watched you know nobody eats more meat than Argentina and when I say meat I mean beef and like homes are built with these pulley system grills you know attached to them or like on a back porch or it wouldn't be uncommon for you to buy a house and one of these

40:26drills to be part of it because on the weekends that's what you do you hang out with your family you hang out with your friends you cook some food you drink some wine you you play you listen to music like whatever you do it's always kind of based around you know food family and friends which is I think the right in this world right now is missing you know I mean I think that not having food family and friends on a regular basis I mean I think we're slowly getting back to that have you do you feel like there's a new normal starting right now like do you we went to dinner with Sebastian weekend before last it was amazing but we're on the way there and I was like this feels normal to me like it feels normal we're in a car we're heading out to dinner but we have masks and hand sanitizer and all these things that we're ready to use and I was like I don't feel awkward about going out to eat like I feel like this is just what we do now and it almost felt normal and then I said to her I said I feel like there's gonna be a day we don't have to wear a mask and Kroger and it's gonna feel weird yeah and are you getting there like maybe we're all just getting used to it you know because I think it did take a while you know to get used to it like even when it was time to reopen and the city said we can reopen we still did not reopen for like at least a week we had discussions with our staff and made sure that they were comfortable and they felt safe under the guidelines that we were going to you know produce and we even had a soft reopening where we invited like friends and family and just kind of practice one night you know maybe what went wrong let's fix that before we reopen for everybody so I think the fact that we were patient was helpful it gave us time to research of course like you know at the same time I'm kind of ready like let's go you know let's let's open but we had to be you know careful and you

42:35know the fact that we wear masks to supermarkets and in grocery stores has become a little more regular and I'm also you know probably going to take my family out for a meal this weekend probably for the first time as a family since all this happened and that's just more or less we eat a lot at home we In Kingston Springs we don't have a lot of dining options and of course we don't mind driving into Nashville to eat but you know I just cook a lot at home yeah you know and I enjoy cooking at home and I like being at home but we also need to do our part and get out and help and you know support other restaurants who are also struggling let our faces be seen out there and not just expect people to come to us you know you've been kind of a leader in this community as far as chefs restaurant tours here in town for a long time and I've always seen you as somebody who's really been a mentor to a lot of chefs a lot of people in your building you care you genuinely care about the people that work here I just you'll hear on a podcast Wednesday with Jensen Cummings we talked about what's happening in the landscape of employees and how really good restaurant tours care they genuinely care about their employees they pay them a good wage and they intend they try and reduce the turnover by doing it right I worked at US Foods with a guy named Nathan Wells who worked with you for a long time just saw him the other day at East so we were eating at Eastside Bon Me and he was over there having lunch oh man it was amazing I've been wanting to get over there myself dude best damn sandwiches I've ever had but you just you've you're one of those

44:41guys let's talk about that for a minute some of the people that you've had come through here just kind of your sous chefs and just kind of the people those I want to just talk about that briefly Nathan's one of my good friends in life and obviously connected with Kara very well and their son Grayson I think one of the things that you know helps us is that you know me Kara and Floyd are our people you know we're people with families and homes and we're not just you know people with money in our back pocket who thought it'd be cool to open a restaurant you know you know we grew up in this industry I grew up in this industry you know I was working at a bakery in the ninth grade so I think being through the whole education part of learning how to cook in school and apprenticeships getting yourself to a certain level of knowledge and ability obviously is important when it comes to cooking but the fact that we're also people like I get the fact that maybe your kid is sick or or your kids got to go get a cavity or you have a pet any kind of issue that life may bring at you we've probably also felt before and we can we can understand sure that these things happen I got a doctor's appointment but you know and so we work with people to you know be able to have a life and not just you know be a person that you know pushes business out so I think that's important I think just being a person like you hear about restaurants where the owners you know are always barking or just want you to show up and work work work we try to

46:44work with people and help you know and when you help and that circle is forever you know rotating it seems to work out well you know and like what's that old saying don't take care of your guests take care of your staff and then your staff will take care of your guests you know there's some truth there so always you know trying to be just kind and respectful offer a safe workplace you know those things are definitely you know part of our culture for sure teaching you know helping we've had many employees make lateral movements that you know you support you know but we are also blessed with staff and how long some of our staff has been with us and you know when you don't have a lot of turnover you can create a chemistry and just like anything you get to know people like I know what you're about to do because I've been working beside you for three years so I can predict your movements you can predict mine you know it just makes for you know a better cohesive team well and a better possibility of success you know so are you gonna replicate this success in terms of another restaurant you know we were very interested in another building I can't remember if it was two or three years ago we were definitely looking and we found a building we're looking we were looking we found a spot the day that we were scheduled to go visit in a contract got put on it so we were a little disappointed about that because it was a neat spot for a nice price

48:44nowadays you know we're probably thankful that that never happened you know only having to take care of one restaurant right now is probably better than taking care of two I've also always been concerned about you know do we need to open another restaurant do I personally need to be part of another restaurant like I sometimes I feel like I would like to other times I feel like Lachlan table maybe is enough because it's offering everyone that works here you know a livable wage and I personally would rather be I always say this jokingly I would rather be the Wednesday night t-ball game than getting called into my second restaurant to work the grill station because so-and-so is sick you know I opened a restaurant to try to control some kind of balance in my life working 80 hours a week for somebody else isn't gonna work as a family man and that was my life you know before Lachlan table opening Lachlan table my goal was to get to a place of balance where I could be a chef and a father and a husband and a son and a brother and a friend and not just work all the time and you know be a corpse on Sunday that just ate and slept you know to get ready for the next week I don't know what you're talking about yeah so and also you know my wife wouldn't put up with that you know my kids wouldn't know who I am I'd just be the dude that you know walked through the house once in a while and that wasn't the life that I was looking for so you know especially now with my kids being young you know four and eight I feel like I want to be home and involved as much as possible 100% now when they get older not to do they would need me less but you know you got school till three soccer practice till

50:47five homework till seven like their day will get a little more regimented to where like you know me being home at five o'clock today maybe isn't as important or maybe it is because my wife's over here and I got to pick them up at soccer practice or whatever the schedule may be the option to do that is is one of your is a priority to you yeah I mean you know you don't want to be married you're married to Stacy and you know your family you're not married to six restaurants that you have to that right now right you have one now that you put everything into and you have balance so I do something for that I do think that maybe in five or six years if everything is going well and our kids are doing well another project could be possible and could be a fun creative outlet and it would never be a Lachlan table number two it would be a completely different I could I can't say completely different but the theme and menu would would be different there may be one or two things that tie the two in together as you know a brother and sister kind of situation but it would be different can I selfishly make a recommendation sure in West Nashville way West Nashville in the Bellevue area way off in Bellevue close to your house you should put something over there you know we did look at that building on the corner of Old Hickory and 70 that used to be a garage and now I believe it's a Mexican restaurant Oh mestizos I know you're talking about now mestizos restaurants we looked at that building and and liked it but there were some floodplain issues and I won't say everything but I got another spot for you to go check out yeah that was one of the places during the time that we were looking that we actually did get a car to and specifically go to and walk and talk to you know the person who's in charge but then eventually I think we

52:51found out a couple things and you know backed out of it well I saw she wants to come up with something close to my house so that I can you know I thought that'd be wonderful because I come to Lachlan table and on my way home I hop off Old Hickory I'm right there I could check in on that place you know finish my journey home you know would be absolutely perfect what was my last question we got to wrap up here I know you've got a lot to do today and I'm so excited that you took the time today to talk to us before we go on our little bit of a break we talked to Khalil Arnold and he said Mayor Cooper pretty much put a knife in our back with a 34% tax increase and he said I didn't know if he's gonna make it he said I don't you know I think we're hearing all of these numbers from restaurants out there's there's some astronomical number of restaurants that are about to close I don't know if it's hearsay or what I think depending what you read the internet the internet you can find that no restaurants are gonna close or all restaurants are closed depending what site you look on how is Lachlan table doing today are you guys are you gonna make it well asking me today I'm gonna say yes you know we we have a plan we have a the next couple months thought of you know we did do things to help us make it as we have so far you know we've had to do some strategic things to make our numbers make sense because we are bleeding like everyone else I liked what Patrick said in your last interview where I think we've all said it maybe just slightly different but you know breaking even is the new victory yeah you know I think like two weeks ago we made like $50 and

54:52you know sadly we laughed and joked about that you know but you wouldn't lose five thousand right I mean which is the reality for a lot of people right now I've got I know a restaurant or they were talking is you don't lose an eighteen thousand dollars a month right now and it's like I don't know how many months you can lose eighteen thousand dollars before you go I can't lose right and I mean just to not to stop that bleeding it's kind of Victor well and we know we are we have concerns about when the weather changes to cold and we lose our outdoor seating because really our outdoor seating has been so important you know Kara has worked closely with the local councilmen's to let us legally be able to use the sidewalk during service time and I think now other restaurants are also going to get the opportunity to do that and it's necessary like we need to do whatever we can do for these small businesses to have a chance to make it and if that means offering two tops on a public sidewalk then you know let's give them that opportunity sure and not every restaurant may have outside opportunity you know we're a we're a rest a standalone building so we have space around us to where we could do that we have a patio so so that's been great and that's been a blessing but if if inside dining doesn't increase to more than 50 percent things are going to change come November and phase three I don't really believe means much to us because you can't be at 75% and still social distance so the mathematics there it doesn't necessarily help you at all so it's like phase two or phase four like phase three is not I think phase three maybe we get to bring chairs back to the

56:58bar which in our case gives us six more seats so you know that alone is a big deal you know we could turn those six seats three times a night you know that's 18 seats a night you know times six days in a week so you know every seat is going to matter and help it's a big deal and maybe those six seats are what you know get us out of the bleeding zone and into the you know making a little bit of money zone but it has like grown slightly tiresome like I think three weeks ago I was just kind of not to say go through the motions but just you know in the beginning of this I felt kind of high-energy energetic you know gonna save the restaurant save our staff keep everybody working feed the community it was kind of a buzz yeah you know and and I feel like the buzz is kind of worn off and not to say it's become a drag but you know it's just so important to remember your blessings and like you know think about them every day find gratitude because that's going to help you when you start to feel like you know what man of course we wish things were different but we're here we're doing it we've got a plan we've got a good staff you know we've got strong ownership we've got a great community you know we'll study as she goes you know and then we'll see what tomorrow brings so well said man thank you for I know it's a it's a grind every single day and sometimes it can be thankless and I think that I'd stand from all the people that I've spoke to around town that need people like yourself who are leaders who are leaders who are doing

59:00the right thing people feed off of your energy and they feed off what you're doing so it's not going unnoticed and every day I know if you feel like that sometimes but I certainly see it and I just feel it all over it's great you're doing a hell of a job what have we not talked about that you want to talk about is there anything yet coming up anything you want because I've kind of let all the conversation here what anything you want to talk about well no we can't talk about the food project lunch and you know I'm excited to be doing a st. Jude dinner here in about three weeks with my buddy Jason Doble he's providing the wines and the home that spent a lot of money on buying this dinner to raise money for st. Jude they're being super cool and like they're gonna set up a table on the patio so that me and Jason can be inside in the kitchen and you know once again just practice the social distancing and you know keep everybody you know happy and I personally enjoy doing work with st. Jude try to do at least one to four things with them a year and this is always something that you know I offer and I really enjoy going to people's houses and doing small you know wine dinners because there again I get to write specific menus and like I reached out to our fish guy like two days ago and I'm like you know I'm doing this cool wine dinner for 12 people and I'd like to do something a little more out of the box like scallops are cool shrimps cool but like what can I do to kind of turn myself on yeah you know what can I do to practice a technique or a method or or what can what product can I bring in that I haven't worked with much to become more knowledgeable you know to become a better chef these are the things that I'll kind of focus on doing dinners like this and you know I won't go into battle with a rifle I've never fired before because you don't want to get there and have your thoughts blow up and whole

01:01:00course you can't serve I'll practice things here at least once before going somewhere to give myself the opportunity to make a mistake and to correct it before it's game time but I enjoy the process of building the menu and then you know Jason builds the wines and and then you know prepping it here traveling to the home and ultimately having a super fun evening with one of my good friends in life you know cooking good food for good people and at the end of the day you know always promoting Lachlan table you know every day you know anywhere I go but then ultimately raising money for st. Jude and you know working with an outlet that helps families that truly need help you know and after becoming a father I connected to st. Jude much closer you know thankfully never needed st. Jude but you know with the thought of loving your children in mind you know wanted to do something in that you know category so you know I really enjoy working with st. Jude and then you know everything else that you know community hour does and you know feeds into mind and care as kids PTO programs to help the schools out you know they always need extra help along with every other event that we do throughout the year for whatever reason and then the things that I personally do also in Kingston Springs where I live I think the connection to the community just makes you feel good you know to be involved you get to know people you make friends yeah you help nourish you help people smile like all those aspects of everything that you do and you know we're also kind of lucky that you know foods one of those things that can just

01:03:00make people happy you know yeah it tastes good you need it to live but making bread with people is special and it speaks to your soul you know it it feeds you deep so you know having that ability is quite a blessing and like back to cooking at home like absolutely I cook at home you know and like all jokingly say on a Sunday night you know you know this is one of the best meals going on in Middle Tennessee tonight yeah right here at our house I mean who else is you know enjoying you know a live-fired you know steak from Southern Natural Farm or you know some green beans fresh out of the ground from White Squirrel Farms and I see yourself on Facebook or Instagram whatever you do it I'm like how far away does he live like I'm just gonna show up at his house and be like dude there's some amazing looking home cooking you've got yeah and I look forward to my kids getting a little older not really like trying to push time or anything but in terms of food like I look forward to saying all right let's go to this restaurant and eat as a family sharing that with them and you know try new things like I'm always trying to throw some new things to the mix at home and it's not always you know met with welcome you know my kids love ice cream and of course you know they love chocolate ice cream well recently when I went to the store I bought some cookies and cream so I'm gonna switch it up a little bit you know Cole loved it Timmy was not interested in the change at all he wanted chocolate you know so I'm like all right you know next time I go to the grocery store I'll get some chocolate good but like I always want to like try some new things with them and give them the opportunity to like something new and and grow their own palette and and you know educate them in food and you know since Cole has been homeschooling or virtual learning maybe I should say I've added some different education into the mix and I've been teaching him how to scramble eggs really

01:05:04so at least three mornings a week him and I are in the kitchen and he's cracking the eggs he's mixing them seasoning with the salt and the pepper mill and you know he turns them and moves them around and you know he gets him to the point of almost being done and then you know he wants me to just kind of come in and like do the finishing you know steps but you know one thing as a parent that I really want to be involved in is you know the things that we would call life skills like I get reading and math and history and the importance of all that but I also want you to understand how to make a bed and brush your teeth and cook an egg and eventually we'll take these lessons further you know me cooking with my mom was the beginning of my profession yeah you know and little did I know you know back then back then I just could with mom because I didn't want to do my homework and I enjoyed eating you know so the kitchen always kind of called me and she accepted my help and taught me and you know whether you cook for a living or not knowing how to cook is always going to be good you know yeah I completely agree with you I you know I spent a lot of time in my backyard and I had a bonfire pit and I've cleared this long trail and I spent all winter months out in the woods and my oldest is out there with me he has his own I have a large what's it called a axe and he really wants to use the axe and I said you have to learn how to do it and finally he showed me exhibited the traits and the responsibility to do it and then we bought him a hatchet so he has his own real hatchet but we have all of these safety protocols around it and he's chopped down his own tree and like his little cedar tree but he chopped down the tree we needed the tree to be gone so he I mean the guy spent an hour a million hacks into the side of a tree but he cut the tree down it was this cool little moment where he saw

01:07:05something that I did we're out there working there's a need and he wanted to do it he saw me and he wanted to kind of be he earned the right to get this hatchet knows his like the look of pride and this kid standing there he's got the hatchet in his hand he's got this big grin the trees on its side and he's like look what is just as a dad I don't know it's just one of those moments to me that was just like this is the coolest thing in the world and you wonder if that'll be one of the things that he files I you know because like think of what you remember then you know sometimes I wonder what they will remember and it's important yeah all of that so that thank you so much for taking the time today and get getting the high sign I always end every episode and I say I'm open the floor to you whatever you want to say whatever it is just anything you want to say to the community to Nashville anybody you think might be listening take as long as you want say whatever you want to say the floor is yours I guess you know I guess I would just like to say thank you to staff and community you know we've been supported during this time it's been clear that you know people care about lock on table so you know it just like makes it all worth it I remember in the first interview we had I think you said something to me like what pulls you out of the sheets in the morning and you know I would always just say that you know my responsibility to lock on table in my home is what pulls me out of the sheets the work that I have to do at either or that day is kind of besides the point I'm gonna go I'm gonna do the work but you know my desire to just do well and not fail is is you know something that just feeds me every day and we couldn't do it without the

01:09:09community we couldn't do it without our staff I couldn't do it without Karen Floyd I would have less desire to do it without my family at home you know all these strengths you know just give me the the power to have the desire to you know do as good as I can so you know everything combined is is just so helpful and you know so thankful to you know still be here and having this conversation and having a plan for the next month and you know just continue working hard and being good and you know like I said we'll we'll see what tomorrow brings a lot of gratitude it's good for your soul yeah it's good thing thank you so much for taking the time I enjoy the talk all right brother hands down one of my favorite people in the hospitality community in Nashville how Holden Bache has been a friend of mine 15 years and every time I've ever needed something he has been just amazing and three times he's been on the show finally we got to do a big one and hope you enjoyed that and please go support Loughlin table I say support local eat at your locally-owned and operated restaurants they are the definition so we appreciate you listening today and like I said Jensen Cummings will be up on Thursday and we hope that you're being safe out there love you guys bye