Tony and Cathy Mantuano

00:00Welcome 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. Hello Music City and welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. My name is Brandon Styll and I am your host. Happy Wednesday to you and yours. Today's guest is Tony and Kathy Montuano and they are the husband and wife duo who are taking over the food and beverage helm at the Joseph Hotel which is opening next week. If you don't know who they are, Tony is a world renowned chef, Michelin star rated James Beard award winner and I implore you to listen to this episode because he talks about a lot of fun things. Super excited to have them here in the city of Nashville and so nice of them to join us on Nashville Restaurant Radio to tell us their story. Quick note, if you guys are out there and you want to help us out, we would love for you to go to the Nashville Scene website, NashvilleScene.com. Find the best of Nashville tab and under media and politics there is a way for you to vote for best podcast. We would love it if you would go in, type in Nashville Restaurant Radio, let them know that you love what we are doing. We would be absolutely honored to have you go out and vote for us for best podcast in Nashville. We are Nashville and we, again that would be an amazing honor if you would do that for us. Do want to talk to you real quick about Trust 20. Trust 20 is an independent company who is out there auditing restaurants. They are coming in and they've identified 20 areas in which you can focus on in order to ensure that you are being the healthiest and the cleanest for your guests and your

02:03employees. So check them out at Trust 20. That's TrustTheNumber20.co, not dot com dot co. Trust TheNumber20.co and they will come out and do an audit of your restaurant for free. It is for free till the end of the month of August. So jump on that. We are 12 days, 12, 13 days until that is out. So we need you guys to give them a call immediately. Also want to talk to you real quick about Springer Mountain Farms. Chicken nestled in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Springer Mountain Farms is providing the best chicken in the world. They feed their chickens the best feed. They take care of their chickens. They treat them in a humane way. All of these things create a healthy chicken that you can feel good about eating. Learn more at Springer Mountain Farms dot com. You can also find out at Springer Mountain Farms dot com which restaurants in your area are serving Spring Mountain Farms. You can also order online. If you want to have the best chicken in the world directly to you. So thank you for listening today. If you like this podcast again, please vote for us on the Nashville Scene page or whatever medium in which you are listening to this. Please click subscribe and we would love a five-star rating. Anything that you can do to get the word out that you enjoy what we're doing here. So without further ado, let's jump right in to our interview. All right. I'd like to welcome in now Tony and Kathy Montuano. Welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. Thank you. Good to be here. I'm thrilled to be here. Thank you. Well, I will tell you it is it's an honor to have you and I didn't I didn't want to do your introduction while I said welcome because it's a long introduction but for those of you who don't know who Tony and

04:04Kathy Montuano are they're going to be heading up the hospitality portion of the Joseph Hotel which is opening next week here in Nashville and we're going to get into that but Tony is a just I'm going to try to do an introduction for you Tony that's fitting and if I'm sure I'm going to miss stuff I'm sure I'm going to butcher this but I'm going to I'm going to try so Tony you are the chef partner of michelin star rated speagia so you say it yep of speagia in chicago for 35 years uh you're also involved with cafe speagia river roast terzo piano inside of the art institute um and you have a place you had a place in disney springs um you've also worked with joe madden who was the head coach of the cubs at the time for madden's outpost you have been nominated for 12 james beard awards you won in 2005 you were I watched it with my wife the entire season of top chef masters uh you made it to the final six um hell of a job on that show I was such a big fan and recently you were a judge in the finale of top chef just this past season I'm sure you've done many more things with top chef you've cooked for joe biden you've cooked for john carry amongst other people uh barack obama has said you're his favorite chef and now you're in nashville and I could not be more honored to have you on this this show so thank you for being here it's our pleasure to be here we're thrilled to be here come on I mean this is such a great um opportunity for us and you know we've um we love nashville love nashville well I would be I'm sure I'm not the first to say it but if I I won't be the last

06:11but in the south down here we have uh southern hospitality and I just want to say welcome to nashville and we are so happy to have you here in our town I feel like I feel like we've stolen you like I feel like you know this this amazing chicagoan is now here how hard is it to leave chicago for a town like nashville um you know chicago was our home our son was born there uh he was raised there he went to school um we love chicago um and our life it was just like we've always been about challenges we've always been about doing new things and you know way back before spiaggia opened we were the this is the crazy idea to go and live in Italy for a year like that was a time when US chefs didn't really have that idea of like let's go to Europe and as we say stage um so you know and then to open a fine dining Italian restaurant in chicago it's like that was unheard of way back then and this sort of parallels that challenge in a way it's like this is a time when Nashville is really growing I mean the luxury part of Nashville is um is coming and like we're we're right there I think I think in the sense that um Nashville is about to hit um even a steeper growth like a growth of luxury um we're here to help define what luxury in Nashville looks like what would you say Kat?

07:56Yeah I would agree it's uh it's a great opportunity for us um you know we we always like Tony said love a challenge and uh you know we wanted to bring our uh our form our our style of Italian hospitality to Nashville so here we are but I mean you guys you go 35 years in Chicago you've done I just read that resume I mean it's way beyond impressive you've achieved so much in life you guys decide to leave spiaggia and I would love to learn kind of some of that story what that was like leaving spiaggia because it just seems like we want to move to Italy and you lived it you moved to Italy the beginning of it and then at the end you move back to Italy to Cathy your family's hometown little part of Moles what's the name of it? Molise. You move to Molise and you're gonna go there you're gonna raise animals and cook and live in the Italian countryside and then all of a sudden you're moving to Nashville to do this project and it's like for me I think like why I mean it's like having another kid you know like you've raised children you've done all of this that's such a big challenge I mean you've got all this stuff going on you're kind of just now just enjoy the rest of it no let's let's get back in let's jump back in like I don't know just to me it's like wow it's just you just love a challenge that's a crazy story it's like you know we we knew that we had we needed to do something new we both felt like that our son lives in New York and you know we were empty nesters as they say and like look let's do something new let's let's figure something out so the first move was to get our Italian citizenship which was a big move for us and we've been working on for a few years so once we got our Italian citizenship which by the way if you have if you are of Italian descent

10:03and your ancestors that came to this country from Italy never disavowed their Italian citizenship when they became an American citizen you can become an Italian citizen it's it's out there you just need to go and claim it and it takes years and it's frustrating because it's Italian bureaucracy so but that was really the first thing for us is let's get our citizenship once we have that it's like okay we want some new challenges so we moved to Italy and we were there we were perfectly happy there and right before we left we we knew it was time for something new and we didn't close the book on coming back to the states we just didn't want to come back for anything yeah and we we met the owners of the Joseph National Hotel and it was an instant attraction we liked their ideas and they seemed to like us and as we talked to them and heard about the project we were enticed let's say so if you don't want me asking for the details of that what what about it what were the things that were enticing to you what were the individual aspects talking to the owners of the Joseph when they tell you this is what we're doing what are a couple cliff notes of that sounds awesome I want to do that what's going to bring you back from retirement in Italy to a different city to open three different locations inside of a restaurant or inside of a hotel well I think the first thing was like we started sharing stories with Joe Pizzuti about his background and his heritage and where his family's from and you know was sort of identical to to ours like you know my family's from Calabria and Kathy's family's from Alize and he sort of has the same thing that his one grandparent was

12:06from from one of those regions the other was from the other so you know it started there like I'm naming this hotel after my grandfather I'm naming the Joseph I'm naming the restaurant after my grandmother Yolan which of course in Italian would be Yolanda but they shortened it affectionately so it's like all these parallels and like they were really they really I don't know it was just like we we totally were comfortable with with each other I mean dinners would last for three four hours and we would just be talking and you know when this is right before we left for Italy and it's like well this this is really an interesting project and this this isn't a developer who's gonna say I'm gonna build this hotel and I'm gonna sell it or I'm gonna build five Joseph's and I'm gonna sell it this is something that he's doing it's like a passion project like this is not what he what his family has has really accumulated their wealth in I mean this is like a passion project for them so and then the other element for us was was the art element I mean the Joseph Hotel is original artists a lot of them based in Tennessee and a lot of work was commissioned by Joe Pizzuti for the hotel so you know we had a restaurant that we consult on still to this day Terzo Piano which you mentioned at the Art Institute and it was we've always been around art we've like you know we love art so you have this Italian thing going on you have this heritage this connection you have art you have this incredible location in Nashville and you also have somebody telling you yeah I don't I don't want you to change it you do whatever you want like you're known for Italian luxury that's what we want

14:09like we're not going to ask you to come to Nashville and cook you know grandma's food I mean this is this is basically like a dream come true for a chef and a son so it's like being able to do what you want and you know designing the kitchen you want and building the wine list you want and you know we're time it was time for a change for us and obviously by the fact that we just we kind of moved to Italy we were ready to do just about anything so and it it doesn't I never like okay a year ago that I think we Kathy and I would be sitting here talking to you in Nashville about this no and not at all but twist and turn here we are Kathy was I mean I love that Kathy what's your take on that they just the same thing or did you have different emotions or feelings going through this process well um I agree on a lot with Tony I mean for me this is a chance to do more um with wine and service uh the last few years uh I really hadn't been involved at Spiaggia much um so uh I did work uh at Terrace of Piano as well but this is a bigger project and a bigger list of being more uh training the staff which I love to do um just the ideas of what we could create at this restaurant and at the other venues too we have so many ideas of different styles of food like Roman pastas or you know great pizzas and different entrees that we want to turn people on to so for us it was really inspiring and the Pizzutis are just really wonderful people and they have a great idea of what they want and they wanted us so that that was really very like a big hug very welcoming was was part of it

16:09the fact that because I've been through a lot of different negotiations nothing like you but I've been through a lot of negotiations where I have to come home and I tell my wife there's an opportunity and this is what's going on and we sit and we talk about it we pray about it we go over like this pros and cons list and I imagine hearing what you guys just said the fact that Kathy you'd be as involved as Tony is I mean Spiaggia being Tony's baby for this long I mean obviously you guys have been together this entire time you're uniquely involved as his wife I don't know how involved you were at Spiaggia you just said the past few years you you weren't that involved is part of it you getting to be complete is you guys doing this thing together that it's not this is Tony's project that this is Tony and Kathy Montuano's project is that another big drive that it's not just going to be another thing that he's doing that you guys get to collaborate is this the first time you guys have really collaborated on an entire project like this uh to answer your first question yes it's about us collaborating and doing this together but when we opened Spiaggia we collaborated on that completely I was head captain of the dining room at the time but we wrote the original wine list and then I moved into management there we wrote the Spiaggia cookbook together so that was yes something we collaborated on as well and then after that we wrote a more informal book called wine bar food about our travels and our love of wine bars in Europe so we really do well collaborating with each other we met in a restaurant and you know we have these parallels of our lives with our grandparents who were immigrants and food and wine and celebration so uh we really do collaborate well together for husband and wife working together so it's it's something we really enjoyed and yeah something we we felt we could do together well I don't know what do you think

18:13I mean let me let me just say that's I think you're that's very insightful for you to say because that is a big part of this too like Cathy had become I mean even though I was a partner in Spiaggia and I was a partner in River Rose and a partner in all these different places Cathy had been sort of sidelined by my other partners and like to get her back doing what she does well because I don't think there's anybody I mean she's at the top of like people that make you feel comfortable when you walk into a restaurant and know the right thing to say and that just sort of plus she's an incredible trainer so it carries down through the entire staff so the opportunity to get Cathy back in there and have her do something that was something that had been I mean that's really really a big part of this too so yeah good good insight well I could just tell I think that you two you know I I own a business with my wife and we work together and it's fun it gives us something different but when I'm constantly doing something independent of what she's doing you know it doesn't make a divide but it's something that when when I get excited when there's a project that we get to do together because I'm like oh wow we get to collaborate in a different way and and it kind of it gets the juices going again you know what I mean you want to do something's motivating you you want to do something that you're excited about and for every sense of the my original question I think you answered it perfectly and I couldn't be more excited by your answer and that it's not another big developer coming to Nashville opening just some hotel as a money grab because hey Nashville's the hot city right now let's just put up a hotel and let's make as much money as possible the fact that there's a family behind it and that they there's an intention of what they want to do with this hotel and that they're hand picking I just I can imagine those dinners that you're talking about having with bottles of Brunello and Barolo's and

20:15I can just imagine the Italian wine that was being poured in the food in the conversation and there's a moment there when you break bread with somebody and you share ideas that it's not just a business transaction it's a feeling that you get and hearing that you guys do these dinners and they turn into three and five hour marathon things and you're like I just know what that's like and going this is something that we have a feeling you lay in bed and you look at her and you go I I like them like I want to do this dude that's exactly right like you know I met them first on my own and then I'm like the you know I said to Cathy like you should really meet these guys like they're pretty interesting and um you know they had to pass the Cathy test and you know once they once they did it we had those conversations like wow this these guys this is sort of a perfect moment it's the perfect moment that we met them it's the perfect moment in our lives where we needed a challenge I think it's the perfect moment in in in Nashville and what's going on here I mean we live in Nashville like we're not carpet bankers we don't still like you know commute from Chicago every day we we we we're here we're in we're Nashvilleians yeah where did you where do you live we live on Rutledge Hill right near husk up there okay nice that's a great location for what's that yeah I just said it's a great location for where you're going to be working yeah yeah yeah all right so it is for sure um let's let's I'm not going to use the word pivot but I just did so let's um I want to get back to kind of some some origin stories here for people who don't know you two and haven't done their research on you you've been married for almost 40 years right you know how many years

22:16to be married for god it's that long 1982 so yeah 38 years but we were together before that so yeah where'd you guys meet you guys have this culinary story goes back a long time yeah we met at a restaurant in Milwaukee called Nantucket Shores which doesn't exist anymore you were used to be in a hotel what hotel was it one hotel on the east side of milwaukee so I was a music major in college Kathy was going to school for psychology and you know this is our second gig like making money while we were going to school and uh we just happened to cross paths in this kitchen and uh that's where we met back in both 1980 you know something yeah do you still play the trombone um I cannot play the trombone I have the trombone um and it's actually in great working condition but um is it close by can we can you give it a shot no no I mean it is close by it is close by I mean I can give it a shot if you'd like but again it's been a few years since I've done it so he's actually never played for me first this would be an amazing first time for him to play for you I want to hear something yeah yeah I don't know um but uh yeah that's a different part of his life then um that was him there did you he just played the trombone for us um here it is pretty good that's a lot better than I could have done it comes back I didn't realize that how easy it would come back for a minute come on oh okay play a whole song no no

24:21oh yeah I'll leave a little more rehearsal time yeah you will well see now now Kathy is gonna forever remember this interview she's like he's the guy that made it pick up that damn trombone and now she's gonna have to hear you practice for the next six months oh sorry Kathy that's okay my dream is to be able to play it again soon so one that's why it was handy you know it's like it's out it's tempting me every day well now you can say that he has played it in front of you yes thank you for that help right so when you guys met in the restaurant I love a good love story and um let's if you guys don't mind you guys met at the restaurant you work back to the house she's front of the house kind of a deal where'd you guys go on your first date what'd you do for your first date go ahead the why not that really wasn't a date in my mind it was a date but it was because I was on my way to work he asked me to meet him for a drink at this bar diet bar that all the cooks used to go to after work but I was on my way in for dinner shift but and I was getting off on the lunch shift so like let's meet at this bar called the why not which coincidentally is basically the owner's name is Tony and he just turned the name around so yeah I like it yeah so I think he thought that was clever but then you know we were having a drink and he's like he said have a drink and I said no I gotta go to work he's like oh okay so after that I think we went out to dinner somewhere it's a little Italian joint in the neighborhood well there were there was also a lot of like you know wait waiters and and cooks that would go out for beers after work and you know we would

26:22be a group of whatever eight or ten and then it would whittle down and by the end of the night it was just the two of us so I guess that sort of counts as a date doesn't it it does it does I think so what was there a similar moment Cathy where you knew that like he was the one was there a moment where like he did he cook something did he say something did he give you a card was there some moment where you went this is the man I'm going to spend the rest of my life with um yeah there was but it's really kind of too personal to talk about um but yeah okay yeah yeah there was um and uh just a little glint in his eye and a smile on my face and I think we both knew at that point awesome well I won't dig any deeper I certainly understand that being a personal moment Tony how'd you propose um it was not um exactly what I wanted it to be but um we were um where the hell were we I remember that's a long time ago um but it was more of one of those things where it's like I had my jacket and I had hung it up um on the other side of the room and I'm like you know would you mind there's something in my pocket would you go and grab it for me and inside the pocket was the ring so um did you know what was going on I thought it was a little weird but um I was like get it yourself um but um I played along so I think we were in Chicago at that point yeah we were living in Chicago so living in Chicago wow and then the rest is history right how many uh children do you all have uh just one son just one son yeah our son lives in New York and um like like we said he um he grew up in Chicago and um you know he's just

28:24he's always it's just been the three of us for so many years and like when we traveled he he would always be with us and um he's eaten in more michelin start restaurants than um than well as many as we have let's put it that way okay wow so what does he is he uh did if you just said this I'm sorry is he in school in New York does he work in New York what's he doing in New York um he did go to school in New York and he went to post-grad school there too and he works for the Infatuation do you know that the online restaurant reviewing site no I'm not familiar but it's not so he does it's not a big presence in Nashville yet but um you know he is basically an editor and he has three cities and he writes features and things but he manages you know the writers for um Philadelphia Seattle Washington DC and he really likes it it's really sort of a newer type a newer voice in the restaurant review world and um he loves it he works hard I gotta tell you so if you are let let let's help him be a bigger voice in Nashville it's called the Infatuation and uh Carlo Montuano would be the the guy you want to read his articles and read what he has to say about restaurants he's got uh he's probably eaten at some amazing places with you over the years you mentioned uh I'm gonna say you mentioned Michelin star restaurants I've read a lot of people say that Spiaggia is a four star restaurant and then also Michelin star restaurant can you help me decipher the differences if I'm a listener out there and I'm like stars great I know five star because people live with Yelp right what's the difference between a Michelin star and four stars well four stars um refers

30:25a lot to in this instance it refers to um local publications like the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Magazine and their top rating was always four stars so that's where that comes from and that's what we had um achieved at Spiaggia um Michelin star is um basically uh more international and they're more and they're not in every city in the United States but they're all over the world they're I think in New York and the Bay Area and Chicago and maybe Los Angeles um but um they're they have like their lowest rating is Bib Gourmand which means you're someone who is worthy to have to eat at I guess in their eyes casual casual thank you and then um then the first achievement of being uh is a one star of being a terrific restaurant and a place worthy of a of a destination of a de-sewer um and then two stars which seems to be the kiss of death because why and then three stars is the top and um that's you know an incredible achievement and uh you know we've worked in three star Michelin restaurants in Italy in fact our favorite is a family-run place called Pescatore and in um near Mantua and Cremona uh but um and that's never really been our goal to be that that um three star restaurant I think one star is very comfortable but um you know the most important thing is how your guests feel you know for us it's the rating system comes it's not something we try to achieve we just really want our guests to feel welcome and feel at home and you know someone who may not feel comfortable when they first walk into our restaurant um is our biggest challenge and we want that person to walk out loving it and

32:27you know it's just like we care about people we care about our guests and that's you know that's why we've been we've been doing this for 40 years or whatever it's like the satisfaction comes from making people happy and to getting to know people and getting to know who they are and the special moments in their life and all that stuff is why we live uh amen 100 amen I mean that's there's there's a lot to be said right there I'm going to ask Cathy um what's your biggest challenge right now in accomplishing that so as you're creating a culture at Yolan or um denim uh four walls what how are what are you actively doing right now to train people to have that spirit of service to have that guest focus like what are the things you're physically doing right now to create that amongst a group of people well we do a lot of role playing and um we um ask a lot of questions as guests like Tony and I will be the guest so um we will ask the waiters a lot of questions and see how they respond um or when we're role playing we'll stop and say okay this was a good opportunity to do this to ask the guest if they have any allergies or dietary restrictions or um we we go through a lot of of uh sessions where we say well what would happen if and we also are trying to get the staff to relax because I think um we have really hired a great group and I think some of them are really nervous and I think guests pick up on that and we're trying to get the the staff to feel comfortable to feel relaxed that they um have what it takes and even though we you know we practice Italian and they they have a hard time

34:30saying some of the Italian words we're very positive to reinforcing them that they're going to get it and they've been chosen because they have the right qualities and they have the right attitude and so they shouldn't feel nervous about the food and we're doing tastings with them and they're all blown away by the food so I think as we're watching all of these things work together we see that um they're going to be fine they just need um the the mindset and to be surrounded by all of us uh working on the food and the wine service and just talking to the customers and talking to each other that we're going to it's going to be great so um it's like it's it's the uh a labor of love really yeah so you mentioned you know when you you said when we hired you we hired you for your attitude and and kind of their their mentality what are the main things you look for when you do hire people and as a follow-up how has the hiring been here in Nashville are you finding that it's hard I mean you you've had the amazing task of hiring a staff in the middle of a pandemic there's no there's no playbook for that so I mean you're you're you're really in uncharted waters what has that experience been like for you um yeah it's been challenging I mean I think that um in a way though we've been fortunate because a lot of people have been furloughed from jobs and so um we did have some very yeah we had a lot of people come and apply and then through the interviewing process we were able to see that um the people that had experience were really looking for you know a new experience as well um within a new restaurant here and uh a lot of them have noticed that yeah there's nothing like this that exists here and wanted

36:33to be a part of that so that's been really fun um but yeah the the the idea that um you know people want to learn and people will you know came in and said well I've never worked in an Italian restaurant before but you know that's fine we can teach you about the food we can teach you about the wine but your attitude and your idea of service is really what is going to you know what is going to have you hired have have you hired by us um because that's hard to teach you know and I think in a sense um there's a there's just a natural friendliness to people in Nashville and I think we it was easy to pick people based on their personalities there was there's people that like Kathy said if you okay you're really friendly and and we we like that and you have a positive attitude and can you learn and you want to learn and um that's that was that helped clear things up but um for us really we don't really care about experience as much as we care about how you know what your attitude is and because you show up to the table hungry we're going to feed you you know and that's that's always been our mantra and you know we've produced a lot of successful restaurateurs that are alumni of our restaurants and you know that's something that people can look forward to like you graduate from the school of Kathy and Tony and you're going to you're going to be you're going to be okay no matter where you go in the world so um we that's our role our role now in life is we're mentors and we we want to teach you took some of the words out of my mouth because I was going to say it's almost like you guys are mentoring a whole new group of people in a whole new city and I find it so cool because I believe I firmly believed that one of God's great gifts in this world is Italian food and Italian wine together I think that Italian

38:35food and wine is absolutely given to this world by God like that is a that is a I am bestowing upon you these things and I don't know if we have I mean we've got some really good Italian restaurants in town but I'm in apologies to all the Italian restaurants in town I don't think we have anything quite like what you're you're going to do and I think it would be so fun if my name was Tony or Kathy Montuano to come to a city to open these restaurants and take these people that have good attitudes that are friendly and turn them into to to show them this gift that God has given us they go oh my god like the wine that comes out of Piedmont is amazing or let me teach you about Tuscany and how Tuscany pairs with this ripe tomato and like it just all those things like just to see people's eyes open when they have something for the first time and they go what this isn't a fruit bomb this isn't a California wine like this is so layered and it's textured and it's chalky and it's oh my gosh like just people learning about that has got to be one of the funnest things for both of you you you really hit the nail on the head there it's like some of the eye opening and and like and having that opportunity to teach people that that's exactly what we live for again another one of those things that we live for so yeah it's been it's been very very rewarding to to teach people and to watch the light bulb go off um but uh you know at times we think like are we crazy is this like a luxury italian restaurant and hotel is that going to work in Nashville and then you get the people that know um like wine distributors that we've met with and like man well we've been waiting for this like or you get like you even get like people that you know some of the people we've hired are like we've been waiting for something like this and then we to hear that is like okay maybe maybe we made the right choice

40:41i think you did if there was ever any doubt and it's you know i think that a lot of that doubt creeps in because you know you didn't foresee when you guys were having these dinners talking about this you didn't foresee a global pandemic i mean i would love to talk about what this process has been like i mean in a dream scenario what you guys are doing the conversations the wine the dinners you have with joe when you're going over this process and you say yes we want to do it he didn't say oh but you're gonna have to do it throughout a pandemic that just happened how i mean how's that process been like for you i mean does it cast doubt into what you're doing because it just adds another layer of complexity to opening a whole new luxury brand when everybody's not working and they're they're closed i mean restaurants right now are half capacity you can't sit at bars like all this stuff closing at 10 30 at night it presents a big challenge yeah it does and so what we've we've formed a safety committee you know like we're you can't enter the hotel without having your temperature taken which is probably true in just about every place today if you can even enter i think of course guests have an advantage that book a room because they'll be the first people that ever were in that room so there's that there's that but it's it's just being safe you know it's like observing everything and it has to start with us like if you know our masks are always on you know our temperature is taken everyone sees that we're doing those things so you know when someone isn't doing it i mean it's like you get you have to do this is just there's no negotiation so it's really been difficult in that sense the the most difficult part really has been what does it look like when we open is anyone going to come to this hotel is anyone going to come to the restaurants and how do you staff for that and you know we're lucky to have ownership that's supporting us right now and and are positive and know that

42:47there's another side of that and we're going to come out on this but you know we already know the answer to the restaurant we know who's going to show up because opening night we're already sold out so which is to me is astounding um but it's like all that group business and banquet business that hasn't come back yet there's you know the rooms that haven't really come back yet either so that's the unknown part of all this um but we've already the answer has already been given to us for for the restaurants which oh my god like when i looked at talk and i saw that we're so off for opening night i'm like how how how did that happen so um yeah pretty cool i think you bring a little bit of clout i mean people are gonna want to be there so um yeah clout you know you just you can't take your nose your your eye off the prize you know and you just keep like you keep working at it you keep working at it and then you get those surprises so yeah you clout okay but that's not something we ever like walk into room and say hey we're here come on and eat our food it's like of course not we try to we try to win win every guest every time so anyway well the question was proposed to us we do a show on friday called the roundup we kind of talk about all we've talked about the joseph for the last several weeks on our show we've kind of mentioned that you're hiring and you need people and um that we are excited about you coming and i will tell you that there's i was listening to a podcast the other day um and it was from eric cacciatore who has restaurant and stop along if you know him he's fantastic great podcast for the hospitality industry but he said you know one of the questions we were asked was what do you see for the future of the restaurant business in nashville and i said i feel like i just got from california and there's these wildfires that were burning while i was there and you you've

44:47probably seen scorched earth after a wildfire there's just this black hillsides you see these mountains they're just like they just look black but always from that grows this beautiful green brand new foliage that comes up and it's like this new life and i can't help but think that after all of this we're going to come back bigger better stronger better than we've ever been before and you've been here for the food and wine festival you know what nashville is about and once we get past this tough time and nashville's tourism picks back up and those events come back and we start doing stuff you're gonna see insanity you haven't even mentioned but you all the things that you're putting in place right now are only going to solidify your place as being one of the greats in town and i'm i'm excited to have you this is cool thank you that's um that's very uplifting words thank you you know sometimes you lose sight of that um because you're just like always like oh my god here we go again like we have to put the masks on and you know but social distance and wash your hands and yeah one of the things that we're very excited about which doesn't get talked about a lot is that when we were designing this hotel we designed this italian style coffee bar in the front of yolan in the lobby and um uh our pastry chef noelle has put together i mean she's baking for us fresh pastries every day and um it's really like a bar in italy like you know like you have a great espresso and pastry in the morning and that's all you have and um it's and i i thought about that because you know we were putting down these you know six feet these you know just keep your social distance stickers or um but i'm like oh if we buy those and put those down which we have to let's make sure they're removable yeah 100 they're not putting

46:51tile in yeah no so i think that's uh gonna gonna be also a star feature because noelle is so talented yeah her pastries are incredible makes all the bread for the restaurant i mean she's makes all the amenities for the hotels we're we're really lucky to get her and you'll get a real espresso a real stop it yeah what's so have we been drinking fake tell me tell me what a real espresso is you brought it up well sometimes the kids like that oily espresso you know or it's it's just the way the beans are roasted and the way the coffee is made it's just um not balanced and uh in italy you know the espressos are very short there's a nice creamy top they call the crema and um you know it's that's a real espresso and unfortunately in america we sort of bastardize that too and so if you like real espresso we also have a coffee drink for the warm weather called the shakerato which is espresso a little simple syrup a little piece of lemon and uh right zest and you shake it over ice and a cocktail shaker and a cocktail shaker and then you um pour that on ice it's like blows cold brew away i i think personally but so i think the canny's point the coffee culture in america is different than the coffee culture in the motherland so we're going closer to the motherland there you go there's a reason star going og what's that i said you're going og going original i like it you know there's a reason starbucks hasn't opened in italy until a year ago okay i cannot with them when they did open they changed it you know they changed what they do

48:52to be more italian interesting well i mean you know that's like everything i mean there's an americanized version of pretty much everything out there and it takes they once it's hard to get people to change i mean you know i i eat spaghetti all the time pasta is probably one of my favorite foods out there but i get you know i i don't make the pasta myself i've got two small children and i'm i'm busy and i don't have time to make pasta but you know so i get pasty buy pasta you boil it and you make it like it's it's a thing but i had dinner the other night at a place in east nashville called set sun which i highly recommend you go check out jason sigma is on the show yeah very good but he hand makes his we had spaghetti and he hand makes the pasta and i was eating the pasta that was my wife and i went holy shit like i forgot what like real pasta tastes like because we've just been eating this store-bought pasta for so long but it's so good but it's so different but it was so amazing like the chew was so good and it's just i don't know you get used to eating this other pasta if i was not a foodie type person like myself who loves different things i may go in there and go what's wrong with your pasta it's not it's not good you go no no that's the way it's supposed to be like that's that's the stuff you're eating it from kroger is not the way it's supposed to be yeah that's right there's a bit of changing we have to we have to check that place out we've heard great things yeah yeah have you had some let's talk about where you've eaten in nashville have you had some great dinners in nashville yeah um at uh nicky's coal fire um so you went to nicky's what you think of that we think uh we think nicky's is strong uh we've been back there probably um maybe several times

50:52at least um you know even their bagels are like incredible on the weekends um so and we got to know tony and caroline pretty well i mean it helps that tony's from chicago which we didn't know um when we first walked in there um but um you know unfortunately he's a white socks fan but there's i was gonna say southside he's a he's a white socks guy he is a white socks guy so you're you're i've seen on your twitter profile picture you're throwing out the first pitch at wrigley i i had the opportunity to do that twice and uh i i just if anyone ever gets the chance to throw out a first pitch make sure you practice before you go out there otherwise you're going to do a you know anthony fauci thing or something that's just like you're going to knock somebody out so did you throw from the rubber of course like i'm just i'm just you know what kind of question is that like who doesn't you know it's funny because there was there was a couple of us that were throwing out the pitch and pitching one person in front of me was i'm not going to say his name but he was actually an athlete and he was it was in front of the the pitchers pitcher's mouth i'm like really like get out of the way come on man so no i knew if i was going to do it i was going to do it from the mound from the rubber and i threw a strike nice i mean it it was not a fast ball that was like a rainbow pitch i call it but you know it got there so i love that you mentioned nickies because caroline texted me yesterday and she said i love being the side view mirror for your show because i mention her all the time because i think she's amazing and i mentioned caroline and just and tony she says i love being a side view mirror for your show and i said well i love you doing that so i just think it's funny that you mentioned them because here we go caroline

52:52she guest hosted the roundup uh three weeks ago and it was a lot of fun yeah i mean they were super helpful like they they like enlightened us on vendors and they enlightened us on farms and you know they they we were sort of like so we're so grateful for them they couldn't have been nice yeah really really incredible and their food is delicious the pastas are delicious the pizza is delicious i mean it's all fun and delicious so there's your first like friends in the culinary industry here in nashville so you had nickies where else have you gone anything that you've had that you've been blown away by so um when um which that was good when covid first broke out our son and his girlfriend who also works in publishing and could work from home they're like hey do you mind like if we drive the nash drive to nashville and hang out with you guys for a while because new york's a little crazy right now and we're like fantastic so um carlo and serice both like pushed us to try places like that we probably wouldn't have tried before like jamaica way like we probably got delivery from them like three or four times it was so um it was just i mean it was so authentic and and i credit them with pushing them pushing us outside of our typical boundaries so have you had riddim and spiced yes we have had that okay i think that's that's their son yeah what about the place when we first got here in january um covid hadn't hit yet we it's a couple restaurants the one indian restaurant we went with convo it was so good i'm trying to remember you have shohan manit shohan has a place here oh no i think kathy's talking i don't think it was indian are you talking about green pheasant which is now closed oh yeah jessica's place jessica and trey no that was an awesome that

54:56was great too though but the place where we had we went into one door and we kind of oh the place uh at taylor taylor taylor taylor taylor oh yeah yeah vivic yeah taylor that place was awesome and the service was awesome yeah that was a really cool experience yeah that that's fantastic that felt like people really cared and that you know i mean the the way it's set up like a dinner party and how they they talk and there's those personal stories from vivic and like it was an amazing evening i wish we could go back yeah i can't wait to go back yes um you know we had dinner the night at a place called bastion have you heard of bastion and have heard of it yeah josh hobbiger uh is the chef there and his wife lauren run bastion and it is as good as i think you're gonna get i mean it's it's out of control so there's a recommendation for you if you want to go out to do they have a tasting menu the whole you eat everything on their menu when you go there you don't even get to order you just you go there and they sit down they go this is what you're eating tonight and uh then you can do a wine pairings with it if you like and the sommelier comes up and will talk to you and say what do you like what are we doing and he'll do pairings with yeah it's a lot it's a very cool vibe very cool vibe in there we're gonna go all right well that's good stuff i always like to know where people are eating what they're doing um and i'd be remiss and we're at the we're getting close to being on the on the show here for an hour and i always say this i could talk to people for hours and hours and hours i love just just chatting but i want to talk about some of the top chef experiences because i know that's a lot of people outside of chicago know you for um seeing you on tv seeing you on bravo doing top chef i was gonna ask a joke question like what's padma really like but i can't say okay i would go for it

57:00she's incredibly gracious and friendly and she's fluent in italian and she has an incredible palette so she seems like the most amazing person right so not just like food critic or somebody whose taste is just like everything about her seems like she's just so well balanced and she's just so impressive in like every way i'm i'm such a fan of everything she does there's no arrogance it's nice not an act she's she's a really wonderful person yeah what's it like being on the show what was it like um i re-watched last night your exit from top chef masters which you know you're watching people like you and jonathan waxman and uh marcus samuelson all these people in the same room or moon and you're like wow the people on that show what an amazing show but you're hugging everybody saying i'm really gonna miss what do you what do you take from that experience like looking back on it now what did that experience mean to you it's like we went to war together it's like these guys you know they're all my really good friends today and you know you spend so much time together and you compete against each other and any one of those competitors on that show that i was on with like if we when we see each other today or when we talk to each other today it's all like there's a special bond there and um you know jonathan was the ringleader like you know we filmed in la and i mean you know you're so exhausted you film all day and it's like 11 o'clock at night you started at seven and he's like all right where are we going out for dinner i'm like wow man he's you go and you have incredible experiences and of course jonathan being jonathan you can get into any restaurant anywhere in the united states just if you're with him which is amazing um but like susan feniger is like one of my favorite

59:06people ever i mean she's what a personality oh man so positive i mean just amazing we were um we were in la about a year ago maybe yeah and uh we went we stopped at their house and and then we went out to dinner and again like she's so positive like i think out of everyone she became her and i became really close friends but every single person on that show we were in we were in the battle together and we fought together and that's a special bond that's a badge of honor that um you know and then of course there were those times sitting around that while you were waiting for the judges where you were drinking a lot of wine and a lot of stories would come out and so you had that too so um it was great i mean honestly the the dish the the episode where i was kicked off was the one where i mean come on i mean i made like 50 pizzas by myself from scratch like grill on the grill and it was like yeah i'm like it's the one where i went to the judges table saying i finally feel like i won like i won this challenge like this is the one and then like to hear what i heard i'm like you gotta be kidding me man like you you totally totally i don't agree but um so it was good pieces what i'm trying to say and if i sound a little yeah a little sensitive about it it's probably because i am well i mean i think that i don't know how many times people have the opportunity to talk to somebody who's on a show like that and i think that you watch the show for myself and my wife when we watched it live because that was appointment television for us but you watch it and you're i mean i'm emotionally invested to what's happening and you know we have our favorites think you're one of our favorites and we get shocked also and then i think that the general perception is is that real is that is that like actually happening or is this all is there a director going act like you're upset you know are they letting you know

01:01:11and so when you have the opportunity to ask the person on the show i think it's it's really good to know like that that's that's act that was real yeah i don't it was real and i don't i don't think they're there no they're for sure there's nobody telling you how to act but there probably is an agenda about you know who they want to see move on i think in a sense you know like who's camera worthy who's television worthy who's controversial you know that kind of stuff and that's just my feeling i have no idea but because it's never really revealed to you how it's edited until you know we see it the first time everyone else sees it so i mean there are a lot of things that happened that they didn't show so yeah especially when you make a pizza that you're super proud of and you feel like you kill the competition and then you go into it you're like and i lost what like what i mean how do you not leave that feeling like i feel like you wanted somebody else to win because when i put together was really good yeah i i would agree yeah i mean it was and there were some things that i tasted that were like again no names that were like horseshit and i'm like how did you win like that's impossible so um yeah kathy what's your experience through all of this i mean he's shooting the show are you at home in chicago are you getting phone calls every night are you guys allowed to communicate what how do you support him through something like this well because it was top chef masters they were playing for charity and they were able to have their phones because they all have businesses so at that time our son was still at home going to school so i stayed home but um yeah we communicated a bit and uh you know it was it was good because you filmed and then you were able to come home remember and then you had to go back yeah so uh it wasn't too terrible for us i mean we could communicate and uh we did see

01:03:18each other it wasn't as long for tony as some of the contestants chef testants were but uh yeah it's it's always been really fun i mean i i went uh with tony when actually they called tony when we were in italy uh for him to judge the final um on top chef this last season season 17 so i was along and uh you know everyone was very nice to me and i hung out at the hotel and went to the spa and slept in and so it's it's not bad it hasn't been bad at all so what's that like being on the final of top chef being one of the people that judge the food dessert do you feel a ton of pressure uh when the food comes out and you taste it and the camera's on you and they say what do you think are you able to give an absolutely honest opinion of what you thought of the food are you reading the room and if somebody the guy next to you says there's way too much salt and it tastes terrible do you then have to go well shit was it salty did i did i not see that wait a minute let me let me taste it again yeah and i i think um you know you just try to be honest it it's amazing you know that was a pretty big table there were a lot of people sitting there so they had to go around the room and ask everyone there around the table and ask everyone their opinion and literally between courses that's all we did was listen to people talk and so you know sometimes it was up to like a half hour listening to every single person say you know what they thought about a dish so the more challenging part was like okay when you get like if i was one of the last people in that round i'd be like all right what hasn't been said like everything's been said like what else can i can i say about this dish but um it was is is there the one guy at the table oh i'm sorry is there the one guy at the table that you're

01:05:21just like shut up dude i i yeah you have to say who that person is yeah there was one person like okay shut up like you know you're now you're just talking to hear yourself and that's like yeah i mean i imagine you get these are seasoned people and you've got but you do have some egos in the room i imagine that every meeting i've ever been in and maybe i'm that guy sometimes too but there's always the one guy who knows everything who wants to just go well let me tell you it's like dude stop let somebody else say something and is that happen that does happen there right you know 100 absolutely there was there was one chef in particular who just like you know there were there were attempts by tom to even cut him off at times like um let somebody else say something guy come on so um yeah i think it's just yeah you know there i it's hard to find the words when like everything's been said sometimes but then other times you know there's been like wow like you know i have this perspective because you know there i mean there was there were other italians i mean there was dario chiquini was sitting next to me who was the butcher who um you know had incredible stories incredible insights and you know was so honored to be there so um but other than that there weren't any really other italian italians if i remember correctly but there were a lot of chefs i mean marco colo greco has the number one restaurant in the world right now and um even though he's french um you know he he's very well respected and you know padma's great insights as well i think the i think was it was it was an interesting table to be at it just it took all day just because you had to talk so much and go around the room so much it was like exhausting at the end i can i can certainly imagine that um all right so again i could

01:07:24talk to you guys for hours and hours and the great news here is that you're not just in town doing the nashville food and wine festival where i i get to talk to you one time you're now you're now living here so we can do this again uh as you know as you get open and as you have new experiences and as nashville as you have anything you want to say i'm happy to i'd love to have you guys on another time another 10 times over your career here in nashville i wish you'd be nothing but nothing but success while you're here we're not going to wrap up quite yet um last thing i do on the show is i like to open up the floor to give my guests a final thought kind of open the floor to the city of nashville city of chicago what would you like to say whatever whatever you want to say for as long as you want to say it mike is on both of you take your time go uh well we're really happy to be here in nashville and um we love it here people are so nice and we can't wait um till the restaurant opens so we can meet more people um and you know it's not far for our families to come so we also can't wait um for our families to come visit because i think they'll really love nashville too and and it'll be great to see them because we even seen them since um last year so um we just hope every you know everything's going to get better and uh better and better as we're here um you know this is such a defining moment in restaurants and and culture and history and um 2020 seems to be such a difficult year but i think it's going to be a year that sort of redefines a lot of the way things are done in business and politics and culture and i mean i just i just want i want opportunities for everyone and i want to be

01:09:29i want to give everyone a shot no matter who you are that we know we can teach you how to be a great restaurateur and a great chef um no matter who you are no matter what your background is and if anything comes out of this year it should be the opportunity for people that didn't have opportunities before and so that's true in chicago that's true in nashville and you know just including as many people as possible and giving people the chance to realize their dreams that's that's what we're here for we that's what we want to do that's what we want to teach we want to mentor and we want to open doors for people that of all backgrounds i love it i love that you guys are able to you've got owners of the restaurant or the hotel that are really encouraging you to follow your passions and i think that we are blessed as a city to have people like you here to inject all of your wisdom all of your knowledge all of the things you've learned through your entire career of service in an amazing city like chicago having you here in nashville the the experience you're going to bestow upon so many people is is truly an honor and um again i wish you nothing but the best of luck i cannot wait to do another interview with you guys and i thank you from the bottom of my heart for taking the time today for us here at nashville restaurant radio this is something we wanted to do since we moved here and i kept pushing um our pr company to reach out to you so we're glad we got the opportunity and thank you for that warm um thank you and warm welcome thank you brandon we will we'll see you again all right so tony and kathy montuano they are going to be right now if you go to our youtube channel you can watch them play the newly reopened game which in this case we're going to call it the about to open game there is a special snippet where they answer six questions that they feel

01:11:32like each other it's in the form of the newlywed game hopefully you can jump over to our youtube channel or you can check it out at www.nashvillerestaurantradio.com to watch the full video watch the full video of this interview as well as our bonus extra our youtube extra which is tony and kathy montuano playing the newly reopened game so happy you guys joined us today we are honored that you joined us today and we hope that you are being safe out there and um we love you guys bye