Restaurant Serves Down-Home Cookin' With Kick Finding Variety Is Spice Of Life, Key To Success

Cooking up your favorite recipes and creating new taste sensations at your own restaurant is an all too common dream for home chefs. Turning the fantasy into reality is difficult enough. Making the reality a success is even harder. Here's a story of how the George S. May International Company helped to make reality successful for a family-style restaurant.

When residents of suburban-Chicago Burbank, Ill., can't decide whether to go out for Mexican, Cajun-Creole, barbecue or down-home southern cookin', there's only one thing to do. Go to Chuck's Southern Comforts Café where the menu features an inspired blend of all of the above - and more.

People have been filling the restaurant to capacity since its opening in 1997. In fact, says Chef-Owner Chuck Pine, there has never been a need to advertise. The positive buzz from satisfied patrons is enough to fill seats, he says.

In an industry where word-of-mouth can make or break an establishment, a full house is testament to the restaurant's Grade A reputation. But a critically acclaimed menu and award-winning barbecue sauce alone weren't enough to keep the restaurant cooking at full steam. Like many chef-owners, Chuck concentrated on the menu while other equally important matters were put on the back burner. "I'm a great cook," admits Chuck, "but I've never been a great organizer."

After three years of increasing revenue but little profit, Chuck and his partners agreed to a Survey Analysis of the restaurant's business practices by the George S. May International Company. "We weren't losing money," said Chuck, "but we weren't making enough for the long hours we were putting in. May International was brought in to identify holes in our bucket and to implement policies to plug those holes. Little did they know that the bottom was missing on our bucket," he adds.

Before opening his restaurant, Chuck had a successful career in video distribution. This first career choice was lucrative, Chuck says, but he grew bored after a few years. After closing 79th Street Video, Chuck stirred up his career plans and enrolled in the chef's training program at Joliet Junior College.

EXPERT MENTOR

As with everything else in his life, Chuck put his heart and soul into his schooling and graduated with honors. He landed a job with the much-celebrated Rick Bayless, the renowned chef and cookbook author who has been credited with changing the way America thinks about Mexican cooking. Rick's first cookbook, Authentic Mexican: Regional Cooking from the Heart of Mexico, was deemed "The greatest contribution to the Mexican Table imaginable" by Craig Claiborne, legendary food writer for the New York Times.

"I hit the culinary jackpot when I went to work for Rick at his Topolabampo and Frontera Grill restaurants," Chuck says. But as he sharpened his skills and learned Mexican cooking first-hand from the Master Chef, he kept an eye to the future. He had long ago set his sights on opening his own restaurant and, in fact, already had the specific location in mind.

DREAM IN SIGHT

The space Chuck had his eye on was a 1,000-sq.ft. eatery that served hot dogs, fries and other fast foods. When the restaurant first opened, Chuck knew that its menu was no match for the competition located directly across the street and predicted a short run for the place. Never one to mince words, every time Chuck visited the fledgling restaurant on 79th street he asked if the owner was ready to sell. The owner took Chuck up on his offer after several months of lackluster sales.

Chuck's first executive decision was to change the menu. Hot dogs and fries were selling like hotcakes across the street, so to set his restaurant apart Chuck opted for a barbecue theme.

"My heart has always been in barbecue," says Chuck. "Not the kind you can do in your backyard, but the very specialized process of super slow smoke cooking. For a quality smoked product, it has to cook for hours, allowing the smoke flavor to permeate the meat."

But Chuck didn't want to serve just any barbecue. In his typical grand style, Chuck hit the open road to tour some of the famous - and not so famous - barbecue restaurants in the Midwest and South. Chuck met with restaurant owners, managers and cooks in 13 states, picking up barbecue secrets and tips along the way.

"Of course," added Chuck, "I had to try all of the products to test sauces and cooking techniques. It's my belief that it was worth it, though, and if you stop in I think you'll agree."

One year after opening, Chuck expanded the restaurant to 4,000 sq. ft. He enlarged the menu also, and began offering some of the authentic Mexican dishes he learned to cook under the tutelage of Rick Bayless. These offerings were a hit with customers and soon became a regular part of the menu. Chuck later added Cajun-Creole foods and hearty Southern-style cooking to the menu.

He also added an additional 1,000 sq. ft. of space to the restaurant and changed the name to Chuck's Southern Comforts Café. "The name is a better reflection of our more diverse menu. We're not just barbecue, but a variety of zesty, southern-influenced dishes. Besides, we are planning to offer breakfast eventually and who would think of Chuck's BBQ as a great place for breakfast?"

A HEADY ENDORSEMENT

Although barbecue, Mexican and Cajun-Creole dishes dominate the menu, Chuck's Southern Comforts Café also offers fresh soups, salads, stews, hamburgers, veggie burgers, sub sandwiches and po-boys.

To help customers choose from the extensive menu, Chuck's Southern Comforts Café introduced a new "gastronomic measuring device" called the Chuck-O-Meter. One image of Chuck's face next to a menu item indicates that it is "really good eats." Two floating heads means "You Gotta Try This." Three images of Chuck denotes that an item is "Not To Be Missed."

Some Three-Chuck menu favorites include Mexican Pot Roast, a slow-roasted beef pot roast in a spicy chipotle-tomatillo sauce served with cheesy mashed potatoes and roasted veggies. Or Carne Asada Adobado, a tender prime beef tenderloin tip char-grilled and brushed with a honey adobo glaze, served with mashed camote (white Mexican sweet potato) flavored with ginger and sweet spices and julienned vegetables. Patrons can finish off their feast with the Three-Chuck Torta de Pina y Sanhoria, a pineapple upside down cake with a rich carrot cake base.

The can't-miss menu at Chuck's Southern Comforts Café regularly draws a crowd. To keep up, Chuck and his partner, brother Jim, were working 70-80 hour workweeks. Only Chuck was drawing a salary, however. And as if there wasn't enough on their plates, Chuck and his brother had been toying with the idea of launching a restaurant development group.

OUTSIDE ASSISTANCE

Enter the George S. May International Company, a management consulting firm that specializes in working with small to mid-size business. Although Chuck's original plan was to work with the May International to set up the development group, the consultant pointed out that Chuck needed to fix his place before going to investors with another business idea. "We were always big thinkers," said Chuck. "But when the Survey Analyst got down to the meat and potatoes of how the consulting firm could help us, we realized that we needed it bad," he says.

May International's consultants pin-pointed several areas for improvement: organization, food costs, portion control and labor costs. "Restaurants can be a nickel and dime business, so you can't afford to miss anything," says Chuck.

One of the first areas that the May International consultant addressed was the issue of portion control. One day workers were instructed to dispose of plate waste in a special bin set up in the center of the kitchen. By measuring the plate-waste at the end of the day, the consultant was able to quantify just how much profit was being scraped into the trash. This demonstration helped the restaurant get a handle on the true amount and cost of waste, a big step in establishing an accurate menu pricing formula.

A new organizational structure also was developed and implemented by the consultants. Chuck became owner/overseer of the restaurant, his brother was office manager/controller, and three staff members rotate responsibilities for day-to-day operations. This new chain of command and an employee handbook with policies and procedures spelled out boosted employee accountability. Better financial controls, including new software tools, are helping the restaurant better identify what is - and what isn't - contributing to the bottom line.

"Our experience with May International was everything it was pitched to be," says Chuck. "We're enjoying the feeling of controlling the business and can now plan for the future instead of reacting to the present." And what does the future hold for Chuck Pine? Look for a line of his award-winning barbecue sauces soon.

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