 Chef/owner Dale Gussett and his first customer when the restaurant opened, Mary Cusick, an executive with Bob Evans Farms. |
01JUN05 Woes of Running a Restaurant Hits All Sizes By Doral Chenoweth The Columbus Dispatch When Dale Gussett opened L’Armagnac on S. 6th street in 1976, he introduced the city to price fixe dining, a four-course French dining experience for $10.50. Newspaper reviews were lavish in praise. But his comment cards, Gussett said, “you’re too expensive.” When the chef/owner, Gussett, sold L’Armagnac six years later to attorney (now common pleas judge) John Bessey and chef Tom Johnson, the fixed price dinner of four courses was $27.50. The raw food prices chef owners must buy today to stay in business continue to climb upward and upward again. Chef Gussett’s current French restaurant, L’Antibes, 772 N. High St., is a classic illustration for people who dine out regularly these days. The first opening night patron on Feb. 9, 1993, Mary Cusick, ordered chef Gussett’s duck breast with orange Muscat, glace de volaille and crème fraiche, $19. Tonight’s menu lists it for $24. Veal sweetbreads with noisette butter, a life long menu must on all Gussett bills of fare was $16 opening eve. His present menu shows $27 for his specialty prepared with chardonnay, lemon juice and capers. Gussett’s partner, Larry Williamson, has a nutshell explanation for what is happening to all restaurateurs, large and small. “The government says there is no inflation, but every year my rent goes up. My utilities, my business insurance, my health insurance, all go up every year. And now some vendors are adding a surcharge because of gasoline prices,” he says. In these days when chains tend to dominate the dining market with kitchen crews working in shifts to meet demands of seven lunch hours/ seven dinner shifts weekly, L’Antibes keeps to five dinner evenings a week. A chain steakhouse will have a kitchen staffed with an executive chef, an expeditor managing a serving line moving plates from kitchen to table, and 10-to-30 others in the dinner house type kitchen. L’Antibes has Gussett, an apprentice and one more person, or two apprentices on weekends. All take dish washing turns, Gussett included. A typical Columbus steakhouse can do 200, 300 covers a night. L’Antibes seats 40. Many chain restaurants today serving soups, ribs, onion rings, roast beef, biscuits, baked beans, chocolate cake, even mom’s apple pie, buy it all pre-cooked and packed many zip codes away. Nuke and plate are common utterances today among hourly employees. Few restaurants today do stocks, bases and gravies. All can be ordered online.
If Gussett serves 40 dinners, or on a good weekend night, two turns up to 80, every ladle of stocks and bases are cooked from scratch. As for menu changes, a chain operation may change weekly to take advantage of some abundant pre-packed, pre-cooked item. Gussett and Williamson in their first year in the Short North, grossed $250,000-plus. Williamson says their best year was $318,000 in the mid-1990s. “This year we’re just hovering around $300,000,” he says, noting that 9/11 hit everyone. They have three-plus years on their lease with 1,550 square feet. There are perils to a one-chef operation. One recent Gallery Hop night, a Saturday, Gussett was hit by a car while crossing N. High street. He had 40 reservations on the books. With a concussion, he returned to the restaurant, put out 40 dinners, and went to the emergency room the next morning. L’Antibes is closed on Sundays, so, he says, “it was more convenient.” For information on tonight’s dinner, parking access, and valet service call 614-291-1666. L’Antibes serves dinner only, Tuesday through Saturday.
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