Curtis Stone has three restaurants and one Michelin star. He’s been a TV staple for over a decade, with regular rounds Masters of great chefs and the Today show, and he is the author of several cookbooks. But selling steaks to Dallas diners might be his most ambitious project yet.
open stone Georgia at the end of 2019 with his brother, Luke Stone, and his partner Stephen Courseau, who also owns neighboring restaurants Le Bilboquet and Knox Bistro. In addition to the dining room and bar, which are open for dinner and Sunday brunch, Georgie also has an adjacent butcher shop, where locals can sample high-quality cuts of meat and grab coffee, cheese and more. juice and pastries in the morning and sandwiches for lunch. “When we arrived in Dallas, we found an emerging restaurant scene with plenty of room for something new and different,” says Stone. “I think Dallas is still on its way, and it’s an exciting time to be here.”
Here, a state of the city with the master (and possibly Iron) leader.
To nail the concept…
Georgie is more than just steak, with a menu that also features house charcuterie and plenty of seafood. But to be successful, Stone and his partners knew they had to do the steak right.
“Imagine the contemplation at first,” Stone says. “I’m an Australian who’s going to open a high-end steakhouse in Dallas. We’re going to bring in Australian wagyu beef and tell Texans it’s the best beef on the planet. It’s a bit cocky, and everything could go up in flames unless it’s really, really good.
Fortunately, he is very good. But with two restaurants in Los Angeles — Gwen, a parallel restaurant and butcher shop in Georgia, and Maude, a tasting menu concept — Stone can only visit Dallas a few times a year. So to ensure the smooth running of the trains, he relies on his team. In addition to Courseau in the field, that includes executive chef Christian Dortch, who has worked with Stone at his two LA restaurants and understands what his boss expects.
Part of Dortch’s job is to interpret Stone’s vision for the dining experience, but he says it’s always a collaborative experience and he has the freedom to experiment with new ideas and plates. “I appreciate this chef’s freedom of expression, but it’s in a well-controlled way, and we flesh things out together,” Dortch says.
Stone adds that it’s important for chefs and restaurateurs to set an example for staff, whether they’re cooks, dishwashers, servers or hosts.
“If you want to inspire your team to be fast, dynamic and creative, then you have to do that too. And if you want a clean kitchen, you have to clean too,” says Stone. “If I’m out drinking wine with guests, why should they clean up?”
Dortch is quick to point out that they would still clean up because Stone is the one writing the checks, but the sentiment holds.
On the Dallas food scene…
Stone has high expectations for Dallas’ culinary future, noting that the city is currently seeing an influx of chefs and restaurant groups from elsewhere, such as New York’s Major Food Group, which recently opened Carbone, Carbone Vino and Sadella’s. He thinks this is a positive trend for Dallas as it will continue to attract a bigger pool of talent to the city. When new chefs arrive in Dallas, they bring in teams that stay and open their own high-quality restaurants, where they can train the next generation of chefs. Stone says this pool of local talent is what it takes for a city to be a true foodie destination, and it’s what can put Dallas on par with top foodie cities like New York, Los Angeles and London. .
For Georgie, Stone and his team recruited 27 people for the back office staff. “It takes a village,” he says. “You can’t have two good people and 25 bad people. I want this restaurant to be here in 20 years, and people still talking about it as fondly as it does today. I want it to be an institution.
When he is in Dallas, Stone spends most of his time in Georgia. But he did some eating and drinking off the clock. On his last trip, he stopped at Bowen House, calling it a fun little place to grab a cocktail. And on previous trips, he enjoyed dinners at Charles and Town Hearth.
On Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend…
Stone is a busy guy. He just filmed the new iteration of iron boss, which will be released on June 15 on Netflix. He is joined by a team of heavyweight chiefs including Dominique Crenn, Marcus Samuelsson, Gabriela Camara and Ming Tsai. The President is back, joined by Alton Brown and new commentator Kristen Kish, winner of Excellent chef season 10, and judges Andrew Zimmern and Nilou Motamed. Each week, talented challengers will enter the Kitchen Stadium, along with renowned guest judges like Wolfgang Puck and Masaharu Morimoto.
Netflix has pulled out all the stops, as they tend to, and the eight-episode season introduces a new kitchen stage and all the tools a chef could want. As before, chefs will be tasked with creating dishes around a secret ingredient.
“You’re cooking under ridiculous pressure, making a five-course menu in 60 minutes for these judges,” Stone says. “And you’re cooking against someone who’s brilliant, which is completely intimidating, so you get this wave of panic.” Add the secret ingredient and chefs must quickly plan a menu and adapt their ideas to what can reasonably be accomplished in the time available. It’s tough, but Stone rose to the challenge.
“Chefs are naturally competitive and we like to challenge ourselves,” he says. “We’re not doing this for the easy lifestyle. It’s as if I sometimes said to Christian: Suck it my friend, you chose that.
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