In the annals of celebrity divorces, it may have been less made-for-TV than the McHugh-Firnstahl breakup (tossing a coin from the top of the Space Needle to decide which partner had first dibs on which restaurant), but Chow Foods was, until five years ago, one of the most influential locally-owned chains in Seattle, essentially defining the concept of the neighborhood restaurant. Driven by food (menus changing every three months) rather than by a celebrity chef; small enough, individually, to feel intimate, yet big enough, collectively, to centralize back-office and administrative functions, the eight (at the time) Chow Foods stores ran parallel to the Tom Douglas and Ethan Stowell "empires." But they never made a big deal about being under the same ownership; their names weren't always know city-wide: Edolyne Joe's (West Seattle), Atlas Foods (U Village), Jitterbug (Wallingford), the Hi-Life (Ballard), Coastal Kitchen (Capitol Hill), 5-Spot (Queen Anne), Mio Posto (Mt. Baker).
It had all started in Portland, where Peter Levy learned the restaurant biz as a kitchen slave for the McCormick & Schmick organization, working his way up to GM. Returning to Seattle in the late 1980s, Levy found an underutilized spot on North 45th Avenue, an unsuccessful, ahead-of-its-time espresso bar and gelateria. He added a restaurant kitchen with a regulation hood and opened it as the Beeliner, a diner with east-coast attitude (a sign said "Eat It & Beat It"). Early on, John Hinterberger of the Seattle Times showed up and wrote a favorable review. The rest, as they say, is history.
Levy added the 5-Spot atop Queen Anne a couple of years later, and took on a partner, Jeremy Hardy, who'd also been a GM for McCormick. In 1993 they opened Coastal Kitchen on Capitol Hill's 15th Avenue, then they tilted at the windmill of downtown sandwich shops with a concept that sounded much better on paper than in practice: Luncheonette No. 1. "But it turned out that downtown Seattle just isn't a breakfast spot," Levy explained to me in a recent interview. "We lost our shirts, over a million bucks. It took 18 years, but we paid back every dime." The Beeliner had also run out of gas, and was sold, only to see the buyer after buyer default. Levy and Hardy reopened it as Jitterbug, but that didn't help much. It's now back in Levy's hands, renamed TNT Taqueria.
There was also a foray into University Village with Atlas Foods. "I thought it was like any other neighborhood," Levy said of U Village, "but it's not. We kept it open for ten years, though, until the lease ran out." In 2003, they added Endolyne Joe, in 2004 the Hi-Line, in 2006, Mio Posto, and, in 2009, the breakup. Hardy kept Mio Posto (which he's planning to clone in other neighborhoods) and Coastal Kitchen; his part of the company is now called Seattle Eats.
Levy is always looking for new opportunities, new neighborhoods. Tacoma? Why not. But now some 300-seat spot downtown. He's eaten at the Cheesecake Factory (in other cities), and, while he admires the assembly-line precision of their operation, he bemoans the lack of flavor in the food.
He does his own design and interiors, writes his own menu copy and private placement offerings. "I don't have any hobbies," he explains. What he does have, on the other hand, are four restaurants, all open for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and almost 200 employees.
Breakfast at one of the Chow Foods neighborhood restaurants (not downtown) is the most popular meal of the day, with a line out the door. And one item that's on the menu at all of Levy's stores: a "Grand Slam" combo (pancakes, eggs, bacon) named for a restaurant critic who complained it was "just like Denny's." Not a complaint, says Levy, but a compliment.
Appeared today in slightly different form, in City Living
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