What We’re Trying Now

He went on to work at Chicago’s Charlie Trotter’s restaurant in 1994 (becoming dining room manager in 1998) before moving into the world of French cuisine. He became a maître d’hotel at Gary Danko in San Francisco in 2001 and relocated to New York to join Restaurant Daniel in 2005 before opening Bâtard in 2014.

In 2019, Winterman left Michelinstarred Bâtard and joined fellow Michelin star chef Chris Cipollone to create Francie. The duo named the restaurant after the protagonist of Betty Smith’s semiautobiographical novel, “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.” Smith’s granddaughter even sent Winterman a message of encouragement during the restaurant’s openings.

“The book’s overall theme is about growing something from nothing,” he says.

When the city shut down in March 2020 in response to COVID-19, Francie was under construction. In December 2020, it opened and had seven nights of service before another lockdown took place.

It wasn’t until Feb. 17, 2021, that Francie reopened. In April, Winterman and Cipollone were notified Francie would be getting a Michelin star, a secret they kept until the official announcement in May. The designation — awarded to seven New York restaurants in 2021 — breathed new life into Francie, counteracting the weight of its delays.

“I didn’t really consider myself having made it big,” he says. “I think what (Chris and I) have done is really an expression of our gained and shared experiences and what we think a restaurant can be like. And we feel like we present a product and a style of service in an atmosphere that people want to be in multiple times a month.”

IN THE KITCHEN Chef Chris Cipollone and his staff hand craft their Michelin-starred dishes down to the last detail. Serving an array of starters and main courses including côte de bouef and dry-aged crown of duck, Francie often has a 200-plus person wait list each night.

NEW YORK STATE OF MIND franciebrooklyn.com

WHAT WE’RE TRYING NOW

THE GRILL OF A LIFETIME

Get a taste of Taylor’s Grill on Wheels BY DALLAS CARTER

WALKING DOWNTOWN IN HENDERSON, Kentucky, the scent of hickory and maple floats to the street from the smoker behind Taylor’s Grill on Wheels.

As the door opens to the takeout restaurant at 130 N. Water St., you’ll hear Maai Taylor’s greeting of “watch your step” and the scraping of utensils as she and husband Carl put the finishing touches on generous portions of their homemade dishes made fresh each morning.

Before opening the storefront in September 2020, smoking meat was a hobby for Carl, who married Maai in 2016. But if he wasn’t smoking meat, he says he was thinking about it, even at the office. “I used to sit at a desk … the whole time, I’m telling my boss, ‘I want a barbecue business,’” he says of his lifelong dream. It was a dream Maai believed; she pushed Carl to quit his job while she worked for Deaconess Health System. Carl agreed, even getting a tattoo of the restaurant’s name before they ever began catering events in 2017 and serving lunch at Henderson Community College in 2018. “When you have passion and a dream, you have to believe in yourself first before somebody

MAAI AND CARL TAYLOR

else believes in you,” Carl says. “This was my motivation. I can’t have the tattoo and not be about it.”

Taylor’s — which also has a mobile catering trailer — offers smoked pork, chicken, and pork chops; signature rubs; mac and cheese; potato salad; Maai’s top-secret barbecue sauce; and other original recipes of southern favorites for takeout.

As for motivation for the future of the restaurant entering its second year of operation, Maai says her own Taylor’s Grill tattoo is “coming next.”