LOS ANGELES
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NEWS Volume 42, Number 29
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July 22, 2013
ON TOP OF THE FOOD CHAIN How Bill Chait Became the Most Important Non-Chef in the Exploding Downtown Dining Scene
photo by Gary Leonard
Prolific restaurateur Bill Chait at Bestia, which he co-opened last year with chef with Ori Menashe and Menashe’s wife, pastry chef Genevieve Gergis. In the past four years Chait has helped open seven restaurants in Los Angeles. He has two more planned for Downtown. by RichaRd Guzmán city editoR
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lot of people have had an impact on the surging Downtown food scene, but one thing in particular sets Bill Chait apart: He’s not a chef. That’s unusual at this moment in time, when chefs have been granted the auteur status formerly reserved for film directors. Seemingly wherever you look in Downtown, or even across the city, there’s a high-profile project driven first by those helming the kitchen: Just think of Trois Mec, where foodies buzzed over the team of Ludovic Lefebvre, Vinny
Dotolo and Jon Shook long before anyone knew what the three would prepare. In Downtown, Chait has already scored two big hits without ever scribbling down a recipe: He opened Rivera in South Park in 2009, one of only six local restaurants to currently boast four stars from Los Angeles Magazine (according to the magazine’s website). Late last year he debuted the Art District’s Bestia. It has been lauded as one of the city’s best restaurants in years, earning an effusive review from Jonathan Gold in the L.A. Times. It recently made the L.A. Weekly’s list of 99 Essential Restaurants.
While Chait is active across the city, he has two more big Downtown projects in the pipeline: He is teaming with Neal Fraser on Redbird, a long-awaited spot next to the former St. Vibiana’s cathedral. He is also developing a restaurant that will be part of Eli Broad’s under-construction Bunker Hill art museum. “Downtown is probably the most important restaurant and social market right now in Los Angeles and it’ll arguably define Los Angeles in a way that was never done before by any area in the city,” said Chait during a recent see Bill Chait, page 8
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