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Lake Martin diners will see a familiar face in the SpringHouse kitchen this summer, as former Willow Point Chef de Cuisine Pete McKenny was named executive chef at the premier hilltop restaurant Memorial Day weekend. As chef de cuisine in charge of Willow Point’s Camellia Room 12 years ago, McKenny honed the classical training of his career-start in Ohio. He ventured to Washington state after that, and opened a food truck there, as well as holding the position of chef de cuisine at a mountaintop resort. From Washington, he moved to Winslow, Arizona, joining a Ford resort there as well. He was chef de cuisine at a Vermont resort when Chris Doggett, the new corporate director of food and beverage for Russell Lands, invited him to take the position at SpringHouse. McKenny’s early training at a Mobil (nor Forbes) four-star restaurant in Ohio focused on French cuisine. When the restaurant owner sent him to Portugal for an internship, McKenny caught the industry travel bug. “The more you see, the more you know,” he said. He moved to Willow Point and worked under thenExecutive Chef Doggett there because he had never been to the South and wanted to see the country and find out what Southern hospitality was all about. “In Arizona, I adapted French sides and sauces with Southwestern cuisine and the native influence. There were spicy peppers and chiles, and having access to them was very interesting. In Vermont, it was the maple,” he said. “There were different techniques of cooking, developing a flavor profile and manipulating the food with the ingredients
that were available. In Washington, we foraged for morales mushrooms; here, it’s chanterelles.” While his mission will be to build on what former Executive Chef and General Manager Rob McDaniel built at SpringHouse, McKenny said he looks forward to sharing the influences of his experience. “We’ll keep the vegetable plate. Those ingredients are just coming into full season, and I am excited about going to the market to see what’s available. These vegetables are nothing like what you find in the grocery store. They are all certified organic, cultivated by hand,” he said. “But we’ll also do some things in a different style, like a machaca – a breakfast dish with Southwest flavors. “Take the fried quail recipe in this month’s Lake magazine (see page 80). It can be made with a spiced maple glaze and served with fried Brussels sprouts, but we’ll also do it sometimes with a bourbon glaze.
The vegetable plate is among the most popular dishes at SpringHouse
30 LAKE
JULY 2021
