A pair of chefs who honed their kitchen skills under Keith McNally of Balthazar fame are fast becoming some of the most sought-after restaurateurs in town.
After decades of working for McNally, whose Balthazar and Pastis restaurants have come to define French brasserie for New Yorkers, Riad Nasr and Lee Hanson only recently stepped out on their own — to instant success.
They opened Frenchette in Tribeca in 2018 to critical praise, including the 2019 James Beard award. It’s still impossible to get a reservation, though they hold some tables for walk-ins each night.
They’re also working on two other ambitious projects: ownership of Le Veau d’Or, a legendary Upper East Side bistro that opened in 1937, and a new restaurant on a prime corner of Rockefeller Plaza in place of Brasserie Ruhlmann.
The chefs stress that their current success has been decades in the making — so much so that the duo first reached out to Le Veau d’Or, which translates to the Golden Calf, eight or nine years ago, “to gauge interest and kept in touch.” Once Frenchette was up and running, they received a call from the daughter of the former owner and, voilà, made a deal. “We said instantly that we would take it on. It is a project and a place that we love and we felt we could do something fun and good there,” Nasr said.
Indeed, while lots of great chefs passed through McNally’s restaurants, Nasr and Hanson stayed for 20 years honing their skills and learning to create the perfect vibe from McNally, the master of atmosphere.
They also went on to create amazing food, which could help differentiate them from their former boss.
McNally, who also owns restaurants including Minetta Tavern, is famous for creating atmospheric restaurants filled with beautiful people. While the food is stellar, it’s not the main draw.
“His restaurants were never about the food. It was always about the vibe and the people. You’d see Anna Wintour beside a filmmaker, mixed with models and actors,” one industry observer explained. “He made people feel good, like they were at the right place at the right time. If you read anything about his restaurants, it is never about the food.”
At Frenchette, however, “people talk about the food,” the observer said.
Indeed, in an era of ambient-heavy eateries, Frenchette has been singled out for its food, which includes duck frites, lobster in curry butter, calf’s brains in lemon caper brown butter, charred carrots, and gnocchi Parisienne.
It’s also about the welcoming, festive, uber chic vibe, the details of which they picked up as opening chefs at McNally’s many restaurants.
The chefs declined to discuss McNally except to say that their experience helped them with their current success. But a person with direct knowledge of the situation said the chefs did not leave on good terms with the demanding and exacting McNally.
“They respect each other, but they are not friendly,” the source said. “Keith is incredibly talented. One of the things that he is good at is spotting talent in other people, which is a talent in itself. Now Frenchette is the hottest restaurant in New York. But they don’t say anything bad about Keith. They just roll their eyes if his name is mentioned.”
McNally could not be reached for comment.
Nasr and Hanson will readily acknowledge that they were eager to branch out on their own.
“We were fighting for our own place,” Nasr said. “We wanted to establish ourselves as chefs and owners of a restaurant and a business. We just wanted to get to that point after the years we spent working for someone else. All of that is what brought us to this point.”
All of their new projects are French-focused, including the 18,000-square-foot space at 45 Rockefeller Plaza they will start working on once Brasserie Ruhlmann’s 15-year lease expires in February. They plan on opening that restaurant in 2021.
The chefs say they plan to draw on the area’s Depression-era history in their design for the Rockefeller Center eatery. “Historically, it was created out of the Depression and I think we are going to try to cue up some of that inspiration,” Nasr said.
“It was sort of idealistically built, and we’d like to build a restaurant on some of those ideals that will be fun and bright and take us out of our political doldrums — to create something that is of the people and for the people — transparent and delicious all at the same time.”
They plan to keep Le Veau d’Or, which is slated to open in the spring, as intact as possible.
“We are refreshing it, mostly the infrastructure, updating the kitchen, plumbing and electrical. But our plan was never to be too invasive. There’s no drastic decor change,” Nasr said. “We are envisioning a classic bistro where the food hasn’t changed but we have to have really good, less tired, bistro food.”
For both chefs, the key word is authentic.
“Restaurants stay relevant when they are authentic. They fill these niche markets with people if you grow up with them, and they become part of your routine, your neighborhood, where you work, where you live, where you celebrate. They are consistent,” Hanson said.
“We are New Yorkers,” Nasr added. “We love classic restaurants, authenticity and quality — in what you are eating and what you are seeing in the restaurant, and the service.”