Ron Lynch – President of The Tilted KiltThe Tilted Kilt is a Celtic-themed sports pub featuring waitresses wearing sexy tartan outfits, known as Kilt Girls. Ron Lynch has been in the food business for many years. He heard of The Tilted Kilt, which started in the Rio Casino in Las Vegas. He bought the name “The Tilted Kilt” and started his first pub. Now it is one of the fastest growing sports bars in the United States with over 4,000 employees and 70 pubs. Ron’s daughter is the Director of Social Media and his wife is the Director of Corporate Relations. Ron’s father was his inspiration and his cheerleader. The year Ron started the business, his father passed away unexpectedly. For his undercover mission, Lynch posed as Ryan Good, a failed sporting goods store owner from San Diego.
Stanley Licairac - Corporate Chef - "Havana Central"
As Havana Central’s first employee dating back to April 2002, there’s nothing more heart-warming for Licairac than pleasing his customers. “The majority of people who come to our restaurant will look at the food descriptions on the menu and say, ‘Wow, this is really like my mother’s cooking. I’ll definitely come back here with my family!’ Or they’ll say, ‘This Arroz con Pollo is different, but the taste and the flavor is definitely something I’m familiar with and it brings me back to ... When I was a kid.’ And when they say things like this—which happens every week—that’s it for me!”
With three locations, each with its own unique personality and distinct clientele, Havana Central has been bringing real-Cuban cooking to New York since 2002. (The Union Square location will be celebrating its seventh anniversary this June 2009). The restaurants evoke Cuba’s golden era, when its namesake city was one of the world’s most tantalizing playgrounds. Walking into the swanky circa 1950’s Havana nightspot setting is to be transported to another place and time.
Brooklyn born and raised, the 38-year-old Licairac could barely see over the counter when he started learning the food ways of a Latin kitchen in his father’s deli. By the time he was 11, Licairac’s Dominican Republic-born father and Puerto Rican mother were living out the American Dream, having purchased the Midtown Manhattan deli in which the senior Licairac had once worked. “It was the first deli in Manhattan to offer such now familiar staples as picadillo and oxtail stew,” says Licairac.
By the time he was 19-years-old, Licairac began his own culinary career as silent partner, cook and waiter of Burritos Tin Tan on the Upper West Side. At Licairac’s insistence, the restaurant was distinguished from the profusion of Tex Mex operations by its dedication to authentic Mexican fare.
A few years later, Licairac persuaded his parents to come out of retirement to open a Mexican restaurant with him in Forrest Hills, Queens. At the very successful Burrito Heaven, Licairac continued his journeyman chef education, mastering a Caribbean-oriented Mexican repertoire, with the help of family recipes that taught him the flexibility of a simple foundation. Twenty-four months later the family sold the restaurant, and Licairac joined the Cabana Restaurants organization, where he took on front-of-house managerial responsibilities, as well as elevating the kitchen operations.
Toward the end of his three-and-a-half year tenure with Cabana, Licairac came to the attention of Jeremy Merrin, who had a vision for the creation of an authentic Cuban restaurant several cuts above the typical storefront variety. A novice to the restaurant industry, Merrin knew he needed a chef and a manager with experience and credibility in the Latin culinary community. He found both in Licairac.
Furthermore, Licairac was armed with a treasure trove of family recipes that would help define the character Merrin wanted to create for Havana Central, that of comforting home-style cooking. “It’s very family-oriented here. To this day I’ll call my mother and grandmother every day in Florida and we’ll test new dishes in our kitchens and check in with each other the following day. Also, we have 230 employees at Havana Central and most have a Latin American background — Cuban, Colombian, Puerto Rican, Dominican — and I ask them to taste everything. If 230 people give their seal of approval, I’m good!”
Aside from continuously reading anything he can get his hands on about Cuban cooking, Licairac finds the inspiration to work 12-16 hour days by feeding off the enthusiasm of everyone around him. “Everyone in our restaurants, from the cooks to the dishwashers, everyone has to be passionate about what they do. I will ask each of them every single day, ‘What would you like to see on the menu?’ And I will take bits and pieces of what they say and I’ll Cubanize it!”
According to Licairac, creating high-quality, authentic Cuban cuisine boils down to one main ingredient: Passion. “When it comes down to it, Cuban food is all about salt, pepper and garlic—it’s very basic. But real Cuban cooking is deeper than that. Take white rice, for example. You don’t just cook the rice and come back when it’s done. You have to watch over it, stir it, taste it, and nurture it. And that’s where the passion comes in. Latin American people are very warm and loving and that’s exactly the flair I put into all of my cooking.”