After six years in business together at Blackbird, the partners felt comfortable enough to consider opening a new restaurant … in the beat-up bar just across the alley. Sous chef Koren Grieveson was tapped to lead the kitchen at Avec, the wine bar they opened in 2003 with a more rustic menu and wine list, in a distinctive wood-lined room with communal seating.
A year after opening, Blackbird had become an undisputed dining destination for both socialites and food lovers in Chicago. Paul Kahan’s influence was starting to emerge on other restaurant menus around Chicago, and the buzz around Blackbird was loud enough to start to attract the attention of national press.
Blackbird opened December 1, 1997, and got a liquor license on New Year’s Eve of that year. Going into 1998, they hoped for business to pick up during what is traditionally the slowest time of the year. The food was a draw for many, and the design received accolades mixed with a few complaints about the tight seating.
Donnie Madia and Rick Diarmit signed a lease on the restaurant space in September 1996, brought Paul Kahan on as chef/partner in February 1997 and brought Eduard Seitan on as another partner later that year. They needed to do two things in order to open: find money and finish construction.
Kahan: When we got started, we didn’t know what the hell we were doing.
These days, it’s nothing new to go into a restaurant and order fine dining-quality food sourced directly from local farms and served in a stylish-but-casual atmosphere. But it wasn’t that long ago that the phrase “farm-to-table” had yet to be uttered – let alone overused. Menus weren’t covered with farm references, and the majority of restaurants were either white tablecloth fine dining destinations or strictly casual.
It was a fluke. Six degrees of separation, really: my college boyfriend’s soccer coach’s wife’s niece was dating a really nice guy who was a chef, and he had made them a delicious Greek salad for dinner one night. I was in school at the CIA, looking for an externship. They suggested I call him, since he had just opened his own restaurant and might want the extra help. I thought it couldn’t hurt to talk to the guy; he had worked at Erwin, one of my favorite restaurants, and if nothing else he could help me get an interview there.
