Quinn and Karen Hatfield
By Leslee Komaiko
For dineLA.com
Three and a half years ago, Karen and Quinn Hatfield opened a little restaurant on Beverly Boulevard called Hatfield’s. She was general manager and pastry chef, he chef. Critics heaped on the praise. Local chefs frequented the place, perhaps the ultimate endorsement. Eager diners had to be turned away.
About a year and a half in, the couple started looking for a bigger space. They had outgrown the original. They found what they wanted at 6703 Melrose Avenue, a storied address in Los Angeles restaurant history. For many years, this was where celebrated chef Michel Richard operated Citrus. A series of less successful restaurants followed: Alex, Meson G and most recently, Red Pearl Kitchen. Next month, the new Hatfield’s will open here. We’re not the only ones excited. After a few months hiatus—the Beverly Boulevard restaurant closed in August—both Karen and Quinn are eager to get back to work and expectations are high for the new Hatfield’s.
Karen, you’re a native Angeleno. What restaurants do you remember eating at as a child?
K: I got into eating out very young. So did Quinn. It was a big part of both our childhoods. It became a game with me. Starting at like seven or eight my dad would take me out to dinner and I would go through the Zagat guide and pick the most expensive places: Michael’s, L’Orangerie, all the best. Quinn grew up in a more foodie family than I did. His parents always lived in North Carolina. They had an apartment in New York and would go every weekend. They were regulars at Chanterelle. He started going to places like that and Bouley very young.
But none of your family members are in the business?
K: None at all.
How did you meet?
K: We met at Spago Hollywood over 12 years ago. The story goes we were forbidden to see each other by the chef.
And you disregarded that.
K: It was like a challenge.
What next?
K: After Spago Hollywood, Quinn moved to Spago Beverly Hills. There was not a lot of opportunity in Los Angeles at the time. We moved to New York for four years, came back to LA briefly then quickly moved up to San Francisco and opened the restaurant Cortez. The plan though was always to open a restaurant in Los Angeles.
Why Los Angeles?
K: We love LA. I’m very close to my family. Quinn has moved around a lot; he really feels Los Angeles is his home.
Q: I love to do a lot of stuff outside. And there’s a really cool camaraderie here. From my experience in New York and San Francisco and Los Angeles, this is the most supportive in terms of chefs supporting chefs. The food scene in LA is so young, people aren’t concerned about competition as much as they are about growing the city. Also, I think we have the best produce in the country.
It is unusual for a restaurant to move. I know it’s been done. But why did you decide to do this rather than opening a second location?
K: It’s not very uncommon for a restaurant to expand. It’s one part expansion. Your vision evolves. I don’t think we ever thought we would stay in that space forever. It was always supposed to be a launching pad. We toyed with number two for a while. But it did not ever involve having two Hatfield’s. It was: should we turn this into a more casual concept? It always involved Hatfield’s being somewhere else.
Should diners, especially those who loved Hatfield’s, simply expect a bigger version of the original?
K: Quinn and I have very specific philosophies when it comes to food and hospitality. Will you get a duplicate menu? No. But if you know Quinn as a chef, he cooks one way. We train our staff to treat people in a certain way. If you were fans of Hatfield’s you’ll certainly feel comfortable there. In a lot of ways we want to recreate the restaurant but take it to the next level.
I know some people hear “next level” and think more expensive.
K: Not at all. If anything it will be less expensive. Everyone has been forced to really pay attention to their pricing and keep their price points down.
What has been your biggest disagreement so far over the new place?
K: With our first restaurant, Quinn did a lot of construction himself. I was the designer. Talk about a trying period. This time we have a contractor and a designer and we’ve done it before so it’s been a lot easier.
What about the little disagreements?
K: You have a million of those a week. I don’t pay a lot of attention to them. We try to compartmentalize as much as possible. We’re both very opinionated. It’s been our motto that we’ll argue about it until we agree.
Q: Most of time we’re on the same page. We’ll call up a rep from a plate company who will give us a ton of samples. We’ll go through 50 plate samples and pick the ten we love. It will always be the same ten. We’ve had friends who have worked with both of us separately. One would always say, “You and your wife share the same brain.”
Will some of your former employees open with you?
K: That’s been the only drag. Originally we were kind of hoping to open as early as October. Then November. Now it’s looking like December. It’s challenging for our former employees to hang on. As of right now our whole front of house staff and kitchen staff is coming with us. We have very deep feelings for them.
What are you most excited about?
Q: It’s a great kitchen. Probably the original shape of this kitchen was designed by Michel Richard. It’s a true European kitchen. Instead of the stove against a wall, the stove is an island.
And it’s an open kitchen yes? Is that going to be weird for you?
Q: Nah. We’ve got nothing to hide. It’s part of the theater that is going out to dinner.
The other thing that’s really exciting is the fact that we’re going to have more space.
The old place was so small we didn’t have anywhere to put people if we needed to buy ten minutes. If someone special called and said, I need to come in tonight, we had no flexibility. So having a little more flexibility, not having to say no. There’s this weird misconception in the world that restaurants like to say no to people because they think we’re creating a buzz or trying to exercise some power. The reality is, that’s just how it was. I’m just excited about not having to say no to everybody. We had this weird reputation of, we can never get in there, when believe it or not, we want to cook for everybody.
And you’ll be doing a bar menu?
Q: I got railroaded into cooking French fries at Cortez. One of the partners was from someplace in France where they eat mussels and fries. So he insisted on us doing fries. I got really into the process of making French fries. I had this weird fry fascination. There was no way to do fries at the old Hatfield’s. When you’ve got a bar, it’s another outlet for creativity. We want the main dining room area to feel like a slightly bigger version of the old place. The bar can be quirkier, more fun. Everybody knows chefs like to go out and eat hamburgers and French fries late at night. It’ll be cool to have an outlet for that and be very clear that that’s a different place.
What about the person in the dining room who wants fries?
Q: That’s always a pain. Probably you can base how you handle those situations on the Dow Jones. When times are tough, you’ll do whatever.
I know you are parents. Will you have high chairs?
Q: I think it’s not completely appropriate to bring children to all restaurants. We accommodate anybody who wants to do that. But I don’t think you want to promote an environment where you’ve got three strollers and three kids under two. Is there going to be a “No Babies” sign on the door? No.
What do you think of Yelp and the blogs?
Q: That’s a whole other conversation. I can’t read that stuff.
Why not?
Q: I sort of feel like if you were to cook a hundred meals one night, the only Yelp reviews would be the two people who thought it was amazing and the two people who had some beef for some reason. What is great about the magazine and newspaper reviewers is we the public have learned their personalities. You don’t have to agree with every review they write. But if you’re a frequent reader of any of those reviewers, you’ll know how you’ll feel about a place based on their review. So many people are looking for so many different things in their restaurants; to have some background on the person that is writing is to have some validity. As a reader of those people, you can pick the one you like. Do I like Kuh? Do I like Viribila? Do I like Gold? They are more of a constant in the equation.
Are you concerned about expectations for the new place, that it has to be at least as good as the original?
Q: I can’t worry about it too much. Karen worries about it more than me. We’ve kind of gotten to where we are cooking for ourselves. Maybe that sounds selfish. The only way to do anything well is to love what you’re doing. I cook from a palate that’s mine, that’s for me. It’s not like I don’t worry about reviews. But I can’t worry about it. I got to do what I do.
Will you do dinner only?
Q: We’re going to do lunch. Whether we do it the opening month, I don’t know. But we’ll do it. Once again, it’s one more outlet for creativity. When your menu consists of five appetizers and five entrees and just dinner, you could only have so many salads and couldn’t do much soup. Having these other outlets really opens up areas for us to be creative.
If you weren’t in the restaurant business, what would you be doing?
K: Probably something else on the artistic side. Maybe a photographer. But I’ve been doing this a long time, since I was 18.
Q: Something with my hands. Not necessarily construction. But I could imagine making furniture or doing woodworking. These days I’m doing a lot of bike racing. If I were rich and wasn’t a cook, I’d be racing bicycles for a living.
Are we talking motorcycles or Lance Armstrong bicycles?
Q: Lance Armstrong bicycles. I specialize in velodrome. My focus is on the kilometer. It’s a good complement to cooking.
What are some of your favorite restaurants?
K: We end up at Hungry Cat a lot. We like Church & State. We had a really good meal recently at Osteria Mozza.
Q: I really like Animal. They do a lot of meat, a lot of bright flavors, a lot of sweet and sour and spicy. It’s not anything like my style. Late night, I also end up at Canter’s. My buddy Eric Greenspan [of The Foundry], I call him up and he makes me burgers to go.
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