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Charlie Trotter hailed as operator of the year

CHICAGO Charlie Trotter added another accolade to his lengthy list of professional achievements last night when he was named the foodservice industry’s top operator of 2008 by the International Foodservice Manufacturers Association.

 

Trotter, chef-proprietor of the fine-dining landmark here that bears his name, was selected as the 2008 recipient of IFMA’s Gold Plate award from a field of candidates that ranged from Roland Smith, outgoing chief executive of Arby’s Restaurant Group Inc. and incoming CEO of Wendy’s International Inc., to Steve Hammel, dining services program manager for the Southwest region of the U.S. Navy. The finalists had been selected earlier as winners of IFMA’s Silver Plate award, a designation presented by the trade group to the standout operators in nine segments of the business.

 

 

Other Silver Plate winners included Richard E. Marriott, chairman of hotel giant Host Hotels & Resorts, in the Hotels & Lodging category; Phil Friedman, chairman and CEO of fast-casual franchisor McAlister’s Deli Corp., Full-service Chains; Pat Farris, director of school food services for the Archdiocese of New Orleans, Elementary and Secondary Schools; Amy Greenberg, senior vice president of banquet and catering services for Citi financial services, Business & Industry; Shawn LaPean, director of Cal Dining at the University of California-Berkeley, Colleges & Universities; and Mary Angela Miller, administrative director of nutrition services at Ohio State University Medical Center, Health Care. Trotter won the Silver Plate in the Independent Restaurants classification. Smith was selected in Chain Fast Service, and Hammel in Specialty Foodservices.

 

 

The Silver Plate winners had been selected earlier this year by a jury of industry journalists, including Nation’s Restaurant News editor Ellen Koteff, and past winners. Secret ballots were cast by the jury for the Gold Plate award. The winner of that honor was announced during a gala at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel & Towers.

 

 

In accepting the award, Trotter voiced appreciation of the opportunities he has been afforded to strengthen the skills of his staff, raise employees’ aspirations, and indulge his love of serving people, an affinity that extends back to his days as a 12-year-old newspaper delivery boy. His colleagues would lob the papers onto subscribers’ driveways, but Trotter said he carefully placed his by front doors, knowing that would be more satisfying to the customers on his route.

 

 

“We’re blessed to be in a world of service,” he said in accepting the Gold Plate. “I do this because there’s a certain nobility to being in the world of service.”

 

 

Charlie Trotter’s is widely recognized as one of the best restaurants in the country, famous for its multicourse indulgences in fresh, organic fare that is still prepared under Trotter’s scrutiny, if not by the chef himself. The restaurant was the first in the nation to feature a chef’s table, where patrons could sit from their kitchen perch and watch the meal being made around them.

 

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