When the Detroit Athletic Club (DAC) began planning its first major kitchen renovation since 1947, CEO and Executive Manager Charles Johnson sat down with Executive Chef Shawn Loving, CMC, to discuss incorporating a chef’s table into the plans.
Loving liked the idea, but he had a few stipulations.
“I believed a couple of things should happen,” says Loving: “It [should] feel exclusive, and it [should] feel like an actual, true dining room inside of the kitchen. I felt like it would really give the diners, the members, an experience of feeling like they are in the kitchen, yet quiet enough to where the whole aura would feel unique to them.”
“I also told him it would force the kitchen to always be on its toes,” adds Loving, “always striving to be clean and organized.”
Long story short, Loving says, Table 1915 was born.
“It’s come together very nicely,” says Loving. “My concern was how we would balance the attention to detail when we’re doing a party of 300 and other events—but we’ve had our fair share so far to where we can see that it is working. We’re very pleased with the flow of it.”
Club + Resort Chef (C+RC): Tell us about the unveiling. What was it like to have former DAC chefs present?
Shawn Loving (SL): I asked the club if we could put a mural in. I wanted to have a mural on culinarians or chefs in the world who I thought were heavily influential, who’ve impacted our thoughts on cooking. That’s the top layer of the mural, and the bottom layer of the mural is chefs who worked at the club here. I wanted them to be celebrated for what they’ve done here at the club. I tried so hard for my my photo to not be in it. I didn’t want it to feel like I designed the mural to have me in it. It’s just not the way that I am. But the club did not want me to spend the time doing all the work that was necessary to build this kitchen and not be in it, so they put me in it still.
But I worked with the artist to design it. [And] I brought [the chefs] here and surprised them—they knew nothing of it [beforehand]. And we had hotel room accommodations for them here, and then we did a beautiful dinner in tribute to them, with their spouses and other key executives that have worked here at the property.
C+RC: Can you talk about the menu-planning process for Table 1915?
SL: In a nutshell, I don’t have premade menus. I utilize Canva to to create nice menus that I feel inspired by, or food that I would like to cook—that might be an ingredient or two, or something in season. I usually [provide] about five courses total. And I send mignardise along with a special box that has ‘1915’ on it as ‘thank you for coming.’
I write my menu the same week. Let’s say the dinner experience might be on a Friday night. I build the menu on Friday of the week prior, then send to the host to ask [about] any restrictions or anything that they would prefer me not do within the menu I wrote, and they send it back. One sent the menu back and said, ‘Excellent. I just don’t really eat the flavors of curry, but I’m very inspired by the dish itself. So please keep the dish, but can you alter that spice?’ No problem. Those are the kinds of conversations we have. But it’s been very imagination-based, and the members have taken to it very much.
C+RC: How often do you expect to host chef’s tables? How has it been going so far?
SL: Our goal is to be at 90% occupancy. Now that it’s up and launched, we’re getting pretty close. It’s booking pretty strongly now.
You know, I didn’t open it cold turkey. I made sure that I had a dinner with our executive manager, with our assistant GM, with our food and beverage director, our director of banquets. I let them fully critique it, to tell me what we need to do better. I took all those bullet points and notes and then started to tweak it immediately.
I don’t have an ego; I just want individuals to be pleased with what we’re attempting to do and the type of food we’re doing.
It’s one thing when you walk into a dining room of a club or an event, and someone wants to talk with you about a meal or something that they didn’t care for. But it’s different when they’re actually watching you plate something up, maybe eight feet from the room. And you walk in there to ask them how they’re enjoying their experience so far, you get upfront and personal. You have to be pretty humble and and take away all of the ego.
C+RC: That must be a great learning experience for your team as well.
SL: Yes, I’ve noticed a lot more detail in my team. I’ve noticed them want to look more pristine. I’ll pick up a mop; I expect for them to stay clean just the same. Certain things rub off on people, and I think Table 1915 has rubbed off in that regard on my culinary team.
