07/27/2026
All the feels…although in 1999 I was still in high school but at the time I was working at north end diner!! Our friend George has it right though…our industry is ever changing and may never fully recover!!! Now I need to get over to Wong’s chopsticks, goodsons for some wings and Faustino’s for some tacos!! If you’re going out to eat try to go local because $40 in our pockets rather than Wendy’s or McDonald’s helps keep your neighborhoods alive!!! We are where the memories are made, we sponsor your local events and we give your kids their first jobs!! ❤️❤️❤️
The Summer of 1999
Sometimes I wonder if we knew.
I don’t think we did.
The summer of 1999 feels, at least to me, like one of the last great moments before everything changed. Maybe every generation eventually looks back and says, “Those were the good old days.” Maybe that’s just how memory works. We only recognize the good old days after they’re gone.
For those of us in the restaurant business, life was different then.
Restaurants were still a little like the Wild West. We lived by our own rules. We worked while everyone else celebrated birthdays, holidays, weekends and nights. We missed weddings, family dinners and football games. And somehow, we loved every minute of it. I wouldn’t have traded that life for any other profession.
It wasn’t romanticized then.
A year or so later, Anthony Bourdain would publish Kitchen Confidential. At the time, I remember almost being annoyed that somebody was pulling back the curtain on our little secret society. Looking back now, it’s funny to think about. I had no idea Anthony Bourdain would eventually become one of my heroes. In many ways, he became our spokesman, our leader, our commander in chief, reminding the world why cooks, bakers and restaurant people mattered.
By then, I had taken a break from the chef world to concentrate on the craft of baking. I was a baker.
Bread occupied my thoughts then, just as it still does today. Bread is alive. It breathes. It changes with the weather, the humidity, the flour, the seasons and sometimes simply because it feels like changing. Making great bread every day, especially in volume, isn’t for the faint of heart. It demands obsession, patience and humility. Every baker knows the dough is always in charge.
Des Moines had an incredible food scene in those years.
It was a decade or so after pioneers like Babe Bisignano, Noah, Guido, Mike LaValle and Mike Steinmetz had helped build the city’s restaurant culture. A new generation was beginning to emerge while still respecting the old guard.
My favorite pizza places were Bordenaro’s, La Pizza House, Scornovacca’s, Corigliano’s, Felix & Oscar’s and Chuck’s.
You could grab a sandwich at B&B Grocery or South Union Bread Café. We didn’t even have a sign on the building, but somehow people always found us.
Who didn’t love Mr. Filet?
You could stop at George the Chili King, Bauder’s Pharmacy or King Ying Low and know exactly what you were getting because those places never tried to be anything other than themselves.
The State Fair still felt like the State Fair I grew up with.
You could get a Jennie Grinder, a Crescente, J.R.’s Little Donuts or a Hardenbrooks Polish sausage loaded with grilled peppers and onions. It was familiar. It was comforting. It was Iowa.
Sam & Gabe’s was one of my favorite restaurants.
Fancy Breads was still baking from the old Krispy Krust tradition. Just a few years earlier, Funaro’s Italian Bakery had been baking across from South Union Bakery.
Larry Cleverley and his wife Beth were downtown at the Farmers’ Market. I shared a booth there with South Union Bakery, alongside Michael Leo, who is still there today selling pastries and sausages.
Life was simple.
Work wasn’t especially profitable, but I was baking bread, making sandwiches and having fun. The restaurant community felt small enough that everybody knew everybody. We rooted for one another.
Food itself was changing.
Our culinary world was getting bigger. New ingredients, new techniques and new ideas were arriving, but we still had one foot planted firmly in the old traditions.
Then came the new century.
We all wondered whether Y2K would shut the world down when the clock struck midnight.
It didn’t.
Instead, life changed in ways none of us could have imagined.
September 11.
Wars.
A country that seemed increasingly divided.
Social media.
A worldwide pandemic that nearly brought the restaurant industry to its knees. Even today, I don’t think we’ve fully recovered.
Restaurants continue to disappear at an alarming rate. Every week seems to bring another obituary for another place that meant something to somebody.
When I think back to the summer of 1999, I think of it almost as our culinary version of American Graffiti. We didn’t know it at the time, but we were living through the final chapter of one era before another began.
I worry about my brothers and sisters in this business.
I wonder what’s next for us.
I pray we all make it to the other side, though sadly I know some won’t.
The future isn’t ours to control. We can only do our best, take care of each other and trust that God has a plan.
If there’s a restaurant you loved years ago that’s still around, go back.
Order the thing you always ordered.
Sit in the same booth if it’s still there.
Remember what brought you through those doors in the first place.
Those places aren’t just businesses.
They’re part of our story.
If we want them to be part of our future, we have to keep showing up.
