Industry Night: Chef Steven Fretz on Leaving Big Cities for Michelin's New Southwest Frontier

Chef Steven Fretz has spent two decades cooking in some of the best kitchens in the country, and now Michelin has finally noticed Utah. In this chef interview, he tells Nycci Nellis what actually happened when he got the email announcing it, and why his first reaction was pure disbelief. Chef Steven Fretz built his career across San Francisco’s Fifth Floor, the Michael Mina Group, and his own restaurant Church Key in LA before co-founding Coast Range, a Michelin recognized steakhouse in Solvang, California. Now he is home in Utah as culinary director and partner at South Hill, a luxury community on the Wasatch Back, where he is opening two restaurants, Montbleu and Charlay. On this episode of Industry Night, Nycci Nellis sits down with Steven right as the Michelin Guide announces its first ever Southwest edition, putting Utah on the map for the first time. They get into what Michelin recognition actually felt like the first time it happened, why he calls himself a resting chef who sears and rests a single steak up to ten times before it is served, and why he believes hospitality, not cooking, is the hardest part of running a restaurant. It is an honest conversation about accolades, ego, and building a serious hospitality business from the ground up, in California wine country and now the Utah mountains. This is a DC food podcast that goes wherever the best chefs and restaurateurs are, and this week that is Midway, Utah. 
Listen to the full episode, or watch it all here.