Newsmaker Q&A: The Kitchen to cook up cuisine, community

Late last summer, shortly after Beau Jo’s moved out of the iconic Avery building in downtown Fort Collins, the giant windows were covered and a humble sign that read “The Kitchen, coming this spring” was the only clue as to what was to become of the highly prized space. Ken Freeman, the manager of what will be the newest location of the garden-to-table American restaurant (scheduled to open June 19), shared why he believes in community through food and why he thinks Fort Collins and The Kitchen will get along.

Question: Can you tell us a little bit about how you got involved with The Kitchen? What made you want to manage a restaurant?

Answer: My Kitchen career began nearly six years ago when I walked onto the floor in the Boulder restaurant as a new hire and was immediately and completely humbled. I had been in the restaurant industry for over a decade by then and thought that I had reached the top of my game. What I saw before me, however, was a world of potential. Service at The Kitchen was elegant and precise, relaxed and professional. The service staff had their fundamentals down to an effortless execution and that allowed them to flourish as authentic human beings at the tables for the guests. For me, this is the heart of creating experiences at the table that blow people away. The years that followed at The Kitchen were a time of development and practice in my own service craft. And eventually I began to feel deep inspiration for training and nurturing other people who wanted to take their service career to a different level.

Q: From the bathtub salad bar to the floral wallpaper, the space was Beau Jo’s through and through. What are you doing to make it the Kitchen’s?

A: Two of the many gifts that the owners, Hugo Matheson and Kimbal Musk, have are a keen sense of vision and the ability to manifest that vision. They have proved that with The Kitchen restaurants, The Next Door restaurants, and The Kitchen Community. Our restaurant in Fort Collins will be no different. When you walk into The Kitchen, you will be struck by the modern yet intimate feel of the space featuring the now iconic Community Table, a beautifully designed and elegant 16-person bar, and, of course, the open kitchen where all of the magic begins. The restaurant is going to look, feel and be The Kitchen, through and through.

Q: What’s going to be different about the Fort Collins location from the restaurants in Denver and Boulder?

A: There will be three major differences. The first is space. The Boulder location, our flagship restaurant, is small, intimate and cozy. The Denver restaurant is much more spacious and cosmopolitan in feel. The Kitchen Fort Collins, I think, will prove to be a happy medium between the two – bigger than Boulder, smaller than Denver. Our head chef is the next major difference. Joel Ryan has his roots deep in Fort Collins and knows many, many people in the community. His connections to the farmers and the purveyors here, coupled with his own culinary flair, is going to create wonderful, constantly evolving seasonal menus that differ from the other restaurants. Finally, what’s going to prove to be most different about The Kitchen Fort Collins is the local community. Fort Collins is already proving to be a town full of support and enthusiasm.

Q: Why do you think the Kitchen’s food philosophy of “community through food” will register in the Fort Collins area?

A: “Community through food” has many different levels of meaning. For instance, it refers to the connection created through the chefs of the restaurant to the farmers in the area. It also points to the connection made between the guest and the fishing boat off the coast of Maine as the server explains the olive oil-poached halibut. Another level is found through the Learning Gardens, connecting children to delicious vegetables grown by themselves in their own school. While I could go on, at its heart The Kitchen’s mission of “community through food” is about bringing people back to being part of a larger human community – one that is nurturing, sustainable and absolutely essential to our well-being.

Q: We’ve heard that you are planting learning gardens with the proceeds from the opening. What are learning gardens and where will they be planted?

A: The Kitchen restaurants have a philanthropic arm, The Kitchen Community, a 501 c (3) nonprofit organization that is focused upon making “community through food” a reality in a different way than the restaurants. Learning Gardens are the vehicle for this, and they are easy, affordable, scalable gardens that are installed at local schools in the communities. In short, children learn to grow and play in gardens and teachers get to teach something deeply tangible and experiential. It’s an amazing program and, to date, The Kitchen Community has created 170 Learning Gardens across the country. On Thursday, May 22, we installed our 171st Learning Garden in Bauder Elementary, a school right here in Fort Collins.

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