It Takes More Than a Chef

Very rarely do you find a restaurant that just works: where all aspects of the business are orchestrated seamlessly and without fail; where the chef and business partner actually like one another; where the front of the house and back of the house operate like a finely tuned “order in, order out” relay team; where the flavor and consistency of the food is never compromised; and where after 15 years the customers keep coming, always in anticipation of the changing seasonal menu.

There in the sleepy Green County town of Monticello is The Dining Room at 209 Main, a restaurant owned and managed by David “Wave” Kasprzak and his wife Jane Sybers. After several years in the Madison restaurant scene, they relocated to rural Monticello and decided to open a restaurant…with a couple of stipulations. First, they did not want to bid farewell to the good life they had created in exchange for long, exhausting hours; and second, they wanted to stay married. Fifteen years later life is still good.

For four nights every week, the crew at The Dining Room serve up plates like grilled beef tenderloin with a Worcestershire glaze, blue cheese cream, fresh asparagus and mashed potatoes. Or the perpetual crowd-pleaser of cornmeal and habanero crusted pork cutlets with poblano cream sauce, cheddar grits and sweet pepper tortilla salad.

Success like this in the restaurant business does not come easy, and Chef Wave is the first to acknowledge that it takes more than a chef to make it work. The Dining Room is a family business that is embedded within the Monticello community. Wave’s mother, Pat Kasprzak, calls the restaurant the “place that nobody quits.” She tells me that “the newest member of the wait staff was hired 12 years ago and if you want a job you have to wait for someone to quit.”

Pat has worked as a waitress for the restaurant since the beginning, and she still talks about her job as if there were no better place or people with whom to spend one’s time. On any given night she is joined by expert waitress Lori Manning, whose first day was over 14 years ago. In addition, Wave and Jane have “adopted” more than a handful of Monticello’s youth, employing them until they head off to college or one of life’s other adventures.

It is not hard to see The Dining Room’s commitment to community. While being a destination restaurant, they offer the residents of small town Monticello a decent paying wage and a quality working environment. They offer the ideals of family within the confines of an employee-employer relationship. And as if you needed another reason to go to The Dining Room, just heed Pat’s advice: “Go for the sticky toffee pudding…you really should taste it before you die.”

You can contact Chef Wave and Jane at syberzak@tds.net or 608-938-2200, and find more information about The Dining Room at www.209main.com. Check out Chef Wave’s cookbook It Takes More Than a Chef: Recipes and Stories from The Dining Room at 209 Main, available at the restaurant or on their website.