Candid Conversation with Host Adrienne Barker, MAS

I'm smiling. I am so excited to be with the famous Christos of Steve's Famous Diner. I'm so excited. Hi, how are you?

Oh, just, you know, fabulous.

So what was it? What was on the meal menu today?

Today I had some, uh, fried fish and chips. And I made some Italian lasagna, and I made some stuffed peppers. Stuffed peppers, really good.

Love.

Love. It's always a lot of stuff. We have a lot of items on our menu that we—

Isn't that what a diner is about? Is that lovely—

The essence of diner.

Yes. OK, so let me tell you, because I am dedicating this to my father who passed away. My dad loved, loved diners, okay? And I don't know if you're familiar with South Florida, but Grandpa's Diner, Rascal's Diner, Flashback Diner. And so I come from Connecticut, so my dad— we grew up, we only ate in diners. Like, that's what I knew, because I always thought because they had a great menu and there was always different food. But my dad was always friendly with the owners, and all the diners had all the artwork from my dad's Barker Animation Art Gallery. And that's all I knew growing up. And so I love diners. So I had your fried chicken, and that is amazing. Wow.

Bread that in-house. We cut it in 3, and, um, we bread it in a light breading. So, um, it takes a while to cook, but it's really— it's like moist inside, you know, the chicken, because we fry it. We fry it hard, you know. Really delicious. Yeah, I sell a ton of them.

So I'm not, I'm not a cook, so I, I really, I, I'm like the world's worst. So for me, going out— but I want to just say one thing before I start asking you questions. Stat, your staff and staff at many of the diners are always, to me, some of the best. They have the best personality. They're always so gracious and easy to work with. And I just want to say, when I was there, all your staff is just so lovely. So kudos to them.

Yes. So what I, what I try to do is, you know, if you go to a lot of these, uh, like corporate chain restaurants, the, the servers, they're given a script, right? So you get ripped and you have to stick with the script. Like, so here I let them create their own script as long as it's within, you know, reason, and I let them keep their personality. So that's what keeps us you know, people feel comfortable when they come here. You know, we want everyone to be comfortable. So by doing that, it helps to facilitate, you know, like a home kind of feeling because everyone is being themself. You know, we want you to come work here for us. You know what I'm saying?

I love that. And you could feel it. I remember, to me, I always thought that my parents went to a diner because it was soup to the dessert. And I love that. And the grape nut pudding, I like had a little addiction. But like back in the day, for like $12, you get like the whole meal, the whole kit and caboodle. So I only know one term in the restaurant industry that is used often in the chains. My son Rudy taught it to me, called crop dusting.

Yeah. Do you know what that is? Yeah, that's in the rest— in the kitchen, it has a saying. Well, we do it, we use that term like French toast because we have to put powdered sugar.

Did we lose you? I think you may have pressed the button. Come back into the room, I can hear you.

How do I—

oh, um, see the camera on the bottom, the little video camera? Or do you see yourself kind of on the, on the bottom of the screen where it says hi or So funny, you're still there. Are you still there? Come back, response, come back. I am so excited to be speaking to him. This is like, is he handsome? Is he handsome? I mean, really? Is he single? I need to know all this stuff. All right, so, yay, you're back.

We use that term crop dusting when we have French toast that we make here and we powder sugar on the French toast and the servers normally sprinkle it, so we crop dust the French toast.

That's a much nicer term. All right, so you, you wrote a book, you write this book. I love that term though, I really, I thought it was great. Okay, but there's a kid inside of me. Christos, what was it like writing a book? What is it like writing a cookbook?

It's time-consuming. It takes a long time. It took me years to write that book because, you know, I had all my recipes in this little— you know, they have them little notebooks and little memo books, the composition books, but they're small. So I had— I had a book full of recipes that I've cultivated over the years. And I said to myself, you know what, I'm just going to write a cookbook. I got all these recipes in this book. Let me put it on paper so I can share it, you know, as another way to share, you know, my love of cooking with the world, right? So it took me years to do that though because I had to scale up or scale down.

Oh, what does that mean?

Scale down. Because my recipes that I had are for restaurants. So I had to scale down the recipe. Every single recipe had to be scaled down for like a household, right? So yeah, I normally make meatloaf, I make it for like a couple of days, so 20, 30, 40 orders, you know, 50 pounds, 60 pounds. I had to shrink it down to like 5 pounds. So that was—

and then did you remake the meal? Did you cook it again? Like, do you have to then cook and see, make sure that that same recipe—

go through all my stuff on the menu, all the stuff that is even not on the menu, because I have stuff in that book that I don't even have, like, just recipes that I have, like, because I cook a lot of Spanish food too, um, because I have some roots in, in the Caribbean, uh, Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic. So a lot of those recipes are in there. And yeah, so it takes a long time to— it's like a science, you know, breaking down the recipes and testing it and testing it. And then, you know, it took a long time.

It's amazing. No, I really— I have so much respect for that. So what is the influence of your food?

Tell—

like, so tell us.

It's, um, it comes from— because I'm, I'm— my mother was Dominican and my dad was Greek. Oh, full-blooded Greek. My mom was full-blooded Dominican. So I grew up— for, for a long time I was with my mom in New Jersey.

And, um, get that, get, get the phone.

It's fine, girl's got it. So, um, yeah, get the phone.

Hello.

Yeah, so, um, like I was saying, so there's a lot of influence. There's a lot of Latin influence in my cooking. There's a lot of Greek influence and European influence because of my dad, because he beat a lot of this stuff into me. My mom, as I was growing up with her, she beat a lot of that stuff. So I kind of put them all together and then you throw in a little bit of classic Americana comfort food, right, because that's what I love to cook and that's what, you know, that's what people love to eat, you know, in diners. They want to feel— they want comfort food, right? They want, you know, Salisbury steak, you know, that's not Latin or Greek, that's American, that's American culture comfort food, you know. So it's a little bit of all that. Sprinkled all together, thrown in a pot, you know.

Did your parents both cook too? Are they chefs?

My dad, yeah. My dad is Steve's Famous Diner.

Oh, I'm new to town, so give me a break. And, but, but now we know why he's got the looks, because that, that's a beautiful combination. Oh, so you're, you're— oh my gosh, so this is a family business. When did your mom and dad move to Daytona Beach? Were you born?

My father moved to Daytona Beach and my mother stayed in New Jersey. Oh, a little bit of a split there. And I stayed with my mom in New Jersey and then my father moved down here and then he opened up the restaurant. Then I came later on in '94 and I joined, you know, I came down, I moved to Daytona just because I wanted to spend time with my dad, you know? Down here. So plus, I love, I love the hot weather.

Oh, I know, I know.

Oh, is it— go ahead.

So I mean, you're, you're— how many days a week do you work?

7 days a week, 8 days a week, 7 o'clock in the morning till 9 o'clock at night. And then when I'm sleeping, I'm working.

Oh, you're thinking about everything. Are you— this— so when you say you're busy, this is just to the regular— anyone's listening— when you say you're busy, Could you please think of Christos and be like, I guess I'm not really that busy because I will never say I'm busy. Cause that, I mean, you are the epitome of being busy. You are just consistently, what if you don't feel good?

Yeah. Even when the restaurant's slow, I'm still busy. Cause you know, there's so many moving parts in restaurant, you know, people, people think a lot of people, you know, they go and they open a restaurant, they don't realize how incredibly difficult it is. I'll tell you, like, my father used to have glasses like this. My father, oh, tell me, he used to tell me sayings, you know, all the time. You know, he'd be— I'd be in the kitchen with him and he'd be like, Christophe, let me tell you something. And then he'll tell me like stories or whatever. But the one thing he loves Sorry, baby. Gift card. Sorry, I got a gift card.

No. Oh, that's so sweet. I love it.

It's my beautiful wife.

Oh, let me see.

Oh, hello.

Oh, hello, hello. It's nice to meet you. I'm Adrienne. Hi, thank you for all you do. You're such an important part of the community.

Love of my life. Has got the patience of a saint. Okay, stuff she has to deal with. Oh, on the place, she does all the payroll, all the books.

Oh, I love that. My parents worked together for over 55 years.

Wow. So you know what it's— you know what it's like. Yep.

They spent my— they died right before their 70th, uh, my mom passed away before their 70th wedding anniversary. They had never been apart. My dad never looked at another woman. It was just a beautiful relationship. He would have loved— he would have loved the both of you. I could just— I know it, like, in my heart.

He just—

because you're, you're just doing exactly what he loves— hard working. And then your commitment to the community, I really want to know more about that too, because you really— and then did that come from your father? So he— tell me a little bit more about your dad. He opens up Steve's Famous Diner, and then what happens?

He, uh, he opened up Steve's Famous Diner in 1987, and he came, um, he used to work at a Marco's Ocean View, now it's Betty's. Oh yeah, he used to work up there, and then he found a little spot on Bevel and Nova, and it was one little bay, small, and he opened it up. And you know, it was hard in the beginning, but he said, I'm gonna call it Steve's Famous Diner, and people are like 'You, you just started, you're famous.' He goes, 'I'm famous.' Oh, I love him. Oh my gosh, voice, very raspy voice. You know, the one thing he'd tell me all the time, and it always stays to me to this day, there's always these little sayings he used to say to me, and the one he used to say to me was, 'Chris, the tongue Don't have no bones, but the tongue will break your bones. Oh, I love that.

Oh my God, that's really great.

In the restaurant business, there's all this chatter and, you know, a lot of gossiping and, you know, this— it's just crazy, crazy town up in here. But, um, you know, he came, he opened that by— get back— getting back to my dad, he opened the Bevel location '87. And, um, uh, he worked there for a while. I was still in New Jersey and he worked there and he built it up all the way up to like 1997. Wow. And my sister worked there for him. My sister, my baby sister was working there. She was like 12 years old, Larissa. She was working. He put her to work.

That's awesome.

Yeah. And my other, my little brother Marco, he worked there. So they were there till like 1997. Then he expanded and he opened up a beachside, not this one, north. He opened a location South Atlantic. Wow. It was there for many years from '97, because he passed away in 2007. And we had to close it. And there was like stuff going on. But yeah, we miss him.

Were you able to keep all the artwork and all of the, um, items from the first store so you could bring it over?

There's a lot of stuff still at the Bevel store that we have from, from back when he used to run it. You know, he gave, he gave, uh, Bevel Nova to me in 2002.

Wow.

And then he was running on the beach. He ran Beachside, and Larissa was there, Marco was there on the Beachside. And then I took over Bevel in 2002. So then we only had one because we had to close that beach. So then 2011, like right after all that crazy, you know, we were still in a recession a little bit. I found this spot up here in North Atlantic. And that's like a long story. But it was like an act of God that I got this building. Yeah, and it was like, what a crazy story about this building, how I got this building.

Can you share it?

The name— the number on the building is 2011. I bought it in 2011. It's just one of them weird things about it.

I love it.

I—

so wait, did it need a lot of work? Did it— like, what?

It was in disrepair. It was closed. You know, the Gillespies came in when everything was going up, all the values were going up in '06. These— a bunch of investors came in and bought like all of Beachside, right?

Okay.

Remember, I don't know if people remember that, but there was like— everyone was buying everything up and the values kept going up, and then everyone was buying houses and everybody was just, yay, right? And then everything crashed.

Oh wow.

So this place, they had this place, they were going to build a giant resort here. Across the street, it used to be the Beachcomber. Okay, everything collapsed, they lost their butt, and this place went into like multi-parcel banks. Like banks bought all the properties on Beachside.

Okay, wow.

Then banks started eating banks, remember that? Little banks were getting eaten up by the big banks.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Not here, but yes, you're right, you're right. Uh, that's what was going on.

Yeah. So then this bank, they put a for sale sign out on this grass here, and I saw it one day. And my father used to say all the time, used to drive up here, he used to say, Chris, good restaurant right there. This good restaurant, one day This is perfect for the Steve's Diner right here. He used to tell me that. So I saw the sign go up. It was $1.6 million they wanted for this. So I said, okay, let me just send them an offer, you know, with my realtor. And I sent them like a really low— because I didn't have a lot of money, you know. So I sent them like a really low offer, like it was like $200,000 or something like that. And they started like— they laughed, they scoffed at the offer, you know, the bank. They're like, no way, you know, they were laughing at me like I was, you know, whatever. So I was like, okay, fine. I kept, I kept putting in offers over the next like year. Offer, another offer. And the realtor was getting sick of me. He was like, Chris, Chris, they're not gonna take your lowball offers, stop. I'm like, Tom, his name was Tom Corso, rest in peace. He passed away, but, um, he was like tired of me putting in offers, you know. So finally it went to this one bank, another bank ate another bank and another bank. So the property moved into a Park Avenue Bank in Georgia, and I hit him again. I was like, okay, offer them $350,000. He's like, Chris, they're not going to take it. I said, just put the offer in. So 10 minutes later, they took the offer.

Oh, oh, chills. I love that story. But that's—

I know I'm talking, it's like a really long story, but no, keep going.

I want to hear.

To make it short, to make it a little bit shorter, he, he then says to me, okay, Chris, you know, you got to get the money now, the financing. I'm like, look, put a financing contingency on it. Give me 30 days, and I'll get the money. He's like, chris, there's a credit freeze. The banks aren't lending money, especially to restaurants. I'm like, let me try, you know, because I don't have $350,000, you know? So I put in offers, right? And then I put in applications with the banks, the big banks, all the big banks. No, no, no, no, no, no, No, no, no. Everybody turned me down. Now we're 2 weeks past, 3 weeks past, we're like 6 days away from this thing expiring, the contract, right? I said, I'm screwed, I'm gonna lose the property, I can't get the bank to finance me, I'm pretty much done, right? So I'm in my bevel store Now we're 2011. I'm in my Bevel store and I'm crying, like physically crying to a customer in a booth. Right. And I'm complaining. I can't believe it. I'm going to lose this property and they're feeling bad for me and stuff. They're like, wow, that's terrible, Chris. A guy comes and he sits down in the booth behind me.

Oh, okay.

Or in front of me. He's in front of me and he looks at me and I look at him. I said hi to him, you know, I'm I'm like, hey, what's up? Because I've seen him in the restaurant before. He was— he had grass stains all over him and had, you know, the little landscaper hat. I thought he was a landscaper, right? So he's listening to this conversation. I'm complaining about that I'm gonna lose the property, right? So he comes and he taps me. He goes— he looks at me, he goes, hey, when you're done, can you come sit with me? I want to talk to you. So I look at these customers, I'm like Let me go talk to him. Maybe it's a complaint, I don't know, maybe he didn't like his lunch or something, right? So I go and I sit down with him and he looks at me, he goes, I heard about you having a problem, huh? What's going on? I'm like, uh, you know, I'm trying to buy a restaurant and this and that and the other thing, and looks like I'm gonna lose the restaurant because I don't have the bank to finance me. He goes, oh really? That's That doesn't sound— that's messed up, man, you know? And he looked at me and goes, you know, I knew your father. And I know you. You do great here. And I love the way you cook and everything. You're great. I'm like, cool, thanks, man. And I was trying to get him to get to the point. Like, is there something wrong with your lunch? Like, you know? He's like— he takes out his business card. And he goes, here. And I look at the business card. I said, you're a banker? It said Larry McDermott, Intracoastal Bank. I said, oh my God, you're a banker? He's like, yeah. I was like, I thought you were a landscaper. He goes, no, I'm vice president of the bank and I'm giving you the money. Come to my office in 7 days. I will have your money. I'll give you the money. My— this bank is going to give you the money. I said, excuse me?

That's crazy.

Like, who are you?

God, that is beautiful.

And I ran outside, I started crying, you know, because I mean, come on, what are the chances? What are the— that that dude was gonna sit in there like that on that day? I mean, that's like coincidence, right? Is that—

that's like— that's crazy.

The—

oh, it's a beautiful— wait, and the fact that you thought he was green and then he ended up actually giving you green.

Good luck. The bank, Intracoastal Bank, the most incredible community bank. It is. Those guys, they have helped me from that time that I was ready to not get this restaurant They, they've consistently been there for my business, those people.

Wow. Your dad sent him in there.

I'll walk on fire for Intracoastal Bank.

Oh, I love that. I love that. I, there's a, I've been in their store. It's beautiful.

Bank, Intracoastal Bank, I freaking love you.

See? Oh, I love that. I love that.

With all these loans and, you know, the PPP, the, the, um, the other, the bridge loan they helped me get, like when the hurricanes hit, they were right there, man.

But they also see what you're doing. I mean, I bet you if we talked to them, they would be like, we love Steve Shamus Diner. So, you know, cause I mean, obviously he knew that he was investing in the right person. It's such a beautiful story. That is a beautiful story. Thank you for sharing it.

Oh my God.

I'm so excited to just get to know you. So what is it like? So, so what happened? So now I know that you were with the hurricanes, but COVID-19 hits. And did you have like a decision? Could you have like, did you say to yourself, well, I could close or I could open? Like what was going on in your head? And then what did you decide to do?

That was just such a crazy time, man. And, um, I was at first, I was like, I don't know what I'm gonna do. What the heck is this? You know, so I said to myself, you know, uh, I was thinking about closing, but I knew that there's a lot of people out here that, that they wanted me to open. And if there was a way that I could open, then I would do it, but of course in a safe way, you know. So I decided to just do takeout. And, you know, I'm very strict I'm very strict. Even now, you know, they opened it up 50%, but I keep the door locked. I lock the door. I don't let nobody assemble in the dining room.

Oh, wow.

And you have to knock. And then we have to, you know, I monitor everybody that comes in here. Everyone's getting temperature checked, you know, because I don't, I don't need any of my employees getting sick, or I don't need no one in the community. We don't want no outbreaks around here, you know. Because there's outbreaks popping up all over now, you know that. There's a lot of outbreaks, people.

I know, but yet people still need to eat. And I was confused. I have a question to ask you. Were there, were there still, um, like visitors at the beachside? Like, I didn't know what that looked like. Did all the hotels just close, or were there still people that didn't really have access to like getting food, like hot meals, or, you know?

Yeah, that they there was no place really open. Like, we were like the only place open doing takeout on the beach side. Yeah, on the beach side, one of the few. A lot of them just fell out. They just said, let's just close, you know. Then there were days in here I was even by myself, you know. I'll just do the cooking and put the food, bring the food out, you know.

So I— it's amazing.

And then so House stayed open. A couple of them stayed open, you know.

Oh, they did? I didn't know. But they weren't providing food. So I mean, now I understand how important it is for a restaurant to actually have that service because I, I really didn't get it. But now I'm like, oh wait, this really makes sense that there's people that really would not— you know, I don't even know, they'd go to the grocery store, I guess, but they wouldn't get anything hot because they don't have a microwave.

Yeah, that— you have all that going on, and then you have a lot of the times they wanted to go to grow— a lot of people, they can't cook. A lot of my customers, they're, they're older, they don't want to— they don't want to have to cook, so they want me to cook for them. And that's what we do. That's what my sister does in the Beverly location, you know. And that, you know, and they don't want to go to the grocery store because they're scared. People are scared out of their wits to go out.

Exactly.

They don't want to go to the grocery store. They don't want to, you know, so they trust me. And I don't want to ever lose that trust. So, you know, they put their trust in me to serve them. And I take it very seriously.

I love that. So how do you handle, like, so having a restaurant and the cooking, but then you're dealing with— so you had actually one of my favorite interviews was the other day when you were speaking, you had your black glove on. And I don't think that, you know, there should be an expectation, or I don't think people should judge. They don't know a whole story. All they're seeing is a Facebook video. I mean, they really do have no clue. They have no clue at all. But you have to deal with all of this. So something had happened the other day, and I was asked to find out what was going on with you and, uh, and how you handled it.

Well, I did a video and it was early in the morning. I did— I do a lot of my videos in the morning and I come in, there's nobody in here, there's nobody in here. I'm by myself a lot and there'll be one cook, he's on the other side. But you know, there's no— I'm not in the public and I didn't have a mask on. I was doing a video just talking to my peoples, you know, that's what I like to do. So I did it without a mask on because when you, when you're talking. Look, I'll try to talk about— try talking about a mascot.

You want to talk about it here?

You know, I don't— I didn't want to do that, so I took my mask off and I did a video. And somebody— there's so many crazy people. They're just scared, you know. I get it. It's like a scared puppy, you know. They're scared, and I, I get that. You know, but I am taking every precaution here to make sure I don't get people sick. That, that's not what I'm here for. I'm here to make people feel good. I mean, I'm here to feed people, and I take that— like I said, I take it seriously. You come here to eat, you're taking food, you're putting it in your body, and it's coming from me. So I can't You know, it's very— I'm very, very strict with the food that I put out. It's all to temperature, everything. I'll take you in the kitchen. I don't care. I'll take you in my kitchen.

Oh, oh, we're going for a walk. Oh, I'm so excited.

Oh, this is—

OK, I got to calm down. I'm very excited. OK, look at— oh my God, that's crazy.

Cooking over here.

Beautiful. Oh my God, it's freaking beautiful. Hello, hello! It's, it's so clean, I could eat off the floor.

Or clean floor.

It is. Oh my gosh, it is really beautiful.

You got a couple of tables in here.

Oh, that is in the back. Hi! That— oh, it's— oh, it's really— that's amazing. I wouldn't have thought it was that big in the back. Hi, people! Oh, I love this. Oh, oh, Dad. Oh, oh, my father would have loved this. I love your bathrooms too. Hi everyone.

Where's Harry? Oh, Harry, say hi.

Oh, hello. Oh, hello cutie. Hello cutie pie. What'd you eat? What'd you have for dinner? Did he bring— oh, is that your children?

That's my son.

Oh, he's so cute. He's got like a TV in front of him. Does he have a life? I'd like to come back and be your son. Wow.

Yeah.

Oh my gosh.

You know, uh, yeah, so that's the story. That's the story there.

Oh, I love— all right, I will tell you something. I wrote, um, I wrote an article about 3 years ago called The Humanity in Tipping. It's called The Humanity in Tipping. And And I wrote because I felt that parents, we need to remember that when we teach our children to go out, like college students, when they go out, that they gotta understand they gotta tip well. Tipping is very important. So my son was working at a fine dining. And so I was talking to him and I'm like, I'm writing an article, Rudy. So I wrote, it's called the, I'll have to post it, the humanity of tipping. And then I wrote another one about bad reviews and how reviews can hurt. I want to take a minute to say this. You know, I've seen people write a review. They had a great meal. They've loved everything. They walk out the door and maybe someone that's homeless approaches them and next thing you know, they bash the restaurant. And I'm like, wait a second, that's crazy. Or they have a bad meal because they don't— it wasn't their taste buds. Like, I can't go to your restaurant and ask for anything with peas because I don't like peas. I don't like corned beef. So why would I order it and expect it to taste good? So sometimes people, they go, well, I want to try something new. And I'm like, that's nice, but that's not fair to judge when your taste buds don't even like it. And then go on and they write. And I'm like, you could talk to the manager or the owner before you write, because a bad review can harm a restaurant. So do not— I'm looking at everyone out there— don't just write a bad review. It's not nice. And you don't want to hurt a business because you're not just hurting the owner. You're hurting all of his employees and all the clients and customers. So work it out. Just, you may not like it. And if it's, if there's something wrong with it, it happens. My God, you know what? They're all humans that work at a restaurant. It's like they make mistakes too. So just speak about it.

Yeah. Just let, let somebody know. Don't just walk out of here and then put a bad review. I mean, give me a call, let me know, and we can work it out. You know, we're not perfect here. Nobody's perfect in this world.

Nobody. We're humans. Pinterest. We're like, I get, I get really upset by that. There's nothing worse than someone. And then I'll write, I'll, I'll go in, I'll say, you know what, you should really give them a second, third chance. You, you, I believe you're wrong. And I, because that really bugs me. It bugs me, as you could tell. Oh, and how hard you're working too. It just, it's amazing. So, all right, so I, I know I was asked to ask about your influence and to ask about the book, which I did. And I just tried— and you're also— now your menu, you— it's just your menu. So your menu stays the same and then you have like the special of the days?

Yeah, I do.

I don't want to talk about that. Yes, can you please tell me about— what is this?

What—

tell me about this.

Okay, this is one of my fly posters. I do, I do, uh, concerts, like dance music concerts, EDM, to the— some— I'm— I got an EDM one coming in Labor Day. And then we do— you know, ever heard of freestyle music? It's dance music, '80s dance. It's '80s. It came out of the urban areas and the cities. And, um, you ever heard of Stevie B? You know Stevie? What is it? Stevie B?

No.

No? Okay. '80s dance music concert.

Okay.

I book the artist. And I bring them here to the Hard Rock Hotel and we do concerts. Wow, we got a concert coming on Labor Day weekend. So I saw that it's going to be a week— a weekend of concerts. It's going to be Saturday house music, the, uh, Florida house music breakbeats DJ, DJ Icy. Oh cool, and he's popular in Florida. And then we have DJ Tony Moran, he's a house music Uh, DJ, and he also does— he sings freestyle music. So, um, yeah, so I just wanted to throw that out there.

No, I saw it on your banner on your Facebook page, and I'm like— and then I saw your productions, and I'm like, okay, so he's not busy enough cooking because he has like 3 hours of spare time a week that he could use to spend. So this— so you're booking them, and then the Hard Rock is an amazing place to be.

All right, sponsor.

I know they are.

I'm always looking for sponsors. I don't have any sponsors, but, um, oh, we need sponsors, but, um, whatever. If we can't get one, that's fine.

Wait, who would make a good sponsor though? Who would make a good sponsor? Would it be— would they be— have to be like, uh, get like— get some ideas.

Like maybe like BMW or a car. Like they can come bring their car up on the Hard Rock, you know, and then they can sponsor the concert. Or like, like maybe an alcohol, like a rum or something, you know, just whoever.

I like that idea. Oh, maybe Daytona Beverages.

Maybe, maybe Daytona Beverages if they want. But the, the market that we go for is people in Florida, like Orlando. A lot of people come to Daytona from Orlando, and typically they like to come to Daytona to go to the beach. So a lot of this, it's like a Latin market in their 40s, 30s, 40s. Now even in the 20s, people are into this because it's having a resurgence, this kind of music, freestyle music it's called. So nice, it's a new resurgence now. A lot of these people from Orlando, a lot of Puerto Rican, Latin, Italian, you know, they grew up in New York City, they live in Florida, they They come to the show, they love it.

I— that sounds fun. I fit in there, I'm Jewish, so I fit into all those cases, you know. Yeah, do they have, um, special room rates?

Yeah, they do discounted room rates during the weekend and stuff, during that weekend that we have the show.

So you're at the beach all day and the music all day, or just at night, or is it like a—

it's at night. So you go to the beach, hey, you hang out on the beach, you come eat at Steve's Famous Diner, then you go back, you take a nap in the Harrah Hotel, then you come out and party on the deck, outdoor deck overlooking the ocean.

Oh, I love that deck.

It's a fun time. We had a show on Christmas. We had a Christmas show. And it was sold out. It was packed. But it was—

I think you'll be back. You'll be sold out once people know that it definitely, you know, that, that— because we're going to be done with COVID We got to get back. I don't know what's going to happen. It's— that's the hardest, I think, for all of us. We just don't know. And that's like, we're not used to not knowing. We all want to know. So I think you're smart to go ahead with it and to move forward, and it will happen.

Adrian, it was supposed to be like tomorrow. I had to reschedule. Tomorrow was the initial Memorial Weekend I was supposed to do it, but COVID, so I pushed it all the way into September.

And all the artists were able to make that day?

Yes, thank God. They're all coming. I got Noel. This guy, his name is Noel. I got Sweet Sensation. You never heard of Sweet Sensation?

No, I was looking at all of them and then I was going to like kind of Google them because I'm just like, I want to go down that path and see who they all were. I like female DJs though. I like— is there any good— you have to bring in a female DJ for me because I think cool.

We have DJ Smiley coming and we have, um, DJ White Boy he's called. But oh, that's awesome. You're gonna know this song if I play it, okay?

Okay.

You gotta know this song. It's It was in the '80s. Okay, wait, that's a commercial.

Skip ad, skip ad.

Skip ad. Yeah, okay, so this is a famous— they're coming. Can you hear it? That's Sweet Sensation.

Oh, I love that video though.

Dance music.

Okay, I guess, I guess I was—

I don't even know.

I guess I was raising a kid in the '80s, Alex, and maybe I was lost in the '80s. I don't even know. I don't remember my '80s. I think my '80s had a little something going on, so I don't remember.

It was a real famous song.

Oh, are there still— I want to see them now. That's awesome. Wait, the same band?

So they're coming down.

Oh, that's so nice! Oh, look at how pretty the girls are. All right, can they wear the same clothes too? Wow!

Oh, I love it.

An LFO. Do you remember LFO?

Huh?

LFO?

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I was trying to get, um You know that the Jersey Shore dude?

Oh yeah, yeah, Paulie.

Paulie?

Yes. Yeah. What, he said no?

No, I was just talking, we were going back and forth, but I was fixing to bring him down here. He would have sold the place out. He's—

oh my God, there is, um, there's a guy, uh, Mike over in Celebration. He brings like all the survivors and he knows a lot of these from like, um, any of the reality shows. He brings them into Celebration, so he, uh, he's got it in on some of them. But You Got It Made, I love it. That's so smart of you. You're so well-rounded. All right, so what's— oh, I have one more question before I let you go. So how do you decide? Like, do you just wake up and like, tomorrow sounds like Meatloaf? Or like, how does that work?

Well, it's just— yeah, it's whatever I feel like. Sometimes I'll, I'll get up like, and I'll put it on Facebook. I'll be like, Today I feel like— today I feel like meatloaf. Yeah, meatloaf. It's gonna be meatloaf today. Or like tomorrow, I was thinking tomorrow I wanted to be like— I wanted to make like sloppy joe. You ever have sloppy joe?

Yes, I can kind of make a sloppy joe. I can't make pierogies. Can you make pierogies?

Yeah, I make that, but my sloppy joe is off the hook.

It is. What kind of rolls are you using? I'm all about the rolls.

I could put it on a brioche, or I could put it on a hoagie. Brioche.

Yeah, I'll go the brioche, please.

And just like—

have you ever thought of getting a, um, a steamed cheeseburger machine? No, because in Connecticut where I grew up and ate at diners, but the one diner my dad would love was Ted's Steamed Cheeseburger, and it was like I don't even know if people like it now. It's weird because it was so plain, but it was like the square of cheese— the meat goes in and it's steamed, so not fried, and then a big thing of like delicious Wisconsin cheese that melts. And then the, the bun has to be just a like the hard roll bun, crispy on the outside, soft on the inside.

Yeah, yeah.

People go crazy all over the world to go to Meriden, Connecticut for Ted's Cheeseburger because it keeps the burger moist inside.

You don't— you're not cooking of it. It's a steam, it cooks it better, you know, tastes better.

Yes. Could you, could you get a machine? No, I'm kidding you, but it is more fun.

So when we make our burger, what we do is we add a little steam and we put a hood on it. We have like a grill hood. Oh, it makes steam the burger like that.

So I have to tell you, my friend David, uh, DT Silva who's watching this. Okay, so he, he is the nicest, nicest man. And when I opened up— I came to town to open up— my father, at 89 years old, wanted to open up his 5th art gallery. He had a lot of art that was— he loved animation art. My dad had the largest collection of animation art in the world, and he want— he said, Adrian, I don't want it sitting in warehouses. It needs to get on the wall. I love Tanger. Were in Tanger in Connecticut. So he, he drove up and checked out Tanger Outlets and he came back and he said, I love it. He was 89. He was in the hospital for 2 weeks just because he drove up here. It like affected his system because he wasn't doing very well. And then so I opened up the gallery for him and David, I hired David because he's so brilliant and he's an art, art student graduate. But anyways, he's also a chef. And so every night he's cooking and he's really a chef. And it's funny because I am like the opposite of him. Like, if I make chili, everything goes in a pot, I stir it, and I serve it.

Yeah, yeah.

And sir, he— everything's separate and cooked. And I'm like, that's a lot of time. First of all, I don't even like the kitchen. You know what they call men that like to cook?

What do we call—

yeah, what are you called? You are called a gastrosexual.

Ah, yeah, that's me.

Anyways, I know David, David looks forward to meeting you, and I look forward to seeing you again. We're going to come this weekend. So how does it work now? So that would just be— so you're— what are your hours of operation right now?

We're doing, um, 8 AM to 7 PM Tuesday through Sunday. I might open Mondays because I was closing Mondays for a little while, but, um, I think I'll open Mondays again.

So Monday, all your baking, where— who does your baking?

I do all the stuff. I do everything.

All your muffins and baked goods too?

All that, yes. I'm a control freak.

Oh my God, that's just amazing.

A guy who helps me, you know, he preps, helps me, cuts the onion, you know, a stew guy, a sous chef that helps me out. But, um, I, I control everything that comes out of this kitchen.

I'm impressed. All right, so I don't know.

My father taught me.

Oh, I love that.

You gotta use your hands, Chris. You gotta do, you know, do it. You do.

I love that. All right, so I don't— just tell me quietly, we don't have to let everyone know, but tell me quietly, what's a good time to go when it's like not that crazy busy?

Uh, like 2 and 4, it's probably good.

Oh wait, but it's a diner, so I could get pancakes or breakfast between 2 and 4.

Whatever you want.

Yeah, I love that. That's why, that's what, that's why we love diners, because you can eat whatever you want. I love that, 2 to 4 PM. And then, um, chicken and waffles. I love chicken and waffles. That's just my favorite. I really do.

That chicken and waffles is— mm-hmm.

Do you— wait, are you cooking at home, or did you cook it and then you bring your home food home for the Family.

My family, they come here. They, they come here all day, you know. They eat here.

Why couldn't I come from a family of—

they come to the— hi, mama!

I speak Spanish. Family. Oh, you're lucky you do. Yeah, I am. I speak kid. I speak a language that kids can hear. Oh, don't do that. Don't do that. Oh my gosh, come say hello. Come say hello like a normal person. Come say hello, come say hello. This is my daughter Alana, she's 14 and she's slowly killing me. All right, so, um, I speak kid. Anyways, thank you so much. Don't do it, Alana, don't do it, don't fool around, don't do it, Alana, don't do—

oh my gosh, Alana, she's killing me. You know what you say to her?

That's a cake. Yeah, no, put it away. She— okay, Alana in the kitchen is the worst thing. First of all, she got kicked out of culinary class. She started a fire in the microwave at school.

How do you do that?

How—

she—

how did you do that, Alana? Alana, stop it. You put a cookie in there?

Aluminum foil. She put— what'd you do?

Well, she put it in for too long. The thing like burned up and she's like She is killing me. And then she weighed eggs the other day. I go to look, she's got it on high. Like, okay, you're boiling your egg. And then, and then the worst thing is in the middle of the night I wake up and something tells me to go to the kitchen. There's a tea kettle, there's no water in it, it's bone dry, and the stove is hot, hot, hot, like it's ready to just blow up. And my dad must have woke me up. I felt like someone woke me up and said, go in the kitchen.

So no, they do that, they do that.

I know your dad put the man in. Larry, was that his name? Larry put him right down here. You know who's touched by an angel? Hold on, Maria.

I'm talking, don't— no, see, like, he's—

you were just— um, the other person touched by an angel is Maria D'Avila. Oh yeah, from Souls International.

Yes, he's not— she Great work over there.

She's doing great work. And she's just— you could see it. She's got like the halo and the angels right there. I love everything that she does. So, so proud of you. I'm so excited to get to know you. Thank you for saying yes. This was like the best yes I've ever heard.

The best yes.

Thank you. I'll see you soon. And yeah, we're going to come this weekend to enjoy your food. So thank you.

Yeah, come, come see me, OK? I love all these people.

Love it. Thank you.

Bye.

Have a great night too.

Love, peace, and chicken grease.

Oh my God. Okay, wait, wait, wait, where's mine? Oh, um, oh, I don't have my crown on me so I can't crown you. Oh, she's gonna get me my crown from Miss Congeniality. We are going to go— we're gonna go out with my saying. Which is— come on, Alana, hurry up! Look, give me the crown! Hurry up, hurry up, we don't have a lot of time! He's got to go back to work! Hurry! Smiles, frowns, don't clown around. I can't remember the thing, but anyways, have a good rest of the day. Thank you, my new friend. Bye-bye!