Eat It and Like It—Savannah Food & Wine Festival Guide Fall 2014 | Page 24

CHEF Kevin Gillespe

A Southern boy

10 Questions for a Top Chef

with Southern ingredients.

Fans of the television show Top Chef already know who
he is. Kevin Gillespe quickly became a fan favorite on
that show. To the others, who perhaps don’t dabble in reality
TV, Kevin Gillespe is a just a Southern boy trying to do some
great things with Southern ingredients. He’s owned several
restaurants over the years in the Atlanta area, but he appears
to have really broken through with his latest spot, Gunshow. A
unique restaurant where chefs and cooks stroll the dining room
passing out the day’s offerings. Gunshow was recently named
to Esquire Magazine’s list of 12 best new restaurants in America. Seats are extremely hard to come by, but Chef Kevin takes
it all in stride. Like any perfectionist, there is always a lot more
work to do, lots of things he feels he and his staff can do better
to improve the dining experience.

trying to do something great

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by Jesse Blanco

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Where did the idea for Gunshow come from?
Really the major goal was to get the cooks into the
dining room. I wanted to figure out a way to ensure
that the people who are serving the food are the
people who are preparing the food. I felt like they
could tell the story of the dish a lot better.

Not as long as you would think, honestly. We
were so inspired by Dim Sum and by the Brazilian
Churrasceria, steakhouse model that I felt confident
that I could make it work. There were kinks, there
were bugs that had to be worked out. There’s still
bugs that have to be worked out. It’s something
that felt right. My gut instinct said to me ‘This is
a good idea, let’s just go with it.’ It was hard to
put on paper. It was hard to translate to people
who weren’t part of the vision, but I knew from the
beginning how it should look.

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I really hope it does well. I know that there are those
of us like myself that are very intrigued to see what
happens in Savannah. As a born and bred Georgian, I want it to be very successful and would very
much like to discuss the idea of doing something
down there myself. Once I’m big enough to be able
to make something like that happen. But I hope for
the sake of everyone involved, including the city of
Savannah, that something like that does well.

Congratulations on your nod from Esquire. 
I’m sure the phone has started ringing, huh?
We’ve been fortunate to be full every single day. We
open reservation one month out and we fill up pretty
much one month out. It’s been like that since shortly
after we opened. It makes me feel great that so many
people have thought so highly of us. When I decided
to do Gunshow I said ‘It’s something I care about,
something I feel strongly about and I hope that it’s
successful.’ And it’s been so much more than that.

How long did it take to put that concept together?

Kevin Gillespe will be participating in the Savannah
Food and Wine Festival’s James Beard Foundation
Celebrity Chef Tour at The Mansion on Forsyth Park.
For more information on that event, click here.

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Some chef in Atlanta that is off the radar right now?

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Are you a beer or a wine guy?

What is your guilty pleasure to eat after a long
day and night at work?

That said, who are your favorites in Atlanta?
You know what? I have found that I’ve become
kind of a stickler for it. My first cooking job ever
was at a place called The Chicken Coop that
only made hot wings and I’m convinced that I can
make better ones, so I tend to just make ‘em for
myself. That’s not to say that when I go out I won’t
order them. If you have wings on your menu? 97%
of the time if I am at your place, I will order them. I
tend to favor my own because the sauce.

Top Chef. As much fun as you thought it would be?
Or more work than you thought it would be?
Oh, gosh. So much more work. I would not call it fun
to tape Top Chef. Grueling. That’s the best word for
it. That’s not to say I didn’t make friends. I’m glad I
did it, but it’s not a walk in the park, by any stretch.

I love Buffalo style hot wings. Chicken wings.
Whatever you wanna call them. Maybe my
favorite food. Certainly my favorite junk food.

Are you surprised that it took this long for
Savannah to get a legit Food and Wine Festival?
You know, it’s funny, I think Savannah is a very
charming city so it does surprise me that it has
taken that long in many ways. Simultaneously, I
know that Savannah has struggled to a certain
degree with having restaurants of a certain caliber.
They’ve had some that have been very successful
and others that haven’t. That’s the story of any
city. I guess it’s just right time, right place. I think
it’s long overdue.

Do you think Hugh (Acheson) sticking his flag in
here is gonna do wonders for this town?

Man, there’s so many of them that are really, really
good that don’t get the credit that they deserve. I think,
probably, one of the best chefs in the city, and granted, I know I’m gonna catch s*** for this, because
the guys are gonna be like ‘Why didn’t you say my
name?’ So, excluding the people who work for me,
because it’s not fair…E.J. Hodgekinson at JCT Kitchen.
He has so much talent. Order his specials. It doesn’t
matter what they are, they are gonna be awesome.

I am both actually. I grew up with my dad brewing
beer. So I consider myself to be a very educated beer
guy. I also tend to sway toward European beers more
than American beers a lot of the time. With wine, it’s
a newer passion. I’ve developed it in the business.
I love understanding food and wine and the way
they come together. So I kinda tread the line right in
between with both. It’s one of the things people don’t
know about me is that I’ve spent a lot of years educating myself &