Michael Mina and the New Endeavor

Honored with numerous awards, accolades and stars; featured on television shows and invited back time and again to cook at the famed, though esoteric, James Beard House chef Michael Mina admits to always keeping his past successes in mind, but they do not drive him. What drives him are the possibilities of the future coupled with a loyalty to the people who have accompanied him along the way. “I have had the same group of people around me for so many years,” Mina says. “That’s 95 percent of my success.” That core, and Mina’s vision, one that is aware of the plethora of new talent coming out of so many kitchens, results in a product continually pushing the limits of American cuisine. “You have to bring in some of that new vision and new talent,” for Mina is still learning, despite opening almost twenty restaurants in not nearly as many years.

Mina’s search for new talent is as continuous as his restaurant openings. Clock Bar, located across from his flagship restaurant in the legendary Westin St. Francis hotel, opened in July; XIV a collaboration with SBE (a Los Angeles based enterprise devoted to hospitality, nightlife, film and real estate) and European designer Philippe Starck opens in Los Angeles this fall; and another San Francisco creation, RN74, a restaurant and wine bar, will be just one of the many amenities offered when the Millennium Tower opens its doors early next year.

The first bar in Mina’s portfolio, Clock Bar features a 70’s postmodernism interior shrouded in shades of yellow, gold and dark brown. Mina offers small plates with such delectable delights as black truffle popcorn and lobster corndogs. No longer content to create solely in the kitchen Mina is involved in every detail of each endeavor. “Now I think, that thing that is really so gratifying, is being able to be involved and coming up with concepts from the beginning.”

Expectations are building surrounding the pending opening of XIV, which looks be the flagship restaurant in a series of projects that pair Mina with Sam Navarian, owner and CEO of SBE. The pedigree of Mina, the credibility of SBE and the design concept of Starck: are coming together in a tour de force fusing the ingredients in a recipe for restaurateur success. “It was important for me that I have somebody who really has built a loyal following and has the right type of clientele, because at the end of the day I like to use the best products and there is a certain price point that comes with that.” Designing the LA addition Mina and Starck work together on every detail. “He had a vision for the design I had a vision for the food and service and everything else and luckily they both work together very well,”

Though it may seem, with all that he has going on, that Mina is all work and no play, but what he does is play and something he shares with his two young sons on a weekly basis. Juggling between restauranteur and father he introduced his sons to a chef’s life almost as soon as they could wield a spatula—bringing his boys, now seven and 11, to the restaurant one night a week. “One comes on Friday and the other comes on Saturday with me and they work all over the restaurant. My eleven year old, he usually knows more people in the dining room than I know.”

Mina too got his start in restaurants at a young age, though not quite as young as four. With a part time job in a kitchen back east he was sixteen when he knew that a life spent in a kitchen was not a life wasted. A graduate of the Culinary Art Institute Mina worked his way up the ranks until opening his first restaurant, Aqua, in 1991. Over the years the Mina empire has expanded under the auspices of Mina Group, a company he co-founded in 2002 with partner Andre Agassi, to include restaurants in Las Vegas, Scottsdale, Miami and Mexico City, Mexico, just to name a few.

Catering to the cuisine cravings of city dwellers Mina is cognizant of the difference in each city and the challenges they pose. “You have to take into consideration what it is that your guests are looking for,” and Mina’s experience has taught him that though their quality level expectations remain the same the expectant dining experience does not. Mina bends and molds each new restaurant to those very expectations and everything can change, “everything from music, to how the servers interact with the guest to even sometimes how the menu is laid out.” Moving with the trends; from nouvelle to haute; chef Michael Mina’s avant-garde American cuisine continues to serve as the base for each new enterprise.

Tubing in Laos

From below the balcony of our room their cries floated up, mixed with the sounds of splashing, as travelers struggled to free themselves from the muddy river. The rains had subsided and dusk was upon us. The mountains rose up around us, green but for a shroud of mist. We relaxed with a bottle of Sang Sam, Coca Cola and ice.

We too had spent our day floating the river and braving the heights—leaping into the swollen waters. It began as a walk down the dusty streets to the tin hut that rents out tubes and transports you to the beginning. A wizened old man writes a number on your hand, recording that you once existed: the total extent of a waiver.

By word of mouth we heard of the riverside bars but at the first we come to we learn the rule: buy a beer, swing off a rope. It is Lao beer and costs one dollar for 40 ounces.

What is it about traveling that makes you throw caution to the wind? Still, my hands shake as I climb the bamboo ladder—reinforced with driftwood and tied with fraying grasses. Atop the platform I grip the handle, one deep breath, I briefly consider backing out, then I jump and am off flying down the zip-line. I hear the operator yell, “Let go!”, but I hold out a moment longer. Right before I hit the end, before I am sent spiraling through the air, I release…I am not brave enough yet.

We continue on, floating and drinking and jumping. Further down the crowds have congregated and are in all stages of inebriation. Here the pinnacle of jumps, a swing thirty feet high, drops to fifteen feet. On the first jump most of us wait to release at the low point, but after a few more beers we release on the first swing. My top jerks over my head as I hit the water and I close my fist to keep from losing a ring pulled loose from the force. Rapidly I am pulled down stream as I swim back for another attempt.

The day ends as the sky opens up and the rains begin to pour. Lighting strikes down amongst us but we have to get back and the only way out is down the Nam Song. It’s not the rain stinging our eyes, but the splash from the drops landing all around us. We struggle to keep our eyes open and stay together as the currents swirl and pull us in separate directions. More lightning. We miss the end and have to work to make it out of the river: climbing muddy banks and gripping sharp grasses. The sandals we bought for the occasion have been swept away and it is a gingerly stepped trek back to the tin hut and onto our rooms.

Lying in our hammocks we slowly rock and toast to making it through another day in Asia, to making it out alive.