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What Farm-to-Table Cooking Looks Like in the Mid Atlantic, by Opie Crooks

Chef Opie Crooks

In today’s episode, I talk to Opie Crooks, chef at No Goodbyes at The Line Hotel located in DC. The restaurant honors the traditions of Mid Atlantic food culture, exploring seasonality and harnessing relationships between chefs and local producers.
You’ll hear how Opie got his start with some of the most well-known chefs in the industry, and what he learned from his experience at Le Cordon Bleu. He explains why his connection to the local producers is so important, and how seasonality inspires creativity.

What we covered in this episode

Chef Opie Crooks' culinary school experience (3:20)
How the restaurant at Le Cordon Bleu stacked up (4:36)
Perspective on going to culinary school or not (5:34)
How chef Opie Crooks became part of the team at Roy’s (7:15)
Advice for aspiring restaurateurs (12:39)
The inspiration behind No Goodbye’s (14:51)
Why chef Opie Crooks is not selling a “concept” (15:52)
What farm to table cooking looks like in the Mid Atlantic (16:11)
How seasonality inspires creativity (16:45)
Creating relationships with local producers (19:31)
Ingredients inspiring him right now (23:17)
How the hotel restaurant experience differs from other restaurants (24:55)
Cooking food that needs to travel (26:24)
Comparing creativity between breakfast, lunch, and dinner (28:00)
Seasonal dishes to prepare at home (30:13)
The current food scene in DC (31:04)
A food tour through the city (31:45)
Chef Opie Crooks' guilty pleasure food (31:59)
Cookbooks to inspire you (32:15)
Kitchen pet peeves (33:03)
His condiment obsession (33:29)
Series of rapid-fire questions.
Link to the podcast episode on Apple Podcast

Links to other episodes in the DMV area

Conversation with Chef Matt Conroy

Interview with Chef Masako Morishita

Conversation with Chef Declan Horgan

Conversation with Private Chef Chris Spear

Covid-19 – Top Chefs Respond (with Chef Ian Boden)

Conversation with Chef Hari Cameron

Conversation with chef Johnny Spero

Interview with chef Drew Adams

Interview with chef Edward Lee

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Being a chef requires that hands-on instinctive approach and discipline. It's like being a woodworker; you can read all you want about how to make a boat from wood, but until you actually go do it, it's not really feasible.

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I can cook a dish, but it doesn't matter if I can cook it. It matters if the cooks, who are going to be cooking it every single night, know how to cook it.

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We don't want restaurants to continue in the way that they were. So, No Goodbyes was kind of a way to say we're not saying goodbye, but we want to welcome people back into something new, something different, something that is going to be sustainable for the future.

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I hate the word concept because No Goodbyes isn't necessarily a concept. It's not like, ‘Let me get some investors, let me pop up a couple of these all over the United States, and then I'll go to Tokyo, and then I'll go to Vegas.’ It's not one of those things. It's a way of thinking and cooking.

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When you cook in a way that's fixated on the landscape, it's a way of thinking. What is the best possible way that I can cook this food to number one, make it delicious, number two, make it nutritious for the guests, and number three, return as much value to the local food economy as we can?

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