Chef Matthew Taylor

Metro Brasserie
7114 E. Stetson Dr., Scottsdale, 480-994-3663
metrosouthbridge.com

THE RE-DO
For the past 10 years, developer Fred Unger has been masterminding an “urban village” on the south bank of the Arizona Canal in Old Town Scottsdale. SouthBridge, as the name suggests, is a link between the glitzy new and the funky old Scottsdale. Unger’s vision included a self-contained mix of shops, residences, offices and restaurants.
The first to open was The Foodbar in June 2007. According to designer Catherine Hayes, it was intended to be an “environment that encourages connectedness within the community [and] heightens the positive energy from each individual that interacts within the environment.”
Translation? An all-purpose breakfast/lunch/dinner concept that also included food-to-go, a juice bar, coffee bar, beer and wine service, retail merchandise and indoor/outdoor dining. Customers ordered and paid at different stations, and servers delivered the food to the table. All of this was housed in a long, shallow space that some diners likened to a dumbbell.
Reviews were decidedly mixed. People liked the food and ambience but not the problematic seating and confusing flow plan. Management did not like that there was little business in the evenings. The consensus was that the restaurant had insufficient focus.
Remember the “flexible” part of what it takes to open a restaurant? One year after The Foodbar debuted, Unger knew he and his team had to rethink the restaurant.
“We had to fix the situation, so we considered what the building could be and at the same time recreate[d] the concept,” says Justin Beckett, culinary director of SouthBridge. “The perception of the restaurant needed re-tooling.”
The team agreed that the new concept needed a consistent menu lineup. Table service would be instituted and, along with a bar, extra seating would be added. Beckett, who has been involved in 14 restaurant openings, says this one was relatively simple since the restaurant already existed.
In the month before The Foodbar closed in mid-July, architects redesigned the space, and Matthew Taylor was hired as chef. Taylor, who graduated from Scottsdale Culinary Institute, has put time in locally at Mosaic and the former Mary Elaine’s, cooked at Boulud in New York, and most recently was sous chef at Restaurant August and Lüke Brasserie in New Orleans. Drawing on his expertise in French country cooking with a little influence of the Old South, Taylor began creating menus, which in turn would determine the kitchen redesign, done by local commercial kitchen veteran Frank Redmond. Construction began in August.
The team decided on the name, Metro Brasserie, a handle they hope will alert diners to both the location and the full-service concept. They launched a Website and drew up marketing strategies. Meanwhile, new tableware, tables and chairs were ordered, and Taylor began testing recipes. Training manuals and handbooks were re-written, and new uniforms were chosen.
Two weeks before the projected opening, staff hiring began and intensive training followed. Over a period of three days, Taylor orchestrated a series of eight “mock meals” for family and friends in order to smooth out any kinks. “The last week or so before a restaurant opens, you can’t believe with all the chaos it will actually happen, but it always comes together,” Beckett says.
And right on schedule, the highly polished doors of Metro Brasserie opened October 20.