New Chef at Tavern in Bobby Hotel Brings International Influences

In another nice bit of downtown hotel dining news, I recently got the chance to speak with Jorge Gonzalez, the new chef at Tavern in the Bobby Hotel,  and I came away really impressed. Well, “new” probably isn’t the proper term to describe his tenure at the lobby restaurant, since he actually arrived in Nashville from Dallas in December with aims to relaunch the restaurant in March. But then, well, you know … So he’s really just now starting to hit his stride in his new role as executive chef after stints working to assist chef Tom Colicchio in the opening of Craft Dallas, working as a sous chef for nearly a decade at Fearing’s inside The Ritz-Carlton Dallas, as well as executive chef of Chef John Tesar’s James Beard Award-nominated concept, Knife Dallas.

Since reopening Tavern in the middle of September, chef Gonzalez has taken advantage of his broad experience to rework the menu in some really ingenious ways. I’ll admit I’ve always been a little skeptical about the concept behind Bobby, picturing that it was conceived in some visioning session with a roomful of branding consultants wearing Silicon Valley-casual attire. “So who IS Bobby? He’s a fun lover. He’s a world traveler. He’s adventurous. He’s trendy yet not a crowd follower. He likes to smell good and look good and be a good friend.”

Yeah, but can he cook? Fortunately, Gonzalez embraced the mythical Bobby’s gestalt with a lot more ardor than I did, and he’s shoehorned his cuisine into the model by incorporating global flavors and techniques from some of his own favorite places to visit — places like the Southwest, Hawaii, Mexico and Peru. “That’s what attracted me to Nashville,” he tells me. “I loved the story of Bobby, how he brought his world travels back to Nashville. I want to be able to explore and get better every day.”

Gonzalez has also fallen in love with Nashville as a city. “I spend a lot of time in Hawaii, and I really feel the spirit of 'ohana' here, that feeling of family. Dallas has a very competitive restaurant scene, but everybody’s comfortable doing what they do here. The restaurant vibe of Nashville is just great, and everyone has shown me such kindness. We’re so happy to be in this area.”

Gonzalez is also having fun cooking with Tennessee’s bounty of seasonal ingredients. He’s started gardening with his vegetarian wife and daughter on a little plot of land in their new home in Mt. Juliet, and he’s loved discovering other farmers in the area. “I grew up on a farm,” he says. “I really want to help local farmers, and Farmer Dave was already a vendor when I got here. Moving from Texas to Maui to Nashville, it’s been great to see true seasons here, and I’m looking forward to learning about them.”

He’s already made some great connections that are showing up on the new menu at Tavern. Bear Creek Farms beef shows up in the bolognese and the burger, and Gonzalez is also sourcing other local meat, vegetables and milk. A recent sampling of the menu revealed his willingness to use Tennessee ingredients in innovative fusion dishes like a beet-and-strawberry salad with honey-whipped chevre and pistachio dukkah, beer-cheese bread made with Gerst from Yazoo and Kenny’s Farmhouse cheese and served with herbed tallow butter, lamb meatballs served with grilled sourdough flatbread, red curry lentils, lemon yogurt and mint coconut chutney. Another great main course I tried was a pineapple-chili-roasted half-chicken served with pickled ginger rice and bok choy.

A final dish that I didn’t order, but which the chef graciously included in my bag, was a really interesting take on the traditional shrimp and grits. The plate featured a nicely seared slab of halibut served over coconut grits and plantains and ladled with a moqueca sauce. Moqueca happens to be one of my favorite memories of a month I spent in Brazil almost 20 years ago, a creamy seafood stew made with coconut milk, peppers and tomatoes that I once accidentally ordered as “macaca.” (Which unfortunately is the Portuguese word for “monkey.”) There was no monkeying around with this delicious shrimp-studded version of moqueca, which shows up as a smaller dish without the halibut on the lunch menu.

Even starting a new job in the middle of a pandemic, Gonzalez maintains an upbeat attitude. “We’re still very reliant on out-of-towners, thank God for them! But we had a lot of loyal locals at the Ritz, and I’ve learned to really take care of locals. I’m waiting to see true Nashville as it’s coming to life. I’m eager to see it at full speed and hope to grow with it. We’ve got a great crew working here, and it’s good to feel alive again."

We’re lucky to have him, too!