Just could give me part podcast. I'm John Magic. That's Gizzo. We are back.
We got a special guest with us today, CEO of Lyn's Restaurant Group, some of your favorite restaurants, Lyn's Fusion, he Oishi, Spicy Jays. Welcome to the podcast, Jason Lynn.
What's going on? Jason?
How you doing? Guys? Thank you for having me today. Pleasure to be here.
It's been a long time coming. I've been wanting to do this podcast with you for a long time because we've known each other for a lot of years now. You've actually done business with our radio station and our company for a few years now too, and we just it's been a long time coming to get you in here and talk about your story and your amazing restaurants. And I know, Magic, you've been a former restaurant owner yourself, and I know you got some questions.
Yeah, definitely a lot because we ended up selling our my restaurant with my business partners, and I guess we could kind of start right there is do you feel like people really need to be about this life to succeed, because in my situation, it was just a bunch of friends that we're like, yeah, let's put our money together and let's open a restaurant. And to me, I think to be successful, you have to be about this life.
Definitely, Definitely. You have to enjoy what you do, wake up excited to go in your restaurant and just do your thing, and you gotta have passion for it. It's got to be your love because if not. This is the only business that I've been since right out of high school. And I don't know much about any other businesses, but this business, I feel like you have to be fully committed and give it all your awe. And because it can be so very very detail oriented from you're
dealing with it's a people business. You're dealing with.
It's a hospitality business, right.
Yeah, exactly. You're not only dealing with the customers our guests are clientel's, but you're also dealing with your employees, our team members that you're having, our managers, and that's a lot of people. And you got to be a people person. And I have kind of slowly grown into that.
That's what kind of going back to what Jesus was talking about, you know, it kind of took me a while to kind of break out of my comfort zone and come in here and talk with you guys, because I'm not I'm not a great people person, but I'm slowly getting into it because dealing with working with people and with our customers and more interactions. So try to be less nervous when things like this. Yeah.
Yeah, So but let me let me take you back to when I first met Jason, because this reminds me of what he's just saying about fully being in it. So the first time I met Jason is when I went to you know what we see. This was probably like the first year it was open, and I was at tapping' Yaki and Jason was our cooks, our taping yockey. Yeah, and this is my first time. So he's asking you the classic questions, it's your first time here? Have you
ever been into any other Tapping Yackey spots? And I'm somebody that I like to engage with the Tepping Yackey chefs. I know some people are like really boring, but I like what they do. And so Jason was like really cool and I was like, I was a really good chef. It was a good experience. I really liked this place. I went back maybe a month later or something, and I saw Jason again, but he was kind of looking like he was wearing like a manager shirt. I was like, oh,
look at the cook for our cook last time. Good for him. It looked like he moved up to like manager or something like that. Right, And then I would go in there often because honestly it's one of my favorite spots. Side note, we had he know Oishi as our top five restaurants in Fresno. We both did.
Yeah yeah, yeah.
So anyway, so I'd go back all the time and I would see Jason here and there, and I'd be like, Okay, this is interesting, like he's a manager. And I think it was one of your employees or something that told me like, no, he's the owner. And I was like, I was mind blown because he was cooking for us. I've seen him back there making sushi. I've seen him sweeping, mopping, like you you couldn't tell this dude who was the owner because he is just invested. And I always thought that was really cool.
Sonumber one that makes I'm mind blown because there's there's so many there I want to unpackage, but the whole thing about cooking and you saw see him doing this, yeah at my restaurant I was the dish I washed dishes and also prep the food, you know, did the cutting. So I understand that part. But wait, we're at that time. Were you just because there was no cook so you were cooking?
Or once in a while. Back back then when I started, you know, I only had run restaurant, so I was there more often, and when we are short staff or they're on break, I would fill in and cook. You know, funny story, when I first started my first stepping Yaki restaurant in in Annapolis, Indiana, I would manage and I would funny is, during the break time, when everybody's on break, I had to serve a customer and then kind of like jump into like a phone booth, come out and
my chef uniform style cook for them. And then if I have to cook in the kitchen, you know, you know, I always tell my managers, is there, if there's anything that you expect your team members to do, you should be able to and you should be willing to do so. So I cooked and I really enjoy it. That's how I started to fall in love with the food business. Started off as a tepeyaki chef nice right out of school, and it really helps me get to know my customers.
And I really enjoy cooking. So funny story was last night I actually cooked for a influencer that we invited them to come in. Her name is Lauren, She's great. Her Instagram name is like Choso fun or something like that, and she did, Uh. I cooked for their family. Yeah, and I was really happy that I haven't touched the spatchal I would say over a year and I didn't break anything, hurt anything burning me once. It came out good. And if you check out our instagram out for you
know issue, you'll see that. Soon people they'll expect me to be cooking and they'll be surprised and yeah, sometimes they'll be like, oh, can we get the other chef we had and then they'll then they'll let them know who I was and things like that. I don't see myself being any special from my chefs and my managers. You know, I'm just one of them, you know, just have wear a lot of more hats.
I like that.
I mean, can we start from the beginning there, because I'm assuming this was a this was a family thing that you kind of but was this or you said out of high school you started.
Yes, so my parents always had and my brother had Lyn's Fusion. So I was in the restaurant business growing up. My dad immigrated from China, and when I was six years old, I moved to He moved us to Tennessee and we're in the little town and they had It's one of those times where you have a couple of Chinese families and a couple of Chinese restaurants and we were one of them, and and that, and then I
grew up in that business. When I moved to California in middle school, I went to Fort Millers in seventh grade. And then when I got a little bit older, around high school time, I started cooking at Lyn's Fusion when it even when it was called New China Buffet. I remember that, yes, that would be you know, I wouldn't even be barely tall enough, but I would have to grab like the longs bachelors a little bit closer so I have enough power to cook that big batch of
chammaine and fight rice and things like that. That's how I started cooking. But what really got me in cooking at a younger age, when I was left with my brother at home where my parents always working, and we had to kind of cook our own food. And then during that that age, I want to learn, I want
to cook better. And then uh, instead of watching you know, food Network, I was, I mean, instead of watching cartoon Network, watching food Network back in the day, you know, and just fell in love with it and kept doing one of my one of my dream when I was a child was number one, being a basketball player, but my height and my skills didn't let me do that, right, But then h and the other one was to be like a like a celebrity chef or something. So I guess the closest thing I got to that was being
a restaurant owner. So I'm really happy that I'm in a career that I love to do. You know, So no culinary school, this is all so culinary school. This is all self learning and also just learning on the job, learning from learning from my dad, my parents, and then
my uncles that are in the restaurants. And I got a lot of experience from hopping around different restaurants that I worked at, and also just really being interested in it, looking, watching and learning and then experimenting, and uh, you get your you know, your your mistakes that you make and you.
Learn Okay, So you know Len's Fusion has been a staple in Fresno that location for a really long time. Buffet. It's a really great restaurant. It was a remodeled a few years back. Yes, so what was the next move? As you know when you were working at Lens, what happened next? Did did he know come about or one of those plans start coming?
So? After so I was I went to Bullard High School and after that that's Bullard. Yes, after that I went to uh my dad was like, hey, if you're not going to school going to college, maybe you should start working. And he really pushed me to work. Not very long after, I became a tepa yaki chef, and with my background and my my skill set, I was able to move up fairly quickly.
But you went, so you left your dad, your parents'.
Business, left my parents' business.
Oh, were you at some restaurants out here? Learn in or so?
The first Tepeanyaki restaurant I entered that and learned was called Osaka in uh Cedar, Rapids, Iowa. And after that I went to Santa Rosa, California, and I worked as a tappanyaki chef and not very long. I became the head chef because they needed someone to run the show. And out there a restaurant called Heikooney. And after that, my dad, I guess he believed in me, and I think that's what really kind of pushed me to open my first restaurant. So I went back to help at Osaka.
When I was over there and see the rapids, my dad's like, hey, your uncle wants heard about, you know, one to do Teppanyaki. He wants to open a Japanese restaurant. And and at first I was like, okay. I was very young age, I was pretty ambitious. I was like, sure, sounds good. Let's let's look into it, you know, so just just talking about it. And next thing, you know, a couple of months later, I was like, hey, your uncle found a spot. And I was like, oh wow,
that's quick. And then I was telling my dad. You know, one night I was kind of thinking about it to myself. I was like, if I'm ready, I told him, you know, maybe we can just wait it all a little bit and maybe get more more more experience and things like that. He's like, I think you could do it. You got to push yourself sometime and then he pushed me a little bit to get into it, and then we did it.
It was it was differently a learning experience, and I was fortunate and I was blessed at with my dad and my uncle's guidance and with even though we made a lot of mistakes and ran and learned a lot of things. But at a very young age, I was working pretty much like two years straight without having a full day off the time I had no if I'm
had I was single. The only times I would be off would be the one when the restaurants would close in between the midday and I'll run to the gym and hang out a little bit at the gym and come back. And for the first year I went off like half day and things like that. But first two years I never had any days off, and I enjoyed it. I was there, it wasn't as busy, but when it got busier then it's kind of needing more time off and things like that.
Yeah, because this was kind of still in the beginning when Campus Point was really starting to still build, right, you know.
Yes, So I had my restaurant in Indiana for about five years. It started off not as great, but slowly built up. That restaurant is called Zakaya. It's still existing till today. I sold my shirt to my uncle and I moved back to help my dad and my brother
in Fresno with Lynd's fusion when they remodeled. After I came back to Fresno, I had been to some of the restaurants in town and I felt like it needed Fresno could use a Tempanyaki restaurant that was doing more tricks and more interactive and can improve I think I could do, you know, still being humble and everything, I feel like we could do better Tippanyaki restaurant in town and that. And then funny thing was I was at
playing a basketball at when they had Dan Gamble. This was back in the day Gamble was there, and one of the basketball players was actually an attorney in town. He just we just started talking and he was like, Hey, they're building a campus point and you guys should put a restaurant over there. So I went to look into it. My brother knew a broker, so I was really grateful to meet the right people and the puzzles coming in place, and we went to talk and we thought that was
a good spot and we started from there. We were lucky because the space was actually already occupied. There was going to be a Japanese restaurant, you know who it was, really I don't think it was going to be Teppanyaki. It was just like, if you have one Japanese restaurant, you can't have another one due to exclusivity. So we were lucky and they backed out and that gave us an opportunity to go on there. So everything worked out well. That's how I started, he know, Oishi and and Fresno.
Wow.
I mean on our end, when my business partners and I put together our money. Financially, it was still tough. It was still tough to build that capital and all this was yours just based off your past restaurants. Was it easy for you to open new ones that financially?
Definitely not. Financially. It was a challenge because opening a business in California for the first time, the expenses and the costs was a lot higher. I would say it was like forty percent highre what we were prepared for. Wow, So we were we had to get loans, We had to get family loans, loans to make it work. Yeah, it was a challenge, but I think it only kind
of made us stronger, but it was. It was not easy at all, especially for a sixty five sixty five hundred square for your restaurant, and all the equipment is so costly.
Ours was so small, and compared to the giants that you guys have over here. The big thing that happened to us we were being We were successful. We opened in twenty nineteen.
By the way, I don't think you told them what restaurant you kind of what kind of restaurant you had.
Oh?
Yeah, we owned a Shabbu Shabou restaurant in La in La La. Well, first we bought it off a former owner and the name of the restaurant was after the mom Yo Yogi, so it's called Yogi. And then we bought it. We bought the we bought them out, and we changed the name to Dip like Dip Shaboo Shaboo. And it was just a u bar. It wasn't table seating, it was a bar seating only. But twenty nineteen, man, we were doing so well, like things were looking good. I was just an investor because I lived here, but
every time I drove home, I loved working it. I enjoyed learning about it, talking to the staff, teaching me how to be a server. That was fun, learning how to play everything. I enjoyed the restaurant business, but then I would get sucked into the business part of it with the money and scheduling.
That was tough.
So that's why that's why I was saying in the beginning, you have to be about this life to be successful.
I'm just a DJ.
Like it got too crazy for me. So we were successful, but then the pandemic hit. I think that kind of like definitely fucked us all. How did you get through that time of getting shut down?
That was definitely rough. That's a whole nother story itself. You know, we had to shut down all the restaurants. Long story short, we ended up me just me and my couple, my brothers. We ended up doing takeout because nobody was everybody was afraid to work. But we had no choice because once everything shut down, we still have bills coming in, We still had the payroll to take care of and there was no help at that time,
so I had no choice. What I did was to help Spicy Jy's what we did was we did tappanyaki and sushi to Go, So we basically put a Tampa yak grill inside the kitchen of Spicy J and when they called would tell them would you mind picking up at Spicy J. So we combined Spiccy JS and he knows to Go because.
I remember that, yeah, because I remember, like I was doing some take out during that time, and I was like, wait, I could get some food from he And.
At that time SALJ needed some help with like getting the name out and also doing takeout and stuff, and I knew he knew it was gonna be popping because they always did a really good job to go. So we combined it and then eventually it was so it was doing really well, and we slowly got so busy we started bringing and when then things got a little bit better. Yeah, we were bringing me in the sushi shares.
We were bringing in uh our managers to help, and they were able to get a paycheck at that time, and we were able to kind of get some make some income for to take care of like the bills and payroll and stuff. So it did really good for three months, and then when they started opening back up, we brought you know back and that really saved us and that's in crucial moment. You gotta have a you know, you gotta have the business mind, you gotta hustle.
Yeah, I think that's what fucked us up is shaboo shaboo. We couldn't.
That's not a takeout, Yeah, it's an experience dining.
So that that messed us up. I mean, but we got.
Through it, and we we actually reopened, but it was such a weird time where people weren't going out to restaurants anymore, and I kind of want to get into that where something that we dealt with with our restaurant was Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and maybe even Thursday, hardly anyone's there. But Friday, Saturday, Sunday it's packed right here in town. With your restaurants, I feel like they're so popular, they're
always packed. Do you go through those like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesdays slow and then definitely?
Definitely, I think all the restaurants do. But I think some of them are more fortunate locations. They don't drop as much. Yeah, you know, some some drop like fifty sixty percent, which is rough because you're still paying the rent, the PG and E and your staff to be there to work. But you're not you're barely making ends met to cover all that. So it does get tough on the weekdays, which is understandable because a lot of less people eat out on the weekdays. You know, they got work,
they got things to do. But weekends is always busier. But I think it's just being consistent and providing the experience. And it's always a competition, but you know with other restaurants too, because there's there's so many only so many people eating out, but there's so many restaurants in places nowadays, so it just got to be on top of your game and do the best that you can and be the best at a restaurant you can be to bring in those people.
What are some strategies you know, you don't have to go through everything, but what are some strategies that made your restaurants so popular in town?
Like I think ICYJS, so he know, oh yeah.
Thank you. I think it has to be with not settling, like not keeping up your your your quality. I think it's very important because, like you know, the type of state that we use from day one, we keep it no matter how hard how high the prices get, like during Christmas time, like New York will go up or doing like for the July, like certain steak prices will go up and flame mignon and things like that, but we still use the same grades and quality. The portions
don't change. There's a lot of it can get real technical when it comes to restaurant controlling your labor, controlling your food costs, you know, day in and day out. Yet it's something you have to admit every single day. But some of the things that we are actually been improving on and learning to do better is I think
marketing a lot. Before we would just rely on word of mouth and the location itself, but now I know nowadays, I think every restaurant's trying to get into being instagrammable, having that presence right, and that's how we partner up with B ninety five and iHeart and things like that, and just getting the name out there, making sure that everybody remembers us and just keep we do happy hours and things like that and try to keep up with
the trend. Also keeping the menu more innovative and always spending time on and never getting too comfortable because when you have the same thing on the menu, people come back. There's nothing new it You can get tired of it and things like.
That to kind of piggyback off that. Are there any food trends you've embraced or resisted over the years.
As far as like what exactly do you mean?
Like it's certain like food, you know, things get popular or desserts or you know that you see maybe out there and you're just like I want to do that at my restaurants, or you see something that's popular and it's like, oh, that's just going to be kind of a phase and I don't really want to get on on that.
Yes, we you know, we kind of got on a trend. We had two roly rollies.
Yeah, I wanted to ask you about that.
Yeah, so so that's something new that Rode ice cream was very popular.
Yeah.
But the strategy we went with, and there's a lot of things that we didn't think about, was like it was very seasonal. So it was very seasonal, and it's also a luxury to pay for ice cream that it's like ten bucks or so, yeah, it was seasonal, and it's you only get that business during after school and after dinner, so throughout.
The whole day it's slow.
It's slow, so it's inconsistent. So that was what's kind of tough for us. And one thing too, because we focus on making sure that whatever product we provide, it's the best quality can be. Like a lot of other ones that we looked into, we use like powder to make the ice cream we had to make. We made ours with straight milk cream, California milk cream and eggelk,
which is so expensive. Yeah, on top of the food costs being expensive, every single ice cream had to be handmade and it took a lot of staff and team. So then that labor and the food costs adding up and it being very seasonal. We unfortunately, we didn't do very well. So we closed down to both of the locations and one of them were actually coming up with a new concept. Oh nice that we are working on.
I mean, just to put it out there. I was also a fan of really Rally, but I had seen that it had kind of disappeared and I figured there was something there that was just a tough business to get into.
Yes, yeah, that's that's a great tip for you know, if any business owners.
He talked about.
The ingredients of keeping things the same, because I think that's that's something that we faced, Like for example, Enoki mushrooms. We were buying them for like seventy five cents a bag, you know, and then after the pandemic, it was like four dollars like a bag and we had to get rid of it. But it made our bowls different, like everything changed. We we were looking for cheaper items. Obviously we didn't want to do, but money wise, yeah, had no choice.
It's tough to be in that decision because do you get the cheaper ingredient to keep your prices the same or do you keep the quality and then you have to raise pop absolutely and the piece people get mad about that, you know.
Right right. I think a lot of it is finding that balance and looking at your numbers, what sells well.
What people like.
So we had like a eight hour meeting today and just dissecting into our our our reports and seeing what people like and what people don't like. And it's a balance and you have to make that decision, and you don't know what the outcome is until you make that decision. And then you gotta see, like, did I make the right decision by taking this off or it's something that people like. Yeah, Yeah, It's definitely a lot of decision making and it could be right or wrong.
So yeah, yeah, Now you recently opened up your newest restaurant, Oiza, right there at River Park and Fresno. I got to experience that during your guys is like I don't know what they call it, like soft openings, I guess, and it was. It was really good. But I've heard that the menu has changed a lot even since then, and I haven't had a chance to go back in. How how have things been in the customer response to that restaurant.
To be honest, I'm really grateful that we've been really uh fortunate that the market loves what they if you what we have brought to Fresno. A lot of comments we get is that they're surprised that they can find this type of restaurant in Fresno.
Super elegant, great location, great quality.
Yeah.
I have not yet to try it, but I attempted to, but it was a two hour wait, so.
I guess I was like, this is a lot hungry.
You had to hit me up next time, and I got we got you. But we are really happy with the results because right now we are a four point six on Google and four point seven on Yelp. Hugs
and that's the highest and weather or restaurants. And with this restaurant being the latest one we open, and from opening all the other restaurants previously, we have gained a lot of experience and whether it's training, whether it's the market and the food and and all of that has been pretty much all the experience we learn have put into Oeza. So we had a really good start.
You learned something from all your restaurants.
Right, Yes, we learn about the market, we learn about the food, uh, and the and then the This is a new venture that we kind of have to redevelop all the menus. Uh. It was it was good. Everybody really is enjoy it. The one thing that we're coming out with the menu change is more lunch options. And I feel like Fresnel or in general lunch nice fancy or nice upscale restaurant doesn't do a lot of lunch.
So I want to to kind of bring that and to work on that market because if I'm trying to take out go to lunch, nice lunch or even meeting or something like that, I think always we are able to do other other places. They're nicer, they're always close for lunch.
So for the people that are not familiar with this new always a spot. How would you how would you describe this new restaurant.
Definitely, it's it's I consider like modern Japanese cuisine with really really fresh fish and sushi. That's what the sushi has been popping. It's been busy when.
I had the sushi there, bro.
Esthetically pleasing, like you eat with your eyes and you can tell just the color of the vibrant color of our fish. You can tell the freshness, bringing different things like a five wagu beef bowl Marrowby and the shrim is literally live in like a little tank in the
behind the sushi bar. So we have really really fresh sushi, and we try to incorporate and be a little bit more innovative when it comes to We have like we took risotto and made it like a little bit of Japanese version, using a dashi and kambu to make that, and we do sea bass, we do ribbi. What's been
very popular is our habachi. It's just kind of like similar to Heino tappeyaki, but we cook it in the back and we use really really great quality and of rice, different type of vegetables and broccolini and things like that. To elevate it and people has been a big fan of it. It is selling a lot, selling really good. I think people don't think that we could. We do a lot of to go, but are to go. It's
it's just as good as our dining. Like if they come in and they get to go, if you don't, if you don't, can't, don't have the time or pleasure, it leads you to go out. You can bring it home. It's just as beautiful, just as delicious.
Yeah. Has that affected you in any way at any of your restaurants, because I've noticed, you know, since the pandemic, there's been a lot of takeout orders. It seems to be the new thing. Like people stopping in to eat not so much and the whole pickup door dash, you know, grub hub, that thing has been more popular. Are there things that you're implementing to sort of you know, combat that I know, like ram and hai Ashui for example. You guys got that like that window that's right there
for pickup orders. Is that something else that you're implementing, you know in your businesses?
Yes? I think we always a lot of our business do really good with door dash and all that, and in the beginning when pandemic stopped, I think the dining business was actually better than we expected because people was tired of being at home.
Yeah, that's for sure.
And going out is you know, people gather around food. That's what food bringing people together. You're always there for celebration anniversaries. Without food, you're just going to be sitting and talking. Yeah. Yeah, So I think the dining and the to go it's a good balance. It's an experience, yes, and we want that takeout and that dining, that to go business, but the dining is what brings people together. And they still and Fresno, I feel like there's not
a lot to do. They're coming in to have a great dinner and have that experience, especially when you have like a little bit of table side cooking and something new like jpie that hot pots isn't in front of you. It just makes it more fun, you know. And that hasn't affect us much. We would in good both aspects of it.
Nice with your personal life, what are you eating out or what are you cooking or eating at home?
Because you're around your restaurants.
When I was at my restaurant, I loved eating our stuff all the time, I was like, I'm gonna eat this, but what are you eating in your personal life?
We eat a little bit at everything. A majority of the food that we eat is like Chinese family style. So we'll cook some rice, make some meat entrees, and then make some vegetables. You know, when I have the time, I try to go home and cook for the family. When we have gatherings and stuff like that, I do most of the cooking. So we cook at bunch of all different foods. Once once in a while, will do
hot pot, sometime we'll do cream barbecue. Sometimes we'll cook up some noodles or pan fried stuff and things like that. Majority of agent for once in a while we'll cook up some steak, some barbecue and stuff like that.
How are you balancing your personal life with the business life? Like you said, you're you're in this, this is your life. You're passionate about it, but you have to have a personal life too.
A lot of basketball, right, balancing.
That just uh, you know, doing what I enjoy. I think another thing is uh, you know, working out and balance that that kind of gives my release my stress for me also being with the family going uh, you know, my daughters and dance and going to dance competitions, my sons in basketball, going to UH basketball competitions and games
like that, tournaments outside of town. You got to have that balance because I think at the end of the day, the most important thing is you know, family in your in your life, because that's what kind of feel feels you to do even better at work. So even my my team, my managers always let them know, you know, you gotta have a rest. You got to get that life and work balance, because weren't it for the for me at least, we're in it for the long run,
so we got to keep going. You know, you don't want to you don't want to bring yourself out that. It's not easy. It's not easy.
Yeah, I know. You say you grew up watching like the Food Network. I'm a fan of like a lot of those shows. Do you have a favorite celebrity chef for somebody that you always like to watch.
When I was younger, it was like Emerald Lagatzi, Yeah, Marimoto and Iron Iron Chef and things like that, Bobby Flay, There's a lot of different chef and and when I was working in Santa Rosa, that's when Guy Fieri's from Santa Rosa and that's when he was getting popular. And their personalities. I really enjoyed them. But a lot of it is I pick up a lot from watching those shows, all the really techniques and things like that.
So wow, yeah, I think that's watching those Food Network challenges kind of like where I learned how to chop like my knife.
I'm not good at it, but I could you know.
Chops just watch watching it. Speaking of celebrities, is there any stories I could random? Celebrities are always in town? Have you ever met any any stories where celebrities came to your restaurant?
That's a great question right off the top of my head. I'm sure there is.
Don't you have a Steph Curry jersey in one of your restaurants?
Yeah, but I just got that auction.
I know, like was always here a lot of NBA boys.
I mean I was restaurants that count.
Yeah, we have a I have a couple of Buddy Greg Smith, he used to play an NBA He comes into a restaurants. I'm sure there is. There was a I can't remember. There was a Hispanic artist that was very popular that came uh and performed and went to heo and everybody was taking pictures of him, and there's a couple, but you know, I think, I think not not the too many that I can remember right off the top of my head.
All right, this is the Okay, So this is the final thing that's on my list that I wanted to cover. There's so I'm originally from la but I've been living here for twenty years, so this is basically.
Home for me.
There's two two styles of restaurants that I that I think would work here in town. Well one is one is more it's it's a it's a chain back in l.
A okay, but it's Yoshinoya. I don't know if you're familiar Yosha with.
The quick casual Japanese type.
Of For me, I believe if Yoshanoya was here, it would work for a franchise or if someone opened a similar style like that would work.
Taky bulls and you do.
And yeah, simple yep.
And then my style of restaurant, I don't know if there's a shabboo legit shabu shaboo restaurant.
So you you it's funny you mentioned so we are working on one and we started construction and it's going to be a legit Shabu shaboo and with waggy beef and the hot pop right in front of you. Oh yeah that, and it's going to be located right across from you know Ishi, it's the previous Wayside Noodle space. Yeah, so we.
Are If you need consulting, I'm familiar with this. I'll be consultant.
Wow, that's cool.
We got to pick your brain.
Yeah, that was actually gonna be a question. I asked if you know some of the other restaurants you were looking to open or were are you moving Heino or expanding?
Yes, Oh, we are moving and expanding Heino, and hopefully it'll be.
That place is already big as it is.
You're it's packed all the time, man, Yeah.
I think I was just there last week. I think for lunch.
Yeah, we were there January for my birthday for sure.
But I think the one thing is our kitchen is really small. Oh yeah, so yes, so this place is gonna be quite quite big, bigger and our kitchen sometimes we got our team members. We got about forty fifty people working on a busy day, you know, so it's really crowded and it can be a hazard sometimes and it's limited us to to be the best that we can be as a restaurant. We couldn't do door dash. We have to give to our weights things like that. And the longest way we ever had was like three
and a half hours on Mother's Day. And we can't take larger parties or reservations when it's holidays. So this new that we're building, it's right on the on the coda sack of chestnut, right there, across from the Bulldog Shop.
It's going to be so kind of it's still on campus point.
Yes, I didn't want to move too far. I want it to be right there because we already have that following.
But you're going to close this one then, no, sir.
Oh we've got some coming for you. And it's going to be Korean barbecue.
Oh that's another one we could use. I know there's some other spots.
Well well I'm not gonna know. I'm not just sing any the ones that are here, but there.
There could be some better ones here.
Jason's here to stay, Yes, I'm you know, it's been on my it's been on my mind. It's been on my list for years, you know, and you know this is a perfect opportunity because I didn't want the previous infrastructure of the restaurant build out already to go to wat Yeah, okay, I can still use the hood. We still got the bathrooms, use a kitchen, our bars, real nice already. So we're just gonna, you know, remodel on the inside and once we move over. So it's a
one way. It's a great center. It's gonna be growing and getting bigger and more stuff. The new Heno, Now that's gonna be something that is very very it's gonna be very exciting. It's gonna be sixteen thousand square feet.
Wow.
So we're gonna have twenty tepanyaki grills.
Wow, we're gonna do this.
I don't know if you guys heard of Omakase. So we have a little area in the back, very exclusive for Omakase that was only we'll probably do one or two seatings a night, and it's gonna be just ten people right in front of the sushi chef.
Yeah, I'm familiar with the thank you. So it's a small area and it's the chef. It's a certain menu. This is what you're getting. Yeah, and only a few.
People, like, only a few people and you eat what they cook or USA okay yeah, or if.
It's raw sushi then we don't even cook it.
But that Wow, I can't Yeah, I can't wait.
Go go ahead.
Yeah. And our new he know is going to have twenty tip yaki grills. Wow. So we're pretty much have all the state of the our equipment better for the exhaust, you know. Always one thing I didn't like about tip of yaki is I'll go in there and leave smelling like bacon.
Right yeah.
Yeah, So just hopefully with the new grills, they're they're better. They don't have they have a down draft, and we have twenty grills. We have four in the private room. Our private room could be divided into in half and they'll see twenty on one side and twenty on the other side, so you'd be more private and you can also have your own you have your own private restroom in there. So it's gonna be in. Our bar is
going to be huge. So the bar, you know, that's why people like to be out on the Yeah, it's gonna see that about just a bar rail alone about thirty people. Wow.
So man, that's something that look, I can't wait.
That's a great thing to look forward to, Shabby Shaw, New Cream Barbie spot on New Yeah wow, yeah you want to run down all his spots again?
I mean, he Knowshi Spicy Jay's, you got a j Pot. We didn't even really get into Ramen Hayashi Len's Fusion you got j T. Actually, I've been stopping in there recently because you know, now that it's getting hotter, I've been getting some some tea and some boba. Am I missing anything Fusion.
So our new Shabby spot is called Ichi Shabu. Okay, that's our new shabby spot. And the one that we're transforming from Roly Roly is going to be called Sushi Box. It's a quick shadow sushi.
Now you are you guys gonna do legit Shabby Shabby because I know legit because people, you know, when they talk about j Pot and they're like, oh, isn't that it?
Like, no, isn't that Chinese?
That's Jot, That mini hot pot is actually Taiwanese, Taiwanese.
And then Shabby Sha a.
Japanese hot pot right where the broth comes with nothing in it?
Yes, and then okay, so okay.
So I actually never been to town Magic's restaurant, even though you a lot of times now I get to try to Jason.
Yeah for sure.
I mean, like I said, I love plating. I love doing the plating and slicing the meat. So I'm familiar with all that. So in case you know this radio thing ends for me, I'm.
Call Jason there you go get a job.
Yeah, I mean the slice are all even washed dishes, because I'm used to that too.
But I'm looking forward to that.
We have you guys come out when we do our friends and family and have you guys taste it. And last you know, we got we're gonna have like spicy miso ton Katu broth and the shabby Shabu broth and things like that. We're gonna have the Waguo beef Australia and Japanese Wagou seafood and all that. So it's it's a whole different experience.
Yeah. So if you've been to you know, these restaurants that we've mentioned, they're all under a lens a restaurant group, And uh, that's probably why you're like, wow, that makes sense because I like all these restaurants. Yeah, Jason, I know you've taken these restaurants to the next level. Is there any last thing that you want to say before we like you go, because I know you're a busy man.
Uh you know, if you want to plug anything. I know we talked about upcoming restaurants, maybe websites or Instagram or anything like that.
I think I just want to make a shout out to my team, my managers, and everybody that made this possible. It's my team that they're grinding every day in there. I want to thank them, and I want to thank the community for supporting us and coming out. Without them, none of this will be possible. Then that's it.
There you go, There you go.
Is there gonna wait? Last thing for me? Is there going to be sukiyaki broth?
Yes, there is. You gotta have that sukiyaki that was our.
Popular seller, our big seller.
I'm excited.
Yeah, I'm excited, and yeah, until next time.
This could get me fire. Podcasts