6 Questions with Scott Schaden of Terra Restaurant On What He Wishes He Knew Before Opening A Restaurant
Read Time: 8 min
By Sophie Braker
This article is from an interview with Scott Schaden. If you want to learn more about Scott and his story, watch his videocast episode BSP371: Scott Schaden of Terra Restaurant on Opening Delays, Menu Stories, & Workplace Culture.
Chef Scott Schaden’s journey to open Terra started way back when he got into the industry at fifteen. Scott says, “The things that got me into the restaurant industry are the things I hate about the restaurant industry now. When I was fifteen, you know what got me into this job: easy access to drugs, late nights, hot hostess.” He’s ready to make a new kind of business moving away from that model. Read more about Scott’s road to Terra below.
What was your first restaurant job?
My dad caught me smoking weed after school one day and said if you're going to get high then you’re going to get a job. You’re going to go wash dishes for my friend Tony at Laudisio in Boulder. I started washing dishes and bussing tables there. The joke was really on him because it just introduced me to more people who could sell me better pot. I just fell in love with the industry. It was an accumulation of moments. Friday night, Saturday night. It felt like a show, the lights went up, and the people came in. It felt like I was in a Broadway show. My dad was giving me crap about my poor performance in high school. He asked what I wanted to do with my life and I said that I liked the job that he had gotten me. My dad asked if I wanted to be a busboy for the rest of my life and I said screw him, I’m going to become a chef. The rest is history.
What is it you love about Italian food and culture?
Italian food is so ingredient driven. It’s so traditional. I’m a fifth generation Irish French German kid from the Midwest. I didn’t grow up with that connection culinarily to my past. When I was shown that at fifteen, it was something I could latch onto. It was inclusive. There were a bunch of guys who were super cool. To a fifteen year old, they had hot girlfriends, drank good wine, and drove cool cars. I got wrapped up in the pageantry of that. There’s no culinary history in my family. As I grew up and the nostalgia wore off, I stayed because of the ethos of simpleness of the ingredients, the idea of Nonna cooking, and that connection to the food history.
What’s a food / drink you always have on hand at home?
Always have La Croix in my fridge because I love spicy water. Fridge is always stocked with tortillas because I can roll whatever I’m eating in a tortilla and eat it on the fly. I’m a busy person. They’re pretty big tortillas. I’ve even rolled Chinese food into a tortilla and eaten it that way. I always keep the freezer stocked with frozen dumplings. My girlfriend is allergic to shrimp. She’s out of town for the next two weeks so I am trying to eat as much shrimp as I can. I’m just crushing shrimp dumplings. I got to get them out of the freezer before she gets home.
Why didn’t you go into the family business?
I sort of am in the family business but I’m not. They are all in QSR restaurants but on the very business side. Their offices are on the twelfth floor. I have this interesting memory of my brother when he talked me into going into QSR and going corporate for a while. I remember him saying, “Welcome to the family business.” We were in his office and he was trying to sell me on this job. He said, “The best part is we don’t make ball bearings for a living. The family business is cool.” It was a good learning experience but a miserable few years of my life. He was right that restaurants are awesome but I hate the way he does it.
Restaurants are in my blood. That’s how my family made all their money. But there was no way I was going to make it to that finish line. I’m too ADD. The big thing is I don’t really know what my family does for a living. Like they move money around on computers and on spreadsheets. They’re like in operations on a really large scale. I saw how the sausage was made and I didn’t like it. I took the hard left and went into fine dining to invest in quality food and sustainable ingredients.
What do you wish you knew before you started this process of opening a new restaurant?
So many things. I wish I had found a different designer. I chose a designer for his product because I loved his product. I still love his product. I love my restaurant. But we spent 80% more and worked 100% more to make it 3% better. Process matters. We are three weeks hopefully from done. And there are still things that have been messed up. It just glows, the colors and the space, but I could have opened six months ago.
How can a shift in the old school chef mindset give way to a new approach to workplace culture?
It’s not that black and white. The things that got me into the restaurant industry are the things I hate about the restaurant industry now. When I was fifteen, you know what got me into this job: easy access to drugs, late nights, hot hostess, the Anthony Bourdain lifestyle. I picked up Kitchen Confidential. As an angsty teenage rebel without a cause, it gave me an identity. I could be proud of being a shitty dropout kid. We’re shitty dropouts but we have this thing.
I stayed for the food, the sustainability, for the connection to the terroir. The concept of making something beautiful with my hands. Not just once like an artist, like a craftsman. An artist makes one painting and it’s beautiful. A craftsman makes a chair and it’s beautiful and then they make a thousand more of them. That’s what chefs are. It’s 2010. All of us came of age, opened our restaurants, flooded the market, and we all failed. The business needs something new. As much as I think Bourdain did a lot for this industry, but he also did a disservice. The new role models, Magnus Nilsson, David Chang, had an effect on me as I came of age. That it’s about the product and the lifestyle of making things perfect. It’s not about throwing pots and pans. The Trotter age is over.
Born in Colorado, Scott Schaden is the Chef Owner of Terra Restaurant. He spent about 10 years working the Denver and Boulder restaurant scene and attended Johnson and Wales University for Culinary Arts. After leaving Johnson and Wales, he traveled to Italy’s Piedmont Region to study and work for several months. In his late twenties he relocated to Chicago and after floating through several work opportunities reconnected with a chef from his former years in Boulder. He went to work for Cameron Grant Chef owner of Osteria Langhe and former Head Chef of Laudisios Restaurant in Boulder. Working as Executive Sous Chef at the award winning Osteria Langhe he moved on to re-concept the companies other restaurant Langhe Market as Chef de Cuisine. Scott’s excited to be coming home to open Terra in his home state.
