Interview with Service Manager and Beverage Director Felix Meana of Cúrate – Asheville, NC

Dan Catinella: How did you get into hospitality?

Felix Meana: I started pretty young, when I was about 19. I was coming back from the Army, and my brother was starting a bar in my hometown of Roses in Girona, Spain. I spent two years there, and I decided I wanted to stay in the industry. So I moved to another place close to my hometown. I spent eight years building my reputation from a bartender to a director of restaurants. At that point, because I’m from Roses, I was in touch with some people who work in the front-of-the-house at El Bulli, and they noticed the passion I was showing. So they asked me if I was willing to take lower pay to move there. I had never really had the experience of working in fine dining, so that was a challenge for me, but I think it was a good time for me to keep learning and also move back to my hometown.

DC: How did you develop your philosophy?

FM: Working at El Bulli really changed my life. Working there for five years at that level really opened my mind. I was spending time with some phenomenal sommeliers, and having access to wonderful wines, I was able to learn a lot. The people there were also passionate, and it was a great environment for learning. Soon they started sending me to consult for the front-of-the-house with friends of El Bulli like Paco Roncero in Madrid. I was able to introduce all these techniques that I was learning at El Bulli—cool things like making Caipirinhas or caviar with melon tableside. Overall, I was raising the standards of service.

DC: How did you transition from Spain to the United States?

FM: José Andrés came to the restaurant one year and saw me there. He asked me if I wanted to come back with him to the United States when the El Bulli season was over. I didn’t want to stay at El Bulli in the off-season, where I would have been painting the walls and other maintenance. I wanted to continue to grow and learn. I was always traveling when I was a director, so I wanted to continue doing that as well, so I could try new things and learn. This was a great opportunity for me.

My first year, he gave me the opportunity to work at Minibar and change the way we did service. Soon Andrés gave me the opportunity to help open Oyamel in downtown, which really opened my mind in a different way. Andrés is the kind of person who is doing fine-dining and high-volume restaurants so I kind of learned a different way of doing things. I didn’t come to the United States to do a high-volume restaurant. I didn’t leave El Bulli to do that, but Andrés said this, “You can do this fine-dining service, but why can’t you do that at a restaurant where we serve 400 people. This is your challenge and you can do it.” That changed my mind completely. I went back to El Bulli, and when I returned, I met Katie at Café Atlantico, and that year Andrés told me, “You’re not going back to El Bulli, you’re going to help me open a place in L.A.” I stayed there for a year and on that team we had an amazing review in the L.A. Times where they mentioned me as service director. They gave us four stars. It was amazing.

After all that, now look at me. I run a restaurant in Asheville and we do between 300 and 500 covers every day. I’m not a sommelier, but I am very knowledgeable. Because I run my own restaurant and we need to have a wine program and also because I was able to work with so many talented individuals and Chef Andrés, I’ve learned so much. Wine is my passion. I know how to take care of wine and experience it and more, but I want the experience to be what’s important. The experience the guests get is not just about the food. It’s about how the hostess takes care of them. How the server explains the dishes. How the food comes to the table. That’s what defines who I am.

DC: Who are your mentors?

FM: My mentors are half and half between Ferran Adrià and Jose Andrés. Even though I was front-of-the-house at El Bulli, Adrià worked a lot with me. I tried to develop a relationship with him that was amazing where he would come to me to ask questions about the front-of-the-house. I also learned a lot from Juli Soler. He is the service person at El Bulli and was the one who brought Ferran Adrià to El Bulli, as well.

DC: Where do you see yourself in five years?

FM: Five or 10 years from now? I will tell you—retired! But maybe that’s too much. I’ve been in this industry for almost 21 years. 20 more years is going to kill me. In the next five or 10 years, I see myself continuing to be involved here in what we’re doing in Asheville. We moved here four years ago (2009), and we are so involved in the community, which is why we we’re so happy to receive this award (Sustainability Rising Star) because we want to be part of this community, and the concept we created is a concept we think was missing. In the next few months, we will be opening a kind of nightclub/bar, where we’ll be twisting American food and cocktails. We’re very excited about that. I can see maybe opening two or three more concepts in the next five to 10 years and then maybe take a break and see what we’re going to do.

DC: If you could invite one person into your restaurant, who would it be and why?

FM: This is something I’ve been thinking about for many years. I lost my dad when I was 18 years old and that was the reason I went into the Army. I came back and I started in this industry from scratch. I never went to culinary school. Everything I learned, I learned from working hard. My dad never got to see that side of me, you know? I was a very bad student in school and all that. Now, I would love, I would LOVE my dad to see what we’ve created here and see my career in the last 10 years. I feel really proud, and I would love him to see that and meet Katie and see Katie’s family and how they’ve allowed me to make my dream real.