Audio By Carbonatix
Say you wanna open a restaurant. You envision yourself cooking and smiling and rainbows are shining and somewhere in the distance a chorus of angels is singing. Or a chorus of Harleys–depends on what makes you happy.
Anyway, you get the idea.
We all know it ain’t that easy–but have you ever stopped to think about how hard it really is? Food business is a complicated endeavor. It would help if you had some experience in accounting, and maybe knew a little about real estate, too…and wouldn’t it be cool if you were friends with a pastry chef?
We sat down with Charles Dean Bowen, owner of one-month-old Tea Thyme & Tisane and learned how his past life experiences (none of which involve food) might be just what’ll make his new business a winner.
On ditching his day job:
“I’ve been wanting to open a tea shop for about seven years now… I
knew I didn’t want to do accounting for the rest of my life, but I’m
very grateful for it because, obviously, in running a business it can
be very helpful. I was also in real estate, which was kind of a
complete flop…but in the long run, I really think it’s gonna help me.
You had to learn how to pitch yourself and market yourself–it’s like
being a politician.”
On setting up shop in Old Downtown Carrollton:
“I really like the downtown feel. It’s a cozy place to be. It’s got
cute little shops…For the most part, the majority of people here are
very active and [they] have things scheduled like Chocolate Walk on
September 18th.”
Chocolate Walk?!:
“All these women come and it’s a huge event and every shop should have
something related to chocolate that night.”
And speaking of food:
“I have two chefs. One’s a regular chef (Benjamin Andrade) who does the
menu items, then he also does the carrot cake, the chocolate cake, the
apple pie… Then, Karen (Kitchen) …is a pastry chef and can do scones
and muffins and little tarts and lemon squares and things like that.”
On how he lucked into his staff:
“Karen was a friend of mine actually and she had told me recently she
was looking for a job…and Benjamin was the chef here at Café on the
Square…I heard a lot from the surrounding tenants [about] how good his
food was, and they love the butternut squash and they love the meat
loaf and they love this-and-that. He’s really amazing.”
On why he babys his tea:
“When somebody tells me they don’t like tea, I think, well, you’ve
probably only had Lipton or maybe a bad green tea… A lot of people
don’t know how to actually prepare a tea. Now, green teas and white
teas and oolong teas, you have to be gentle with them.”
And what the heck is a ’tisane’?
“I consider a ’tisane’ anything that’s like a leaf, berry, root or bark
boiled in water…basically it’s any kind of herbal concoction.”
On his tea of choice:
“I do more herbal, which don’t have the caffeine…but sometimes I just
can’t help myself, I gotta have my jasmine!”
