The goal of many chefs is to open a good, successful restaurant. Great chefs aspire to have a restaurant that serves more than just good food.
Heartland Restaurant and Wine Bar, now in its 13th year, its fifth at the downtown St. Paul location, is such a place. For chef/owner Lenny Russo, this is no accident.
With every menu—each is composed daily—Russo’s goal is to celebrate the cornucopia of the Midwest. Heartland maintains high standards for its ingredients, favoring local sources that also serve as good stewards of the land, treat animals humanely and support their local community.
This principle of local sourcing can be a challenge, which Russo and the staff at Heartland accept and meet with enthusiasm. “Will we ever have saltwater fish on the menu?” says Russo. “No, but that’s a worthy trade-off I’m comfortable with.”
Each day, the kitchen staff arrives at noon to take stock of the ingredients delivered that morning. From day to day, and season to season, the options change, and they must figure out how to use what’s available for a menu that satisfies customers not just as locavores, but as discriminating diners.
In some ways, working with local ingredients and the rigors of daily menu creation have been a blessing. Food shortages or less than top-quality ingredients aren’t issues; it simply means the menu of the day won’t feature those items. It’s a problem not as easily overcome at restaurants with set menus and signature dishes.
For those who may think of Midwestern ingredients as limiting, take a gander at one of Heartland’s prix fixe menus. Courses featuring morels, venison, rabbit, wild plums and paw-paw take diners out of their comfort zones, even though most of the food on their plates hasn’t traveled more than 200 miles.
At 3 p.m., the staff gathers to discuss their ideas. Russo will add his critiques for style cohesion, but doesn’t lead the discussion, and all ideas are heard and hashed out within the group.
Russo encourages all of the chefs at Heartland to find their voice and bring their perspective to the table. The conversation at the afternoon meeting often focuses on three or four menu items, and serves as part of the development process for staff members. That development is important to Russo, who recruits heavily from culinary schools, as someone who spent many years working his way up the culinary food chain himself.
Russo, who is originally from Hoboken, New Jersey, began his restaurant career as a dishwasher while on summer break from college. His comfort in the kitchen led him to progress quickly, and he was a part-time prep chef by the time classes resumed in the fall. His double life continued even after graduation, when he continued cooking part time even though he was working as a full-time psychotherapist. Eventually it became clear where his heart was, and Russo made his part-time passion a full-time career.
Russo would work his way up at a restaurant until he felt he could no longer grow, moving on to another opportunity that would bring the next exciting challenge. “If you’re not growing as a chef, you’re moving backwards,” he says. Of his migration to Saint Paul, Russo says, “One girl brought me here and another one kept me here.”
When the menu meeting wraps and all dishes are finalized, the menu is posted online, and the wait staff meets to work through pairings before the first seating at 5 p.m.
Diners at Heartland are often seeking something different, or are attracted to the trendy farm-to-table concept, which Russo has been experimenting with since the early 1980s.
Russo readily admits that there is indeed an agenda with the farm-to-table style at Heartland, but it’s one that seeks to unite. At the restaurant, they prefer to lead by example, supporting the local economy and agriculture, and reminding diners that eating well is something to be given the highest priority.
It doesn’t matter what kind of background or perspective a person has, Russo says. Whatever [that perspective]may be, “they can come in here and find common ground over great food and good wine,” says Russo. “As toxic as the world is these days, if people sat down and talked with one another, they could find common ground.”
Heartland is taking this credo beyond the dining room floor, sharing the beauty of locally sourced ingredients in a new cookbook, Heartland: Farm-Forward Dishes from the Great Midwest, scheduled for release this fall.
