Hi, I'm Chef Lee Burton.

I'm a chef and a culinary instructor.

But more than anything, I'm a supporter of everything local.

My passion and my pallete usually lead me to a locally owned restaurant, because to me, they're the lifeblood of every community.

Owning and operating a restaurant certainly comes with its share of challenges.

On Go Local Lee we'll give you an insider's view of the restaurant business from operations and interviews with the owners.

To visits with the chef in the kitchen.

Great to be with you Jon Darby thank you for letting us come in and film and tell your story here about Darbys one of Redlands local favorites.

Of course.

Thank you for having me.

So take us back to the beginning, way before opening Darby's.

And your motivation for wanting to open a restaurant in Redlands?

Well, I started I was working at Capitol Records in Hollywood, and the band I was working with was out on tour, and I didn't have a whole lot to do.

And a friend of mine was bartending at a place called Club Max So it was a nightclub owned by Sylvester Stallone and Dolph Lundgren.

And he said, Ask me if I wanted to come bar back.

And I said, Sure.

Make a little extra money or whatever.

And within like three weeks I was already bartending because they needed somebody.

And about maybe three or four months later, my mom owned a small little bar and restaurant in San Bernardino called Celebrities.

And she they got rid of one of the bartenders and she asked me if I'd come in one or two nights a week and help her out and bartend.

And to tell you the truth, I really didn't want to I didn't want to come back here.

I was having a great time in L.A. and having fun and looking forward to hopefully still working with Capitol Records after the band came back and I agreed to do it and one thing led to another.

My old friends started coming in and the business started picking up really well and I got an offer to come back and take over the restaurant, basically.

And I did, and I was there for seven years.

We lost our lease and there was another restaurant right around the corner and a much bigger place and a much nicer place.

I was a little nervous because it was so big, but it had just gone under but was up for sale.

So I bought it and moved over there and stayed there for another six years or 14 years and ended up selling that when I got divorced and was looking for something and Redlands which I had been doing the whole time, by the way, I always wanted to have something and Redlands.

I couldn't really find anything.

So well.

I actually found the falconer I was going to buy the falconer, which was next door to us.

Just right here.

Just right next door, Yeah.

And they we had a verbal agreement.

We didn't have anything on paper yet, but Dr. Egan, the guy that owned it at the time, backed out.

He got cold feet and backed out.

So not really knowing what I was going to do for a while, I decided to take a job at Sysco Foods as a food rep.

I took that and in the meantime kept looking and looking and I thought about this place and it was called Charlie Jewles at the time.

And I went and approached the owner, who also used to own a restaurant, another restaurant down the street, and asked him if he wanted to sell Charlie Jewles He said yes.

And four months later, after some negotiations, I took it over and we've been here for right around nine years now.

Nine years now?

Yep.

And then you mentioned Sysco, which is, I think, one of your main vendors here.

You have kind of a because you did have the experience with working with Sysco, you know, about the vendor relationships how important that is with developing the menu and the concept is also consistency and other things that come with that.

Let's talk a little bit about that.

With your involvement with that experience, how that's helped you as a restaurant owner?

Well, I only spent four months with Sysco and I had already worked with them for the previous 20 years before that as one of their customers.

But I did going through their training, I learned quite a bit about different parts of it from what they deal with and different things about.

I learned some things about chicken and about beef I never really knew, knew.

And also as far as the whole logistics with the trucking and all that kind of stuff as well.

So definitely helped out for sure.

And then as I like to say, this is really a people business managing people.

I know you have a very low turnover here.

Your employees are happy.

I think that also is part of the experience here.

People are upbeat and pleasant and and like being here.

But I know people like working for you and you're well-loved in the community.

There's no doubt about that.

But I know that's been a lot of hard work all of those keeping all of those things in motion and keeping the consistency.

I mean, I know for a fact you don't really take a lot of time off.

No, not very very little.

and that's part of the operations side of it.

Yeah, well, and also treating that.

But I always tell my employees that when they clock in there, my family and you treat I don't care if they're whatever you would consider the lowest job in the place to the highest job I treat them all the same and that's I think that's a big key to people making people happy and keeping them for a long, you know, a long employment.

Keep them coming back.

Yes, Keeping them coming back.

Yeah.

Same with the customers to.

True.

Very true.

Made it through a difficult time.

The COVID, the lockdown period.

I know that you were doing things a little bit differently and kind of re-engineered the menu.

Yeah.

So that you can make the operation still work during that time.

Yeah, that was tough you made it through some tough times.

Yeah, that was very tough.

I mean, it actually was by far the toughest thing I ever dealt with in the restaurant industry, for sure.

Being forced to close and and being told we can only do takeout when takeout is really not what we do.

I'm not a huge fan of that for our type of food.

And I'm I'm not in the restaurant business to do takeout Im in the restaurant business to provide an experience that people can come and enjoy themselves and get waited on and and enjoy a game or the music that we have in the background playing or whatever it is.

It's also hard to control quality when people take it with them.

I mean, a lot of our food doesn't really travel that well.

It's not like pizza or chicken wings.

We do have chicken wings.

That one travels pretty good.

But things like nachos, they're going to be really soggy when you get them home 10 minutes later.

And so I almost prefer people didn't order them to go.

Also, the back to the design of the place with the the bar being the center of the kind of the heart of the whole business here.

Yeah, absolutely.

That was that was one of the things about this place that I loved when I bought it.

The bar itself was already there and I knew the changes I wanted to make to to kind of warm the place up a little bit and and change the atmosphere a little bit.

But the bar itself was definitely the focal point that it was perfect.

And I didn't change much at all behind the bar.

And the the long vignettes, which I like as well.

Yeah, very open atmosphere.

Yeah.

That was actually an addition that I did change the wall on Orange Street so that we got windows that you could see out before you couldn't see out.

And the banquette idea I got from Romano's down the street that I that was a very popular bar still is and I loved that idea of the banquette against against the wall looking towards the bar.

So I give hats off to Gary Romano for doing that.

Don't have to reinvent the wheel.

No.

And then let's talk about the space that we're in right now, which was actually a change that you made during the COVID period with having the open air.

Yeah, well, you know, the crazy thing is, I really wanted to do this for a long time, but I knew that not only was it going to be hard to do because of the old building and going through the historical society and everything, but I knew was going to be expensive as well.

And when when COVID happened and we were shut down for a while, I thought, you know what?

This is the time to do it.

People really want to have more open air things.

We've just added the patio, out outside that the city lets us rent some of the sidewalk to do a patio, and it just was a no brainer.

And it got across really well With the guests times.

You always say to me, You have no competition and we're all in this together.

That's right.

That's really what something important about this show is.

Each place has a different experience.

We're all in this together.

If you have a bigger draw to the community, then there's more options for people to come and enjoy.

But I love how you show support for the other local restaurant owners.

And I remember that day specifically with Kareem, whose point of sale system went down, and later I saw Kareem and he says, Oh, Jon Darby saved me.

Oh, yeah.

Because I think once that POS system goes down, you're you're done.

What do you do?

Right.

You're pretty much done.

Yeah.

because that's the only way to run a credit card.

And nowadays pretty much everybody uses a credit or debit card.

So you might as well just shut down if you don't have it.

Well, it speaks volumes to your character and who you are as a restaurant owner and a local businessperson.

And that that's something is very commendable.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

It means a lot to me to be able to help.

For sure.

But it's all approachable food.

It kind of reminds me of you.

Your personality.

You're very approachable, very likable.

Everything on the menu that I've had, I've enjoyed.

But there's things that are familiar that are elevated slightly, and the quality I would call an elevated bar food, I would.

Agree.

And so what was behind that?

Do you work a lot with Chef JJ to create that menu, or how does that part work?

I work with Chef JJ.

I also do research.

Look at what what's working at other restaurants, especially in areas like Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, at things they have.

And then I'll run it across JJ We'll try different things and we try to keep it somewhat standard, but but change it up a little bit.

I call it Mexican-American fusion with a twist, basically.

Mexican-American fusion with a twist for the most part.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So.

Oh, speaking of food, looks like we've got some on the way now.

Yes, we do.

You have some of your classics here?

Thank you.

So what do we have here, Jon?

Thank you very much.

This is the Aha.

Aha Ahi Tuna Appetizer.

It comes with the mango, salsa, avocado and Sriacha Chimmichurri sauce.

This is a brand new one.

This is the Esquites Street Bowl which is basically the Elote Corn.

But in the bowl.

Oh nice.

It has Jalepenos and poblano crema.

These are brand new chili Verde tacos which are big hit already.

They just came on our new menu and they're doing really well.

And that's the Darbinator that.

Oh yes look at that.

That Is the biggest hamburger we have.

It's actually named after my son Kyle.

When we first opened, we did a we had a monday Build Your Own Burger thing, and Kyle built that one day.

And his nickname in baseball was the Darbinator in high school baseball.

And everybody named their burger and he named it that.

And we decided to put it on the menu.

It's been on ever since.

Perfect name.

And then, you know, I'm looking at this.

Ahi excellent quality of ahi tuna that you get here.

I'm sure this Oh, this is sushi grade, right.

Which is important.

It's beautiful color.

I love the presentation of everything Looks fantastic.

I just don't know where to start.

Start wherever you like.

Looks good.

All right, I guess Will, then get into this.

Oh, it's going to be a big one.

This is going to be fantastic.

So tell me, what all is in this.

That has the ground beef patty, brioche, bun, bacon, straws, onions straws a fried egg and.

And chipotle ranch also.

Oh, and tomato and lettuce.

Fantastic.

That's a mouthful.

And then the French fries, of course.

And that's the side of Ranch side of Ketchup with you.

From toasted bread, I like that really good flavor.

I like the crunch with the softness of the burger.

But again, the idea of elevated kind of bar food, the shareable and approachable and very flavorful as well.

Thank you.

Yeah, the thing with fries is one of the things I went in the trainings at Sysco they actually do a whole afternoon.

I'm training you about French fries and they talk about how that's the first thing that you eat when they bring out your food at your table.

Even if you didn't get French fries, that.

Yeah, but you'll pick them off someone else's plate, your neighbors fries.

And it's also the last thing you eat usually after you finish your your burger or whatever you're having with it.

And they talked about how they can understand why some places have low end French fries should always have the great french fries.

Crispy and delicious perfectly prepared.

That's right.

Yeah.

Wow.

Delicious burger.

And im remembering to now you brought back a mushroom portobello burger as well, right?

Yeah, we had it originally on our menu when we first opened and it went away when we shut down after COVID, we actually shrunk the menu down quite a bit and by popular demand is back now.

So it's a good, good sandwich.

So plant based vegetarian option as well.

And you can also get these burgers with the is it impossible or impossible?

Yes, we have a of the impossible, Patty, so you can get it some vegetarian also but you have to skip the bacon as well on that one.

Oh gotta have the bacon I agree.

So good.

And then tell me about this new menu item.

The Chili Verde tacos, something we've been wanting to do for a long time.

And they're fantastic because.

I haven't tried these.

Good stuff.

I think we should have some of these now.

I've heard good things about these.

It's phenomenal, flavorful, moist, really good flavor.

That's a winner.

So Chef JJ kind of that was his influence on this.

Yes.

And you have a lot of Mexican dishes.

You have a lot of American dishes and kind of.

Kind of a cross section of both.

Yeah, absolutely.

Fantastic.

Really good.

And then the other dish here was what was that one?

The Esquites Corn.

I brought that to JJs attention and he wanted to go this route instead of doing it on the on the cob.

And it's been very popular since we brought it out as well.

It has Jalepeno avocado and and it's very good.

So you're constantly re-engineering the menu looking what moves, adding a couple of things, and then things don't move.

Then you just make a decision to have something, something new on their version of the menu.

You're constantly rotating that I notice.

Yes.

Every six months or so when we redo the menu, it's important you have to add new things.

Yeah.

I'm trying not to take off stuff that other people like.

Like that's the hardest part, correct?

Like this?

Thats never coming off.

Fantastic.

And I really love the AHI for the quality of the tuna.

The sushi grade tuna.

Absolutely.

It's a beautiful presentation too.

Like how he does the avocado into a flower?

Yes.

JJ, he's got some good knife skills.

Yes, he does.

And he's taught them to a lot of our other chefs as well.

And Cooks is very he's done a great job.

He's been with us since day one, and I don't know what I'd do without him to tell you the honest truth, I don't.

JJ has, and I think a couple of your bartenders and my.

Bartender today, Julia has been here since for the very first day we opened.

Wow, that's fantastic.

Yeah, well, that.

Speaks volumes for you and the way you run your business.

Thank you.

Thank you, Jon.

It's great to be here with you today.

I really appreciate you letting us have the behind the scenes look at it and learn a little bit about your business and about yourself and why.

Darby's is one of the best restaurants in Redlands.

All right.

So loved by so many people.

Oh, I appreciate that, Lee.

And again, I really appreciate your time today.

And the staff is excellent, very hospitable.

We appreciate you being so open.

Oh, of course.

And letting us come in to film with us today.

And I just want to mention, too, that that, you know, this is a tough business and it's a lot of work and a lot of hours.

And without the right person behind you, it won't work.

And my wife, Denise has been amazing what she puts up with and what she's willing to do to be my backbone is outstanding.

That's good.

Shout out to Denise to as well.

Thank you.

Thanks again, John.

My pleasure.

So, JJ thank you so much for taking us behind the scenes here at Darby's.

Of course, it's great to be here with you.

And then what's our first dish?

First, we start off with a little bit of olive oil, butter will burn pretty quickly in a hot pan if you don't add all that oil first.

Love it.

The sizzle.

Yeah, You got to hear that sing.

Yeah.

And corn goes next nicely sauteed And now insert Fresh jalapeno knife skills are mad, man.

I'll tell you.

Yeah, it's.

It's a must.

And part of having everything pre-prepared and mise en place is important before you execute the dish.

Of course, preparation is everything.

You want to have a nice flow when you're firing dishes.

Yeah, because it needs to be streamlined.

And we're just going to give this a nice saute.

So it's nice and hot.

You know, the corn is already cooked.

We're giving the corn that jalapeno flavor and that.

Oh, and everything starts to mesh But have a little bit of diversity in flavor.

So I love that.

Now that it's hot.

The layering, the flavors.

Yeah, layering flavors.

Yeah.

We're going go ahead and plate this because it's nice and hot with that butter right into the pan is also good.

Yeah.

That butter and the corn with the jalapeno, it's almost it's almost sinful.

So where did this dish come from is that your influence.

On this dish came about because we have a Sonora salad chicken so it's basically barbecued chicken salad, but it has fresh corn in it.

And we thought about things.

To utilize the corn as well to put on the menu.

And since we're in California, we were heavily Latino influenced.

So we thought about putting in another corn dish, which is hte Esquites which is street corn, cut off the cob and served with a little bit of cheese and crema and some fresh ingredients which will come in next right now, which will be the avocado.

Avocado we love.

Yeah.

So that's just a quarter of an avocado.

Great presentation, too.

And right after dark is going to be the crema, but that's going to.

Make it Housemade.

Yeah, we try and make everything scratch made.

It makes a huge difference from store bought or even pre-made stuff.

You know, people can tell So after the crema we do the Cotilla cheese we do the cilantro that's going to go right on top.

Beautiful.

And we finish it off with a chili adobo seasoning.

Oh, nice.

You got the whole dish.

Literally layers of flavors.

Oh, you're going to get that freshness off the bat and that heat will wake you up.

Mm.

Acidity.

Sweet, pungent, like all the layers are here.

So Mise en place, for this, dish my favorite burger in town is the Darbinator.

Yeah, the Darbinaor famously coined by my owners son.

He was called the Darbinator as a child playing baseball.

That was his nickname, I guess.

And this is how that name came about.

An homage to his son.

His name is Kyle Darby.

love that.

Jon Darby, who everyone loves in the community.

Yeah, we love Darbys.

And part of it is about approachable food familliar food.

There's nothing pretentious.

Everything I want on a plate.

Yeah, this exemplifies that.

Right.

Okay, so we have here a brioche bun.

We grill that off first the reason why we grill off the bun first is to make it more robust in handling a lot of sauce.

Egg yolk.

Give it a nice char right on the grill.

And while that's happening, we want to put our third pound.

It's a third of a pound ground, Chuck, right on the flat top.

And Jon told me that your burgers are never frozen.

Yeah, they're always fresh.

So we give it a little sear.

I prefer medium rare, medium.

So that's what we'll do today.

We do a triple A ranch on the bottom bun.

And this.

Is Housemade.

This is Housemade as well.

After that, we put two ounces of guacamole right on the bottom.

Oh, yes.

And two slices of applewood smoked bacon.

Got to have that bacon.

Yeah.

Bacon saves the world.

Now we're going to see if you get a nice sear on the burger.

There we go.

Good flip and you always want to season both sides of your burger.

Season as you cook because.

This burger requires something else that adds a crunch to the dish, which is a fried pickle.

Oh, no way.

Fried pickles.

Yeah.

And it also gets fried jalepeno straws and fried onion straws.

Love of.

What we do.

Oh, fresh jalepeno straws It's just a light coat of milk.

And we have a drudging flour right here.

While.

We judge it fresh.

It's a little bit of us around here.

Yeah, that's a seasoned flour.

There's paprika, onion powder, garlic powder.

Okay.

It goes right into the fryer.

Another layer.

And there's the next layer.

Yeah.

And also, we also have a fried pickle.

We fuse Orange Wheat batter to make our fried pickles.

Nice.

JJ Amazing.

Come on.

For every order you do all this?

Yeah.

This is what you get in the burger here.

Fired ot order fresh.

right after that.

I love it.

Let's do it.

We've got to crack the egg right?

Oh, come on.

A little bit of seasoning on the yolk.

You got to check our straws That's nice and crunchy.

Burger is our number one.

We sell a lot of hamburgers and.

Who doesn't love a good burger?

All right, let's do it here.

Remove that.

Yeah, I mean, look at that.

It's amazing.

All right, here we go.

And I'm in your kitchen now.

This is.

I feel so rude doing this here, but.

Oh, hey, just.

Just for your chef, All right?

Mm hmm.

Yeah, that's their reaction.

Oh, good, chef.

Respectable chef is nothing without his team.

People don't realize, you know, they come in there every day putting up quality on a plate, basically.

So that starts with a good leader.

I got to say.

Thank you/ Now that you've set the bar and people love you, they love Derbys as far as an experience people love the brand and what you've done here.

And it all happens with the back of the house too.

Thank you.

And also thank you for being part of the go local lee show.

Thank you for watching.

Go local Lee