The imaginative chef

Gilly’s cook makes food fun

By Amie Steffen | The Daily Journal

Published Monday, February 26, 2007

It’s unofficially called the Leaning Tower of Chili, and it is Richard Saunders’ latest culinary creation.

“Leaning Tower of Chili” is not the official name of the taco salad-like dish at Gilly’s Prime Time Bar and Grill, but the name fits. Layers of fried corn tortillas, hot chili, cheese and lettuce are stacked one on top of the other until they can’t be stacked any higher. Black olives, pimento, tomato and sour cream round out the tower, which is enough to serve two people.

You’re given a fork and a napkin to eat it, but Saunders, who’s been head chef at Gilly’s since it opened more than five years ago, claims his only job is to figure out how to make the food look and taste good.

“I don’t know how you eat it,” he said, with a laugh.

But he knows how he thought it up.

“I just lie awake at night sometimes, thinking about tomorrow,” Saunders said. “I’ll think, ‘Ooh, that sounds like fun.’”

And, just like that, the customers who come to Gilly’s have a delicious new dish straight from Saunders’ imagination.

Saunders has been a chef for almost 30 years. He came to Gilly’s from Old Broadway Food and Spirits in Alexandria, and he’ll likely keep cooking for even longer.

“Forever,” he said. “Either that, or I’ll be a rock star.”

Musical aspirations aside, Saunders has made quite a career out of his passion. He refers to the small kitchen at Gilly’s as his “workshop,” and each menu item is a work of art — both pleasing to the eye as well as the palate.

“Food has to look good,” Saunders said. “It should be pretty to look at, usually. Then the sky’s the limit.”

But the artist also has apprentices. Saunders calls his sous chef, Travis, his “right-hand man,” and raves about the five cooks and numerous waitstaff he has the pleasure of working with.

“It’s the people, working with people every day,” Saunders said when asked about the best part of his job. “Elbow Lake is different than any place I’ve ever been.”

The kitchen may be little, but the restaurant is large, with both a smoking bar portion and a non-smoking restaurant portion as well as a banquet room. Saunders said the banquet area normally books up around Christmas.

His main duties at the restaurant include hiring, training and retaining staff, ordering food and planning the menus, which are changed and reprinted every year.

“We do a little shuffle,” he said.

The most popular item on the menu is a hamburger, and Gilly’s serves prime rib every day. Thirteen different spices, many of them trade secrets, are included in the rub.

“You can smell it when it’s cooking — cinnamon, nutmeg,” Saunders said. “People sometimes pick it out.”

But Saunders enjoys making unique soups the most, and comes up with new ones all the time. The other day, he served Italian Chicken and Pasta, a broth-based soup with rotinni pasta and Italian vegetables.

And occasionally, there will be lots of soup left over — enough for, say, the Leaning Tower of Chili.

“I like to be creative, give it a name or two to sell it, and have a little fun,” Saunders said.