Stuyvesant’s Scalding Hot Chef—Drew Nieporent

Name: Drew Nieporent

Age: 68
Date of Birth: June 4, 1955

Graduation Year: 1973

Occupation: Restaurateur

Bio: Drew Nieporent is a world-renowned restaurateur hailing from the Stuyvesant Town area in Lower Manhattan, New York City. Restaurants he founded include Corton, Tribeca Grill, and Nobu, which has over 40 locations worldwide. He graduated from Stuyvesant High School in 1973 and later attended Cornell University.

Q&A:

Q: Were you interested in the culinary world during your childhood?

A: Yeah, I was always interested in food [...] So as a young person, my mother, my brother and I, we [went] to all these different types of restaurants, all kinds of food, you know, French, Italian, Chinese, Greek, you name it. And I took a liking to it. Besides the fact [that] I like to eat, I just loved the theater of it, and I thought it was pretty sexy business. And then I wanted to be a chef, so I read up on cookbooks and everything. 

While I was at Stuyvesant, I was always into food. In fact, I think [during] my senior year I worked at McDonald’s. Now, that might not seem like such a great thing, but at McDonald’s, I actually learned quite a bit about it—the store was on 23rd Street between First and Second [Avenues], just one block from where I lived. And you know, [...] today I do the hamburgers at Madison Square Garden, have done that for about 12 years, and it’s really [...] going full circle. I mean, I did the hamburgers at McDonald’s as a 17-year-old and [...] now I’m responsible for probably the most popular food item at Madison Square Garden, the World’s Most Famous Arena. 

Q: How are you able to manage all of your restaurants while also balancing life with your wife and your kids?

A: You know, that’s a good question. The, excuse my expression, the bull answer is, you know, you find a balance. And the reality is, there is never a balance. And what I mean by that is like, when you’re at work, your wife’s pissed off, when you’re at home, your partners are pissed off. So there’s never a balance where I spent some time here, I spent some time there [...] So the answer, really, to the question is that you got to have a sense of where you’re supposed to be. And quite frankly, [focusing on] the minute details is the way you used to manage a restaurant when it was your only restaurant. You can’t possibly manage that when you open a second, third, or maybe a 50th. So in every case, you obviously need to have a system where somebody’s in charge as a manager, as a director, and then you’ve got to figure out how many people you really need to run the business.

It’s dinner time onboard the M.S. Vistafjord. Hundreds of hungry passengers flood the main dining room awaiting their meals. One college student could be seen maneuvering himself through the maze of tables, carrying his tray of food in front of him with two hands, the sign of a newbie. That young man was Drew Nieporent (‘73), an aspiring restaurateur, who, in the future, would found many Michelin-starred restaurants including the famous, high-end Japanese restaurant Nobu with the Myriad Restaurant Group. 

While onboard the Vistafjord, sailing to ports like Dublin, Leningrad, Copenhagen, Stockholm, and Oslo, Nieporent worked “seven days a week, breakfast, lunch, and dinner.” He remembers having to learn each day’s unique menu and the culinary terms associated with the different dishes. For example, “if [the menu] said cream soup Dubarry, you have to learn that Dubarry means cauliflower, if it’s consommé célestine, you have to learn that célestine means a julienne of crepes.”

Nieporent’s experience onboard the different cruise ships was one of the most important parts of his culinary education. Not only did he see great food each day, but he also learned how to manage and serve hundreds of guests. After graduating from Cornell University with a bachelor’s degree in hotel administration and finishing work on the cruise ships, Nieporent moved back to New York and worked in many prestigious restaurants, like Maxwell’s Plum and The Tavern on the Green in Central Park, before establishing some of his very own. 

Ever since he was young, Nieporent developed an interest in the culinary world. His father worked for the State Liquor Authority, giving various restaurants their liquor licenses. As a result, he was exposed to a wide variety of cuisines from an early age. “We all [went] to these different types of restaurants, [with] all kinds of food, you know, French, Italian, Chinese, Greek, you name it. And I took a liking to it. Besides the fact [that] I like to eat, I just loved the theater of it,” he recounted. Nieporent expanded on his childhood culinary interests during his senior year at Stuy, where one of his first jobs was flipping burgers at McDonald’s. This experience gave him a lot of confidence in himself, something he later relied on when he was running his own restaurants. 

Nieporent wasn’t the most interested in STEM subjects and was always academically humble. “I didn’t excel, you know, I wasn’t interested in science. I wasn’t interested in math,” he remarked. Despite this, he thought Stuyvesant prepared him extremely well for college. “Stuyvesant really made me mature. I mean, I remember I was very confident going to college. I wasn’t scared at all,” he said. In high school, Nieporent met many other like-minded people, some of whom would attend the same college as him.

Though the classes at Stuyvesant were great, Nieporent’s favorite part of his experience was his interactions with his teachers. “Even in classes [where] I didn’t understand a thing of what they were teaching, like biology, the teachers were great,” he remarked. After graduating from Stuyvesant, Nieporent stayed in touch with some of his favorite teachers. Outside of school, Nieporent expanded his interest in culinary arts, was an avid rock and roll enthusiast, and liked sports such as football and baseball. 

At Cornell, Nieporent found the overall quality of education high, despite his disappointment in the school’s and student body’s focus on institutional food service, like feeding hospitals or schools, rather than culinary arts. To this day, he still appreciates the campus architecture and community that Cornell provided. “Cornell was just a worldly community with people from everywhere, all walks of life, and that part of the [experience] was very good,” he said. Nieporent also took advantage of opportunities to travel while serving food on cruise ships, those experiences helping him grow into one of the world’s greatest restaurateurs. Later on in his life, Nieporent was inducted into the Cornell School of Hotel Administration’s Hall of Fame.

After graduating from Cornell, Nieporent worked at one of the grandest restaurants in New York City—The Tavern on the Green in Central Park. There, while still only 23, Nieporent managed a staff of over 200 people and drew his confidence from the days he worked at McDonald’s and on the cruise ships. In April of 1985, Nieporent started his first restaurant, Montrachet, on a sleepy little street in Tribeca—239 West Broadway (not on Park Avenue, he pointed out, because of the high rent there), not far from Stuyvesant’s current location. After a three-star review from The New York Times (contrary to a three-star review on Amazon, three stars from The New York Times is phenomenal as the second highest possible amount), which Nieporent said jump-started his career, he opened Tribeca Grill in 1990, one of his oldest restaurants that stands to this day. Throughout his career, Nieporent opened dozens of restaurants, including the Harley Davidson Café, Rubicon, the Berkeley Bar and Grill, Bâtard, Corton, and his most famous restaurant, Nobu, with over 56 locations worldwide. In that original 239 West Broadway location, Nieporent opened three different restaurants, all with three-star reviews and Michelin stars, an incredible accomplishment.

Being in charge of so many different restaurants all around the world, Nieporent has established himself as a role model for all of his staff. “As an owner of a business, it’s kind of like the fish stinks from the head. You set the tone, you set the standards,” he said. Nieporent leads by example and can often be seen in his restaurants, either in the kitchen or helping out with other tasks.

In terms of advice for students, Nieporent stressed the importance of always doing your best and working hard at whatever you enjoy doing because Stuyvesant students have a tremendous number of opportunities at their fingertips. “Stuyvesant sort of sets the table for where you’re going to go to college, and that’s where you can hone down on and specify the kind of areas of discipline that you can follow,” he remarked.

But, ultimately, Nieporent mentioned that high school is also a moment to enjoy. “I love my life. I love Stuyvesant High School [and] loved everything, every moment of it. So, you know, I have no complaints about anything,” he recounted. Stuyvesant has undoubtedly left an everlasting mark on Nieporent, and his experiences carried forward to transform him into the successful restauranteur he is today.