Stephan Pyles

Stephan Pyles is a chef, cookbook author, philanthropist, and educator. His dishes are described as a blend of Southern homestyle cooking, Southwestern fare, Mexican food, Tex-Mex food, Cajun cuisine, and Creole cookery. Pyles — along with his colleagues Dean Fearing, Robert Del Grande and Anne Lindsay Greer — contributed to changes in the cuisine of the U.S. states of Texas, New Mexico and Arizona. Pyles spent more than 25 years in the Dallas restaurant circuit and was the main creator of New Texas Cuisine. His first two restaurants were the business casual Routh Street Cafe, which was founded in 1983, as well as a miniature version of said restaurant called Baby Routh. These restaurants are known for being the flagships of the Southwestern Cuisine explosion of the 1980s and 1990s. Since opening Routh Street Cafe, Pyles has opened some 24 restaurants — including Samar, in the fall of 2009.

Pyles is a fifth-generation Texan. He was awarded ‘Outstanding Restaurateur of the Year’ by both the Minnesota Restaurant Association and Texas Restaurant Association.

Stephan Pyles is the author of five cookbooks on Texan and Southwestern Cuisine. He also hosted the Emmy Award-winning PBS series “New Tastes From Texas With Chef Stephan Pyles.” This series ran between 1998 and 1999 and included several guest Celebrity chefs, including Diana Kennedy, Rick Bayless, Patricia Quintana, Zarela Martinez, Americo Circuit and David Garrido.

Early life

Stephan Pyles was born in Big Spring, Texas, in 1952. He received classical training in voice and piano but preferred to apprentice in the kitchen of his family’s West Texas truck stop. After studying music in University, a trip to France inspired a career shift after experiencing haute cuisine. This was followed by training in fine French Cuisine at The Great Chefs of France Cooking School at the Mondavi Winery where he worked with and was taught by Michelin 3-star chefs Michel Guerard, Jean and Pierre Troigros, Alain Chapel, Paul Bocuse and Gaston LeNotre. Pyles also met Julia Child, famous cooking show host, and became good friends with her up until her death in 2002. Pyles published a cookbook entitled “The New Texas Cuisine”, which made him nationally recognized by his early thirties.

Career

Pyles owned and operated the Dallas restaurants Routh Street Cafe and Baby Routh from 1983 to 1993. He owned and operated Goodfellow’s and Tejas restaurants in Minneapolis from 1987 to 1993. In 1994, Pyles opened Star Canyon. The James Beard Foundation called it one of the top five new restaurants in America, and it was well-reviewed in Bon Apetit, Esquire Magazine, Town and Country, Playboy and other publications. The September 1998 Food and Wine Magazine issue listed Star Canyon as the “quintessential Dallas restaurant.”

In 1997, Pyles opened AquaKnox, a global seafood restaurant. It, too, was named the best new restaurant by Food and Wine. In 1998, Pyles sold Star Canyon and AquaKnox to Carlson Restaurants WorldWide and, during the next two years, opened new versions of Star Canyon: in Las Vegas, Nevada, at The Venetian, and the Stephen F. Austin Hotel in Austin, Texas. Back in Dallas, he opened FishBowl, an Asian-themed restaurant, and a casual Mexican restaurant called Taqueria Cañonita, which was later replicated in several cities around the U.S.A. He has appeared worldwide as a guest celebrity chef and was one of five chefs worldwide invited to prepare dinner for Jimmy Carter’s 70th birthday. Pyles has also cooked for Soviet leader Michail Gorbachev, 6 American president, 7 American first ladies, and Queen Elizabeth ll. In addition to his first cookbook, The New Texas Cuisine, Pyles has co-authored Tamales and written New Tastes from Texas and Southwestern Vegetarian. He further worked full-time on the PBS TV show New Tastes from Texas. Pyles was a cuisine consultant for several hotel and resort companies and American Airlines.

Change & New Discoveries

In 2001, Pyles took a five-year “siesta” from the restaurant world; he used the time to travel, educate, teach, and write.During this hiatus, he spent significant time in Latin America and the Eastern Mediterranean, including the Levant, Spain and India. These places would all provide cultural influences for his new restaurant ventures. In 2006, Pyles opened a new restaurant named after himself in Dallas. The “Stephan Pyles" Restaurant is situated in the Dallas Arts District.

On 22 November 2009, a second new Arts District restaurant by Chef Pyles was opened, “Samar by Stephan Pyles”. “Samar” is a concept that combines three cultures: Spanish, Eastern Mediterranean and Indian.

Philanthropy, consulting, and scholarship fund

Stephan Pyles is a founding board member of Share Our Strength, America’s largest hunger relief organization. In 1998, Share Our Strength presented Pyles with the Humanitarian of the Year Award for his outstanding patronage. Pyles founded Dallas’ Taste of the Nation event for the organization in 1988, raising over $1,500,000 for local ministries and food pantries. He also serves as a life board member of The North Texas Food Bank (NTFB), an organization that “seeks to eliminate hunger by distributing food and grocery products through a network of nonprofits while providing education and increasing community awareness”. Since its inception in 1982, NTFB has procured and locally distributed more than 293 million pounds of food. In 1986, Pyles co-founded NTFB’s perishable food program, The Hunger Link, which connects Dallas restaurants and hotels with shelters and meal programs. In addition to running two top-scale and demanding restaurants and his charity work, Pyles serves as a cuisine consultant to Gaylord Texan Resort & Convention Center in Grapevine, Texas, where he developed the restaurant’s menu and continues to provide culinary direction. He has returned to work as a cuisine consultant for American Airlines and a chief chef consultant for Dallas-based Art Institutes International.

Since 2000, the Food and Wine Foundation of Texas has awarded a $15,000 scholarship to a worthy Texas-based culinary student. The award is given to the winner of a cook-off held in several cities around the state. This scholarship is called “The Stephan Pyles Scholarship Fund.”

He is currently Chief Culinary Advisor for Ventana by Buckner, a luxury senior living community in Dallas, Texas, where he also has 3 restaurants that carry his name. In January 2020, Pyles transitioned from restaurant ownership and operations to consulting, License Agreements and organizing culinary tours around the world.

Cookbooks

• The New Texas Cuisine
• Tamales
• New Tastes from Texas
• Southwestern Vegetarian

See also

• Share Our Strength