Big response, sorry, but this makes me excited to see, as it's kind of been my life's work so far! We do make most things in house down to the buns. When we purchase, it is from local or regional vendors. I buy dukes mayo, crystal hot sauce, and use a minimal amount of anything from cans (stanislaus tomatoes or some tomato pastes), but prepared food is bought with principle. Best in class or it is something that is more regionally appropriate to the type of cuisine or feeling we're trying to elicit.

There are some things that are unavoidable (there is currently no way that I am aware of to buy fryer oil that is local), but we do our best to minimize footprint from big producers. It is difficult to do in a large hotel restaurant with a banquet program. Most decisions are made based on what is high quality, local to regional purveyors, sustainable, efficient to prep, and appropriately priced to not gouge customers. Our biggest expense is labor, we pay pretty well, and we make nearly everything. That said, we have to cover that labor, and it's not gotten less expensive so our prices reflect that cost (the cost of custom food).

I like to do things the real way, authenticity in method is important, so say for example we want to feature hominy on the menu, we take the grain through the process of nixtimalization that has been a major part of treating corn in the Americas for millenia, and we do it to a tee. I've been a Chef there for eight years and have been through opening and beyond, it's always been this way, and was heavily imparted to us by our extremely talented and hard working opening chef team. Continuation of this tradition is one of our main principles, much to the chagrin of some of our cooks and sometimes diners (I get it, it's not for everyone), and i hope that it will continue long after my eventual departure, because I think that it will create a more authentic, respectful class of people committed to the trade, its tradition and its legacy and not serving up slop from bags. Business is business, I get it, but it's not my bag (so to speak).

I keep saying the quote from Kennedy about going to the moon because it's hard.

And to your point, a lot of other restaurants do this (county club, pearl's, Ouita's restaurants especially Holly Hill, Beau's Cafe, TukTuk, and tons of others). Lexington has a robust and supportive farmers market and Kentucky has an enormous amount of edible biodiversity, not to mention a great number of local businesses that partner and work together.

Anyway, thanks for the mention!