In Terry We Trust

Chef Terry White's poised to bring the Philly steak house into the future.

by A.D. Amorosi

Michael T. Regan WHITE KNIGHT: Philly-bred chef Terry White, who's heading up Chestnut Street's Union Trust steak house. Below: a peek at the restaurant's opulent interior, designed by DAS Architects.

If this were another story about a Philly steak house, I'd suck some marrow and we'd be done. But this is the tale of something bigger: Union Trust.

Not because Trust (719 Chestnut St.), which opens Feb. 9, has a million-dollar kitchen, or because the luxe location reportedly cost upward of $12 million. Not because its address, at the old Union Trust Integrity Bank, comes with soaring sky-high ceilings and depth-diving basement vaults. Not because it'll be the crown jewel of a block housing Morimoto, Jones, Chifa and the soon-to-be-resurrected L'Ange Bleu. 

It's big because Terry White is big.

The executive chef and co-owner of Union Trust (with ex-Capital Grille capo Ed Doherty and the property's owner, Walnut Street Capital developer Joe Grasso) has had a busy past, and he's in for a busy future if this steak house is successful. And it will be. White's the last of the ring-tail rounders — a guy who took the conceptual steak house from its musty, manly origins into sleek modernity throughout the last two decades as an executive for meat-chomping chains The Palm and Del Frisco's.

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Now he's cooking something rare by making Union Trust one of the city's most exquisitely well-done independent restaurants.

"I've done my share of big ones, brother, but this was tough," says White, huffing about dealing with workers, historic property folks, bothersome sommelier neighbors and the downward-spiraling economy. "I felt like Sisyphus a few times. Still, I was happy to be doing a big one at home."

Other than lending his expertise to the 2005 opening of Public House, White hasn't worked on a Philadelphia project since before 1994, when he left Philly for Chicago, Manhattan and beyond as an executive corporate chef and restaurant opener. White was waiting for Philly to be ready. "I knew it would happen, especially after I saw New York City operate," says White, who watched NYU students go from books to boardrooms and become steady local customers at his Manhattan location of Del Frisco's after graduating.

"In Philly in the '70s and '80s, the best and brightest who attended our universities would split," he says. "It's only when Old City repopulated in the late '90s that you'd see fresh graduates staying in the city rather than heading toward the 'burbs or Jersey." The collegians who once packed Philly streets became the affluent sorts to stimulate growth in the Philly's dining and cocktail scene — "the cool kids with money," laughs White.

But don't think the Philly boy started affluently. White began in the industry washing dishes at Hunt's Seafood in Northeast Philly in 1976 at age 12. He worked at The Shack on the Boulevard, too. When he moved into Center City at 18, he apprenticed in Georges Perrier's pastry kitchen at Le Bec-Fin before moving onto South Street's now-defunct Monte Carlo Living Room. In the '80s, Second and South was Philly's food zenith (Nola, Knave of Hearts), and Monte Carlo was that mountain's high. After a turn cooking New Orleans cuisine at the Bourse's Blue Moon Jazz Club and consulting on the opening of Striped Bass for Neil Stein and Alison Barshak, White left for Chicago's Palm chain. "Philly didn't know how lucky and how spoiled it was and is — how great a culinary place it is ... and I moved to a great food town, so I can say that," notes White of the Windy City.

Chicago is where White's quest to perfect the great American steak began. The staple began changing in the mid-'90s. Wagyu and Kobe beef came into play; chefs were toying with foie gras and topping filet mignon with tuna. "I fell in love with the steak house as an atmosphere, a gathering place for sociability," says White. He relocated to the Midwest to shut down Lakeshore Drive's old-man-y Palm (drawn blinds, dark wood, "those sketches on the wall") and debut its glitzy-glass, multi-level replacement in the Swiss Hotel, a hybrid spot where the Euro jet set met the cigar-chomping elder. "It became the place to go before the Bulls game, and for swinging affluent [diners] over 30," says White. "Make it cool and glamorous, and the younger moneyed people will come."

In 1997, White joined Lone Star, the restaurant corp which then owned the Del Frisco's brand. It was looking to kick-start its Sullivan's chain, as well as open a Del Frisco's in New York. By 2000, White had unveiled that Big Apple location and crisscrossed the country, popping the top on several Sullivan's installments.

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There are two distinctions to note about Union Trust. One: Rather than eschew the old school, this steak house takes the historic and the future-forward in equal account. "We told DAS Architects don't cover the [original] stone — let the building speak for itself, its steadfastness and history," says White. "Fill it with accoutrements that scream color, design and newness." When you see the aged bank building's stonework from 1888 juxtaposed with sleek chrome and glass, a 12,000-bottle wine gallery, and nine modern brushed nickel chandelier pendants hanging from the soaring, 65-foot ceiling, you'll get White's vision of uniting the steadfast and the slick.

And as for joining the fray in a city populated by steakhouse chains: Oddly enough, White wasn't originally planning to make an independently owned stand at this Chestnut Street address. When the chef was still with Del Frisco's, the very same property was going to be the place for their Philly venue. That White left the company, which ended up opening up at 15th and Chestnut late last year, to start his own legacy has as much to do with greedy corporate buyouts as it does his love of the building itself. White gave up a lot to go it on his own with Doherty and Grasso.

"I can't say anything bad about chains," says White. "I did well with them and they made me and my partner Ed a fair amount of money. But when the chains got bought out by bigger conglomerates and hedge funds, they stopped caring."

In this economy, White knew that if he wanted to throw the best dinner party in the city and serve his guests with a check at the end, he had to make certain that the best of everything — Allen Brothers meat cooked atop state-of-the-art Montague broilers, served on sleek German china — came to play.

"Every aspect has to be blow-away good," says White about Union Trust's aggressive approach toward customer comfort, tony design and culinary excellence. "The average guy might not know why the steak melts in the mouth, but he better taste it and feel it. That's the difference between a guest and a customer. A customer comes with a cell-phone company — you're stuck with each other. At Union Trust, you're my guest. And for the prices we're charging, I better make you happy."

(a_amorosi@citypaper.net)