Put Down Roots

A little over a decade ago, Michael and Tara Gallina came to St. Louis and had lunch. It wasn’t their first time in town from New York — since leaving his Brentwood home at the age of 22 for the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco, Michael would regularly come to St. Louis to visit family and revisit old dining haunts. 

This time, however, felt different. He and his wife, Tara, were looking to leave their roles at the prestigious Blue Hill at Stone Barns in Tarrytown, New York, so they could open their own venture. Relocating to St. Louis made sense for a number of reasons, but first, they needed to feel out whether or not the city would be the right fit for what they wanted to do. Within minutes of meeting James Beard Foundation award-winning chef and restaurateur Gerard Craft while dining at one of his St. Louis restaurants, they were convinced. 

“St. Louis is such a tight-knit community,” Michael says. “Working in New York and California, where everybody is trying to get over the person in front of them, it felt very different. Before we moved here, people were already reaching out to us and saying, ‘Welcome; we can’t wait for you to be a part of our community,’ There was such an outpouring of support and acceptance, and you understood that everyone here wants to see each other succeed.”

Now, as the couple prepare to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of their return to town and the launch of the pop-ups that would eventually lead to their celebrated restaurant group, Take Root Hospitality, the Gallinas cannot imagine being anywhere other than St. Louis.

Developing Dining Destinations

Their flagship restaurant, Vicia, is now in its eighth year and is firmly established as one of the best restaurants in town, if not the United States. Additionally, they operate two other beloved local restaurants, Winslow’s Table and Bistro La Floraison, employ 75 people across their three locations, and have watched as the junior cooks they’ve mentored have gone on to do big things in the area’s culinary scene. The Gallinas and their team have racked up innumerable national accolades, including multiple James Beard Foundation award nominations, inclusions on national best of lists by Eater, Esquire, and Bon Appétit, and a nod for Michael on Food & Wine’s “Best New Chef” list in 2018. Their restaurants are leaders in vegetable-forward cooking and are a must-visit destination for out-of-towners looking to be dazzled by the St. Louis dining scene.

However, perhaps Michael and Tara’s biggest contribution is how they’ve helped to thrust St. Louis’ dining scene as a whole into the national conversation. By celebrating the bounty of what is available in the Midwest while creating a sustainable, empowering environment for their team, they’ve shown that Vicia, a little restaurant in the middle of St. Louis, can do more than serve some of the best food in the country — it can impact the way we approach dining in the United States. 

Gerard Craft, who the Gallinas credit with helping them see the thrilling potential of the region’s dining scene before moving here, has been excited to see how the couple have helped change the way St. Louisans think about dining out. 

“The Gallinas could have gone anywhere in the world with their résumés, and they chose to come home to St. Louis,” Craft says. “That’s such a big deal. We are so lucky as a city to have their talents and their vision. Progressive food has always had to fight for its existence in this city, and their team is at the top of their game. I think in 10 years, there will be a long list of restaurant professionals with Vicia on their own résumés.”

Finding and Building Community

Michael and Tara never imagined they would have this level of impact when they first began conceptualizing Vicia a decade ago. In fact, they were just thrilled to even be thinking of opening their own place, which felt out of reach for them on the east and west coasts.

“For me, being in New York or California for such a long time in my career, I was never in a place where I felt I could do my own thing and make an impact in the community,” Michael says. “The only option was to just become part of a scene that is already established. Being here, things felt more approachable — that I could own my own business without having five different investors and that I would have an incredibly supportive community behind me. That has allowed us to build a foundation here to do our own thing, rather than do it for someone else.”

That community-focused aspect of St. Louis’ dining scene helped the Gallinas build the relationships that would form the foundation of Vicia. By the time it opened in 2017, the couple had already established trust with the region’s diners, thanks to their undeniable talent and the willingness of fellow chefs and restaurateurs to welcome and collaborate with them. This trust allowed them to do something many thought was unthinkable in the allegedly meat-and-potatoes Midwest: to open a vegetable-focused elevated dining concept that flipped the script on the center of the plate, where dishes like “naked vegetables” or eggplant schnitzel get equal billing to a heritage-breed pork chop. It was a gamble, but they quickly realized the St. Louis community was betting on them, too. 

“When we first opened Vicia, what we were doing was considered very different; people were wondering about this vegetable thing and not sure how they were feeling about it,” Tara says. “It was a bit polarizing at the time, which is now funny, because so many places are going in this direction. What struck me and is a testament to St. Louis is the amount of people who rallied behind us. People who we met once or never even met at all went out of their way to stand up for us and support us (when others questioned us). It was incredible, and it showed that people are really supportive in a way I couldn’t have imagined.”

Without that robust community support, the Gallinas might not have been able to expand Vicia to include a stunning chef’s table experience and lush outdoor garden and patio. They also insist they could not have grown from a single restaurant into a hospitality group that includes Winslow’s Table and Bistro La Floraison. The former, a casual neighborhood restaurant with a small market and prepared foods case was a beloved community gathering place before the Gallinas took it over in 2019. Under their stewardship, it has built upon that legacy and garnered a reputation as one of the city’s essential daytime eateries. The latter, a transportive Parisian-inspired restaurant and bar, has become the city’s essential destination for French and Mediterranean cuisines. 

Team Work Makes the Dream Work

The Gallinas understand that they would not be the thriving restaurant group they are today without the strong team they’ve cultivated over the years, some of whom have worked with them since the very beginning.

One of those team members, Vicia’s chef de cuisine Jane Sacro Chatham, embodies the Gallina’s commitment to supporting and empowering their employees. Born in the Philippines, Sacro Chatham grew up cooking in her mother’s small, roadside kitchen, never dreaming that she would one day be a 2025 James Beard Foundation Emerging Chef nominee for her work at Vicia. However, by working her way up the ranks and taking advantage of every opportunity available to her at the restaurant, she’s been able to achieve more than she thought was possible.

“I’ll never forget my interview with Michael,” Sacro Chatham says. “We met at a coffee shop and then he took the time to show me the restaurant, like I was a big deal, not just some cook they needed to fill a position. When they see talent, they work as hard as they can to keep it. They bring you up with them.”

The way the Gallinas develop and energize their employees, Sacro Chatham notes, is as much about the training they provide as it is about the way they lead by example. Every person who works in the kitchen learns every single station and is treated like a vital part of the team, beginning on their first day. This builds confidence, she says, and also creates an environment where people can move up in the kitchen, as she did from line cook to chef de cuisine. She also points to Michael’s drive in the kitchen as inspiring to others. Whereas a typical chef-owner might leave the hard work to those underneath him, she’s been impressed that Michael is never one to shy away from being in the trenches alongside the kitchen staff. 

“Nowadays it’s rare to see a boss grind side by side with you every day, but he is one of the few that does that,” Sacro Chatham says. “He is the first person you see when you come in, and there is passion in that. He is never one to sit back and watch you work. He’s there alongside you.”

Prioritizing People Over Plates

It’s also vital to the Gallinas to demonstrate to their employees the importance of work-life balance. The couple have become industry leaders and staunch advocates for employee health and wellbeing, and by doing so have started to change the conversation about how the hospitality industry values the whole person. 

Liz Deken, Take Root’s events and hospitality manager, has experienced this person-first philosophy in action. A victim of the May 16 tornado that devastated the St. Louis community, Deken was at work when she got word that her home had been destroyed. Overcome with fear for her son, who was home at the time, but also concerned about the wedding she and the team were coordinating the following day, she didn’t know what to do. Tara made it clear to her where her priorities should be.

“She told me, ‘Go. Don’t worry about it. We’ve got this,’ and I had 100 percent confidence that they did,” Deken says. “They knew I was worried about the event, but also going through a personal crisis, (and) they were completely supportive. I didn’t go to work for two weeks, and they made it so I didn’t have to worry about anything without even asking a question. That they could do that and that they were also there for me in any way I needed was such a profound gift. And I have seen that repeatedly when other colleagues have gone through things. They are very supportive of the fact that people have lives and that family comes first. That is unique in this industry and makes people who work for them want to stick around because they feel valued as human beings.”

The Gallinas are leaders in this relatively new person-centered approach in the hospitality industry — a business that has been criticized for creating grueling, sometimes toxic work environments. As their employees move on to positions at other restaurants, they bring this culture with them, helping to bring about change in the region’s dining community.

“We try to lead by example,” Michael says. “If we need a mental health day or personal day, we try to take it because we want people to know that there are more important things in life than the restaurant. That goes for me and for everyone that works with us. Sometimes things happen that you can’t control. You need to take care of what’s important.”

Tara has seen how this philosophy — and Michael’s example — has resonated with people within the restaurant industry.

“Michael in particular has done a lot to show chefs and cooks a different way to be that has now trickled out into the larger dining community,” Tara says. “We know people who have worked for us who now have their own places and show their staff that this is important to them. That is a direct benefit of leading by example, and it wasn’t always that way. These changes didn’t happen overnight. There was a lot of unlearning that had to happen, but we have come a long way and can start to see change happen.” 

If the hospitality industry is taking notice of Take Root’s work-life balance philosophy, the local and national dining public has recognized how their culture results in exceptional service, food, and beverage. Vicia in particular has become a destination restaurant for those visiting St. Louis thanks to its location in the Cortex Innovation District, a technology- and startup-centric area of town that draws business leaders and investors from across the country. In fact, that proximity to innovation and a neighborhood filled with others also looking to push the envelope in their respective fields is why the Gallinas chose to open Vicia in Cortex in the first place. 

As the neighborhood has grown over the years, so has Vicia — reaching those from across the country who want to experience all that the modern dining experience can be. 

“We do a lot of events and host many groups here, and some of them have been attended by these renowned thought leaders and visionaries,” Tara says. “We’re constantly seeing dinners happen where there’s people talking about major things they’re developing. And to be in the middle of all of that has been really exciting. Sometimes, I wonder how we got here, but I do know that we have created something that feels somehow still innovative and fresh even after all this time. The people that choose to spend money with us and put faith in us to have a special moment here do so because we have worked hard all these years to build something special and unique. Now, it feels like we can step outside of ourselves and see how cool that is.”