Player's Retreat chef talks hangover cures, what she loves about cooking
Five years ago, chef Beth LittleJohn went from running the kitchen at a French brasserie to one of Raleigh's most iconic sports bars and she hasn't looked back.
"It was a cool, unique opportunity to help a Raleigh institution, give it a little love but not change it too much," LittleJohn said of taking the executive chef job at Player's Retreat. Some of that love included a new kitchen for the restaurant, which turns 69 years old this year.
"We wanted to stay the same but just make it better," the Durham native said, noting that now all of the sauces and dressings are made from scratch. "Now we hand-cut and batter all of own onion rings."
LittleJohn is this week's guest on the Out and About Podcast.
"When I was about 12 or 13, I really started playing a lot in the kitchen," she said. "I watched a lot of PBS cooking shows like Julia Child and Justin Wilson."
After attending college in Massachusetts, LittleJohn went to The Culinary Institute of America.
For her, cooking is about bringing joy.
"Making people happy with food is what I love about it," she said.
Since she runs the kitchen at a sports bar in a college town, we had to ask her what her favorite hangover cure is. "Cheeseburgers," she said.
