6 Questions with Daisy & Greg Ryan

  1. Bell’s opened in 2018 and already has earned a coveted Michelin star. What’s the Bell’s birth story?

    Daisy: Greg and I met working at Per Se in New York, and lived in LA and Austin, always working in restaurants. We moved back to Santa Barbara County, and the Santa Ynez Valley, which is where I grew up. We’ve always wanted to have our own restaurant so we opened Bell’s in 2018 as a French-inspired California cuisine restaurant. We do a la carte service for lunch, which is much more traditional French bistro style food. And then we do a prefix menu for dinner, which is still very French inspired but really more of the region, and of the produce and vendors that we have access to locally.

  2. How did you go about choosing Bell’s location?

    Daisy: Part of it was to be closer to family to help raise our son, but also knowing that we wanted to have our own business. We knew that there was a lot of opportunity in this area. There's the wine community here, and a void for inspired restaurants, I would say. We actually initially purchased a restaurant that is in Los Olivos, that is now our second restaurant. But initially there was some trouble opening there. So kind of by coincidence, we were having lunch in Los Alamos in the space that is now Bell’s, and got to speaking with the owners, who revealed they were looking to sell both the property and the business. And so we ended up being here, and it was very kismet in a lot of ways.

  3. What are some of your biggest inspirations or influences when it comes to design and architecture?

    Daisy: I think for me, the design elements of life come from my family and my parents. I spent a lot of time as a kid traveling to Europe with them, specifically to France and just seeing the different ways that people dress and cultural traditions in architecture throughout France, Paris, Provence, wherever, has a huge influence. For the restaurant, I also think specifically about where we live and drawing parallels between those two styles, both that European French style and this traditional Mexican style of dress and food and color, all those things kind of meet in my mind together. Ranchero culture has a big influence on me personally.

  4. Along with your restaurants, you also started a nonprofit called Feed the Valley. Tell us more...

    Greg: We started Feed the Valley because we were trying to understand a better way to reach a part of our community here. We had a certain skill set and a commercial kitchen that could provide a hot meal on a daily basis to those who are in need. As a restaurant, we're probably best equipped, more than anyone else really, to try and do that. And it has allowed us to connect with a group of community as well as organizers that we had never had imagined or had the ability to connect with before. And so it's really been a very fulfilling part of us, for us, in terms of being able to get food to people that that truly needed. Like we, you know, we're a pricey restaurant, relative to where we are, it's semi-expensive in terms of California. And by us being able to do what we do in order to pay, not just ourselves, but other restaurants in the valley, to feed folks that are food insecure, is a deeply fulfilling thing.

  5. Why do you think people have such a strong affinity for what you're doing at Bell's?

    Daisy: We understand fine dining. We understand what it takes, from the financing to the, quote, 'three star experience'. And we moved here not to do any of that. And yet, it's kind of ingrained. There's a certain level of hospitality that's just ingrained in us. People don't want to be doted upon, but they want to have an interaction with a person that feels unique and genuine and authentic. And we're able to provide that, because that's who we are as people.

  6. What do you hope someone gets to experience in places like Portugal and Provence with you?

    Daisy: I don't just think about the food I think of things like what’s the space around me like? What bowl am I going to serve it in? And what are you drinking out of? So it's not just about what you're consuming, but how you're consuming.