We ask Chef Bill Fuller for his Top 15 memories of Kaya to commemorate the restaurant’s 15-year anniversary and to celebrate Kayafest this Sunday, May 30! Leave us a comment with your own Kaya memory and you could win a $100 gift card! (Deadline is Friday, May 28.)
- Underwear-only Chef Jamie Achmoody dancing with similarly clad very young server atop the foyer ceiling at Tallulah’s lounge, Kaya’s old Sunday Club night.
- Armed robbery in daylight by one of our dishwashers who sped away with a couple days’ deposits. He was never caught.
- “Accidentally” kissing Kristen C. as I helped “adjust the stereo.” Off duty, mind you.
- Playing poker until dawn at table 26.
- Driving the two dishwasher Jones brothers home to Homewood at 1 a.m., nightly. Over those six months, I became quite familiar with the Frankstown Road nightlife.
- “Steamer Darrell!”
- Sharon Stone slipping in the back door to eat wings – “drummies only” while she was filming Diabolique here in Pittsburgh. She would sit at the very back table, and we’d dim the lights way down. No one ever got a peep up her skirt that I know of.
- Kayafest after Kayafest after Kayafest, where we fill the streets with friends and relatives and have a great ole party.
- When we first opened, there was parking on both sides of 20th street. We would wait to see which delivery trucks would smash the bad parkers.
- Bob, our resident alley homeless guy and his ever-changing bikini costumes.
- Ejecting lovers from the prep room table during Tallulah’s.
- Eating cold Cuban sandwiches late at night and very early in the morning.
- Whole afternoons slicing chips by hand on a mandoline. Eventually we purchased a mechanical chipper.
- Walking into Fat Franks (previous restaurant in the Kaya space) and wondering what I had signed on for.
- Opening Kaya after my first long Pittsburgh winter and seeing all the beautiful people packing the sunny dining room. Relieved to learn that Pittsburgh isn’t always grey.
