By Patrick Graham
As all foodies know, a chef’s path on the road to becoming the general of the back of the house takes a little while: culinary school, externships, staging, making one’s way up the ladder working various stations in the kitchen, to sous chef, and then taking the reins as executive chef. And that’s the Reader’s Digest version.
My point is that once you get to the top of the mountain, the view can be nice, but it’s not always what is regarded as true happiness. I met Shay MacDonald when he was his brother’s sous chef at one of Kiawah’s many multi-diamond locations. The resort is very nice, but very corporate, which is to say that creativity can be limited by product availability, food cost, and, ultimately, the will of the patrons on the property.
In the 1989 movie "Field Of Dreams", a voice whispers to Kevin Costner's character Ray Kinsella that "If you build it, he will come." In this quote, the antecedent of "it" is a baseball diamond in the middle of a corn field in rural Iowa. Later in the film, a James Earl Jones character named Terence Mann indicates that if he builds the baseball field, his financial needs would be satisfied because people will gladly give their hard-earned money, if not their eyeteeth, to experience such a ponderous sensation of witnessing the old greats playing a child's game that was once known as "America's Pastime".
Growing up in Dayton, Ohio, the indoctrination about the feats of the illustrious Wright Brothers began essentially as soon as we five-year-olds walked into our kindergarten classes. Fascinating stories about how a wondrous flying machine evolved in the minds of Orville and Wilbur in their little bike shop in 1903 permeated our little minds, and Dayton has been on the map forever since that blustery day at Kitty Hawk.
Fourteen years ago, I was in Joliet, Illinois visiting my grandmother when I had some free time. I mean free time, like the whole day free time. I decided to pull a Ferris Bueller and head up I-55 into downtown Chicago because I had never done it of my own free will. I decided to do Chicago. It was a Sunday, so not much was going on. It was late March, so the Cubs were still in Arizona, the Bulls were on the road, and the Bears were sleeping off a 4-12 season. St. Patrick’s Day had come and gone, and the forecast was a 100% chance of gray. These conditions, however, did not sway my determination to go see what I wanted to see since I was about fifteen or sixteen: the inside of an Irish pub in the Second City. O’Callaghan’s on West Hubbard Street was the prototypical Mick joint of the day, with a long bar, wood floors, bar tables on the opposite wall, and the appropriate amount of televisions. I was delighted and sad at the same time. I believed that I had crossed off something on a relatively short bucket list, but I feared I would have to return to the 312 area code in order to experience it again.
It’s tough to find parking in the Avondale district. It just is. An unfortunate truth, but it speaks to the vibrant nature of the area. Few places on the Charleston map jam together such an eclectic mix of styles and tastes in a two-block radius, and right smack-dab in the middle you will find perhaps the most famous former gas station in West Ashley.
On a bustling Thursday morning in July, Paul Godbout, wife Marla, son Mike and adopted son Andy are getting ready for the Sellsfish weekend rush. Hour after hour, the boxes pour into the cutting room. They are immediately opened and inspected for quality. If they are up to muster, they are put in their designated freezers; if not, they are sent back. The phone is ringing off the hook about large orders for clams and shrimp. The store will clear through 1500 pounds of freight from now through the upcoming Sunday; Godbout says there’s a line of customers sometimes 25 deep. And not all of them live close by; they have customers from Kiawah and Mount Pleasant too. Godbout tells me they “are working their tails off” and “it's always like this around here, it never stops.”
Inventive dishes and fabulous service set 
People read restaurant reviews so they can make an informed decision on whether or not they want to take a chance on an establishment that they have never laid eyes on or just driven past. They also read because they want to solidify an opinion that they have obtained by word of mouth from their contemporaries. Furthermore, they read because they just like hearing about good food.