Getting to Know You: Rare Chop House Owner and Chef Jeffrey McGuire
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By Chip Forrester
Photo by Paul Elledge
Jeffrey McGuire
From his first job at 16 at 9th Street Grill where he worked for Laura Thacker, working in the kitchen doing the prep work and honing his culinary skills in Mt. Vernon making $8 an hour, to becoming Mt. Vernon’s premier chef and restaurant owner, meet Jeffrey McGuire, Rare Chop House Restaurant’s master chef.
Born in Wisconsin, he and his family trickled down to Mt. Vernon by the time Mr. McGuire was in first grade, and he has never left. He grew up with a family of seven in a single wide trailer and began Rend Lake Community College at 16, but found school wasn’t for him.
The story of Rare Chop House and Mr. McGuire’s path to its full ownership is in itself a fascinating story. Begun in 2013 by then National Railway Equipment (NRE) CEO Steven Beal and his wife Erin, Mr. Beal needed an upscale, fine dining establishment in which to entertain his high-powered international railroad executives when they came to town. Being no such place in Mt. Vernon, Mr. Beal and his wife designed and developed Rare Chop House with a railroad equipment theme (there are iron railroad wheels decorating the place and other railroad items) and opened to a hungry Mt. Vernon clientele making the restaurant an instant success. (Maybe call this an industrial theme, featuring exposed metals, woods and the railroad wheeled bench.)
For Mr. McGuire, the journey to Rare Chop House started as an assistant to the general manager to its eventual owner, but was a bit more complicated with a low-paid stint at 21 at Walmart in Mt. Vernon, making less than $10 an hour to an internet company specializing in UHRS (Universal Human Relevance System, or “an internet company specializing in using people to help AI applications recognize data”) where he did technical work, to eventually finding his way to the restaurant in 2016.
Recruited by NRE marketing director Brandon Bullard to manage “front of the house” handling the servers and bartenders, this task proved important as Mr. McGuire continued to build on his restaurant management knowledge. Primarily focused on the lunch period, Mr. McGuire managed staff and patrons from the front. Additionally, he was tasked with coordinating private events, which became an additional revenue source for the restaurant and is to this day.
With Ms. Beal becoming the General Manager of the restaurant in 2019, Mr. McGuire continued his apprenticeship under her tutelage until the tragic and sudden death at 46 of Mr. Beal in the summer of 2020.
Following her husband’s death, leaving the restaurant business in Mrs. Beal’s hands during the height of the COVID crisis, the business closed for six months with some question as to whether it would ever reopen.
As Mr. McGuire explained, “Steven and Erin kept me employed during that period when we were closed. I could not be more grateful for what they did.” And when the state restrictions loosened and the restaurant was able to reopen, with the loss of her husband Ms. Beal moved to St. Louis and Mr. McGuire and she began discussions of a “lease-to-own” contract and the restaurant business was purchased in 2022.
One of the key success factors of the restaurant Mr. McGuire notes is a very small but tightly organized staff that is extremely close knit, with a total of 10 plus Mr. McGuire. Staff turnover is rare and staff and regular patrons are soon on a first name basis creating that intimate feel of a hometown restaurant where, “Everyone knows your name.”
Following the COVID crisis, having lost so much staff, lunches were no longer financially viable, and as Mr. McGuire explained, “Unlike dinners, people just don’t make lunch reservations, which made it difficult to anticipate staffing and inventory needs, creating a tough environment for tipped employees and a low margin business like ours.”
But business has rebounded strongly, with a bustling Wednesday Night Live Music night in the bar from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. filling the bar and restaurant with patrons, and with local musicians providing the entertainment. An Everyday Happy Hour continues to bring the after-work crowd in for drinks and fellowship.
And while open for dinner Tuesday through Saturday, the restaurant does a number of major private events on Sundays and Mondays, a continued source of additional revenue and a culinary service to the community. From weddings and wedding receptions to wine-pairing dinners to corporate management dinners to retirement parties, the facility hums seven-days-week and keeps Mr. McGuire busy and profitable.
As a handsome, eligible 35-year-old Mt. Vernon bachelor and successful restaurateur and businessman, Mr. McGuire was recently made ineligible when he tied the knot last year on August 25th, 2024, with Dr. Lauren Williams, a freshly minted general surgeon returning home to Fairfield. With no children, he still manages to cook for fun and plays piano, preferring classical music like Toccata in Fugue D minor and other old video game soundtracks from his childhood on his keyboard. His main hobbies are reading — a lot he says — the classics like Steinbeck and Vonnegut and regular fitness/strength training using his small, home-gym for workouts.
It has been a long and winding journey from his early days with Laura Thacker and 9th Street Grill to his ownership of Rare Chop House, but a satisfying and successful one for sure.
(If you know of someone interesting that we should feature contact us at: gettingtoknowyoucolumn@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you)
