National, International, Armenia, and Community News and Opinion

The Armenian Reporter | March 28, 2009 7
Community
Andre’s Steakhouse exceeds expectations
Continued from page 6
Andre’s long journey from Shishli,
Turkey, to Naples, Florida, began
in a multilingual society, where
he learned eight languages – all of
which he still speaks.
“I went to an Italian school in
Istanbul,” Andre says. He not only
learned Armenian and Turkish, but
also picked up Hebrew and Spanish.
“Because the Jews in Turkey spoke
Spanish,” he explains. He picked up
Greek when he served in the Turkish
Army in Ankara for two years.
Andre was part of a troop that included
other minorities, including
Greeks and Jews.
“We were in the minority, and
being in the minority in Turkey,”
he says, “you stick together.
That’s why I learned so many languages.”
Andre also learned French and
English, and he learned German after
arriving in Germany, at age 24.
“Turkey was an okay place to live
at the time, but we always looked
toward living in a bigger country,
a better country,” says Andre. “Europe,
America, and that was the
reason that I went to Germany all
by myself.”
He is comfortable in his own
skin; perhaps he’s always been.
Wearing a red T-shirt and preppy
Bermuda shorts, Andre has come
to the steakhouse earlier than usual
to give the Armenian Reporter an
interview.
The steakhouse is open only in
the evenings. On this night, we run
into the visiting parish priest, Fr.
Nerses Jebejian, who is here to
dine with his wife.
“I was baptized by [Angelo Giuseppe]
Cardinal Roncalli, who
later became the Pope [John
XXIII],” Andre says. “In 1935, he
was a cardinal in Istanbul. But we
grew up Armenian, because my
father passed away and my aunt
married another Armenian guy.
He is the one who raised me, practically.
So we grew up Armenian in
Shishli, where there was a thriving
Armenian community. It was really,
really nice to be there.”
Leaving Shishli for Stuttgart,
Germany, in 1959 was a life-changing
experience for Andre. “Because,
all of a sudden, you’re out of the
nest and you’re flying away, not
knowing where you’re going and
what you’re doing,” he says.
Andre reached Germany with
four suitcases, and he was greeted
with an important lesson about
good customer service. The lesson
has stayed with him since and is
perhaps a key factor in his success
in the restaurant business.
“I grabbed two of my suitcases
and put them on the train I had
to take,” he remembers. “When I
came back to get the other two, the
train [with the remaining suitcases]
had left.”
Andre did not speak German at
the time, but he found someone
who spoke French. The Frenchspeaker
told him where to go and
what to ask for.
“Finally, I went and found the
place, and two hours later my baggage
was back there,” he says. His
first interaction with German society
left him in awe of good customer
service and hospitality. “It
was amazing.”
Soon after his arrival in Stuttgart,
Andre began working in a factory.
“After a year, I said, ‘This is not
my cup of tea,’ and I had to move
on,” he says. His next stop was a job
with a company that served American
GIs.
“I worked with them for two years
in the parts store, in the garage and
repair shop,” he says. “Then I went
to a construction company and became
an interpreter.”
After eight years with the construction
company, Andre became
the manager of the payroll department
and supervised eight Germans.
“I was about 30 or 35 and stopped
doing that and bought a restaurant,”
he says.
Eating and eateries
Andre’s interest in restaurants
dates back to his youth in Turkey,
where he and his family frequented
local eateries.
“They were good,” he says. “Turkish
food is excellent. While living
in Germany, every time we visited
Turkey, the first stop was in Istanbul
and a place called Beytee. They
had the best stuff, best food.”
Andre got to know the restaurant
business inside out when he moved
to Germany. One of his first places
of residence was a room over a German
restaurant.
“I was practically more down in
the restaurant than I was in my
room,” he says. “They were a nice
family and had a nice bakery, and I
enjoyed it and liked it. It was called
the Gruenerbaum, and it’s where I
learned how to serve people, how
to cook. You know, it was very, very
interesting.”
Andre opened his own restaurant
in Stuttgart at the age of 40. He
says his first place was more of a
pub than a restaurant. He and his
Turkish partner served a lot of beer
but also offered Turkish food.
“People came, but they came more
to drink, because the German love
drinking,” he says. “And from there,
I took a bigger restaurant, a better
restaurant with more food than
beer, and that worked out.”
The move to the Big
Apple
The big move to the Big Apple happened
in the early 80s, after Andre
traveled to New York to visit his
sister, who had moved to the U.S.
from Turkey.
“We came to visit them, and we
liked it,” he says. “The first thing
that caught my eye and my ear is
that nobody gives a damn where
you are from. You are an American,
even if you don’t speak English.
You don’t feel like a stranger, and
that impressed me. I liked it a lot.
I said, ‘We have to go back, sell everything,
and establish ourselves in
America.’ So we moved to New York
and spent 12 years in New York before
coming to Florida.”
Growing up Armenian in Turkey,
says Andre, wasn’t a big deal.
Ethnicity wasn’t an issue he had to
deal with. “Maybe it’s a bigger issue
today,” he says, “but at that time
people didn’t talk about the Genocide.
We knew it [had happened],
but nobody talked about it.”
Andre was made very aware of
his ethnicity and nationality when
he arrived in Germany.
“The funniest part of Germany is
that when you are in Germany and
you don’t look German, people are
a little apprehensive about you,” he
says.
The open arms of America welcomed
Andre and his family in 1982,
when he moved to Long Island.
In New York, Andre worked in
coffee shops and restaurants for
$25 a day. He also drove limousines
to help make ends meet before
he landed what he calls “the
right job,” at Peter Luger Steakhouse.
“I used to work every day at the
coffee shop, from 5 to 3,” he says.
“I didn’t care about the money, because
as long as I worked, I was
learning English. Those two years
were a good experience – working
as a dishwasher then on the counter,
and from the counter to the
Andre Cottoloni.
The epicurean wonderland of Andre’s Steakhouse.
wait station, which was a promotion
for me.”
Going from a restaurateur in
Germany to a dishwasher in New
York was hard for Andre, who was
over 40 years old already, but the
difficulty was overshadowed by the
promise of the American Dream.
He knew that he could work his
way up the ladder.
“America is great,” he says and
repeats himself. “America is great.
You know, in Europe, we used to
say, ‘The gold is on the ground’ [in
America], but no one told us that
you have to bend down and pick
up that gold. That’s the issue. That’s
the point. You have to work and
you get it. If you don’t work, you
don’t get it.”
The turning point
“The right job” for Andre came in
1984, when he began waiting tables
at the famed Peter Luger Steakhouse,
which has been popular for
more than a hundred years.
“I had a very good experience, and
the money was right,” Andre recalls.
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“At that time, in five hours we used
to make $120-150. That was great
money for me, compared to $40-50
a night. Then I became part time
manager, and I made more money.”
Holidays were spent in Marco Island
in Southwest Florida, and in
1993 Andre decided it was time to
move on again.
“We had a house in Marco Island,”
he says. “We came down regularly,
and, finally, we said, ‘We gotta go
now. We gotta do it.’ So we came
looking for a place.”
Andre spotted a former Kentucky
Fried Chicken restaurant on the lot
where his steakhouse now sits.
“We rented the place, we renovated
and started the business,” he
says. “The first night, I had about
25 people here. The second night, a
Saturday, I had 40 people. The third
day, I had two people, and one of
them was an Armenian I knew
from New York, and that was it. But
slowly it picked up. It took a year
and a half until the place was going.
Two years after we opened, we had
to put this addition, because the
space wasn’t enough. Now we are
doing okay. We are surviving even
now, even in this economy.”
“When I started 15 years ago, I was
the only steakhouse in town,” says
Andre. “Now there are a few others,
but they are having a hard time. Our
clients come back time after time for
the porterhouse and the best steaks.”
“People sometimes call and ask if
Andre is there tonight. ‘We’re going
to come, and we want to see him,’
they say. They come in, hug and
kiss, sit down, eat, and go,” he says.
“People come in and want to see me.
They want to see me in my shorts,
because I never wear long pants.
I’m in Florida, and I refuse to get
dressed up. I run a casual place, and
you see it, and people put on their
shorts just to come here.”
The most important lesson Andre
has learned in his long journey
from Shishli to Naples is that, in
order to succeed in life, people always
have to adapt to their new environments.
“If you go somewhere, and you
try to stay with your culture and
impose your culture on the other
people, it’s no good,” he says. “You
have to adapt yourself to the country.
You have to go with the flow, so
you can survive. If you do it different,
it’s not good.”
Tight-knit community
Members of the Southwest Florida
Armenian community often come
to dine at Andre’s, and Andre joins
other members of the Armenian-
American Cultural Society of Southwest
Florida at various events.
“The Armenians here get together,
and we socialize,” says Andre. “One
tells the other one, and we get more
familiar with each other. Many of
the people come from the north in
the season. They are retired. They
are nice people, very nice people.”
Andre says if one Armenian
meets another Armenian, the
first Armenian eventually ends up
meeting the friends of the second
Armenian.
“If I see that you are Armenian, I’m
going to talk to you, and you’re going
to talk to me,” he says. “Then you’re
going to talk to another Armenian,
and you’re going to say, ‘I met Andre,
and he’s Armenian.’ That’s going to
happen, and that’s the way you do it.”
So when you visit Naples, stop
by for a visit to Andre’s. Enjoy a
great meal and share an Armenian
tale.
connect:
(239) 263-5851
2800 Tamiami Trl N.
Naples, FL, 34103