{"id":1481,"date":"2017-05-03T18:35:45","date_gmt":"2017-05-03T23:35:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/?p=1481"},"modified":"2017-05-04T15:00:44","modified_gmt":"2017-05-04T20:00:44","slug":"travis-mohlenbrink-restaurant-extraordinaire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/2017\/05\/03\/travis-mohlenbrink-restaurant-extraordinaire\/","title":{"rendered":"Travis Mohlenbrink – Restaurant Extraordinaire"},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=xgcsmqodB64&feature=youtu.be<\/p>\n

Over the past twelve years Travis Mohlenbrink has established himself as one of Peoria’s most successful restaurant owners, developing various casual restaurants, with a twist on traditional flavors. However, when he was first choosing his potential career path, owning restaurants wasn\u2019t at the forefront of his mind.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMy degree is actually in elementary education,\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cI did my student teaching my senior year and decided that it was not going to be something that I wanted to do.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

While Mohlenbrink attended college at the University of Illinois Chicago, he also worked at a restaurant downtown, and met Doug Gooding who was a district partner for <\/span>Brinker International<\/span><\/a>, a large restaurant corporation that owns Chili\u2019s. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI called Doug and said, \u2018I think I\u2019m ready to jump into this restaurant thing and see what it is you can come up with for me,\u2019\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cWithin two weeks he had an opportunity with the Chili\u2019s organization, so I went right into working for Chili\u2019s and I opened restaurants across the country.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

After opening various Chili\u2019s, Panera Breads, and other chain restaurants, Mohlenbrink decided he wanted to do his own thing, and settled on Peoria to do so because of it\u2019s business possibilities.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI was living in Bloomington at the time and originally my whole idea of being in the restaurant industry or hospitality industry was going to revolve around catering,\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cWhen I looked at all the areas in central Illinois to decide where the best opportunity would be, with the medical facilities \u2026 the big business with Caterpillar and RLI being located in Peoria I felt like the best opportunity I had was here.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

With this idea in mind Mohlenbrink rented a cheap facility on NE Adams street and opened <\/span>Cracked Pepper<\/span><\/a> which focusses mainly on corporate-style catering and also features a bakery and caf\u00e9.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

The Maple Bacon Log\u00a0at Cracked Pepper on NE Adams.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cWe wanted to be the people that a lawyer\u2019s office would call or CAT might be able to have an off-site meeting somewhere, so they would call us to cater their lunch for that,\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cCatering is still the biggest thing that we do as far as volume.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

After Cracked Pepper\u2019s success grew exponentially, Mohlenbrink decided he wanted to do something bigger, which lead to the opening of his first restaurant Salt, followed later by <\/span>Sugar<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Thyme<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>Cayenne<\/span><\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n

Each of these restaurants brings a unique twist of flavor and decor to traditional restaurants concepts.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cEssentially, I have an idea of a concept and get together with my executive chef, Vince Swanson,\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cOnce the food is figured out that is when I start to look at what the feel is inside of that concept.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

At Sugar, a wood-fired pizza bistro, as well as at all his dining establishments, Mohlenbrink has stuck to the business model of bringing his customers good service and high quality food at a fair price.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Sugar Wood-Fired Bistro serves up some unique pizzas including Buffalo Chicken Pizza.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201c<\/span>Probably what keeps people coming back is the consistency of the product,\u201d Sugar manager Andy Sepich said. \u201cThat\u2019s really important to any restaurant is to be able to consistently put out the same product, and it delivers every time.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In addition to bringing consistency in products and service, his newest restaurant Cayenne, a Mexican taqueria, has brought an authentic and casual atmosphere to downtown Peoria Heights.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Cayenne is serving up authentic Mexican cuisine in Peoria Heights.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cTravis put a lot of work into detailing this place to give it the full effect of a dining experience and I think he\u2019s done a very good job of accomplishing that,\u201d Cayenne manager Mr. Chung said. \u201cIt\u2019s really authentic Mexican style decor and we really, really want to bring that to the table at one-hundred percent, versus just opening the doors of a Mexican restaurant.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

When Mohlenbrink isn\u2019t focussed on developing new concepts, he enjoys giving back to the Peoria community. He is actively involved with multiple organizations including Boys Scout of America, Quest Charter Academy, St. Jude, and the Big Brothers Big Sisters of Peoria. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s something that I try to do as much as I can for the children in our community,\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cWhether it\u2019s a senior in high school to a sick child or a child that is a little less fortunate than maybe I was as a kid. I try to give back as much as I can to the youth of our community.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Although it wasn\u2019t the career he ended up choosing, Mohlenbrink also had the chance to return to teaching for a few years as an adjunct professor at Illinois Central College, where he taught in their culinary arts program. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the greatest challenges that I have today, and from day one still, is finding people who are passionate about this industry that want to make this their career, so it\u2019s an important program to me,\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cI\u2019ve definitely seen the fruits of some of the labor that\u2019s happened there. I\u2019ve got a number of students from there that work for me today.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Bringing new passionate people into the restaurant industry will be vital for Mohlenbrink as he has multiple new concepts floating around in his mind as he looks toward the future.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re looking to do an additional one or two projects in the next few years,\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cMaybe in the next few months I\u2019ll be able to announce what those projects are, but what I can assure you is that they\u2019ll be different.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=xgcsmqodB64&feature=youtu.be Over the past twelve years Travis Mohlenbrink has established himself as one of Peoria’s most successful restaurant owners, developing various casual restaurants, with a twist on traditional flavors. However, when he was first choosing his potential career path, owning restaurants wasn\u2019t at the forefront of his mind. \u201cMy degree is actually in elementary education,\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cI did my student teaching my senior year and decided that it was not going to be something that I wanted to do.\u201d While Mohlenbrink attended college at the University of Illinois Chicago, he also worked at a restaurant downtown, and met Doug Gooding who was a district partner for Brinker International, a large restaurant corporation that owns Chili\u2019s. \u201cI called Doug and said, \u2018I think I\u2019m ready to jump into this restaurant thing and see what it is you can come up with for me,\u2019\u201d Mohlenbrink said. \u201cWithin two weeks he had an opportunity with the Chili\u2019s organization, so I went right into working for Chili\u2019s and I opened restaurants across the country.\u201d After opening various Chili\u2019s, Panera Breads, and other chain restaurants, Mohlenbrink decided he wanted to do his own thing, and settled on Peoria to do so because of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":150,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1481","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/150"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1481"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1481\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1493,"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1481\/revisions\/1493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}