Chef DeAngelo Newson is adroit in the kitchen. On his Instagram, Chef Newson shares photos (and videos) of stunning dishes, and as Executive Chef for ClarkLindsey Village, Newson is responsible for preparing a fine-dining dinner every evening for the retirement community. That’s not all he does. He’s also a private chef for special events and recently, Newson was Allerton’s Supper Club featured chef for January.
I’ve seen ClarkLindsey Village on Race Street in Urbana many a time, and for years, I’ve been impressed with plate after plate of Newson’s culinary creations on Instagram that curiosity finally got the better of me. I had to know more. What kind of dining room does that Urbana retirement community have? What does the kitchen look like? Do the residents appreciate Newson’s pretty plating as much as Instagram does? Does he take requests from the residents? How did he become executive chef at ClarkLindsey? Last November, Chef and I set up a time after the holidays, so he could dish on all the details. The week before Restaurant Week, Newson walked me through the kitchen and ClarkLindsey Village campus.
In our conversation, Chef Newson talked about his passion for food, what other Champaign-Urbana restaurants he’s worked at, which ingredient he doesn’t care for, and what it’s like cooking for the extremely high expectations of retiree diners — including the number one, most requested menu item at the retirement community.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Smile Politely: I want to start at the beginning, when you were a kid. What’s your earliest cooking memory?
DeAngelo Newson: When I was a kid? The earliest I started cooking when I was 12, and my earliest memory was the day I learned how to cook. I was babysitting one of my little cousins, and I was hungry. Sure, I had snacks or whatever, but I really wanted to cook something, so I called my mom while she was at work. I went through the deep freezer downstairs. I was like, “Hey, I want to make pork chops.” We had some greens, and I want to say I made sides of mashed potatoes or corn. My mom walked me through it for about an hour and a half over the phone.
I made this meal for myself and for my little cousin, and she loved it — and I loved it, too. After that meal, I remember seeing the satisfaction on her face — and when her mom came to pick her up and she was describing what I had done to the food — you know, I got this feeling that I had never experienced at that time, and I found gratitude in that. I knew then that I could see myself doing this.
My grandfather, he trained me pretty much for this, but I didn’t realize that’s what he was doing at the time. My grandfather being from Tennessee, it was definitely country living, so we did a lot of fishing. Hunting, gardening — I wouldn’t necessarily say farming, but definitely gardening. We went out to fish or hunt, and whatever we brought back, my grandfather cleaned it, and we ate it. The first thing I ate was rabbit.
SP: Is there anything you wouldn’t eat?
Newson: I’m not opposed to eating a lot of things. I like frog legs, too; it’s my favorite thing to eat, hands down. We ate a lot of deer, venison, any type of fish, any type of seafood.
Oh, and I love spicy food as well. I love spicy peppers.
SP: Did your grandfather cook spicy food?
Newson: Yes. He always — no matter what — made sure he had about four or five different types of spicy peppers. He’s really big into pickling and canning and preservatives. As a kid, I thought it was strange to see all this stuff in the basement in jars, but the more and more I go through my career, I’m so grateful that I got a chance to live and be a part of that way of living, not even realizing it would have an effect on me today. I’ve known for a while — since before I was a teenager — that this was the route that I was going to go.
SP: So how did you become executive chef at ClarkLindsey? How long have you been chef here?
Newson: I’ve been Executive Chef here a year and a half now. I was not looking for a job when my wife and I moved back from Nashville two years ago, back to Champaign-Urbana. I had already started being a private chef before we moved to Nashville, after leaving Everyday Kitchen, and it was going well: a slow burn, but I was definitely making progress with clientele and finding my niche. Then we moved to Nashville. My father-in-law got sick, and we came back, and I thought to myself, you know what? I’m not gonna go back to the restaurant business. I’m going to just do the private chef thing. Meanwhile, my wife was sending out my resumes to all these places. And one of them was ClarkLindsey — and they called.
I got a call, and it was: “Hey, this is Jason,” (at the time, that was our director), and he’s like, “I have you down for an interview on this date,” and I had no clue that I had even applied.
SP: Wow, so what was that interview like? Did you cook for him?
Newson: He asked what I wanted to make for a demo. I told him I wanted to do a pan-seared trout with a white bean-cauliflower hummus and grilled broccolini. I get here for the interview, and he doesn’t mention anything about it. So I ask when am I gonna cook? He’s said he forgot to get the ingredients, and I don’t know if this was a test, but I took it as a test because it was a challenge: I still had to make a meal. But the kitchen didn’t have what I wanted.
I ended up making the white bean-cauliflower puree, and I used salmon in place of the trout. I was able to use broccoli, just regular broccoli. It wasn’t the exact dish that I wanted, but it blew him away that I was able to cook with such short notice and not really even have all the ingredients that I needed. I came back for a second interview and met the CEO, and they gave me the job. It seems like it was meant to be because I wasn’t even necessarily looking to be here.
I had heard of ClarkLindsey, and in my mind, I thought nursing home. But it’s far from that. Now that I’ve been here, I’ve got to meet some of the residents. They’re very well traveled, very opinionated, and very vocal.
SP: Oh really? What’s a popular dish around here?
Newson: A good bit of residents like their comfort foods like meatloaf and mashed potatoes. Turkey and dressing and cranberry sauce. We do have residents here that are well-traveled and are very open-minded to trying new things from all over. We have people here from Pakistan, people here from Iran, people from Russia, all over — and they all want to have a piece of their homeland here in some way, shape, or form.
I kind of collaborate with residents every now and then. They’ll come in the kitchen and show me something that they would like to see. We’ll do an example bite, and I’ll present like a small version of it at cocktail hour. And if residents like it, then we’ll put it on the menu. It’s definitely been eye-opening. I’ve learned a lot from the residents: different techniques, cooking techniques. We have a lady here who was a private chef on a yacht in Spain, and she’s always giving me information and recipes. And she’s very critical about my potatoes.
SP: Really? What’s wrong with your potatoes?
Newson: She thinks that I should soak them a lot, a lot longer than I usually do. She thinks I should always poke holes in them. She says that there’s so many ways to do potatoes that she’s not impressed with the ways that she’s seen so far. And she’s right. She is right about that!
SP: How do the residents tell you this feedback?
Newson: We have comment cards on the tables, and they drop it in a little drop box. A lot of times people will stop me in the hall, and they’ll just flat out tell me whether they liked it or not, what they want, what they would like to see. Some of them, they’ll even walk through the kitchen. This guy here [points to a resident], he’s very vocal. He actually brings me green tomatoes every now and then, so I can cook it. It’s always a pleasant surprise, and I’m not expecting it.
SP: How many residents live here?
Newson: Right now, we have 89, and we’re getting ready to add 64 starting next month. Then by the end of the year, we’ll add another 45.
SP: How does the dining work here? Can residents dine at any time or are there certain hours?
Newson: For the independent living residents, I make them dinner. Residents that need special care, we make them three meals a day. But the independent ones, they have kitchens in their apartments, so they still do a lot of cooking for themselves, and they get out and go places. The dinner is upscale — some would say upscale, some would say fine dining, but I would say it’s more upscale. I try to incorporate fine dining dishes.
SP: Yes, I love how you plate the dishes in the photos you share on Instagram.
Newson: Thank you! I try, but some of the diners here, they don’t like it. It’s too much. It’s too fancy for them. They do not like their food to touch. So if it’s stacked a certain way or if the sauce is on something, they’re going to let me know.
I can’t please everyone, and I know that. I’m fully aware of that, and I keep trying. I do not just plate side-by-side, glop and plop. I do not do it. So I plate it knowing that I’m gonna get some some criticism.
SP: How do you get your ideas for each week, and how often do you change what’s on the menu?
Newson: We do a five-week cycle menu. I plan out weeks in advance. For example, we’re on week four this week, and by the time we get back to week four, I’ll probably go back in and change two or three of the appetizers, maybe three or four of the entrees, and most of the side dishes, the veggies, and starches.
I get a lot of ideas from books. I’m a huge fan of Thomas Keller. I’m a huge fan of Anthony Bourdain, Mario Batali, Emeril, a bunch of old school chefs. Sean Brock, for sure. He’s like the Southern godfather. All praises to Sean Brock. The residents all have subscriptions to food and wine magazines, so I get a lot of ideas from the magazines here. I’m on YouTube when I’m at home, and we watch cooking shows. I like to do a lot of outdoor cooking, so we have smokers for outdoor cooking in the summertime. I’ve even started a garden here. This summer was the first year we did it.
SP: I wish I could eat here! Is it just for the residents?
Newson: Well, at the end of the year going into 2025, we’re hoping to add a bistro into here. That’ll be open to the public and to the residents for lunch.
SP: With a menu designed by you?
Newson: Yes, I’ll still make the menu. I work with a dietitian here, and this is my first time working with a dietitian. It’s been an eye-opener.
SP: What does the dietician want to see in the meals?
Newson: Number one, she likes to see color. Color is very important. For those special parts of the campus where the diets are very strict diet restrictions, we make sure we’re following protocol. Making sure my purees have it just right if someone has a pureed diet, making sure it’s pureed enough and still has the proper nutrients. She gives a lot of suggestions, things that I wouldn’t normally think about because I’m not a dietitian, but it’s been cool working with Beth. Shout out to Beth! The residents love her, too, and she’s made a huge impact.
SP: Walk me through a day in the life for you at ClarkLindsey as Executive Chef.
Newson: I get here around 7:30 in the morning, and I’ll go check in on the units. The units are parts of the campus where certain residents live who need medical attention. Their diets need to be tended to, and I’ll go check through that area first — make sure all the food is up to par and everything’s up to temp.
I like to say hi to everyone. I am a morning person, so I’m really excited in the morning. Then I come in here and I’ll touch base with my crew. Check in with my morning supervisor, and then I’ll go over the menu, go over the production sheets, go over the recipes with everyone, and then I’ll go down to the greenhouse homes. We have greenhouse homes, and they’re not allowed to leave the building. They have they own their own in-home chef down there who cooks lunch and dinner for them, so I’ll go touch base, make sure everything’s up to par with them, make sure they have everything they need.
Then I make it back here around 9 a.m., and I have a daily standup. I meet with the leadership team in this front room where we’re sitting right now. We all meet in person and do activities like team building, so it’s pretty cool. By 10:30 a.m., my sous chefs are both rolling in, and we game plan for dinner. We go over everything for dinner, and I let them tend to getting prepared for dinner. If I’m putting on a new dish, I’ll be present and show them how to do it, but most of the time, I try to let them do it. I try to stay out of their way. I was once a sous chef before, and I worked for chefs that even though you’re the sous chef, they never let you really do anything, so I am very conscious of that.
Sometimes if I’m doing something new, I’ll come out to the dining room and grab the mic and go over each dish, and the residents really appreciate that. Last week, we had pork cheeks. Everyone was like, what is going on?!
SP: Did they go for it?
Newson: Oh, nights like that where I know there’s going to be some hesitation, I’ll come out with a cart and have some samples, just convince them to try and actually order it.
SP: So what time do you usually leave work at the end of the day?
Newson: I usually get out of here around 6 p.m. at the latest. Some days I’m able to leave earlier. That’s what I do like about this: work-life balance. Something I’ve never had in my career is being able to get off before 7 p.m.
SP: What restaurants did you work at before working here?
Newson: I met my wife when I was working at Farren’s, but I’ve worked at Red Herring, at Hendrick House, bacaro was always my main until they closed down. I did Dancing Dog, Bread Company, Miga, and Epiphany Farms. I worked with Blake [Biggs] at bacaro working for Thad [Morrow]. Blake cooked for me for my birthday, and I’ve learned a lot from him. We did over 300 tasting menus together because Thad would just unleash us in the kitchen. He’d get all these ingredients, throw us in the kitchen, and we had fun. Not a lot of people do that now, but he let us do a lot of things to let us grown and learn.
SP: Are there any ingredients you don’t like or foods you are opposed to eating?
Newson: No. Oh, actually, you know what? I don’t really care for white pepper. It’s a little too much for me. I don’t know what it is, but I just don’t care for white pepper.
SP: What’s the residents’ favorite thing to order?
Newson: Lot of sides of ketchup. And a lot of butter!
SP: Is there anything else they love?
Newson: Well, one of the residents bought us a soft serve ice cream machine because they were wanting soft serve. They just wrote us a check, like there you go. And so, now they get soft serve ice cream. They eat quite a bit of soft serve here. I offer fruit every night, and there’s four different types of ice creams in addition to the soft serve machine.
SP: What’s your favorite thing to cook?
Newson: Pastas from scratch and seafood. I love seafood. Halibut is my favorite fish, and I’m a huge fan of rainbow trout. When I was in Nashville, I worked at an Italian restaurant called Culaccino. The chef was from Sicily, chef Frank Palermo, and it was the most amazing place I’ve ever worked. We made 12 or 15 pastas from scratch, and the pizza oven was flown over from Italy.
SP: What about your kids — what is their favorite thing that you cook?
Newson: All my kids love my French fries because they watch me cut them. It’s not necessarily the fry itself, and maybe it is, but I think it’s the process of them seeing me cutting them up. They love cucumbers, whole tomatoes. They’ll eat whole onions. They love salmon, shrimp, mortadella.
SP: That’s awesome. Okay, finally: What’s the key to success for cooking good food?
Newson: I try my best not to think I know it all. I know I have so much to learn. A lot! And there’s so much I want to learn. I don’t want to be close minded to any anyone’s ideas, especially if they’re on my team and trying to help. Even with my sous chefs — one is 25 years old. He still has a lot to learn, but he has a lot to offer as well. He has some good ideas, so I do try to listen. I listen to my dietary aides, who are mostly college kids just because I feel like it’s going to help me continue to grow.
