41st Anniversary: Lilly's Bistro

Lilly’s Bistro
1147 Bardstown Rd
Louisville, KY 40204
502 451-0447
lillysbistro.com

Lilly’s Bistro

I opened La Peche, a stand alone gourmet-to-go business on Bardstown Road in 1979 several years after it became clear that the small catering company I had started in my tiny Highlands apartment kitchen could no longer accommodate the increased orders and client demand. With farmland roots, a lifelong passion for food and gardening and an inherited entrepreneurial spirit the business I began as a young woman has grown to include Lilly’s Bistro, an award-winning restaurant now 32 years old.

Fresh and locally available meats, produce, cheese and seafood did not exist on any level close to what is now offered in this region. I was one of a very small group of people who recognized that this was a problem and a lost opportunity for our local farmers, chefs and purveyors and decided, along with these other special colleagues, to commit ourselves to changing that situation here in town. We also saw in those early days the beginnings of such local food institutions as Heine Brothers Coffee, Bluefin Seafood and Bob Holmes’s Creation Gardens. I can remember the owners of each of these companies making calls at our kitchen, introducing me to their fine new products. Gradually there would be no shortage of farmers and vendors coming through our “ back of house” selling the most wonderful and freshest of items.

Interest in good, local, healthy food and the delectable recipes that can be readily created by the home cook has fueled the need and popularity of magazines such as Edible Louisville. I am proud to have been a part of those beginnings and am also proud that I have been in business long enough to see how Louisville has blossomed into a significant restaurant town with many more chefs, particularly female chefs, to guide the way.

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