When people call
his 5-year-old restaurant a landmark, Wildwood executive chef
and co-owner Cory Schreiber is flattered but also a bit amused.
You want to talk landmark? Look no further than Dan &
Louis Oyster Bar, the Portland institution his great-grandfather
founded in 1907.
WW: What were you like in high school?
Cory Schreiber: I was a near dropout, very low-profile,
very shy, non-dating. I barely got out of there with a 1.97
GPA. Because I had started working in the seventh grade,
my family's restaurant was really my world. At Lincoln,
about 80 percent of the kids go to college, and I never
had any intention of going to college, so I was surrounded
by a culture that was totally counter to what I wanted to
do.
If you went back to school now, what would you want
to study?
There was only one other thing I wanted to do when I was
younger, and that was to be a forester, to work in the forest.
I still have a strong attachment to the land. We support
local farmers to a huge extent here at the restaurant, and
I've planted a massive garden in my back yard at home.
Are you Y2K ready? Are you storing up food?
The restaurant is Y2K ready, let's put it that way. Me,
I figure I'll survive. Actually, it's not the Y2K problem
that scares me, it's more the people who are talking about
it.
What's your favorite fast-food restaurant?
Macheezmo Mouse and Pollo Rey. I'm not a big burger eater,
but I like fast food when it's done in an ethnic mode.
And what was your favorite restaurant when you were
a kid?
I used to love going to Sayler's Old Country Kitchen, Yaw's,
Huber's--all the old classic Portland restaurants. I also
used to love it when my dad would take us to the A&W
in Newberg on the way back from the beach.
Are people afraid to cook meals for you?
Absolutely. We never get invited over to people's houses.
People always suggest it, but then they never do it. They're
terrified.
You seem incredibly focused on your work. Are you a
man with no hobbies?
To a certain degree. I mean, you couldn't get me to go
to a movie. It's pretty bad. I'm extremely focused on what
goes on here. But then again, a restaurant is really an
avenue to a lot of different parts of the community. There
are so many people walking in here, and whether they're
involved in computers or banking or furniture making or
whatever, we have contact with those people.
Do you remember how you felt the first time you put
on one of those tall white hats?
It was when I worked at the Benson Hotel. I sort of thought,
"Get this thing off my head."
What is with the hat? Why is it the traditional chef
headgear?
I think it has to do with being a servant. You have to
remember that cooks originally were servants, and white
is the sign of sanitation and cleanliness. Then, of course,
there's the sanitation factor of wearing a hat while you
cook.
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Willamette Week | originally
published May 19, 1999
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