Chef rediscovers entreprenurial spirit

Life is like a box of chocolates for some, but for the enterprising Runcible Spoon owner and head chef Matt O'Neill, life is a path filled with chances and risks to take.\nBesides, he can just make his own box of chocolates.\nFive years ago, O'Neill thought his risk-taking days were done. He came to Bloomington to retire with money earned from smart investing and more than 30 years of success in the cooking business. \nHe took the time to travel and visit with friends and family. He invested his time and money in the Bloomington Cooking School, becoming co-owner and teacher for the small school on College Avenue. He was settled, or so he thought.\nThen Sept. 11, 2001, caused stocks nationwide to plummet. O'Neill's invested money fell with the rest, which forced his retirement plans to take a backseat. He started looking for ways to earn money again.\n"I could've lied down and cried in my beer," he said, "or I could go back to what I knew."\nAnd O'Neill knew the cooking business. From the age of 14, he had been trained in the culinary arts through a five-year apprenticeship at a French restaurant in Dublin, Ireland. He had also worked in restaurants in Montreal, Chicago, Indianapolis and Cincinnati from the time he was 20.\nFaced with a decision, O'Neill took a risk. In December 2001, he bought Runcible Spoon, 412 E. Sixth St., from Jeff Danielson. \nO'Neill had been a client at the Spoon for years before living in Bloomington, and Danielson said he felt comfortable he could keep the business running.\n"He would step in and help in the kitchen sometimes," Danielson said. "I knew he liked the place, and I was getting burned out." \nThe Spoon has tripled its revenues since O'Neill bought it, and he has also become the head of another business, the R Street Bistro, in Bedford. Now, the once-retired O'Neill, 55, finds himself busier and more content than he would've imagined five years ago.\n"It's a recovery I'm quite proud of," he said. "This is my comeback story, basically. Everybody has a comeback story somehow in their life, and this is mine." \nO'Neill is no stranger to comeback stories. Many times, his life has been like cooking from scratch -- just taking his talents and making something happen.\nAfter his apprenticeship, O'Neill, a Dublin, Ireland, native, wanted to earn money to complete an education at University College Dublin. So he took the chance to be a cook in one of Montreal's luxury hotel restaurants, stepping off the plane in Canada with $70 in his pocket.\nAt that point, he thought Indiana was somewhere on the West Coast, he said.\nFrom there, O'Neill took a job in the restaurant on the 96th floor of Chicago's John Hancock building. He then moved to Indianapolis, where he worked with culinary wizard Wolfgang Puck, then to Cincinnati as an executive chef and instructor for a culinary arts school.\nHe took classes at a university in Montreal and at IU-Purdue University at Indianapolis, but never earned a degree other than his Culinary Arts Certificate from his apprenticeship in Ireland.\n"I kept on getting promoted at work, so the degree got left behind," he said. "The chefing just kind of took up my life."\nBy 1984, he made his way back to Indianapolis and was hired as the head chef to help start a restaurant, the Crystal Room. O'Neill and his partners worked from the ground up to get the Crystal Room on its feet, and he said he enjoyed the success, especially with clientele like opera singer Luciano Pavarotti and actor Paul Newman.\nTwo years later, opportunity knocked again and O'Neill was presented with a chance he just couldn't refuse, he said. This time, a man from Greencastle, Ind., wanted to hand him a building with the positions of innkeeper and head chef. \n"To me, that was a fabulous opportunity," O'Neill said.\nHe moved to Greencastle, the small DePauw University college town, and spent the next 15 years putting the Walden Inn on the map. He started from scratch again, without a staff or clientele base, but he trained employees and, after many years, O'Neill played host to guests such as the Prime Minister of Israel, former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, former first lady Barbara Bush and Jerry Springer. \nDuring his time there, he also published a cookbook, "Seasons at the Walden Inn," which he wrote parts of while sipping coffee at the Runcible Spoon, which now thrives under O'Neill's ownership.\nJoe Bower, 19, a manager at the Spoon, works closely with O'Neill and attributes his success to an artistic approach to life, creativity and his "unbelievable charisma."\nO'Neill echoed that observation from his own experiences: "The only thing I've learned from it is, if you live creatively, you're going to be successful, and it's amazing how happy you can be"