We recently connected with Thomas Bille and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Thomas, thanks for joining us today. What was it like going from idea to execution? Can you share some of the backstory and some of the major steps or milestones?

The restaurant concept of belly of the Beast started in early 2015. I was a sous chef at the JW Marriott/Ritz-Carlton at LA Live, in Los Angeles, CA. I was working crazy hours (80 hours weekly) and told myself if I was going to be working this hard, I should be doing it for myself. The original concept was going to be a food truck. The food truck scene had really taken off in the city and I wanted to capitalize on its popularity. I came up with the name after yelling it out during service when I would expo busy nights (500 covers). I thought to myself, that’s a good name for a restaurant. I talked about the concept to a colleague, and we brainstormed. We wrote out a menu, business plan, and I filed the LLC. The concept never came to fruition due to financial reasons and I took on another job as an Executive Sous Chef for a prominent restaurant in Los Angeles. After working there for 3 years, my wife and I decided to move to Texas to make sure we were able to raise our children in a place that is more affordable, and I could open a restaurant. We made the move in October 2018 and in August 2019 I signed a 2-year lease for a space in Old Town Spring. I had no clue what I was doing but i did know that with faith and hard work anything is possible. We did all the red tape and applied for permits to commercialize the space. We did pop ups out of the space in the interim and catered. We sold tamales, pozole, and other items in our neighborhood to raise funds. Little by little we bought equipment and built out the restaurant. 6 months later we officially opened our doors in February 2020, 5 weeks before the global pandemic shutdowns. We survived with great success. When our lease was up in 2022, I decided not to renew our lease in order to look for another space that would better suit our needs.

Flash forward to May 2023 my wife and I found a space available not too far from our home in Spring, Texas. We put our heads together and rebranded Belly of the Beast to be more of a bistro type of restaurant, offering full service, and beer & wine. Just like the previous time, we cut through all the red tape, but this time with experience. We did a lot of pop-ups in the city and in our new space. We opened our doors in November 2023.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I got my start professionally in 2007. I was relatively older than most cooks getting their start in the industry. Being 27 and a single father at the time, I knew I had to jump in headfirst and fully immerse myself. I had a foundation of cooking. I learned how to cook at a very young age around 6 years old. My father made sure to teach me how to cook eggs and other foods. My parents wanted to make sure i could feed myself. I was a latch key kid, so i spent a lot of time by myself. By 8 years old I was cooking grilled cheese, French toast, spaghetti, and other things. In January 2007 I attended Kitchen academy (a Le Cordon Bleu subsidiary) and soaked up all the knowledge I could. I got a kitchen job while I attended school, and I graduated top of my class with the highest honors.

I feel our brand is different by personalizing the food and service we provide. A lot of the food I create are memories and rifts of food I ate growing up, places I traveled to, and just my imagination. We like to educate our guests and staff about the food that is on their plate. We want our guests to feel like they are having dinner at my home. We high quality ingredients, nixtamalize corn for our tortillas. My mom makes our tortillas daily. My wife (Elizabeth Bille) runs all aspects of the dining room and is offering warm inviting service to our guests. She tells our story and gives folks a brief history of our brand and what we do.

We have accomplished so much within our first year. I received a James Beard semifinalist nomination for Best Chef Texas. We won best new restaurant and best chef in 2023 for Nick Local Eats. I received a nomination for Rising Star Chef from Culture Map and most recently Plate Magazine named me one of ten in the nation Chefs to Watch for 2024. I am extremely proud of our accomplishments the team and I have achieved.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

My wife and I have worked most of our lives just trying to set us up for the future. We are 1st generation Mexican Americans and that is met with its own challenges, but we make it into our motivation. We both didn’t grow up financially rich, but we knew our work ethic and ambition could set us apart. Elizabeth has worked a life of service for the community and on the national level as a director for nonprofit organizations empowering the Latino community. We made sure we saved money and built our credit. I picked up catering gigs, pop ups, and did some consulting tin the meantime.

When we decided to reopen Belly of the Beast, we knew that no financial institutions were going to fund us or give us a loan, and not from lack of trying. We took upon ourselves to do pop ups and build funds but also use the little savings that we had to invest in ourselves. We make sure we spend correctly, buy equipment that is good but not breaking the bank and utilize the extra money from our sales to reinvest into our company.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

I feel by being genuine to ourselves and standing 100 percent behind our product we are able to set us apart from the rest. We are consistent and aim to improve daily. We listen to our guests and apply what we learn from their feedback. We continue to receive accolades and really good write ups from local and national publications. We stay humble and continue to want to grow within our community.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://botbfood.com
• Instagram: @botbfood
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/botbfood

Image Credits

All photos were taken by Thuy An Nguyen for Thuy An Photography