Happy Birthday, Jeffrey Chodorow!

Fifty nine years ago today, a little baby boy was brought into this world named Jeffrey Chodorow. He emerged from the womb with a fully formed beard and a dream, a dream to open grandiose and failing restaurants across the Eastern Seaboard. Well, congratulations Choad, you've succeeded.

So here's to a man who will never be poor no matter how many of his restaurants fail--that is except until China Grill folds. A man stuck in the machismo big box restaurant world of the 1990s, where daggers and barbarically priced steak go well together, where Caviar pairs with Bananas and golden salmon swim forever upstream.

Here's to a man who doesn't take criticism lying down but rather fights back with peevish aplomb. Take back the night, Chodorow!

Here's to a man unafraid to open yet another big steakhouse in these lean times and to name a restaurant after the most hated woman in pop history.

Chodorow, you dreamer! Chodorow, you schemer! Chodorow, you fifty nine year old child! Happy Birthday.