BEYOND THE PLATE WITH CAROL

Carol Erickson, owner of Red Arrow Diner since 1987, sits down with the people behind New England's food & hospitality scene. Real conversations about the journeys, the community, and what drives people beyond their job titles. New episodes every Tuesday — follow so you never miss one. 🔗 Connect With Beyond The Plate

BEYOND THE PLATE WITH CAROL is a arts podcast hosted by Carol Erickson, with 75 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Carol Erickson hosts BEYOND THE PLATE WITH CAROL, a arts show with 75 episodes published.

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  BEYOND THE PLATE WITH CAROL

  Travis Greene of The Lake Estate: Banquet Chef to Executive Chef in 11 Months | Ep. 74

  Sep 29, 202641 min

  Being executive chef was always the dream for Travis Greene -- he just never expected to find that kind of fine-dining opportunity in the Lakes Region. He started as a first-year culinary student at Lakes Region Community College, plating baked haddock for the public at a student-run cafe. Now he's the Executive Chef at The Lake Estate on Winnisquam, one of New Hampshire's newest luxury resorts, running a Dining Room, a Bar, a poolside grille, a wine cellar, and four event spaces that hosted roughly 500 guests in a single weekend. From Hart's Turkey Farm in Meredith to Steele Hill, five years in dining services at Plymouth State University, Hermit Woods Winery, and The Common Man's Lakehouse Grille, Travis built almost his entire career ten minutes from where he grew up in Northfield, New Hampshire. He joined The Lake Estate's opening team as Banquet Chef alongside Chris Viaud and Aaron Millinghaus, and stepped into the Executive Chef role eleven months later. In this episode, Travis talks about competing in the 2025 New Hampshire Food Bank Steel Chef Challenge alongside Marcus Samuelsson, breaking down a whole red snapper live on stage, earning a 2026 NHLRA Chef of the Year finalist nod, and building dishes like Brussels sprouts with lemon-chili ricotta and a crispy skin chicken with Carolina Gold rice and Aleppo honey jus, sourced from Vernon Family Farm in Newfield and Row 7 Seed Company. He also opens up about raising two kids in the Lakes Region he calls home. The Lake Estate on Winnisquam -- 725 Laconia Road, Tilton, NH thelakeestatenh.com Carol Erickson spent nearly 40 years in the hospitality industry as the longtime owner of the Red Arrow Diner before turning her attention to Beyond the Plate with Carol, a New Hampshire-based podcast covering food, restaurants, and hospitality all across New England. Every episode, Carol sits down with the chefs, entrepreneurs, content creators, and everyday people with an interesting New England story to tell -- from family-owned restaurants and food trucks to rising creators like Travis Greene. It's not just about the food -- it's about the journeys, the community, and what drives people to go beyond. This episode is sponsored by Belmont Hall & Restaurant. Manchester, NH -- family-owned for over 90 years. belmonthall.net | Instagram: @belmonthallandcatering | Facebook: @belmonthallandcatering New episodes drop every Tuesday -- hit SUBSCRIBE and turn on notifications so you never miss one! Find Beyond the Plate everywhere: linktr.ee/BeyondtheplateNH 0:00 - Intro 0:12 - Welcome to Chef Travis Greene 0:31 - The 2012 culinary student article 1:49 - Getting his GED, finding his path 2:28 - What LRCC taught him 3:11 - This winter's kitchen training program 4:06 - From Hart's to Steele Hill to Plymouth State 5:02 - Becoming Banquet Chef at The Lake Estate 5:40 - Guest plug: Chef Travis Greene 6:24 - 2025 Steel Chef Challenge with Marcus Samuelsson 7:22 - 2026 NHLRA Chef of the Year finalist 8:04 - Banquet Chef to Executive Chef in 11 months 9:00 - Building the opening kitchen team 9:30 - A day in the life at The Lake Estate 13:27 - Why he loves the expediter role 14:54 - Dining Room, Bar, Folly Grille, and the winery 16:01 - The Brussels sprouts dish 17:01 - Crispy skin chicken and Sean Brock 20:26 - What "New Hampshire food" means to him 24:00 - Chasing the cabbage trend 28:11 - Staying close to home in the Lakes Region 30:23 - Family life and two kids 33:34 - Cooking for the NH Food Bank 37:06 - Five-year goals and James Beard 39:10 - A hospitality story from Hermit Woods 40:18 - Outro

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  BEYOND THE PLATE WITH CAROL

  Jenny Cyr: She Quit Macarons to Feed Cancer Patients Instead | Ep. 73

  Sep 22, 20261h 1m

  Jenny Cyr of Live Life Bites never planned any of this -- she was 14 years old washing dishes at a small bakery, and now her protein bites are feeding cancer patients at a treatment center affiliated with Dana-Farber. In this episode, Jenny sits down with Carol to trace the whole path: a Pastry Arts degree from Johnson & Wales, staging in NYC kitchens under Bobby Flay and Todd English, burning out and becoming an art teacher in Hampton, NH, and nine years bartending at 900° in Manchester just to stay close to food. During COVID, Jenny started selling French macarons out of the trunk of her car -- $1,200 in sales her first December alone. She and her husband Mitch soft-launched Lemon + Lavender Pastries at the Kittery Farmers Market in June 2023, and by 2024 they'd built Live Life Bites, a line of clean-ingredient protein bites that's grown from nine bags at their very first market to roughly 550 bags a week, sold in almost 40 locations across Maine and New Hampshire. Two weeks before this recording, Jenny retired the macarons for good to go all-in on the bites -- including a new wholesale partnership with New England Cancer Specialists, whose “Food Is Medicine” Passion Project sent 200 bites through a treatment center in under two weeks. Live Life Bites -- founded in Buxton, Maine, sold throughout Maine and New Hampshire (including Exeter, Manchester, Bedford, Portsmouth, and Rye) livelifebites.com Carol Erickson spent nearly 40 years in the hospitality industry as the longtime owner of the Red Arrow Diner before turning her attention to Beyond the Plate with Carol, a New Hampshire-based podcast covering food, restaurants, and hospitality all across New England. Every episode, Carol sits down with the chefs, entrepreneurs, content creators, and everyday people with an interesting New England story to tell -- from family-owned restaurants and food trucks to rising creators like Jenny Cyr. It's not just about the food -- it's about the journeys, the community, and what drives people to go beyond. This episode is sponsored by Belmont Hall & Restaurant. Manchester, NH -- family-owned for over 90 years. belmonthall.net | Instagram: @belmonthallandcatering | Facebook: @belmonthallandcatering New episodes drop every Tuesday -- hit SUBSCRIBE and turn on notifications so you never miss one! Find Beyond the Plate everywhere: linktr.ee/BeyondtheplateNH 0:00 - Intro 0:12 - Welcome to the studio -- meet Jenny Cyr of Live Life Bites 0:51 - Two brands, one story: Lemon + Lavender vs. Live Life Bites 3:16 - Pastry school, Johnson & Wales, and life in Europe 6:08 - Her first wholesale accounts -- a flower shop, then a Portland hotel 6:28 - Why an active, outdoorsy couple built a protein bite instead of a cookie 7:26 - The “ghetto bag” protein bites that sold out in 5 minutes 9:46 - 40 locations, two states -- and retiring the macarons for good 10:18 - Where the name “Live Life Bites” actually came from 11:36 - Staging in NYC under Bobby Flay and Daniel Boulud 17:36 - What “staging” even means -- and bumping into an executive chef 29:46 - This episode is powered by Belmont Hall & Restaurant 31:14 - The new wholesale deal: New England Cancer Specialists 32:19 - “Food is medicine” -- why this partnership hit different 37:40 - From 9 bags to 550 bags a week 38:04 - Cafe Luna and Foley’s -- their first big believers 48:53 - Pushing into New Hampshire: Warrior Yoga, McKinnon’s, Portsmouth 55:20 - Her favorite farmers market vendor (and the drink that started it) 56:28 - The hospitality story: Mel Harrington’s Sunday Supper 1:00:39 - Closing thoughts

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  BEYOND THE PLATE WITH CAROL

  Tyler Isabelle of Hap’s Roast Beef: My First Guest Was My Son | Ep. 1

  Sep 8, 202623 min

  Throwback -- this is Episode 1, originally recorded in spring 2025 and first aired June 19, 2025. Hap's Roast Beef closed in July 2025. Seventy episodes ago, before Beyond the Plate with Carol had a studio, a logo, or a single subscriber, it had two chairs at a table, a camera Carol Erickson's son set up for her, and that same son sitting across from her. This is Episode 1 -- Carol's very first podcast -- recorded with Tyler Isabelle of Hap's Roast Beef in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, eight days after Tyler and his partner Amanda Long brought home Carol's first grandbaby. Tyler grew up inside the Red Arrow Diner. He jokes that he was born in the basement, and he worked every job across all four New Hampshire Red Arrow locations -- dishwashing, prep, the line, front of house, manager. In January 2023 he and Amanda took over Hap's, a forgotten sub shop on Lafayette Road with missing ceiling tiles and a lot of history, and spent two and a half years turning it into one of the most talked-about roast beef sandwich spots on the New Hampshire Seacoast. In this episode Tyler walks Carol through perfecting North Shore style roast beef -- pink and rare, never gray -- and the 1986 Berkel slicer that finally made it right after oven cooking, convection and sous vide all failed. He explains the New England beefer world, a Facebook community roughly 50,000 members deep that will absolutely tell you when your beef is off, right down to napkin count and beef-to-bun ratio. He tells the story of the Hap's bathroom -- the black toilet, the gold fixtures, the murals and fine art, its own scent machine and its own one-song playlist -- and why he thinks every restaurant owner in New England should invest in their bathroom. And he opens up about closing Hap's, becoming a dad, and personally hand-picking Tostimo's Pizza Kitchen out of Seabrook, New Hampshire, to take over the Portsmouth space so the community would be in good hands instead of watching the lease go on the open market. Hap's closed for good in July 2025, which makes this one a time capsule. Watch it for the story of how a shuttered roast beef shack got its shine back, for a mother and son talking shop as equals, and for the first time Carol Erickson ever hit record. Hap's Roast Beef -- 2222 Lafayette Road, Portsmouth, NH (the location is now Tostimo's Pizza Kitchen) hapsportsmouth.com Carol Erickson has spent nearly 40 years in the hospitality industry as the owner of the Red Arrow Diner -- four New Hampshire locations, all open 24/7 -- and hosts Beyond the Plate with Carol, a New Hampshire-based podcast covering food, restaurants, and hospitality all across New England. Every episode, Carol sits down with the chefs, entrepreneurs, content creators, and everyday people with an interesting New England story to tell -- from family-owned restaurants and food trucks to second-generation operators like Tyler Isabelle. It's not just about the food -- it's about the journeys, the community, and what drives people to go beyond. This episode is sponsored by Belmont Hall & Restaurant. Manchester, NH -- family-owned for over 90 years. belmonthall.net | Instagram: @belmonthallandcatering | Facebook: @belmonthallandcatering New episodes drop every Tuesday -- hit SUBSCRIBE and turn on notifications so you never miss one! Find Beyond the Plate everywhere: linktr.ee/BeyondtheplateNH 0:00 - Intro 0:23 - Carol's very first guest 1:06 - Where Carol finds new places 1:47 - Born into the Red Arrow 2:32 - Maine, Amanda, and Hap's 3:16 - Who Hap's was named after 4:32 - The year he changed nothing 5:02 - The 1986 slicer 5:47 - Pink and rare, never gray 6:19 - Inside the beefer world 7:34 - Every job at the diner 7:54 - Diner doodles become Hap's doodles 9:01 - You have to see this bathroom 11:12 - Its own scent and its own playlist 12:07 - Invest in your bathroom 13:23 - Becoming a dad 14:52 - Why Hap's is closing 15:54 - Sauces and spice packets 17:22 - Finding the right successor 18:46 - Tostimo's takes Portsmouth 19:38 - You have to start somewhere 20:21 - Carol's first radio show 22:06 - Closing

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  BEYOND THE PLATE WITH CAROL

  Deb McCluskey: From Lil’s Cafe to 7 Restaurants | Ep. 71 Beyond The Plate Podcast

  Sep 1, 20261h 5m

  Deb McCluskey bought one small cafe in Kittery, Maine in 2021. Five years later, she and her son Michael McCluskey run seven restaurants across Maine and New Hampshire -- and she signed the lease on the seventh one without telling him. Carol Erickson sat down with Deb inside Salty Spirits, the 500-square-foot oyster and cocktail bar in Kittery Foreside with just 14 seats at the bar, to walk through all seven concepts one by one: Lil's Cafe and its famous crullers in Kittery, the Islander Cafe on the water in New Castle, New Hampshire, Stella's Cafe in Dover, June's Cafe in Newmarket, Henry's Bagel and Deli on Route 1, Salty Spirits, and Dudley Street Pizza. Deb talks about frying donuts alongside her grandmother, washing dishes at 14, the fifteen years she spent working for Michael Landgarten before buying Lil's from him in the middle of COVID, why Henry's has no espresso machine, how an entire raw bar menu gets made in one toaster oven, and the year her son got seriously ill while three brand new restaurants were opening. Carol brings nearly 40 years of her own diner experience to the table, and the two of them land somewhere real about what regulars actually mean to a family-owned restaurant. Salty Spirits -- 76 Wallingford Square, Kittery, ME saltyspiritskittery.com | lilscafe.com | junescafenh.com Lil's Cafe (Kittery, ME) | Henry's Bagel and Deli (Kittery, ME) | Dudley Street Pizza (Kittery, ME) | Islander Cafe (New Castle, NH) | Stella's Cafe (Dover, NH) | June's Cafe (Newmarket, NH) Carol Erickson has spent nearly 40 years in the hospitality industry as the longtime owner of the Red Arrow Diner and its four New Hampshire locations, open 24 hours a day. Alongside the diners, she hosts Beyond the Plate with Carol, a New Hampshire-based podcast covering food, restaurants, and hospitality all across New England. Every episode, Carol sits down with the chefs, entrepreneurs, content creators, and everyday people with an interesting New England story to tell -- from family-owned restaurants and food trucks to multi-concept operators like Deb McCluskey. It's not just about the food -- it's about the journeys, the community, and what drives people to go beyond. This episode is sponsored by Belmont Hall & Restaurant. Manchester, NH -- family-owned for over 90 years. belmonthall.net | Instagram: @belmonthallandcatering | Facebook: @belmonthallandcatering New episodes drop every Tuesday -- hit SUBSCRIBE and turn on notifications so you never miss one! Find Beyond the Plate everywhere: linktr.ee/BeyondtheplateNH 0:00 - Intro 0:12 - Live from Salty Spirits 0:54 - Frying donuts with her grandmother 1:21 - Dishwasher at 14 2:52 - The six months she regretted 3:32 - Buying Lil's during COVID 6:47 - How the Foreside grew up 8:58 - The Islander Cafe in New Castle 12:33 - The cruller recipe that never changed 14:36 - Through the kitchen to the bathroom 16:42 - A record store in a bank vault 20:46 - Stella's Cafe and Lilian's middle name 26:34 - June's and the 130-year-old building 31:41 - Belmont Hall & Restaurant 32:30 - Henry's Bagel and Deli 37:37 - Michael's ten-year oyster bar dream 42:28 - One toaster oven, whole menu 43:34 - "No new businesses" 48:04 - Signing the lease in secret 50:29 - Andrew takes over at Lil's 52:05 - Regulars who become family 53:33 - "Do you know my name?" 54:54 - Lightning Round 1:00:25 - The triple vegetable guy 1:04:20 - Closing thoughts

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  BEYOND THE PLATE WITH CAROL

  Chef Evan Hennessey: Winning the 2026 James Beard Award | Ep. 68

  Aug 11, 20261h 5m

  He wanted to be a Disney animator. Instead, Chef Evan Hennessey became the first chef in New Hampshire history to win the James Beard Award for Best Chef: Northeast -- and this year, he opened his fourth venture in Dover. Carol sits down with Evan right at Stages at One Washington to talk about the whole arc -- from a dishwashing job with no career plan, to staging in some of the country's best kitchens, to building three completely different restaurant concepts and a culinary travel company, all without leaving his hometown. In this episode: • What it actually felt like to hear his name called on that James Beard stage • How he discovered his own foraged ingredient -- a rare "sea truffle" red algae • The full, very sweet story behind his daughter's cookies, served at the end of every tasting menu at Stages • A walkthrough of Stages, The Living Room, and his brand-new Mediterranean spot, Topolino • Why he started "Staging At Stages," a hands-on apprenticeship program for young chefs Stages at One Washington | 1 Washington St, Dover, NH | stages-dining.com Subscribe on YouTube, follow us on Instagram and Facebook, and like, comment, and share this episode. New episodes of Beyond the Plate with Carol drop every Tuesday. This episode is sponsored by Belmont Hall & Restaurant. Manchester, NH -- family-owned for over 90 years. belmonthall.net | Instagram: @belmonthallandcatering | Facebook: @belmonthallandcatering ABOUT BEYOND THE PLATE WITH CAROL Carol Erickson brings nearly 40 years of hospitality experience as the longtime owner of the Red Arrow Diner to Beyond the Plate with Carol, a New Hampshire-based podcast covering food, restaurants, and hospitality all across New England. It's not just about the food -- it's about the journeys, the community, and what drives people to go beyond. Follow Beyond the Plate -- find us everywhere: linktr.ee/BeyondtheplateNH Follow Carol: Instagram @carolsew24

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