By Sarah Blaskovich and Amanda Albee
08:00 on July 27, 2020 CDT
To read this art in espa’ol, press here.
Luis Dominguez, a career leader in Dallas, died of COVID-19 on July 22 after spending 18 days in the hospital, the last with a fan.
The chef, described as a worker and trustworthy in his roles in more than a dozen kitchens in Dallas, more recently worked as executive deputy chef at HG Sply Co. in Dallas. Dominguez 38.
“It’s unreal,” said Tracy Mackay, who worked with Dominguez while he was a chef at Smoke. “Someone I know well is gone, and he’s from COVID.”
Dominguez entered Parkland Hospital on The Fourth of July after a week of discomfort. In some of his last phone calls with his cousin Eric Dominguez, he expressed fear of repaying the loan of a space the two had bought in combination after leaving Veracruz, Mexico, to move to Dallas to paint at the age of 17.
He was also concerned about his circle of relatives in Mexico, who he kept financially running in dallas-area kitchens for his 21s.
Shortly after his admission to the hospital, phone calls have become too difficult, so he communicated via SMS with his cousin; his wife, Consuelo Dominguez; and his most productive friend, Jerry from the Riva Angels. After being lowered from angels into a respiratory system, no parting words were exchanged. He was able to make a short video call with his wife.
When Luis and Eric Dominguez arrived in Dallas, their first jobs were as a dishwasher at the Wyndham Hotel. Luis Dominguez then worked at Cosmo Rouge and Hattie’s, and the two worked in combination as chain chefs at Tillman’s Bishop Arts.
Eric Dominguez said he cooks it in his cousin’s DNA. “He’s very talented,” he said.
At Tillman, “that’s when he went to heaven,” he said. “I cooked with him there, but for me just for the money. For Luis, it’s his passion: cooking.
De los Angeles Riva eventually recruited Luis Dominguez to enroll him in NYLO’s kitchen, and from there he went to paint in Smoke, where he spent nearly 10 years working with executive chef Tim Byres.
Dominguez has been described as the “chef the chef” of Dallas: his paintings in the kitchens of Smoke and HG Sply Co. have been an integral component of the good fortune and popularity of these restaurants.
The leading owners who worked with him said he was a humble guy who didn’t like being the center of attention. He is a concerned team member and a satisfied colleague, said Byres, who hired Dominguez as one of Smoke’s first workers in 2009. It remained in the place to eat until it closed in 2018.
“He was the connector,” said Mo Byres, who worked with Dominguez Smoke for the past few years. “If Tim was the talent, it was the heart. His sense of the circle of family and loyalty was unwavering.
When Dominguez began to run as second executive chef at HG Sply Co. On Greenville Avenue, said culinary director Danyele McPherson, discovered rapid camaraderie among permanent kitchen staff.
“What Luis did every single day is not fleeting,” McPherson said. “He and chefs like him are the ones who extract food and experience for others every day.”
She points out that each and every outstanding chef, there is someone like Dominguez. “You can’t have this place to eat without Luis, ” he said.
Chris Jeffers, a former smoke co-owner, praised Dominguez for staying on site for so many years to eat. Smoke a smokehouse at the new school at the renovated Belmont Hotel, where ribs, smoked bird tamales and delicious red meat sandwiches are served. It is a hot spot in Dallas and, several years later, chef Byres won a James Beard Award in 2014 for his cookbook Smoke: New Firewood Cooking.
Meanwhile, Dominguez was in Smoke’s kitchen, preparing the food “because he liked it,” Tim Byres said.
Mo Byres Dominguez a “creative genius”.
“There are other people like Luis in each and every place to eat, [who] bring Tim Byres, Matt McCallister and Stephan Pyles to life. It’s other people like Luis who make smart food in this city,” he says.
Dominguez prepared a “family meal” for the waiters: an off-menu lunch or a morning dinner that dining room workers enjoy before the one-shift frenzy begins. He enjoyed serving Italian and Mexican food to his friends, recalls Liam Byres, Tim Byres’ son.
Liam Byres met Dominguez at the age of 13, painting salads in his father’s restaurant.
“The way it differs from everyone I saw, ” he said. And it’s remarkable: in Liam Byres’ time as a young chef, the 23-year-old chef worked at the famous Stephan Pyles, Flora Street Cafe, Fauna and Homewood restaurants in Dallas, as well as Oklahoma City’s famous Nonesuch restaurant.
“It’s a kind of genuine positive reinforcement,” he said. “He cared a lot about the paintings, but he also cared about the outdoors of the paintings.”
In Smoke, Dominguez received credits for his collaboration with Tim Byres on the goat and dough dish that has one of the restaurant’s specialties. In almost 10 years in Dominguez in the restaurant, he was promoted from the chef position to the entry level line to that of executive chef, the highest kitchen post of the restaurant.
When Smoke was about to close, Mo Byres said, Dominguez approached him.
“When you have a place to eat and check out to make a plane catch fire, everyone has to take a parachute and jump,” he says. “I was going out to do things with such integrity and care, and to put Smoke’s circle of relatives first. Array… I may only be the pilot and Smoke was the plane, but it was the landing gear. so that it doesn’t crash without him.”
McPherson said his attitude is also unwavering in HG Sply. “I was just looking to be smart with others,” he said.
HG Sply Co.’s parent company, 8020 Hospitality, has protection protocols in a position to verify to protect workers from the COVID-19 pandemic. But, as the Dallas Morning News reported, workers at food stalls have a greater threat of coVID-19 than North Texas who can stay at home.
At HG Sply Co., all painters go through temperature controls upon arrival at the paintings and are asked to quarantine them for 14 days if they feel sick. Employees return until they have a negative COVID-19 test.
McPherson said he didn’t know how Dominguez could have stuck COVID-19.
“We are doing everything we can to keep everyone safe. Beyond being absolutely closed, there is no 100 percent certainty. We follow the rules and do the most productive,” he said.
None of Dominguez’s colleagues conducted COVID-19 tests after him.
McPherson’s sadness was felt as he reflected on the colleague he had lost.
“He cared about other people in a way that many chefs are important. Many think it’s about plate perfection, food load or workload. Luis would find out what was going on with other people and see to improve their lives,” he said.
On Friday, the company purchased 250 tacos at La Banqueta, Dominguez’s favorite place, and organized one of their lives for his colleagues on the rooftop of HG Sply Co.
The first time the Riva Angels saw their friend in early June, the business had recovered significantly at HG Sply. The reopening has now begun to seem “a little scary” to anyone, he said of the Riva angels. Or they had set up their own personal catering business. Dominguez made reasonable lunchboxes for a local retirement home.
When Dominguez did not work, he liked to be in the backyard of his space in Oak Cliff where he grew fruit trees, worked in a nursery and raised chickens.
“He is from the countryside, and his garden would possibly have reminded him of his house, ” said of the Riva angels.
Patty Ramirez, who worked with Dominguez for six years, stated that “everyone who has worked with him speaks well of him.” He was a smart, good-humoured user.
Dominguez is survived by his wife; his parents, Jesús Dominguez Mata and Josefa Garrido Andrade; and brothers Jesús Dominguez and Jessica Dominguez.
A Go Fund Me page increases the budget of the Dominguez family.
Sarah Blaskovich, gastronomic writer. Sarah writes about Dallas’ restaurants, bars and culture. He also appears on NBC5 twice a week. Follow @sblaskovich and ask what to do, where to eat, or where to drink in your ward.
Amanda Albee
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