I must admit I had preconceived notions about Olivo Verde. And a little tale might explain why.

It goes back about 25 years. I was doing the daily discussion of the night before with my number one art director Melanie. Much to my amazement she told me that she had dined at The Olive Garden. Now I thought I had taught Melanie well. All headlines in bold type. No drinks before five. No body copy in less than 10 point size. Never light one cigarette from another. And never eat at chain restaurants (except for the fries at McDonald’s…and yes of course this was when they were still cooked in lard). Melanie did have an excuse. Women always do. She and her friend had gone to see a movie at a mall and when the first show was sold out, she had a couple of hours to kill. There was only one restaurant in the mall and it was…well, yes, it was that one.

“So, hoooooowwwwww was it?”, I said, drawling out the “how” to emphasize my disgust.

“That’s what they wanted to know”, she told me. “They give you this questionnaire to fill out. Nice graphics but a lot of questions.”

“What kind of questions?”, I asked.

“Well things like ‘Would you recommend The Olive Garden to your friends?”, she replied. “I told them I wouldn’t even admit to my friends I’d even been to The Olive Garden.”

So why the story? Well the chef/owner of Olivo Verde, one of the latest chefs to throw his toque in the San Miguel restaurant ring, comes direct from The Olive Garden. It’s one of a number of chains that he’s worked at and, as far as I know, this is the first time he’s ever worked at a restaurant that wasn’t part of a chain.

So when Don Day and The Gentlemen Who Lunch decided to eat there last week, I walked down Calzada de la Aurora saying to myself, that was then, this is now, that was then, this is now, and yes, I think I was bobbing my shoulders up and down as I said it.

Chef/owner Juan Manuel Reyes Patlan has returned from the U.S. to his childhood home. And I’m not just talking about San Miguel de Allende. Olivo Verde is in the original family home that Juan Manuel grew up in. It’s across from Fabrica de Aurora, the giant weaving and tanning factory, and in a home that once housed one of the families who were employed by the factory.

It’s not the first time Juan Manuel has come home. He’s returned to San Miguel a number of times. Sometimes because he missed his family. Sometimes because he had no choice.

I pushed Juan Manuel for a reason why this time he had come home, why he was no longer with The Olive Garden. Don Day got one of those types of answers I sometimes get from Don Day’s Wife.

“I am not there because I am here.”

As if Mexicans didn’t have enough names, Juan Manuel Reyes Patlan also goes by the handle Denver. It dates back to when he was 14 years old and, thanks to some academic achievements, he won a trip to Colorado. He earned the name when he came back to San Miguel wearing a pair of shorts and telling stories of golfing and skiing. Now a guy in Mexico in shorts who doesn’t have a soccer ball at his feet is about as rare a sight as Don Day’s Wife in sneakers so there was obviously some teasing. But it stuck.

Denver has a very charming business partner named Zoe. Zoe likes to refer to herself as an elf and, as you know, elves live deep in the dark forest away from the eyes of people who frequent restaurants. But Don Day also thinks that Zoe is a very entrepreneurial elf and, despite trying to hide in the shadows, she’s hoping that some very bright lights shine on Olivo Verde and, particularly, her shining star, Juan Manuel “Denver” Reyes Patlan. Zoe, in fact, often bubbles with even more enthusiasm than the sauces in Denver’s skillets.

Olivo Verde began its life a few months ago about as humbly as a restaurant can, in a tent doing almost exclusively takeout. Now there are bricks and mortar but only about 16 feet by 12 feet of it. In there, Olivo Verde squeezes seating for about 12 and, most recently, a fridge to hold beer and wine (there was more than one reason The Gentlemen Who Lunch had delayed their visit; the restaurant has only just become licensed). Oh, and also in that space is the kitchen. Well that’s if you call a counter, three gas burners and a microwave a kitchen.

The Gentlemen Who Lunch started with Zuppe Toscano, a soup that combined chicken stock, sausage, potatoes, oregano, pepper and a touch of cream. It was after one of the guys told me that if you just added kale, it would be exactly like the Tuscan soup at The Olive Garden that I began to realize how proud Denver might be of his heritage there (and I should have pointed out by now that Denver’s job at The Olive Garden was training the chefs). Obviously, by calling his own place the Spanish translation of green olive, he was actually paying tribute to his experience there.

Don Day liked the soup. Don Day thinks all of the men liked the soup. It was a very manly soup.

Next up was one of Don Day’s favorite dishes, eggplant parmigiana. How was Denver ever going to be able to cook eggplant parmesan without an oven? And especially when you’re serving 12 portions of it at once?

Don Day was intrigued. I walked over to the burners to see how Denver could possibly make this miracle happen. Denver had peeled each piece of eggplant (a lot of people make the mistake of leaving the bitter skin on) and dipped it in a mix of milk and flour then breadcrumbs, garlic and Italian spices. Two slices went into one frypan of sizzling vegetable oil on one burner, quickly followed by two more on the next. As each two slices came out of the fat it was drained then topped with delicately chopped and spiced tomatoes that came from a can (yes, even the world’s greatest Italian chefs use canned tomatoes) and parmesan cheese (from Costco, the same place that Don Day’s Parmigiano Reggiano comes from). In the space of about six minutes, there was eggplant parmesan for twelve.

“It’s amazing he can do all this with just that,” said Bill Zivko, as he joined me in watching Denver’s little ballet dance at the burners.

Don Day was worried that the eggplant parmigiana might be greasy after being deep fried instead of baked. He shouldn’t have been. It wasn’t.

“I thought the eggplant was great”, said Niels Henriksen (who took that great opening photograph of Denver). “Eggplant is often either too chewy or too soggy. Not this one.”

Last up was pasta. When we were originally planning the lunch, Don Day had hemmed and hawed back and forth between a cream sauce and a red sauce. Being married, Don Day decided on a compromise. We would have a rose sauce that combined the two.

Don Day was a little worried about the sauce. Denver had told me how each day he leaves pots of his red and white sauces simmering which is the way not only chain restaurants do it but many large, upscale, independent Italian restaurants do it. In fact, growing up in an Italo-Canadian community, Don Day thought that if Sunday’s sauce didn’t go on before 10:30 am, the time you left for church, there’s no way it would be ready at 5:00 pm.

The old-fashioned long simmer was more the style of Sicily and parts of Southern Italy. Today, it’s Tuscany that sets the standards and, as an example, Tuscan-born chef/owner Gaetano at Osteria La Mia Italia in San Miguel makes every sauce a la minute, from scratch for every single order.

It was easy to recognize Denver’s corporate background as he separated the fresh pasta into portions. I was reminded of the days when I was 13 and working at my first ever job in a supermarket. The manager told me each shopper who came into the store created an average of two cents in profit for the chain and each bag that was used to pack groceries cost two cents. So if I used three bags for groceries that would fit into two, I’d just given away everything. I was sure that if I measured Denver’s every piece of fettucine in each of the 12 portions, they’d all be within a strand or two of each other.

Don Day had asked the sauce to be kept fairly simple (the best sauces usually are) with just a few mushrooms and spices. The dish came to the table with a generous portion of parmesan on top and the recommendation that most people might want to add some chili flakes.

My reservations about the sauce were unfounded and I was beginning to think my whole attitude to chain restaurants might be unfounded as well.

Cactus Jack Jacobs whose rose sauce Don Day considers one of the best he’s ever had said, “This is at least as good as mine…no make that better.”

Richard, another frequent pasta sauce maker, echoed, “And mine.”

And the other thing I couldn’t help notice was the efficiency with which the pasta dish came to the table. And that those noodles were perfectly al dente. That was testimony to the corporate training as well. Most chefs I know would be screaming blue and maybe even purple murder if they had to do banquet service to their entire restaurant (and know that some hack blog writer was going to have a stopwatch on them).

Denver has won awards for both speed cooking and dancing. In his pasta delivery, he was showing off both talents at once.

Don Day has never denied being a little arrogant (except maybe when he’s had a few drinks). Especially when it comes to his attitude regarding chains. But Don Day has to admit, with close to 800 locations, $3 billion in sales and 200 million meals served annually, The Olive Garden is obviously, doing a lot of things right.

Like The Olive Garden, the food at Olivo Verde isn’t Ferrari food. This is Fiat food. This isn’t fancy food. This isn’t fusion food. This is food that fills your belly. Makes you feel good. And without you ever feeling much of a dent in your wallet.

What Olivo Verde has that The Olive Garden hasn’t though is charm, personality, warmth, that personal touch (and not that hello I’m your server and my name is Larry personal touch). What makes you enjoy lunch at Olivo Verde is being able to talk to the chef, seeing the smile on Juan Manual “Denver” Reyes Patlan’s face, feeling the pride radiate from Juan Manual “Denver” Reyes Patlan as he sneaks a glance at you eating his food.

Denver’s partner Zoe told me, “Love is what The Olive Garden lacks. Love is our active ingredient.”

The Olive Garden used to have this ad where they’d boast that they “provide every guest with a genuine Italian dining experience.” I think it was that word “genuine” that used to frustrate the hell out of Don Day the most.

If I wanted a genuine Italian experience I’d go to a place with a chef whose name ended in an “i”. If, though, I simply wanted a good Italian lunch, I’d go to Olivo Verde. Despite his chain background, I think Juan Manuel “Denver” Reyes Patlan has become unshackled.

Zoe expressed it as well as anyone could when she said, “For everything corporate cooking could give him, he took the best…left the rest…and then improved on it.”

Olivo Verde is located at Colonia Aurora #5 in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. They’re open from Noon to 8:00 pm, Monday through Saturday.