Of all the restaurants to open here over the past year, few have been as hotly anticipated, closely scrutinized, and avidly gossiped about as Michael Altenberg’s organic pizzeria Crust, otherwise known as Crust Eat Real. Much of the advance publicity, including a feature story in the Reader on March 9, discussed Altenberg’s association with Charles Foulkes, who bakes naturally leavened, artisanal bread, also under the name Crust, or, more formally, Crust for Bread, and who would be baking the bread for the restaurant on the premises.
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
But a little more than a week after the Reader piece ran the association ended in acrimony. People who’d been following the restaurant’s saga, including Altenberg’s efforts to get organic certification, were curious to know why. As is often the case with disputes involving small businesses, the answer depends on who you ask.
Foulkes says that he and Altenberg had a “gentleman’s agreement” that Foulkes would receive something for Altenberg’s use of the name Crust. In a letter he sent to his customers that was later posted on a friend’s blog, Foulkes wrote, “Michael refuses to formalize the agreement and offer promised compensation for the name Crust. Michael gave us his word that he would not use the name Crust without our blessing, and now he has.”
That summer, says Foulkes, Altenberg began talking to him about the organic restaurant he was going to open, to be called Flatearth. The restaurateur was “interested in tapping my skill set in dough production and to actually do some demonstrations for actual investors.” He says he did two or three such events before Altenberg offered to let him use the oven rent free in the new restaurant.
“As for the name Crust,” Altenberg replied, “there are two restaurants to my knowledge that are currently using that name for pizza places and Jimmy John’s has been trying to get the rights for years–unsuccessfully because Crust is too generic of a word to trademark.”
