Inspired by a lack of upscale dining options around USC, Alex Chang and Robert Kronfli began hosting weekly dinner parties at their apartment when they were sophomores in 2009. Chang, an aspiring chef, designed the menu while Kronfli oversaw the front of the house. Their small gatherings with close friends quickly expanded as more students learned about the high quality food and intimate ambience.

READ MORE: Paladar: Underground Supper Club And One Of LA's Delicious Secrets

(Photo courtesy of Paladar/Facebook)

Chang and Kronfli capitalized on the demand and started charging guests $15 for every three-course meal. They named their underground establishment Paladar, the Cuban word for a family-run restaurant operating from a private home. The narrative intrigued Gil Freston, a film student and Paladar regular, who decided to chronicle the secret supper club. Paladar: A Documentary, which debuted on iTunes in July, captures the fun-loving, passionate and often unpredictable nature of the operation. 

READ MORE: Tribeca 2013: Interview With 'Paladar' Documentary Director

In December, Zagat included both Chang and Kronfli in its prestigious “30 under 30” list of innovative bartenders, chefs and restaurateurs. Chang, executive chef at Vagabond Restaurant and Bar in Miami, and Kronfli, co-owner of Los Angeles restaurants Bacari PDR, Bacaro and Nature’s Brew, credit Paladar for igniting their interest in the food service industry. 

I recently sat down with Freston and Kronfli to reflect on Paladar’s success and discuss the process of creating the documentary. 

Maral Tavitian: What was special about Paladar that kept students coming back? 

Gil Freston: Paladar was definitely a breath of fresh air being in this area. Bobby and Alex would be educating us a lot about food. I liked it every time. It was just the experience; there was so much there. The ambience and the people you were with. The vibe of being there was so underground, so unique and so cool, and it’s something that the social life at this school needed so much.   

MT: What unique aspects did Paladar bring to the social environment at USC?

GF: The academic life at USC is so monotonous. Paladar added something new that was sort of unstable, it really affected the USC bubble. It was disruptive. 

The social circles at USC were so segregated. It became a place where you’d meet people you wouldn’t usually meet, because of these social cliques. Literally businesses started in Paladar. Boyfriends and girlfriends met each other. It was pretty cool. 

Robert Kronfli: With Paladar, you were able to set two to three hours out of your day to be there with your friends, have a meal and get your night started off. There really weren't that many places to do that that were affordable around campus.

MT: Did Paladar influence your decision to enter the restaurant industry after graduation? 

RK: Paladar definitely helped me realize that [operating a restaurant] was something I really enjoyed doing. I love being a host. I love when people have a good time at my place, whether it’s my house, my restaurant, wherever it is. It’s really rewarding. Paladar gave me the confidence to go for it in the real world. I realized that Alex and I are pretty good at this, and that maybe we are onto something. 

MT: What were some of the most valuable lessons you learned through Paladar?  

RK: I learned some very specific things about the restaurant industry, like managing food cost, where to buy certain ingredients and learning farmers’ markets. All that boring stuff that nobody ever wants to hear about when it comes to owning a restaurant. I learned all of that stuff by trial and error and by making mistakes. 

MT: What inspired you to document Paladar? 

GF: I’d be going there all the time, thinking ‘Oh this is cool. This is great. I can’t believe this is happening. I’ll shoot a documentary on it.’ I went to my producer and we’re like, ‘Let’s do a short doc on Paladar. Let’s get the festivals and learn. It’ll be a cool learning experience.’ Before I was always in the dining room, but once we were doing the doc, I was in the kitchen, and it completely blew my mind. 

MT: What did you learn throughout the production process?

GF: We never had any experience shooting a documentary, which is very different than shooting a narrative film. Based on everything that I learned in film school, I thought that it would get edited in three weeks. Because when you’re shooting a regular movie, you have a script and you know exactly what you’re going to shoot, whereas with a documentary, you are just hanging out. By the time we got finished shooting, it took us a year and a half to get it edited. It was a whole learning experience because we never took documentary making class. We liked that it was so raw and we just wanted to capture those hazy college times that you can’t really remember, the friends and the nostalgia of being in college, and just how Paladar became a community. 

It was really cool because it was a crash course for both of us in what we wanted to do, and we really helped each other out. Paladar is my first movie, and there’s a lot of things I wished I did better. There are a lot of things Bobby and Alex wish they did better, I’m sure. 

MT: What was the message you aimed to convey with the documentary? 

GF: I wanted it to be a movie of the times. It’s a movie about food and partying. But, underlying that, I wanted to capture a time and place when we weren’t too psyched about graduating, the economy was in the gutter and a lot of us were lost. You have one kid who’s a music industry major and one kid who’s a biochemistry major, but they both had this passion for food. I feel like everyone in our generation has everything laid out. But Bobby and Alex did what they loved and they took a chance. The biggest message of it is that you can only learn by doing. They did that with the restaurant and I did that with the movie. 

I don’t think older people like it that much, but I didn’t really want them to, because I wanted it to be something for our generation. I wanted it to be something for us. I wanted to piss of old people. 

Portions of this interview were edited for content. 

Contact Food Editor Maral Tavitian here. Follow her on Instagram here.