Who

New York's brasserie king, Oren is the man behind L'Express, Pigalle, Nice Matin, Café d'Alsace, and a handful of other French eateries. He's also an owner of Sushi Samba.

Backstory

Despite Oren's fondness for Gallic cuisine, he's Israeli—not French—and moved to the States in the late 1980s, opening his first restaurant, Brothers Bar-B-Que, in 1991. Oren turned his attention to French cuisine a few years later when he opened the casual café French Roast; in 1996 he teamed up with restaurateur Andrew Silverman to open L'Express on Park Avenue South, which remains a neighborhood staple after more than a decade. In the late 1990s, Oren founded his own restaurant management company, Tour de France. He's since unleashed an onslaught of Francophile brasseries, including Pigalle, Marseille, Nice Matin, Le Monde, and Café D'Alsace, New York's first restaurant to have a beer sommelier. (For his part, over the years Silverman has opened Brasserie Centrale, Chat 'n Chew, City Crab, Duke's, Le Monde, Maritime, Rive Gauche, and Steak Frites.) Oren is fully capable of opening non-French restaurants, too: He's a co-owner of Japanese/Peruvian restaurant Sushi Samba and the Mediterranean Barbounia.

Recently

Most recently, Oren opened Metro Marche, the upscale brasserie located within the Port Authority Bus Terminal. Much of his attention these days, however, is focused on turning Sushi Samba into an international dining chain. Sushi Samba now has locations in Chicago, Miami, Tel Aviv, Dallas, and Las Vegas. Of course, not all his restaurants end up succeeding. In August 2007, his Varick Street French bistro Charolais closed its doors after three name changes and a marked lack of customers.

AKA

His given name is the reverse of the one he goes by—Oren Simon. He's since changed his name legally.

Personal

Oren and his wife, Dana, live in a townhouse on East 79th Street, not far from Mayor Bloomberg's residence.