Ashley Flagg, the current executive chef at Millwrights in Simsbury, is excited about the opportunity to open a restaurant in West Hartford inspired by a variety of cuisines in a space diners can feel at home.

By Ronni Newton

Ashley Flagg describes her plans for The Laurel as her “passion project” – using the terms “shareable plates, globally inspired, locally sourced” – but what she hopes to create in the space she is taking over from The Corner Pug goes far beyond those six words.

“I really love cooking with no set cuisine,” Flagg said. It’s hard to label or fit what she does into a specific category since her inspiration comes from her family, from the other chefs she works with or has worked with in the past. She said she’s always learning, and likes to change things up and experiment – sometimes including elements of Thai, or Indian cuisine. “Sometimes I’m nostalgic for Spanish food,” she said, as a nod to the food she grew up with prepared by her grandmother, who is from Spain.

“Once I started learning about all these cultures, I have woven them into what I do.” She said she has been luck enough to work with so many good chefs, from a variety of backgrounds, and she’s always looking to create something their grandmothers would have served.

The concept of coming together for a meal is important to Flagg, and shareable plates will be featured on The Laurel’s menu. “It’s an act of love,” she said of sharing food with family and friends.

The menu will be seasonal and feature locally-sourced ingredients, but it will approachable as well – and she plans to continue to offer many of the staples that diners would find at The Corner Pug, like burgers and wings.

The space will be approachable as well, and Flagg said she doesn’t plan major changes other than reupholstering the booths and repainting. “We’re putting lipstick on the pug,” she said, but she wants people to feel at home there.

Flagg said she has always loved The Corner Pug, and has great respect and admiration for what owner Ted Vetter brought to the Elmwood neighborhood. And she knows it well, having spent a good part of her childhood living at her mother’s house on South Quaker Lane, right around the corner. She even attended Conard High School as a freshman, before moving to Burlington.

“We used to go to The Corner Pug when I was a kid. It’s the first restaurant where I ever had a Cuban sandwich. It fueled my obsession,” she said.

Her father and stepmother lived in Wallingford, but she also spent a lot of time living with her grandmother in Middletown, on Laurel Grove Road – and that street name became the inspiration for her restaurant’s name and the logo, designed by artist Jaime Jones. Flagg’s grandmother, now 101, was a landscape designer in Middletown.

While Flagg learned a lot about food from her grandmother, she said didn’t always have her sights set on becoming a chef.

“I had gotten my undergrad in social work and started pursing that career,” Flagg said. She started off working as a live-in provider, and decided to further her education. She was working on her master’s in social work, at the former UConn West Hartford campus, with the goal of pursuing social work policy.

“One of my responsibilities was to teach the young women how to cook,” she said, and she realized how much she loved it. Every time she saw an ad for a culinary school, she thought more about it.

Flagg eventually left social work, and went to culinary school at Lincoln Culinary Institute, the first year they took over what had been the Connecticut Culinary Institute program. The CCI chefs were still there, she said, and she was lucky enough to learn from talented chefs like Peter Dwyer, who helped her get a job with Billy Grant.

“Once you start working for Billy, you’re in a whole other level [of education],” she said.

A decade or so later she worked for Grant again, helping out while another chef was out on leave, and in early 2019 was named to the chef de cuisine role at Grant’s on Farmington Avenue in West Hartford Center. When Grant’s closed in April 2019, Flagg became the executive chef at the Hamilton Park restaurant in New Haven. That’s where she really got to know chef Tyler Anderson – who was a consultant for that restaurant – and Millwrights co-owner AJ Aurrichio. When the pandemic hit and the New Haven restaurant scene shut down in 2020, she ended up in Simsbury at Millwrights, where she will continue in her role as executive chef through the end of October.

Flagg’s wife was already working with Anderson – and had been since she helped open Porrón & Piña at the Goodwin Hotel in Hartford in 2018. She’s now the dining room captain at Millwrights, but will also be leaving this fall to open The Laurel. “She’ll be part of the front of house management team,” Flagg said.

The couple lives in Bloomfield now, but after a stint in Boston they had lived in West Hartford. She drove by The Corner Pug all the time, and always loved the location.

For the past year or so, Flagg had been planning to open her own restaurant, and was looking at spaces. She considered a few spots in Bloomfield, but they weren’t existing restaurants, and she also considered the space where Tisane recently closed in Hartford. In the spring she asked her “amazing realtor,” Lee Pollock, about The Corner Pug space. It wasn’t on the market but she urged him to call. “He called me back and said, ‘You’re not going to believe this,'” Flagg said.

Due to a confluence of factors – the liquor license and lease coming up for renewal, the increasing cost of food and labor, and turning 75 – Ted Vetter, owner of The Corner Pug, had decided it was time to retire and close the restaurant he has owned and operated for nearly a quarter century. The Corner Pug will close on Aug. 17, 2024.

Flagg is taking over the space, but not The Corner Pug restaurant itself. “We really had our own vision of what we wanted to do – to have our own little thing on that corner,” said Flagg. “It’s different than Teddy [Vetter], but we are really accomplishing the same thing, being a part of people’s lives,” she said, and bringing innovative dishes to the Elmwood neighborhood.

Flagg said she has strong ties not just to West Hartford but specifically to Elmwood, and she’s very excited to be part of other transformative happenings in the area – particularly the transit-oriented development, Elmwood LOFTS, that will be built on the site of the former Puritan Furniture/Ashley Furniture Outlet store right across the street on New Britain Avenue.

She’s also eager to provide jobs to local residents, and perhaps to increase her impact by teaching and inspiring others to a career in the culinary industry. “It’s a great career. I’m not saying it’s not crazy, but I have grown so much as a person in this industry.”

She takes over The Corner Pug space in November, and realistically hopes to open in early 2025.

Flagg feels lucky to be the steward of the space where Vetter was successful for so long. “I don’t think we could have gotten a better space,” she said.

“We’re very excited,” said Flagg.

Follow The Laurel on Instagram (@thelaurelct) for further information and updates.

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