This Man Nearly Opened A Steakhouse With Donald Trump

Seventy-eight-year-old WOLFGANG ZWIENER, the former waiter-turned-bossman of Wolfgang’s Steakhouse, says Robert De Niro once borrowed money from him to pay for his meal, and that he nearly went into business with The Donald.

- Yip Jieying

Men like Wolfgang Zwiener (pronounced Zwee-ner) are a rare breed these days. On the sweltering afternoon we meet him, the jovial German-born, New York-based owner of upscale New York steakhouse chain Wolfgang’s Steakhouse by Wolfgang Zwiener is wearing a tastefully tailored suit with matching tie and pocket square, unperturbed by the heat, a Masonic signet ring perched on his finger. The 78-year-old exudes the kind of old-world glamour that could only come from rubbing shoulders with the world’s richest and most famous — and for four decades he did just that, as the head waiter at New York culinary institution and celeb haunt Peter Luger Steakhouse in Brooklyn, where he regularly served household names like Elizabeth Taylor and Alfred Hitchcock. Yep, Wolfgang is a self-made man who worked his way up to his current position, put his two sons (both in their fifties now) through top American universities, and is now enjoying life as a towkay. He opened his first Singapore outlet at the new InterContinental Singapore Robertson Quay hotel a month ago, in partnership with a Japanese businessman.

To think the last time he came here, it was 1959 and he was a steward on a ship working for a shipping company. “It was completely different back then — there were no skyscrapers,” he recalls in a thick German accent. “I was very young, about 20. I was here for four months.” Since then, he pretty much hasn’t stopped working, except for that brief moment in 2004 when he considered retiring from his head waiter job at Peter Luger. “I worked long hours and made good money. I always worked late at night ’cos you get $4 an hour working during lunch service, but $8 an hour if you worked dinners,” he says. That same year, his son Peter, a former banker, convinced him to open their own steakhouse, using Wolfgang’s vast experience and contacts in the steak world. “Being your own boss is much better.