PLYMOUTH — Cooking comes naturally to Steve Lavoie.
But Lavoie, who just opened Steve’s Top Dog and Smokehouse at 18 Main St. on July 14, started cooking out of necessity. His mother had gone back to work and Lavoie, an only child, had to fend for himself.
He said he started out with “simple” meals, but remembers during a Thanksgiving week, when he was just 13 or 14 years old and his parents were away, he cooked a “full-course” meal with a 20-pound turkey. He said the turkey came out “amazing, for my first time.” He ate turkey all week.
When he got older, got married and had kids, he always did the cooking when he had friends and family over for dinner.
“I was always cooking up something new,” Lavoie said. “I always wanted them to try something different.”
A lifelong Bristol resident, Lavoie, 52, said he did not attend a culinary school.
“I just have a passion for food,” he said.
That passion simmered on the back burner into his 30s, when he discovered that a food truck he frequented was up for sale. So he borrowed some money from his parents and bought the truck.
Twenty years later, he still owns and operates the truck. When he started, there were eight items to choose from; now there are 35 to 40.
But his real dream was owning a full-fledged restaurant. So he and his wife, Valerie, took out a home equity loan on their house so Lavoie could start his restaurant.
“We’re looking forward to filling the seats and having the money coming in the other direction,” he said with a laugh.
The name “Top Dog” comes from the food truck’s previous owner, Lavoie said. His signature bright-yellow color comes from when he replaced the old food truck with a newer one that he had painted yellow. He said he wanted his truck to stand out.
Now Lavoie uses the name and color theme at the restaurant, too. Yellow was also his mother’s favorite color.
“My mother loved wearing yellow dresses when she was a kid,” he said.
Mayor Joseph Kilduff, who attended Monday’s ribbon cutting, said Top Dog is a key to the future transformation of downtown. Top Dog fills the vacancy left by the Lucky Cup restaurant, which closed a few years ago.
Top Dog “gives our efforts a major boost and is an encouraging sign of still more things to come,” Kilduff said.
Steve’s Top Dog and Smokehouse is open from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Saturday. Visit stevetopdogandsmokehouse.com.