Sean Stout didn’t arrive in Waterville Valley with a business plan. He arrived broke, on his way back from Colorado, making a desperate phone call from somewhere outside Indianapolis. What followed was thirty years behind the stove and the bar of one of the valley’s most beloved restaurants — the Coyote Grill.
In a wide-ranging conversation hosts Charlie and Ken sat down with Sean to trace the unlikely arc of his life in the valley, from that roadside phone call in 1989 to handing over the keys last November.
A Call from the Side of the Road
Sean grew up on Long Island and always knew he wanted to be in the restaurant business. He put that instinct to work early — bussing tables, hanging around the kitchen, eventually enrolling at Johnson & Wales for culinary and hotel management. After summers on Cape Cod in Woods Hole, he headed west to ski in Breckenridge. By 1989, the money had run out.
“I was more or less broken almost out in Colorado,” he told Charlie and Ken. From a highway outside Indianapolis, he called Bill, an old colleague from the Cape who had become executive chef for Waterville Valley. Bill offered housing and a job at the conference center — and that was that. Sean arrived just in time for the first World Cup, which he recalls as a significant event for the valley.
He found his footing quickly. When a restaurant in Town Square folded, Tom Corcoran tapped Sean to take over the space, rebranded as the Brookside Bistro. Sean served as chef, then general manager.
Sight Unseen
Sean got a call from Tom Gross when he was an executive chef in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Tom wanted to know if Sean would like to own a restaurant. The answer was yes, though the details were thin.
“So what’s in the restaurant?” Sean asked. “I don’t know, things,” Tom replied. Tables, chairs, a bar, “things to cook on.” The two worked out a deal over the phone, on trust. Sean loaded a U-Haul, crossed the George Washington Bridge the day before Thanksgiving, and opened the Coyote Grill in December 1995. Located upstairs at the tennis center — where it would remain — the restaurant started with roughly 45 to 50 dining seats and 10 bar stools.
Game, Farms, and a Menu That Took On a Life of Its Own
The early menu was simple — baked ravioli, garlic bread, whatever could get a kitchen running in 16 days. But Sean had an instinct for sourcing that would define the Coyote Grill’s identity. He tracked down a heritage elk farm in Vermont, a buffalo operation in Henniker, and a venison farm in Plymouth. When local supply couldn’t keep up with demand, he went further — Canada, New Zealand, international distributors. Kangaroo, ostrich, elk, venison, buffalo: Sean pursued whatever farms and suppliers could provide.
“I was always maniacal,” he said. “I would be searching out farms.” A buyer at one of his produce distributors eventually called to tell him he needed to share. Sean’s response was blunt: he wasn’t buying through them anyway.
Over three decades, the restaurant grew with Sean’s ambitions. He moved the bathrooms, demolished the original bar, filled in a balcony, converted a storage room into what became known as the den, and relocated his office three times. The dining room expanded from around 50 seats to more than 165. Charlie, who only started visiting the valley in 2022, marveled that the space looks like it was always designed that way. Sean laughed: it wasn’t.
When You’re Done, You’re Done
Last November, Sean sold the Coyote Grill to Nate — the new owner, whom he speaks of warmly. (He mentioned he was heading back to help Nate out the Sunday after the podcast recording.) The handoff was characteristically direct. “When you’re done, you’re done,” Sean said. The lawyers were slow; Sean wasn’t. He told Nate he’d like to be finished by the weekend, and walked out.
Thirty years of 80-hour weeks will do that. “Eighty hours a week is an easy week,” he noted. “All the other hours that should have been downtime, you’re still thinking about it.”
What Comes Next
Sean isn’t fully retired — he’s just not sure what comes next, and he seems to be enjoying the uncertainty. He’s exploring starting an auto detailing business with his son, including possibly attending a training school outside Pittsburgh. And he’s instituted what he calls his snowbird rule: when New Hampshire gets cold, he books a one-way ticket to somewhere warmer.
He also reflected at length on the valley’s evolution — the heyday of busy nightlife at places like Legends, the shift in how people eat and drink, the persistent disconnect between the mountain and local businesses. He suggested, only half-jokingly, that what Waterville Valley really needs is a mediator: someone to help the town, the mountain, and the year-round community find a common language.
His story — from a cornfield phone call to a full dining room overlooking the tennis courts — makes for a great podcast episode.