ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) - Stephen “Steak” Shapiro is known for radio talk but is also known for Atlanta Eats. He has won an Emmy Award for his TV show and website.
Steak has always wanted to work in radio. He talked about how he got his name “Steak.” Living in Minnesota he visited Manny’s famous steakhouse. Their specialty of the house was a Steak Shapiro instead of a New York steak. At the time he was working as an intern and being the young kid at the office, and they started calling him Steak Shapiro instead of Stephen, his birth name.
When he began his radio career in Atlanta his parents weren’t too happy with people using the name Steve or Steak because neither was his name. But Steak sounded like a good sports talk, radio name. All Shapiro wanted to do was be on the radio, from Atlanta to Boston and back to Atlanta, he landed a radio job at CNN which was short-lived because he was fired within the first year. Even though he got fired he stayed loyal to Atlanta once he returned.
“I just realized that the radio business traditionally was gonna be one where I’m moving all the time. And I, and, um, and I, I didn’t know if I wanted to do that to my family,” he said.
Once he was given the right opportunity and a bigger block of time on the radio, he used that to run a business. He was obsessed with food and sports. He also knew Atlanta was obsessed with food and sports and that’s where the Atlanta Eats idea came about.
“This town is out all the time from Alpharetta to Decatur to stone mountain, to Buckhead like restaurants dominate. So I knew that Atlanta was obsessed with food. Um, it indexed is the number one topic in this city, social media and, and media in general food. And I said, listen, somebody’s gotta own. That might as well be a guy named steak.”
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