Table X / Table X Bread
Address: 1457 East 3350 South
Telephone: 385-528-3712
Website: tablexrestaurant.com
District: Millcreek
“We wanted to build a place where people felt comfortable coming in, even if they did not know exactly what they were getting,” Mike Blocher says. “The idea was always to take care of people and let the food speak.” Table X did not appear overnight. It grew slowly and deliberately, shaped by years of work and a belief that food could be thoughtful without being intimidating. From the beginning, it was built on trust: trust between three chefs who believed in one another, trust in cooking seasonally and locally, and trust that guests would be willing to follow them on a culinary journey.
Mike grew up just outside Rochester, New York, in a middle-class family where restaurants were a constant presence. His mother worked as a server and manager in country clubs and family-style restaurants, and some of his earliest memories involve waiting in managers’ offices after school, watching kitchens operate from the edges. Food at home was not fancy. It was practical and familiar. But restaurants, the rhythm of them and the people behind them, left a lasting imprint.
By the time he was thirteen, Mike was already experimenting in the kitchen at home, inspired in part by early Food Network programming, back when cooking shows were rooted in technique and curiosity rather than spectacle. Soon after, he began working in restaurants himself, first washing dishes and prepping, then flipping burgers at a snack shack between the ninth and tenth holes of a golf course. “I was young, probably too young, but I was hooked.” He remembers thinking, at around fourteen or fifteen, that he could do this, make money, and build a career.
That realization never left him. Throughout high school, Mike worked steadily in kitchens around upstate New York, gravitating toward mentors who took the craft seriously. One early sous chef, a recent graduate of the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) located Hyde Park, New York, recognized his drive and encouraged him toward formal training. Another restaurant, a higher-end operation on Lake Ontario tied to the Finger Lakes International Food and Wine Festival, exposed him to wine dinners, tasting menus, and an elevated approach to hospitality. He absorbed everything.
After graduating high school, Mike enrolled at the CIA. He entered with more hands-on experience than many of his classmates, which allowed him to move through the program with confidence. He worked wherever he could, in campus restaurants, dining halls, even briefly filing paperwork in their office, learning not just cooking, but how kitchens and institutions function.
For the year spent outside of CIA, Mike chose practicality over prestige. He landed at the Equinox Resort in Manchester, Vermont, a historic property where he could earn a paycheck, receive housing, and learn under chefs he respected. What began in banquets soon turned into line work, then leadership. He made himself indispensable by showing up, staying late, and being ready whenever someone was needed.
After graduating from CIA in 2010, Mike returned to the Equinox full time, quickly rising into a sous chef role. He learned how to manage people, balance creativity with budgets, and hold standards even when compromise was required. He also learned how demanding that balance could be.
When the opportunity arose to help open Salamander Resort and Spa in Virginia alongside his previous mentor, Mike took it. The opening was intense. Expectations were high. Hours were relentless. But it was there, under pressure, that the foundation of what would eventually become Table X began to form.
Two people from Mike’s CIA days re-entered the picture. Nick Tramp and David Barboza. The three had met in culinary school, bonded by shared curiosity, long conversations about food and wine, and a desire to build something meaningful. Nick was about ten years older than Mike, had a corporate background and a deep personal connection to food through his father, who had once owned a restaurant in Salt Lake City. David was equally committed and equally restless.
When Mike invited Nick to Virginia to stage - a short working trial in the kitchen - David came along. Soon, all three were working together again, professionally this time, and realizing that the resort world was not where they wanted to stay.
Salt Lake City entered the conversation not as a calculated market decision, but as a convergence of possibility. Nick had roots there. The dining scene was evolving. There was room to build something focused and personal. In 2014, they packed up, sold what they needed to sell, and drove west.
At first, the three worked wherever they could: line cooking, side jobs, anything that paid the bills. At the same time, they began hosting pop-up dinners under the name Red Kitchen, eventually presenting a single table experience they called Table X. It was a nod to the chef’s table, the place outside the numbering system, the seat closest to the work. Those early dinners were intimate and deeply personal. Hand-delivered tickets. Seasonal decorations. Tasting menus designed to tell a story. Slowly, people began to notice.
When the three men found an abandoned warehouse in Millcreek, it felt like a place they could finally shape into their own. With the help of a quiet supporter who believed in them, they spent 2015 designing and planning, and most of 2016 building the restaurant themselves, choosing materials, working with local craftspeople, and shaping every detail. The building was raw and open, with soaring ceilings and layers of its former life still visible. Rather than stripping it down completely, they salvaged what they could, working with the bones of the warehouse instead of trying to hide them. “We did not want it to feel polished,” Mike says. “We liked that it was honest. You could see what it had been, and we wanted to respect that.”
Table X officially opened in November 2016. From the beginning, it was a tasting-menu restaurant built on approachability: no white tablecloths, no pretense. Bread made in-house and always included. The trio believed that bread should be a part of every good meal. Food was rooted in seasonality, preservation, and local sourcing. The open kitchen kept everyone honest.
For the first four years, Table X also offered an a la carte menu alongside the tasting format. Over time, the choice guests were making became clear. Nearly eighty percent were opting for the tasting menu, drawn to the rhythm of the courses and the experience of being guided through a meal. Shifting fully in that direction allowed the kitchen to cook with greater clarity and to tell a more cohesive story through food.
From the beginning, the menu was driven by freedom. “We had to cook what inspired us.” Rather than chasing trends or expectations, the team focused on food they believed in and trusted that guests would follow. The tasting menu became an opportunity to try things one might not otherwise order, to experience vegetables, proteins, and sauces in thoughtful combination, and to let the kitchen lead the way.
It took time to find their footing. Once they did, recognition followed. A James Beard nomination, along with annual mentions in Salt Lake Magazine, affirmed what many already felt. Table X had become part of the city’s culinary fabric. The menu, typically seven courses, shifts with the seasons and the farmers market, rooted in locally grown ingredients whenever possible. Guests are encouraged to share allergies, dietary preferences, or dislikes, and the kitchen happily accommodates everyone. Nothing feels like an afterthought.
COVID tested everything. But it also accelerated something that was already taking shape. The opening of Table X Bread, the bakery downstairs, transformed what had once been a storage area into a second expression of the same philosophy, and a more casual way to connect with the community.
Neil Hopkins, who had originally joined Table X as a line cook, quietly become a fermentation expert over the years. In 2020, he shifted fully into the bakery, where his understanding of dough, time, and temperature found its natural home. The bakery now produces what the team proudly describes as their best laminated pastry croissants. “They can be put up against anyone in the world.”
The offerings extend far beyond croissants. Scones, cookies, cakes, baguettes, English muffins, bagels, and daily toast anchor the menu, alongside soup, sandwiches, and a full coffee, tea, and espresso bar. While the bakery is more relaxed than the dining room upstairs, it is no less precise. This is a high-end bakery built on quality ingredients and technique, and a place where people can walk in without a plan and still experience the heart of Table X.
As the business matured, so did its leadership. David stepped away in early 2020, realizing that restaurant life, at least in this form, was not where he wanted to stay. Nick later moved out of day-to-day operations, remaining an owner but no longer present every morning. New leaders emerged from within, people who had grown alongside the restaurant and earned trust through consistency.
The idea of constant expansion does not interest Mike. Almost ten years later, in early 2026, Mike still spends his days planning the beverage menu / wine list and working with the kitchen and front of the house. Although, he no longer stands on the line every night. Mike arrives at 4:45 pm, checks in with his team, and often goes home to spend time with his family - he lives only four minutes away. “I thought I would always be the guy on the line,” he says. “But this is the right evolution.” What matters is doing the work well, close to home, with people he knows and trusts. He has found serenity in the chaotic world of restaurants. “With our beautiful garden out back, I like staying in our little bubble here in Millcreekland.”
