Team

Stephen Beckta is President of the Beckta Restaurant Group that includes Beckta, one of Canada’s premier fine-dining restaurants, along with the critically acclaimed, small-plates Play food & wine, and the upscale Westboro neighbourhood restaurant Gezellig.

After graduating with honours from Algonquin College’s Sommelier program, Stephen departed Ottawa to hone his skills in New York City for four years with the top players in the restaurant industry. Stephen managed the wine programs and dining rooms at Café Boulud working for the celebrated chef Daniel Boulud, followed by two years with renowned restaurateur Danny Meyer at Eleven Madison Park before returning to his native city.

Beckta, Play and Gezellig have received glowing reviews in The New York Times, The Globe and Mail, The National Post and countless others, being applauded for their extraordinary hospitality and inspired cooking. Just two months after opening, enRoute Magazine rated Beckta dining & wine the fourth best new restaurant in Canada. Other accolades include nineteen consecutive CAA/AAA four-diamond awards as well as being named the #1 restaurant in Ottawa by Ottawa Magazine three years in a row. Beckta was named “Ottawa’s Signature Restaurant”, by the Ottawa Citizen, and has been on the Top 100 list of Best Restaurants in Canada four times, most recently in 2022.  Play was named “Favourite Fine Dining Restaurant” at the Ottawa Restaurant Awards, and Gezellig was said to “redefine the neighbourhood dining experience” in the Ottawa Citizen.

Stephen has personally contributed to his industry in many ways: sitting on the board of ORHMA, teaching at Algonquin College, sitting on the advisory committee for the Hospitality School at Algonquin College, mentoring dozens of burgeoning restaurant entrepreneurs and donating his time to various local and national causes whose values he shares.  He is most engaged with the Boys and Girls Club of Ottawa, being an active member of board since 2011.

Professionally, Stephen has been named Top Independent Restaurateur in Ontario by the Ontario Hostelry Institute, won the National Terroir "Outstanding Service Professional" Award, won the Bill Joe Restaurateur of the Year Award in Ottawa by ORHMA, named one of Ottawa Life Magazine’s Top 50 people twice, one of Ottawa’s Top 40 under 40 by the Ottawa Business Journal and Algonquin College’s Alumni of the year, giving his college’s convocation address the same year.  He created & executed “Canada’s Table”, a 1000-person dinner at a single table in front of Parliament Hill for Canada’s 150th Anniversary celebrations, featuring 20 top chefs from across the country.

Clay Cardillo is the Managing Partner for Play, as well as for its sister restaurants Gezellig and Beckta dining & wine. Clay completed the Algonquin Culinary Program in 1998 before becoming the Sous Chef for LeMetro in Ottawa. From there Clay worked in the kitchens of the NAC and The Keg, and was soon promoted within The Keg to open restaurants as Kitchen Manager. Here he began to find that while he got into the business to work with food and wine, he enjoyed working with the people in the restaurants as much as the product. Before long, Clay was recruited by SirCorp, then a small Canadian restaurant corporation, to be the opening Kitchen Manager and then General Manager for a number of restaurants throughout Southern Ontario. After 9 years and soon after the birth of his first child, Clay left SirCorp to become Business Development Manager at Cara, where he helped owners develop their people and restaurants. In 2012, Clay joined the Beckta family of restaurants of Beckta dining & wine, Play food & wine and Gezellig, where he is happy to fulfill his passion for building business by driving hospitality.

For 13 years, Pieter served and managed at Ottawa’s Courtyard Restaurant. Along the way, he fell in love with two things. The first was the rewarding experience of looking after people. The second was all things wine. Both of these passions led him to become a graduate of Algonquin’s College’s Sommelier Program and earn a Level 3 Advanced Certificate in Wines and Spirits from the WSET. First joining Beckta as Service Manager in 2006, Pieter became our Sommelier in 2008. Since then, he’s crafted a diverse wine list, which promotes delicious Canadian and international wines from great producers who make wine with a sense of place. Outside of Beckta, Pieter continues to spread the word about wine through his teaching at Algonquin College and his articles in Diplomat magazine.

Chef Brent Henderson joined the Beckta Restaurant Group in 2017, starting first as a cook at Gezellig, soon rising to Sous Chef and then shortly afterward joining the Play food & wine team as Sous Chef as well. With his many years in the Beckta restaurant family and his background in corporate kitchens, Brent has well-earned his newest role as Chef at Gezellig. Brent was drawn to the fast-paced and dynamic nature of the restaurant industry, specifically the ability to learn about food and international cuisines. Since then he’s established himself as not only an inspired cook but a great leader whose steadfast professionalism earns him the total admiration and respect of all of his teammates. His passion has taken him to all kinds of exciting destinations where he doesn’t shy away from spicy foods, citing a very memorable lamb vindaloo in Peebles, Scotland. Brent appreciates all foods from five-star dining at Café Boulud in Toronto, to his can’t-live-without, comforting classics like pizza and pasta. When not at Gezellig, you might find him catching a Dallas Cowboys game, playing guitar, or golfing.