Estiator’s Lifetime Achievement Honoree: Stamatis Bililis
Posted by estiator at 15 February, at 19 : 14 PM Print
Estiator’s Lifetime Achievement Honoree:
STAMATIS BILILIS
COVER STORY By Eleni Mavria
We are proud to introduce a yearly tradition every February of recognizing a Greek-American restaurateur for his years of success and longevity in the business with a Lifetime Achievement Honor. This year, we have the distinct pleasure of featuring our first honoree, the well-deserving Stamatis Bililis, legendary owner of the renowned Stamatis Restaurant in Astoria. This recognition serves as a tribute to his longstanding and invaluable contributions to the restaurant industry. Through traditional Greek cuisine, decent prices, and an exemplary work environment, he has come to embody the very essence of Greek personality and customer service. Beyond his professional success, we honor his profound philanthropic work and his selfless devotion to those in need. Stamatis Bililis acts as a lifeline for people from Greece facing hardship, assisting them in coming to America, providing them with housing, and offering them employment at his restaurant—even when there is no immediate need for additional staff. All these deeds, and many more, make 91-year-old Stamatis Bililis a restaurateur and a human being who excels through his integrity and kindness. These are the rare virtues we choose to honor this year.
According to his military registry, he was born in 1935; the official certificate of the Hellenic State records the year as 1936, 1935 or 1936. By either reckoning, Bililis speaks today with a calm awareness of time, of labor fulfilled, and of a life completed in its arc—from Thessaloniki to New York. With humility, yet with a quiet and dignified pride, he tells Estiator on the morning of January 5: “I am ninety-one years old. I was born on December 28…” He adopts the year of the military record, as though leaving it to history itself to decide and invite him to return to the first great station of his life: his thirteenth year.
“It was then,” he recalls, “that my father, Sotiris Bililis, brought me into the work of his restaurant. ‘If you learn to cook, my child,’ he told me, ‘you will never be hungry.’” The son listened—and remembered. His father’s restaurant stood on Aristotelous Square in Thessaloniki, bearing the name “Sotiris.” His mother, Eleni, was the household’s guiding spirit, and it was she who first initiated him into the culinary traditions of Smyrna. From Smyrna they came to Thessaloniki in 1922—“they came,” as he says, pausing, his gaze momentarily retreating into a deeper past, as if he can still hear the voices of his parents recounting their passage. Soon, however, he returns to the present. There were thirteen children in the family: ten sons and three daughters. “They have all passed now,” he says softly, lowering his voice.
At that moment, his grandson, Vasilis Apostolidis, thirty-two years of age, approaches the table at which he had welcomed us with two Greek coffees, ordered—naturally—from the kitchen. The young man’s quiet smile illuminates the face of his grandfather. “This is my successor,” Stamatis declares, with certainty and faith. And thus it appears that the long journey of Stamatis Restaurant toward the future has found its guide in Vasilis, an economist and a graduate of Baruch College in New York.
When asked how the road to America began, Bililis recounts: “I learned the art of cooking at the Army Cooks’ School while serving in Gytheio. I also trained at the Officers’ Club in Thessaloniki—beyond what I learned at home from my mother. I worked in construction as well, and even became a contractor.” At the age of twenty-three, in 1961, he opened his own restaurant in Thessaloniki, on the corner of Fragkon and Dodekanisou Streets, near Vardaris. Across from his establishment stood the Ministry of Labor, where three hundred students were trained. In 1964, the Ministry entrusted him with the daily feeding of these students, twice a day, for a monthly fee of 35,000 drachmas. This collaboration endured for eight years, until the close of 1970, when conflict arose—a conflict that would carry him across the Atlantic.
He arrived in New York in 1970, “where I had friends,” he says, and with 100,000 drachmas in his pocket. The date remains indelibly engraved in his memory: February 1, 1970, a Friday, at six o’clock in the evening. He was thirty-four years old. He did not leave behind a promised love in Thessaloniki, but he did carry with him an enduring devotion to Greece, his homeland—one he has never failed to visit each summer.
Love, in New York, he would find with Anna, first his partner in work and later his wife. Together they raised a family. Their daughter Georgia would give them three grandchildren: Anna and Anastasia, now both teachers, and Vasilis. His first employment in America lasted seven months, on Third Avenue. Thereafter, he settled in Astoria. Between 1970 and 1979, he established several businesses, among them Megas Alexandros and the pastry shop Lefkos Pirgos. The first restaurant to bear the name Stamatis opened in 1991 on 23rd Avenue, opposite his previous location. Drawing upon his experience as both craftsman and contractor, he acquired the building itself when rising rents threatened his livelihood. “A restaurant cannot survive on leases alone,” he remarks.
On September 15, 2007, the present establishment opened its doors. “The food at Stamatis,” Bililis states, “is pure, fresh, and unadulterated.” He holds that one who has not cooked Greek food cannot truly claim mastery of the culinary art. The menu numbers 130 dishes, many of them time-honored staples: lamb in red sauce, fricassee, veal ragout, moussaka, pastitsio, Smyrna-style soutzoukakia, stuffed cabbage leaves, and artichokes prepared in the Constantinopolitan manner. Fish occupies a central place—fifty crates weekly—sourced in the early hours of the morning, while meats and vegetables are procured with equal care.
The restaurant opens at eleven in the morning and closes at eleven at night. Its staff of thirty-two has remained largely unchanged for decades—a testament to continuity and mutual respect. Leftover food is never resold; instead, it is offered to those in need. Acts of generosity, long known within the Greek-American community, are spoken of by Bililis only with restraint. He believes that charity loses its worth when proclaimed.
In conclusion, the life of Stamatis Bililis stands as a testament to labor, perseverance, and measure. His values speak quietly but firmly: devotion to family, fidelity to tradition, love for Greece and gratitude toward America; affection for Astoria and the city of New York; respect for learning, counsel, and the dignity of human exchange. Above all, there is his reverence for Greek cuisine—born of the olive and its oil, gifts of the Greek earth itself.
Captions: Mr. Stamatis Bililis during the interview and his award recognition by Estiator magazine. In the first photo, he is pictured with his grandson, Vasilis Apostolidis; in the second, with writer Eleni Mavria; and in the bottom photo, in recognition of his enduring contribution to the restaurant industry, Estiator honored Stamatis Bililis with a commemorative plaque, presented by the magazine’s Publishing Director, Vicky Tsavalias.
