Nicholas Lambrinides (1879–1962) was a Greek-American entrepreneur who built the

Skyline Chili Skyline Chili is a chain of Cincinnati-style chili restaurants based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Founded in 1949 by Greek immigrant Nicholas Lambrinides, Skyline Chili is named for the view of Cincinnati's skyline that Lambrinides could see from his fi ...

chain of chili restaurants based in

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

Early life

Lambrinides was born a

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

Kastoria Kastoria ( el, Καστοριά, ''Kastoriá'' ) is a city in northern Greece in the modern regions of Greece, region of Western Macedonia. It is the capital of Kastoria (regional unit), Kastoria regional unit, in the Geographic regions of Gree ...

, then part of the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...

, now in

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...

. He emigrated to the US in 1912 at age 33.

Restaurant owner

In 1949, Lambrinides and his three sons opened a small restaurant in the Cincinnati area now known as Price Hill. They named the restaurant Skyline Chili because of its panoramic view of downtown Cincinnati.

Cincinnati-style chili Cincinnati chili (or Cincinnati-style chili) is a Mediterranean-spiced meat sauce used as a topping for spaghetti or hot dogs ("coneys"); both dishes were developed by immigrant restaurateurs in the 1920s. In 2013, ''Smithsonian'' named one l ...

is a sauce usually used over

spaghetti Spaghetti () is a long, thin, solid, cylindrical pasta.spaghetti
Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com Unabridg ...

hot dog A hot dog (uncommonly spelled hotdog) is a food consisting of a grilled or steamed sausage served in the slit of a partially sliced Hot dog bun, bun. The term hot dog can refer to the sausage itself. The sausage used is a wiener (Vienna sausag ...

s, that contains a blend of spices that with a distinct taste. The recipe for Skyline Chili is a well-kept family secret among Lambrinides' surviving children.

Personal life

Lambrinides and his wife had five sons. He died in 1962.

References

Emigrants from the Ottoman Empire to the United States People from Kastoria Greek Macedonians American restaurateurs Businesspeople from Cincinnati 1879 births 1962 deaths Burials at Spring Grove Cemetery 19th-century Greek Americans {{US-business-bio-1870s-stub