He accomplished what five other owners in had tired, and failed to do in the decade prior, and in the process became “Mr. College Park,” said College Park Partnership Director Andrea Kudlacz.

“He knows everybody, and everybody knows Steve,” she said.

Getting there, Gunter said, required throwing everything he’d thought he’d known about running a restaurant, throwing it out the window, and starting from scratch, the key variables in that formula being his mangers Barbara Teal and Cathie Ashby.

“I assure you without both of those women I would have been a colossal failure,” he said with a laugh.

Far from a failure, since Gunter took ownership of the Tap Room the restaurant has won six Orlando Sentinel “Foodie Awards” and was named as the winner of the “Best of” in Orlando Magazine three times.