In July 2013, Former "Top Chef" contestant Hector Santiago became the new executive chef at Abattoir , the meaty restaurant from Bacchanalia chefs/owners Anne Quatrano and Clifford Harrison.

Now, according to Quatrano, Santiago is out and Joe Schafer, who recently left King + Duke in Buckhead, is in.

"Joe Schafer is taking over the kitchen sometime in October," Quatrano said."We're very excited about it."

Santiago was the chef/owner of a trio of popular Poncey-Highland Latin concepts, Pura Vida, Super Pan Latino, and El Burro Pollo, which closed in 2012. And more recently, he was involved in Big Sky Buckhead.

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Mathew Palmer, a former Delta Air Lines employee, at his home in Atlanta on Thursday, Oct. 9, 2025.  Palmer was fired less than two weeks after writing a post on social media about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. (Natrice Miller/AJC)