Jonathan Brooks began his culinary career at 14, washing dishes in an Indianapolis jazz club, where he first absorbed the rhythm, urgency, and energy of professional service. After high school, he headed west, where time spent in Montana and the influence of his brother—an avid hunter and fearless eater—helped shape Brooks’s deep respect for game, offal, and ingredient-driven cooking. He worked his way back east through kitchens in Chicago before returning home to Indianapolis with a point of view that was already unmistakably his.

In 2014, Brooks opened Milktooth, the now-iconic fine diner that helped redefine what breakfast and lunch could look like in America. The restaurant earned immediate national acclaim: Brooks was named one of Food & Wine’s Best New Chefs in 2015, and Milktooth was recognized by Bon Appétit as one of the 10 Best New Restaurants in America that same year. The success established Brooks as one of the most influential chefs to emerge from Indianapolis and put the city firmly into the national dining conversation.

In 2018, drawn back to the darker, moodier possibilities of dinner service, Brooks opened Beholder with partner Josh Mazanowski. Together, they built a restaurant celebrated for its imagination, hospitality, and fearless culinary identity—one that expanded Brooks’s reputation beyond brunch into a more layered, theatrical, and emotionally resonant style of dining. Beholder has since earned wide recognition, and Brooks was named a 2025 James Beard Award semifinalist for Best Chef: Great Lakes for his work there.