Chef barred from many Main Line restaurants until 2011

Chef John Mims has been barred from working at Mims Food & Drink in Wayne - and many other Main Line restaurants, for that matter - until July 2011.

An injunction by a judge in Montgomery County, signed Tuesday and received yesterday, supports a noncompetition agreement that Mims signed in late 2006 with his then-partner, lawyer Howard Taylor, when they were preparing to move Carmine's Creole Cafe to Bryn Mawr.

Mims agreed not to work for a "competing business" within 10 miles of Carmine's, according to Taylor's suit, filed this month.

In April, the Louisiana-born Mims, 47, and the Main Line-bred Taylor, 49, opened Les Bons Temps, an updated Creole restaurant and lounge, at 12th and Sansom Streets. They had a falling-out in July.

Shortly after he left Carmine's and Les Bons Temps, Mims started cooking at the Freehouse, a pub on Wayne Avenue specializing in fare such as Welsh rarebit and cottage pie.

Taylor calculated the distance between Carmine's and the Freehouse at 4.1 miles. Taylor said he notified Mims that he was in violation of the agreement but received no response.

In early January, the Freehouse was renamed Mims. Taylor's lawsuit was filed shortly afterward. He alleged that Mims was siphoning business from Carmine's, though their menus are different.

County Court Judge Harold Thomson's order bars Mims from working within 10 miles of the Bryn Mawr restaurant until July 1, 2011. The Mims restaurant was open last night.

Mims founded Carmine's in Havertown in 1998 and in 2004 moved it to Narberth. In late 2006, Taylor and his wife, Linda - loyal customers - provided $650,000 to move the restaurant to Bryn Mawr, the suit said. It opened there in January 2007.

Mims did not return messages left on his cell phone and through his publicist. Mims' attorney, Albert Oehrle, was in court yesterday and did not return a call seeking comment. Mims' partners were not available for comment.