FORT WORTH, Texas — He calls them “maskholes” — the people who left negative reviews for restaurants whose managers enforced state mask requirements. Back in the early days of the pandemic, a restaurant stood to lose its liquor license for failing to carry out the COVID-19 safety mandates. Still, in an already difficult climate for businesses, restaurants bore the brunt of people’s frustration about everything from public health issues to staffing shortages.

In his new book, "Carry Out, Carry On: A Year in the Life of a Texas Chef," Fort Worth chef Jon Bonnell discusses, among many other topics, how he dealt with being thrust into a position of having to enforce a statewide order that riled the passions of seemingly everyone on both sides of the issue.

“We're always about trying to make everybody happy, but suddenly we were putting a position that made it impossible,” he said. “If I said, ‘I need you to wear a mask,’ one guy is going to say, ‘If you ask me to wear a mask and give up my freedom, I will never darken your doorway again.’ Then somebody else says, ‘Unless I see a mask on everybody in there, I will never darken your doorway again. You're killing people.’ Well, one of you is not coming back. This was happening across the board everywhere and at every restaurant.”

Bonnell is a towering figure in the Fort Worth restaurant scene. He owns and operates four successful, long-tenured restaurants — Bonnell’s Fine Texas Cuisine, two locations of Buffalo Bros., and Waters Restaurant. He’s also the author of three cookbooks, won countless awards, made numerous local and national television appearances, cooked at the James Beard House three times, is active in local chef’s organizations and is famously generous with his time and talent. If any one person could claim to be the face of Fort Worth’s culinary arts, Bonnell would have a strong case.

Like everyone else on the planet, Bonnell found himself at a crossroads when the pandemic reached Texas. He was forced into the painful decision of having to let go of 231 employees — keeping only 31 people on his company’s payroll. When the state shut down, Bonnell openly wondered if a chapter of his life had ended.

“On the 17th of March, I remember very distinctly thinking, ‘There's a good chance we are just not in the restaurant business anymore,’ ” he said. “We're going to lose everything, and I have to try to figure out something else to do with my life.

“You have to close,” he added. “Fine dining, white tablecloth, full-service wine list does not work when you can't open the doors. There’s just no way.”

Instead of polishing his resume, Bonnell took action. Pivot or perish was the new survival strategy for small businesses in every field. In the face of financial ruin, Bonnell correctly read the tea leaves and changed his entire operation.

The chef sat down with his core staffers at the bar of his namesake restaurant in southwest Fort Worth. First, he turned off the phones — there was nothing tell callers. The group decided to ditch fine-dining. March 2020 was not the time to peddle the luxury of foie gras, beurre blanc or grass-fed ribeye steaks.

“We were in crisis mode,” Bonnell said. “So what does the city need? And what do we need? People still need to eat. And a lot of people don't feel safe even going to the grocery store. So, we need to try to serve the most meals we can for the least amount of money we can.”

Bonnell’s Zagat-rated restaurant — a station of the cross for local fine-diners — began serving drive-through family dinners. Just $40 fed four people.

Seemingly overnight, lines of cars wound around the block, often stopping traffic. Bonnell was able to rehire some people to accommodate the brisk business. Drivers arrived hours early and created a socially distanced tailgate scene. The dinners sold out every night — and still do most evenings. The chef said he would continue to serve the family-style meals as long as there’s demand.

At his downtown restaurant, Waters Restaurant, he sold beers for $1 each to anyone picking up an order or just wanting a drink. Crowds of socially distanced people congregated outside and created de facto happy hours.

“As I put in the book, what we found was humanity was searching for camaraderie,” he said. “Everybody just stayed at home for a while and thought, ‘I can't do this forever. I need to see people.’ ”

Instead of resting on his own accomplishments, Bonnell created an email list of other restaurant operators and employees. He shared his formula for success, pitfalls, and news on law changes related to his industry.

Mayor Betsy Price appointed him as something of a pandemic news hub for the local restaurant industry. She would feed the chef news on changes to regulations and other updates, and Bonnell would then pass the info on to the people on his list.

The pandemic, the chef said, brought together people in the restaurant business in a way he’s never seen before.

“It put everybody on the same team,” he said. “I think it bonded us as a culinary community more than anything. Instead of thinking, ‘These are my competitors, and I want to know how to I get the buck instead of them getting the buck,’ everybody's like, ‘You know what? Let's see if we can all survive this together.’ ”

Early on, Bonnell wrote down his experiences, which included the trials of the pandemic, yo-yoing COVID safety regulations for restaurants, living through the protests after George Floyd’s murder, Snowmageddon and the failure of the power grid and more.

He shielded his children from the worst of the worldwide crisis, but thought it important to chronicle the events so they would someday better understand the chaos and trauma the world lived through.

“This is such an unprecedented set of events,” he said. “There's so much craziness that's happened. I wanted to make sure I wrote it down so that, if nothing else, I wanted to be able to give it to my kids later so they could see what was really going on. Then I kind of became obsessed with it. I started really putting all the details in, trying to edit it, and then realized, ‘You know what? I should probably go ahead and publish this.’ ”

"Carry Out, Carry On: A Year in the Life of a Texas Chef" chronicles the events from March 17, 2020, to the day Gov. Greg Abbott ended the restrictions on restaurants. The book is available on all major digital platforms, and hard copies are on sale online, select retailers, and at Bonnell’s restaurants in Fort Worth.