There's no serious professionals that get into hospitality
intentionally, at least that I've met.
Hello chefs. This is Chefs PSA, and I'm your
host, Andre Natera. Today my guest is Chef Chad
Welch, executive chef with Horse Soldier Bourbon, who's worked
alongside the Jacques Pepin Foundation.
We're going to get into his storied.
Career. From scaling Navy recipes for
5000 troops to cutting Cornish game hens with a bandsaw on his
first day ever cooking. We're going to talk about.
The world of pre Google chef learning and landing with a
bourbon brand that puts World Trade Center steel in every
bottle. Stay tuned.
I know you got started cooking on cruise ships or not cruise
ships in the Navy. In the Navy, I've never talked
to anyone that has like expressed what it's really like
to be in the military cooking specifically in the ocean.
I had a friend that he was cooking on a boat recently and
he's saying it was like, and there was like a storm.
He said the fucking pots are sliding down.
It's like it's fucking wild. It's nuts.
Like for for us, an aircraft carrier doesn't move very much.
Like you rarely see it moving, but like, you know, it's very
similar to take a flight like just a commercial flight, like
when I flew here or whatever, everything has to be properly
stowed and tied down and ready to encounter rough weather,
right? But on an aircraft carrier you
never do that because it never moves.
So the only time that anything like that's ever happened to us,
we were coming back in from a Mediterranean cruise into
Virginia and there is this huge storm at the in the Atlantic and
it rocked our ship. And I'm from California and it
felt like an earthquake, but all the like the Baker's racks and
roasting pans and everything just came crashing down.
Like because we'd never had anything stoked because it never
moved. And then the one time that it
happened almost required stitches from roasting pans just
falling off top of speed racks was pretty crazy.
Yeah, unlike, you know, other than a pizza place like in my
hometown. My first day in the professional
kitchen was on aircraft carrier on the USS America.
Day 0. Day zero.
Yeah. So other than, you know, we
went, I went to Navy culinary school in San Diego, which was
basically basic knife skills and safety sanitation.
And then this was a 1992. So tons of longhand recipe
conversion. So all the, all the, all the
armed forces recipe cards, they're universal throughout the
entire military and they're all based on 100.
And so you either have to scale up or scale down depending on
how many people you're cooking for.
And the aircraft carrier has 5000, so we would always have to
scale up. So doing the math on scaling, I
don't even remember how to do it, but scaling like one
tablespoon for 100 people up to 5000 portions was crazy.
And like going up and down it was, it was nuts.
But on my first day on the ship, show up completely green like
you would in any other kitchen and but all of your military
bearings and my my uniform was all white and perfect and shoes
polished and everything. I was clearly the new guy.
And we were going to see my first day on my ship was our
first day at sea. And you meet up in the morning
and they assign everybody a station based on what the menu
is for that day, right? It's like, all right, I don't
know, we're doing meatloaf, mashed potatoes and fried fish.
So Andre, you're on ovens, Chad, you're on fryer, you're on
whatever. And then you just go sort the
recipe out to go over there. But since I was the new guy,
they put me in veg prep. They were like just, you just go
into that veg prep room and that was actually very nice duty
because it's air conditioned and all you're doing is like peeling
stuff and chopping stuff and whatever.
But that day we had Cornish game hen on the menu and I think they
were just trying to make everybody feel good for it being
their first day at sea, right? And in order to do the Cornish
game hen for 5000 people, my job that day, on my first day at
sea, my first day in a professional kitchen, was to cut
the Cornish game hens in half on a band saw.
And I'd never worked with a band saw.
And I'd, I had no idea what I was doing.
Yeah, it was, it was wild. And you're at sea.
Good news is I couldn't feel the, the ship moving at all.
But, you know, and I was really scared.
I still don't mess with band saw.
So I didn't cut myself, thank God.
But it, it's treacherous, you know, like doing these frozen
ice cubes, basically. And we cut them while they were
still shrink wrapped with the guts inside.
And you treated them kind of like lemons, right?
Like you cut them in half, shake the insides out and squeeze the
plastic off and throw them on the Lexan on either side and,
and just keep it moving. So I asked because we, you know,
you start work at like 4 O clock in the morning because you got
to start for breakfast. And I asked, I was like, hey, I
thought we were going to see today and I don't know, we're at
sea. And I was like, no way.
So they took me up to the hangar Bay and I could see the waves
coming up over the side of the ship.
And then now all of a sudden now I can feel the ship moving and I
had to go back downstairs and finish doing those Cornish game
hens while it's defrosting. And then the little stuff is
accumulating at the top of the bandsaw and slowly dripping down
as I can just slowly feel the boat rock.
That was as close as I ever came to getting sick in my whole time
in the military and but I never did.
How long we were on the ship. I was on the ship for two years.
Yeah, cooking the entire time. Cooking the entire time.
And you know, like the The funny thing I think you and I were
talking about it before is about how like kind of everybody's
origin story is pretty much the same.
And I hate reading people's resumes or their BIOS talking
about how they grew up, their mother's apron strings and
whatever in the kitchen because like you know, you said that's
we all did everybody did that. Mine is a little bit different
because like I never wanted to be a cook.
Like I had tried to join the Navy as an electrician and I was
working at at like a quick serve place being a busser.
And it ended up turning into an accidental career in the Navy.
And then I got a job at a restaurant the first day I got
out. And so it seems like if you
follow my trajectory and kind of initially unconventional cooking
jobs and hospitality jobs, they were all kind of against my
will. So you you had no desire to be a
chef, You're just going into the Navy because they're just kind
of throwing you in. My mom started charging me rent
and it was time to go. Kitchens are brutal right now,
everyone knows it. Fewer people on the line,
margins tighter than ever, and somehow the expectations keep
going up. There's just no room to miss
anymore. I was talking to a chef recently
who said the biggest stress wasn't the volume, it was the
mental load. Babysitting, food, timing,
everything perfectly, trying to be everywhere at once.
And that's where equipment matters more than people want to
admit. Rationals technology comes up a
lot in those conversations. The Icon V Pro, the Ivario Pro
overnight roast that don't need to be checked, custom programs
for all your recipes, consistency without hovering
completely automated cleaning, monitoring everything from your
phone, The list goes on. And what really buys you the
headspace? Less standing over pans and more
time to leave the kitchen instead of constantly putting
out tiny fires. When you're down to cook, when
the prep list is rough, when the production ramps up.
Think rational. So when you got out, what is
what is your first cooking job right out of the Navy?
So I got out of the military on August 23rd, 1994 and they were
opening a new But you get out, it's called terminal leave.
You get out two weeks early just because I had basically PTO
saved up, right. So I get out two weeks early.
Took two weeks to kind of figure out where I was going to sleep.
And then the on August 23rd, 1994, I got a job at a
restaurant in Northern California where I'm from and
it's called the Hop Yard and I started working there that day
and it was all just kind of quick serve pub type food that
ended up being really good like it what?
Was pop type food in 94? It was, it was chicken wings,
grilled chicken sandwiches of all kinds of different
varieties, burgers of all kinds of different varieties.
But like everything, you know, Caesar salads.
We punched our own French fries, blanched them, did all that
stuff. And then, you know, in
retrospect, looking back at it, everything was like super
proper. Like it was, I didn't know what
I was doing, but it was like now that I do looking back on it,
like we didn't need to be doing everything that good.
And but like during that time was also the time that because
we were buying some stuff from Cisco.
And the first time that I remember like I was like the
kitchen manager, first time I remember my Cisco Rep bringing
me kind of convenience appetizers like jalapeno poppers
or like pre done mozzarella sticks, you know?
Like fucking best. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I was just like, this is crazy, like people will do this for
you, like and then so then you know that I little do I know
that was kind of the end of mom and pop.
Restaurants. The fucking sampler platter.
Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally.
The mozzarella sticks and something else, right?
Yeah, but everything we did, we were doing it all from scratch
and potato skins and like just for example, like we made, we,
we had baked potatoes on our menu.
And so when the baked potatoes and they were stuffed with all
kinds of different stuff and when the baked potatoes were
turn like after two days or whatever, three days that you
couldn't serve them as a baked potato, we would take the
insides out, make potato skins out of the the leftovers and
then we made potato chowder out of the insides.
So like, I can't take credit for putting that menu together
initially, but the guy that did had all of like real restaurant
flow sort of stuff, even though we were just like an open bar
grill place, you know, like we made all of our dressings from
scratch, like mayonnaises, everything.
And it was like, good. It's, it's so funny because
back, back then, you know some, some of those things when you're
seeing them for the first time, like you said, the mozzarella
sticks. You, you don't know, you go to a
restaurant, you're a young kid. Like how do they make
mozzarella? Sticks.
You're fascinated and then you find out like, Oh my God,
there's a convenience product where it's like brilliant.
I would love to do a restaurant today that serves that kind of
food. Yeah.
You know, like, really nice. Like a nicer from scratch
version. Not, not frozen mozzarella
sticks, but like, homemade mozzarella sticks, you know,
pigs in a blanket. Yeah.
Devils on horseback. All real comfort food stuff like
I have I, I write concept menus all the time, just like for fun
for myself. And one of the ones that I wrote
a long time ago, it still sticks with me.
It is that it's just all elevated comfort food that is
just like, it's not super pretentious, but it's like a
little bit nicer of a spin on a meatloaf and like of on like a
sloppy Joe even. And then you know, the crazy
things I was, I'm really into like we had a class in culinary
school. I went to culinary school in San
Francisco and we had a class called Foods of the Americas and
it was all about indigenous ingredients in the in the
continent of America. And then following like food
trends around the country and like, you know, the impact that
filmed the railroads did like with you'll find like amazing
Chinese food in like North Dakota because of the railroads
and then like Mexican cuisine and then just how stuff flows.
And then I had a conversation with with Michelle Neshawn and
he was explaining to me about he opened, I can't remember which
one it was. Oh, the dressing room.
When he was open in the dressing room, he had the idea of doing
everything comfort food from the standpoint if American comfort
food was continued to be passed down through the hands of
craftspeople. You know what I mean?
People that actually took it seriously and like, I never
thought about at some point and like the 60s or 70s or 50s even
a lot of like the craft of cooking and home making was
stunted by like big brains and convenience items.
Like we were talking about like the can can tomato sauce and
like, and, and it's really interesting.
He showed me a database and I think it was, I think it was
University of Michigan. There's like an online database
that has kind of compiled all these original recipes that were
written by people that knew what they were doing.
And we're handing it down to other people that knew what they
were doing before, you know, not to disparage Chef Boyardee, but
before they came into play, you know what I mean?
So my friend Bobby, he has his pages retro kitchen recipes, I,
I think on on Instagram. Sorry if I'm wrong Bobby, he'll
let me know if I'm wrong. I'm pretty sure it's retro
kitchen recipes he just put up. He's got a book and a lot of the
stuff that he does is like, I mean, first of all, he's good at
delivering the retro vibe on social media, like the music and
the look. And he's he's fucking really
good at it. But and, and his book is really
good as well. Like I've, I've, I've already
had the opportunity to look at it and but he's doing stuff
that's like, you know, a lot of gelatin dishes, a lot of a lot
of, you know, like carpetbagger, you know, this, that, and it's
like you forget about some of these things.
And so when I'm looking at some of this, I was like, I remember
making that. I remember some of these dishes
were on menus. Some of that was family meal,
like was the chicken tetrazzini. And yeah, yeah, yeah.
A lot of these old dishes that's like.
Turkey tetrazini all. Those right the Turkey
tetrazini, yeah yeah, a lot of these dishes.
Well, he does a great job at that.
So for, you know, shout out to Bobby.
He's he's he's, I don't think anyone's doing what he's doing
wrong. On, on, on bringing that sort of
awareness out there. So people should follow him.
But it's curious to see where that food would have wound up
today. Yeah, If it wasn't, if there
wasn't some sort of fork in the road that, you know, here comes.
Here comes Monsanto. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
I was thinking about it just, you know, there's there's a
another funny story we were talking about gave Aralis
earlier and and you know, we've only met one time.
I don't know him very well when we text occasionally on on
social media, But like my family is is all Mexican from my dad's
Greek and Irish. My mom's full Mexican.
My dad didn't have any brothers and sisters and my mom has a
million. So you grew up Mexican?
I grew up Mexican and eating only Mexican comfort food.
And you know, my grandma was a Greek cook on my dad's side and
my grandpa on my dad's side. He was remarried to an Italian
before I was born. So I'm kind of taking a tangent,
but he was a Baker. He opened the first bakery in a
grocery store in Northern California.
And then him and my grandma owned a bakery in Northern
California. So it was like kind of an
Italian. She was Daisy Loopy.
Then the bakery was called Loopy's Bakery in Northern
California. But so I've always been kind of
surrounded by food in spite of me never wanted to cook.
I don't know that I really had a choice in retrospect.
But back to the the Gabe thing. So I've always had a issue for
whatever reason. I don't, I don't know, I've been
kind of exploring it, but like this mind block of cooking
Mexican. So like whenever I have to do
anything fancy or an audition or whatever, for whatever reason, I
like trend Asian like towards Asian flavors.
I have no experience with Asian cuisine.
Like I've never worked in in there's except for like a really
good teacher in culinary school. But like, for whatever reason,
the flavors when I just think about doing something fancy, it
would be like soy based or something, you know, and really
strange. And I, I, I kind of boiled it
down to like one, It's so comforting.
It feels like it's not special. It's like only special to me,
you know what I mean? It's like it, it seems too easy
or like to kind of passe. And again, that's just me kind
of analyzing my, my stance psychologically, right?
But so I've never really, there's a few recipes that I do
and I'll incorporate on occasion.
But like I grew up my grandma, they're from Mission, TX and my
grandma always made flour tortillas for us.
Like I mean all day, every day. You go to my grandma's house and
there was a pot of beans and a pot of rice and flour tortillas
and the Kamala was always on. And then with a.
Little bit of butter. Yeah, butter.
Or then we'd get super crazy and fry it and put sugar and
cinnamon on them, the little Bowellos, you know?
But like always with butter or jam or or whatever, and always
with or food, like she used to tell me that, you know, real
Mexicans don't use silverware. You know, that you just got to
tear the tortilla apart and eat with the tortillas.
And I used to make them with her all the time.
The tortillas. Yeah, yeah, all the time.
And like I have this, you know, she always made it in the same
bowl, in this blue bowl that like that's kind of how she
measured everything. And I have this vivid memory of
like my hands being in the bowl with her and getting the feel
for the masa and everything. And like her telling me that
water had to be as hot as your hands could stand.
So you got to make it as hot as you can, but not to burn your
hands and your hands stay in the ball.
So I have all these memories, but I've never made flour
tortillas, right? And so during COVID, I had, I
had a test kitchen with the company I was working for in
Louisville. And I was, I worked everyday
through COVID, but largely often I was by myself in my full test
kitchen and not doing what it was meant for.
So it was just, but it was very therapeutic for me during COVID
just to go in and cook. And I was just cooking for
people. That was like running the
business and it, it felt very military.
But like one Saturday I went into the office and I was in the
kitchen by myself and I was going to make flour tortillas.
So I texted Gate. I was like, what is your flour
tortilla recipe? And it, and I always feel so
stupid because it's like three ingredients, you know what I
mean? But I need somebody's recipe for
that. Or something.
And so he sent it to me and I was in my kitchen by myself.
My kitchen had windows in it and I was like, sun was rising.
It was like just the perfect time of day.
And it was super clean. Everything was set up for me and
I was by myself. I turned on mariachi music,
Linda Ronstadt, the Constance de MI Patre that my mom and my
family used to listen to, and I like actually FaceTime my mom
and I'm and I got Gabe's recipe and I'm channelling my grandma
and remembering all this stuff. And those shits didn't turn out
at all. Not.
Give games you the wrong fucking.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. He was trying to sabotage me.
No, it was definitely user error.
It was definitely user error, but it was like, I just
couldn't. I couldn't make it work, you
know, and like, but like back to the convenience product aspect
of stuff. I remember my grandma, this is
like how kind of micro it can get.
Like as I was thinking about the conversation with Michelle, my
grandma used to toast cumin seeds and smash them in the
mocahete. I don't know if she didn't have
access to ground cumin, you know, or like, I don't know
because, you know, it was always called comino or whatever.
But eventually her recipe morphed into ground cumin, not
toasted. And like, the little salsa
changes would just be with things that started showing up
more in Northern California, you know?
So, you know, there's all kinds of crazy stuff, whether it's
macaroni and cheese or toasted cumin seeds, I guess.
It's, it's funny, you know, I grew up a latchkey kid.
I was texting with someone about this last night.
We were talking about, you know, food from our childhood and how
it shaped us as chefs. I grew up as a latchkey kid.
My parents divorced when I was pretty young.
So I was either living with my mom or with my dad, one or the
other. And the good thing about living
with my dad is, you know, he would go out and party,
whatever. So he wasn't coming home till
2:00 in the morning. So I'd have the house to myself.
And when I first learned to cook, you know, I'd invite
cousins, friends over. So, you know, we're all going to
stay the night. We're middle school, high
school, you know, come over, stay the night.
We're going to we're going to watch Goodfellas or Godfather or
something like that where I'm going to cook some a a big
Italian feast. We're going to play cards and
we're going to like prank call fucking whoever out of the phone
book or. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, but my, the, the food that I first learned how to cook when
I because no one taught me how to cook, you know, I don't have
that beautiful like, oh, grandmother's her mom's food.
And I didn't really grow up that way.
I mean, I, I ate what they fed me, but I wasn't in the kitchen
with them totally. But when I learned how to cook,
it was because I was like that scene in Goodfellas where
Polly's slice in the the garlic or the razor blade, I'm like, I
want to make that. I want to make the fucking
sausage. And the so I learned how to cook
that, you know, buying magazines or whatever and getting Italian
recipes. So I'd make that.
And that is like my food identity when I was growing up
was that Italian food that I was like, Hey, we're just just like,
we're going to fucking watch Goodfellas and, and.
Make Italian. And fucking make Italian.
Yeah. What else were we going to do?
We're kids. Yeah, yeah, yeah, That's the
best. I mean, we had, I don't know.
You know, The funny thing has my it was very much the same way.
Like I was always surrounded by food, like, like all kinds of
different flavors and and approaches.
And I grew up same thing. I I like my parents were
divorced when I was in 6th grade and then and I went to 9 schools
and lived all over the Bay Area and did did everything a.
Lot of stupid. Shit, a lot of stupid shit and
but it was, you know, we had to cook for ourselves.
My sister really kind of got stuck cooking for me, but it was
more like I, I remember I had like, it's crazy how like you
have like alcohol stories. If you get too drunk and you
threw up on tequila, you never drink tequila for like years or
whatever, right? My sister, we used to eat minute
rice with butter and salt on it. I don't know if that's a thing,
but that's what we ate when we were kids.
Like when she would have to cook for me.
And I loved it. I really liked it.
But then one time I put too much salt on or like the top came off
or something and it was like disgusting.
And she was like, well, that's all you got to eat, so you
better fucking eat it. So I ate it.
And then I now I can't stand the smell of parboiled rice.
Like, still to. Yeah.
You know, it's fine. I'm like that with soy sauce.
Yeah. I like soy sauce.
Yeah. But when I was a kid, I went to
a friend's house. I didn't know anything about soy
sauce. Yeah.
I was used to eating fucking
Mexican food all day. Yeah.
And so I go.
I go to a friend's house and I'm, like, probably 5 or 6 years
old, like, kindergarten, first grade.
Yeah. And his family made Chinese
food, and they had white rice, and they gave me some soy sauce.
And I just doused the food in soy sauce.
Like, I don't know what it is. I can't eat.
It's ketchup. It's like soup at this point.
Yeah, Yeah. And I remember the dad who was
like, very stern, looking at me and saying, you're gonna eat all
that. And I'm like, I'm a little kid.
And I'm like, OK, yeah, I don't know what soy sauce is, but they
see me wasting it. Yeah, it's their soy sauce.
They know I'm fucking up. Yeah, yeah.
And they made me. That's probably nice soy sauce.
Yeah, I mean, who knows what it would keep command or whatever,
but I remember they made me finish all that rice and I'm
like gagging and and it's like hit the the my friend's dad.
It's like a military man. Yeah, guy, I'm like 7 years old
or six years old. He's like, you better eat all
that rice too. I'm like gagging it down.
That's the worst. I, I hate that shit.
I had, I think, you know, kind of back to the alternative
careers and kind of how I backed into the military and cooking
just in general. It was like kind of the same.
I've been in senior housing for it was just a little over 20
years that I was in senior housing and it was very much the
same. I had no intention of working in
senior housing. It was like it was an accident.
I I was working at a winery in Northern California and I
changed whatever they did. The winery didn't.
The management company for the catering operation fired me when
I was on vacation, which was super fun, but it the I've
maintained friendships with everybody though, and, and the
winery is Mitchell Katz Winery. My friend Mitch passed away a
couple years ago unexpectedly and his son is running
everything and it's in, it's in Livermore.
I just had to give them a quick shout out, but the, I was
working at that winery and I didn't have a job.
So I just started applying everywhere on Craigslist back in
the day. And you know, going on all these
interviews and printing out my MapQuest things cause like, you
know, there was like there was no navigation.
You know, this was like, I don't even know what year it was,
early 2000s. And I got an interview for this
place called Atria and I didn't know what it was.
And so I went and interviewed with them and I, I saw that it
was a senior living place when I pulled up and before I
interviewed, actually I almost didn't go in to the, the
interview at all, but it was like it was like 20-30 minutes
from my house. So I was like, well, shit, I'm
already out here. I better just go do it and see
what's up. And I went in and I was like,
there's no, no way I'm going to work here.
And then I've met the people that interviewed me at the time,
my former boss, and they were amazing.
And then I, when I saw the senior housing, I was like, it
was way different than I, what I anticipated.
I thought it was going to be a what I now know is a nursing
home, like a skilled nursing facility or a much more clinical
environment that's more like a hospital and like people wear
scrubs and tile floors. And that's, that's what I was
expecting. This wasn't, this was like and
you know, and again, this is 20 years ago, so there's been a lot
of advancement since. But when I started, it was still
really nice, carpeted floors, real dining rooms, like
restaurant sorts of things, the linens people got dressed nice
to come to the restaurant. And I was like, there's a lot
that we can do with this place. And and I told myself, my friend
that hired me still jokes with me about it, that I was like,
look, I'm either going to be here for a short enough period
of time that I never have to talk about it again, or I'm
going to be here forever. And turns out I was there
forever. It was like 20 years.
You have a very interesting career that I don't know if I've
ever had anyone on the podcast before that's probably worked in
as many diverse areas of the industry as you because I feel
like you've been in hotels, like you said you were in the Navy.
You know you're in a restaurant now.
Brewery. Partner in a bakery like you
got. And a freestanding restaurant
Freestanding like you've. Covered pretty much every aspect
of the industry at that is that a chef can go into.
And one of the things that I think about often is that
obviously I have a podcast, so I talk about, I talk to chefs and
I talk to industry. You know that that's my
audience. But unfortunately we usually
talk about a certain section of the industry, right?
Which is like maybe 5 or 6 restaurants.
Yeah, but that is 5 or 6 restaurants that are covering
500 employees and there's millions of people in the
business. Yeah.
And, and the industry is so varied and vast.
And just because something's going on in one type of
restaurant doesn't mean that that the entire industry is
affected by that and vice versa. I think it's super interesting.
And I think for a lot of people, when you're starting your
culinary career, like get, get some experience, figure out what
you want to do first of all, but get some experience.
Like it's we, we go into a certain, a certain in certain
kitchens and we think, well, this is the best.
Like, well, you can't say that if you've never worked anywhere
else if you only know this, Yeah.
And, and, and your exposure to different chefs, you know, like
the other thing when I got out of so I, I was military 1st and
then free standing restaurant for five years.
We opened a second location and I got to design my first kitchen
there, which was really just mild adjustments to the line in
a different placement to the walk in.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But.
But still, you know, like, it was a mom and pop opening, like
literally laid the foundation for the kitchen floor myself,
like with a shovel, you know what I mean?
Like helping out and then going to the going to The Four Seasons
after culinary school and my my trajectory after I went to
culinary school. Forget The Four Seasons, but
after culinary school. Where'd you go to culinary
school? The California Culinary Academy
CCA. Yeah, CCA before the Cordon Bleu
bought it. When?
When were you there?
I got out in 9899. OK, so I, I, I went to school in
Portland, OR. I graduated in 9596.
I don't remember. What school?
It was the Western culinary. I I know.
I know where it is, yeah. In Portland and.
With the glass front. Yeah, yeah.
I don't know what it looks like. I don't even know if it still
exists, to be honest with you, but I remember our the Dean of
the school had come from CCA. His name was Larry Lewis.
Hit a ponytail. Yeah, Yeah.
I don't know. I don't.
Know if you I think it might have been before your time, but
he was like the coolest dude. Yeah, and the the the CCA was
great when I went but one again, I mean, it's weird when I talk
about this stuff, but like I didn't want to go to culinary
school like so. Why'd you go?
Because everybody kind of convinced me, you know, if
you're going to you're my dad had a big part in that.
But everybody I just met my wife, my current, my only wife.
We've been together since 96. So we just kind of got together
and I was trying to figure out where we were like what I was
going to do for a career. And you know, like a lot of
people, I spent five years in one restaurant talking about I'm
going to get a real job at some point and watching everybody
around me go get a real job and finish their school.
And like, that's a lot of the stuff that I teach and preach
currently is like hospitality and cooking is really
placeholders for people. There's no serious professionals
that get into hospitality intentionally, at least that
I've met, like have gotten in to either cooking or front of house
management or service and been like, you know what, I'm going
to do this for the rest of my life.
Day one. This is what I'm doing.
You know what I mean? There's a few and I went to
school and started with people that had that attitude and
didn't last like more than a year or so.
But like when I went to culinary school, everybody was kind of
trying to convince me to go. And then I had my GI Bill from
the military. So I used it, went to culinary
school and it was fantastic. And also before I went to
culinary school, I had done 2 externships at my job.
So like people would graduated from the CCA and come and done
their externship with me and they couldn't cook for shit.
And and I was like what, what am I going to go pay these people
to show me how to work like this kid?
You know, like slicing a mushroom one piece at a time,
put it in a bowl like it was, it was crazy.
But when I went, I was like, all right, I'm going to go and I'm
going to treat this super seriously.
And I'm the worst academic. I hate school and you know, like
I can't but too much ADB. But you know, my wife is very
academic. She helped me do my school work
and did my reports and stuff and and that.
But I could cook, you know? So like, I knew that I was good
at cooking, and I was just going to hang out with the teachers
and not try to make friends with anybody.
I would say I was trying to make money.
If I was going to go to culinary school, my next move was a check
I didn't care about. What you were making back.
Then I was making I think I was making $15.00 an hour.
Damn it might have been. I think they convinced me to go
salary for like 25,000 a year really or something.
I remember when I was making like it was a big deal for me
when I got my first $11.00 an hour job.
And I well, I was in the Bay Area.
Yeah, I know, I know. And I remember making $11.00 an
hour. It was, it was a sous chef job
and I was negotiating with the with the person.
I was like, can I get like 1125? And they're like no, take it or
leave it. I was like $11.00, like a $2.00
raise for my $9. Yeah, I'll take.
It Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's and, and that's what it was.
So as soon as I got out of culinary school, I was expecting
to make money like that was it and I didn't care.
So I wasn't chasing. I wasn't going to go to the the
fanciest play I remember. So like in culinary school, you
know, you have to go find a place to do an externship.
Everybody was going to French Laundry or Stars or Chez Panisse
or like a bunch of my friends went to Picasso, like in Vegas
and like everything was going on.
I didn't. Was everyone stayed in
California? Was that the like from CCA?
The most, most people were, and a lot of the people that were
looking for those externships weren't from California.
Do you know where? So I went to a culinary school
in Portland. Do you know where the hot places
were? Where you're not going to
believe. This where?
Taco Bell. I'm not, I'm not kidding.
I remember the Taco Bell person came.
They were trying to recruit from culinary school and saying you
know, store manager from Taco Bell.
I remember the numbers making 50,000 a year.
Right. Like I didn't go to school.
That's where I would have been. But I'll still be a Taco Bell.
Never forget, they were Taco Bells showing up trying to
recruit. And a lot of kids went, yeah,
they're like, fuck, that's a lot of money at Taco Bell to be a
Taco Bell manager. The Benson Hotel in Portland, OR
was the other one that was getting, you know, big
recruitment, but the Playboy Mansion.
Oh shit. The Playboy Mansion was taking
and and Disney like Disney Playboy mansion, Taco Bell and
and the Benson Hotel. Everyone from my culinary
school's like we got to get into that Playboy mansion.
It was like the fucking hottest. It was the hottest place for
people to try and get an internship.
Well, when, when for whatever reason, there was so many people
trying to go to these spots and I didn't want to go like I had
no desire. I just thought it was corny.
I thought it was like I, I didn't even know anything about
it, right. Because I went to stars a bunch
because it was near my school and, and I had a bunch of people
working there. But I like, I would go see them
work in a station and like a place like stars with like the
volume that stars was doing. And I was like, I don't want to,
I don't want to do that. I don't want to work and one
station and have one component to one dish, you know what I
mean? I want to do, I want to do
everything and I want to be in charge.
You know how to cook. That's not the problem.
The problem is getting your team to do what you want when you
want it. That's leadership.
My book, Culinary Leadership Fundamentals, breaks down
exactly how to run a kitchen without losing your mind.
Stop yelling. Start leading.
Get the book at Chefs psa.com. And so like my trajectory was
totally backwards. So like coming from volume and
institutional and then trying to make money and then going to The
Four Seasons and then starting to see like what we were talking
about a little bit earlier when you, when, when I went to The
Four Seasons, I was on the tail end of the change. the IT was
changing. It was the Clift Hotel and it
was changing from the actual Four Seasons into a Marriott.
And then ultimately Schrager bought it while I was there.
I did the Millennium New Year's at the at that hotel.
So I didn't get to work with all of the chefs that ran it, but I
got to work with all the cooks and all the servers and all the
bartenders. There were like 20-30 year union
employees. They knew it.
They knew everything. Yeah.
And. For people that don't know, we
were talking about this earlier, the chef at The Four Seasons of
the time, Mercer Moore, Yeah, who I met as well.
We crossed paths briefly, and I remember him telling me that his
sous chefs at the time at The Four Seasons in San Francisco
were Michael Mina, Mario Batali. Right, right, right.
Yes. And I didn't get to meet them,
but there were Mario. I don't I don't remember ever
hearing of him being in San Francisco, at least while I was
there. By the way, I have no idea if
that's true. Yeah, I'm just taking his work.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's so much also about like
not being able to Google, you know, like I was thinking about
it was. Better to lie back then.
Yeah, yeah, get away with. It I was thinking about coming
on here and I have like all these stories and I was like,
damn, I don't even know if that's true.
It's something that I've just known for my whole life.
I don't even know if it's real. But but at the but Michael Mina
was always around and you know, one of my he took over Charles
Nob Hill at some point and and Ron Siegel from San Francisco
was my he, he's he's kind of my. At that time.
I'm the big fanboy. Fucking goat, right?
So for people that don't know the name Ron Siegel, and I think
it's important to do your homework on some of these great
chefs that set the foundation for you.
I don't know exactly what his relationship to the French
Laundry. I don't know if he's a sous chef
there or what, but he was. He went through that system and
then he was the chef of the dining room at the Ritz Carlton
in San Francisco. I think it might have actually
been his concept. Right, right.
Something like that. But he was the first American to
go on Iron Chef Japan before Iron Chef America even was a.
Thought it's the reason that I have ever heard of Iron Chef.
It wasn't the other way around. He didn't get famous from my
perspective. He didn't get famous from being
on Iron Chef. Iron Chef got famous to me
because he was on it right? And and watching him and like,
first of all, seeing Iron Chef in that, you know, again, no
Google back in the days. I, I'm just gonna sound like a
old guy. But like the only way you saw
that was passed around VHS tapes that cuz somebody found some non
translated Japanese stadium cooking show that this dude from
San Francisco went on and crushed and and won battle
lobster. Well, and the crazy thing was is
he was. Correct me if I'm wrong.
I'm. I'm, but I believe this.
The mayor of San Francisco hand selected him.
So, like, probably we need a chef to represent the United
States, to go to fucking Japan beyond this crazy stadium game
show and fucking be the best of us.
Yeah, Be the best chance we have to fucking win.
And they sent Ron Siegel and he fucking won.
Yeah, yeah, he fucking won. He's a total fucking gangster.
And I think, I don't think that I've ever said more than high
chef, big fan. Yeah, Like, I think that's my
only the extent of our conversations ever.
But having seen him around and like, been in the same places at
the same time, you know, like, he is just the most unassuming
dude and like, not that Iron Chef guy, you know what I mean?
Like for him I wonder? I would love to hear his
perspective on that story. Yeah, I saw what I Ron.
I don't know if you listen. To the show.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You got AI got a chair for you?
Yeah, I want to know what that was like.
For sure and and like, you know his stuff that he did like my
first. So he was at Charles Nob Hill,
which Michael mean I ended up owning, I think.
But my experience at Charles Nob Hill, because I was such a big
fan, I proposed to my wife on our anniversary, on our dating
anniversary and I was carrying around a ring with a little
proposal note in the box. And she gave me my anniversary
present 1st. And it was a tie and a gift
certificate to Charles Nob Hill so I could go have bronze
tasting menu. And it was the first fancy fine
dining tasting experience that I've ever been a part of.
And but it, like the the gift presentation, was overshadowed
by me proposing. Was it was it a tasting menu
back there or was it a la carte? Do you remember?
No, it was tasting for sure. Yeah, yeah.
It was like, and you had a choice.
I can't remember how many courses, but it was a it was a
we got the extended course, like whatever.
And you know, when I met my wife when we first started dating,
she was like Lean Cuisines and like a medium oil filet or well
filet. And like we went there and it
was like sweet breads and you know, like it just everything.
And she was like a little hesitant, but she ate
everything. We still, I was saying something
to her during that dinner that we still use now, right.
Like when we go out with people, it's like, taste it because if
you don't like it here, you're never going to like it.
That's that. I'll tell you.
That's a fucking true statement. That's it.
So if you don't like Ron Siegel's sweetbreads, you're
never going to like them, so you may as well taste it now.
Yeah, that's a great point. And and, you know, we're talking
about back in the day, we had like the food lovers companion.
What were the food lovers companion?
Dictionary chefs, Yes. Library chefs, Yeah.
And then, you know, the next generation was the generation of
chefs that had Google for information.
And then the third generation after that, the current ones,
the AI generation, right? You don't need Google.
But in, in my opinion, when we were coming up, I think you hit
the nail on the head earlier when we were talking that one of
the things that I think people miss out is you had to learn it
and you had to memorize it because.
You, you, you. Needed to memorize the terms and
the definitions and the recipes and things like that because you
weren't going to look it up on your phone.
There was, if you didn't know it, there was no going back to,
to, to the computer to figure it out.
You needed to know that information.
And I think I mean, I remember when we were cooks, we'd like
quiz each other all the time. Like what is matignon?
What is this, you know, tell us the five mother sauces.
It was like constant, like breakdown a Chantilly.
Can you use powdered sugar? Can you have to use granulated?
And also because, like, it's not even if your place had recipes,
they would call for hollandaise, there wouldn't be a sub recipe
for the mother sauce. It would just be whatever, you
know what I mean? So like, what the hell?
What is that? Like, I remember I had to look
up what a Dutch oven was. Yeah, because of the recipe.
I was making the soup and the recipe called for a Dutch oven.
I didn't know what it was. And I was like, how?
And there was nowhere to go. Like I had to like, keep calling
people until I found like the food lovers companion.
And it's crazy because you know that that food lover's companion
was like, it is it is what we fucking base you were talking
about The the the in the back. There was like the grid.
Yeah, not the grid, but like the the there was bring down the.
Range measurement, conversion, smoke points, cuts of meat, like
all that stuff. And I was talking to, I hired a,
my, my new chef for the company I'm working with now.
He's younger. And I was telling him how
reliant I was on the food lovers companion.
He was like, oh, me too. You're not that old.
I was like, no, but you don't understand.
Like there was no, I was known not having it.
It was like having your phone. My chef would tell me something
and it would just be like yes chef if.
You don't know if it'll. Walk in and go look it up
otherwise. And then the same thing when we
were talking about having recipes passed down from people
like professionals or craftspeople that did it from
one person to another. I have all these notes.
I remember just like standing on the line on Saute and writing
down the steps of everything that went into the pan sauce,
right? Like start with this, start with
the, you know, next this, next this.
And I would write it down on my on a post it or my little
notepad. And that was my recipe.
Like if there was no like referring back or being able to
go ask, you know, like because they didn't want to hear from
me. Not the not the OG union cooks
at the hotel, you know they didn't they didn't care and.
It's funny because back in the day, you know I had one of these
recipe books I found like an old notebook of mine with.
It wasn't even a recipe, it was just method to pick up on the
saute, add garlic, add. Shallots D plays you.
Know so on and so forth but a lot of times and I'm you know I
talked to chefs all day you're talking about Gabe earlier
sending you a recipe for tortillas right Yeah.
And I, and I think what people miss is that there's no secrets,
like where everyone's sharing recipes all the time.
Totally. And then you don't know where
they came from. And you might be in a restaurant
five years later. Yeah.
And then like, you've been making this recipe that was
handed to you by one person, that was handed by another
person by it. And then and then someone
notices all that came from this cookbooks.
Like, I didn't know. I never had that.
Right, 100%. This was handed to me.
Three or four times. Yeah, once it's out there as a,
you know, in the in the public domain, yeah, it's like it's
fair game at that point. Everyone's using it at their.
Restaurants, I mean, there was a period of time and like the mid
2000s where like the salmon cornet was everywhere with
catering everywhere and, and whether it was like the actual
recipe or, or whatever, they were everywhere.
And then like you can buy the cornets and sometimes they're
sweet. There'd be like some shitty
tartar in this sweet like ice cream cone thing.
And like these younger cooks would have no idea where it was
from. And you, you, you know, like
they think they created something or whatever.
And like, you know, the other thing I had AI had kind of a,
an, a, an epiphany moment when I went, I moved to New York City
in 2010 and I'd been going there for work a bunch.
But when I moved there in 2010, you know, I grew up listening to
hip hop and punk rock. Hip hop 1st and then and then I
got into punk rock because the scenes were.
Very Bay Area hip hop. Yeah, no, no, no.
I was East Coast hip hop. I listened to the Cole Crush
brothers first, Cole Crush to Run DMC and then and I actually,
I hated Bay Area hip hop. But now, you know, it's like
it's my DNA. So now it's just like my
childhood. So now I listen to everything.
But like for years I hated, I hated West Coast rap at all.
So it was all New York. But so when I went to New York,
from food to music, rap, punk rock, food, it was like a museum
to me. Like New York was just like, it
was like Mecca, you know, like every, every street I drove
past, I either had some association with food or a hip
hop lyric or like something from the Beastie Boys or punk rock or
or whatever. And I started going to all the
restaurants that I had only read about, like in Gourmet magazine
or whatever. Seen pictures because I don't
read really. So the all the pictures that I
saw I was going to look for. But I went to and I used to have
like this progressive brunch that I used to bring people on
when they'd come to visit. There's a place called Mac Bar
that just served macaroni and cheese like out of this little
window. And they like have the coolest
merch and like they served the macaroni and cheese.
I'm like this yellow half. It looked like a piece of
macaroni, right? Yeah, OK.
It was the coolest branding. Food was mid, but it was like
kind of a a must do. So we'd go to Mac bar donut
plant and then WD-50 and we'd get the eggs Benedict or like
the eggs quarantine at WD-50. And I had like this love, hate
relationship with the, the, you know this.
Like the molecular movement? Yeah, the molecular movement.
But like I went to a convert, I we had AI went to a talk with
Wiley and somebody was asking him about molecular gastronomy
back in the day and he like took offense to it.
Like he was like, what is molecular gastronomy?
And so I still haven't really come up with that answer.
So I hesitate to call it the molecular movement, but I had
like this, I was so impressed with like the fried hollandaise
and like just the approach and making that dish and, and I went
there like probably once a week to have it.
It was fantastic. And but like I didn't know how
he made it and I would always just try to figure stuff out.
And then that same it was, I don't know if it was at the
same. Well, it was around the same
time period that it was Restaurant Week and I went to,
while I'm trying to come to grips with my feeling about like
fried hollandaise and, and, you know, things that are done so
well, but from a different standpoint of craftsmanship,
right. I went to Nougatine by John
George for Restaurant Week and my wife and I never stuck to
Restaurant Week menus. We always got all the
supplements and ended up paying $1,000,000.
And even though we went there for the $40 Restaurant Week
menu, we just, everything was, yeah, we'll take the upgrade.
But we went to Nougatine and I stuck to the the menu and it was
a roasted chicken breast with chicken juice, mashed potatoes
and green beans. And it was like still one of the
most memorable meals that I've had in New York.
And it was like because. Because it was executed, it was
just. Perfect like the chicken was
perfect It was moist where it was supposed to be moist.
The skin was crispy mashed potatoes were velvety.
The, the chicken chew was super rich and the green beans were
perfect. And it was just simple.
And I, I thought to myself, and I wrote it down like the
difference between the two approaches is like one of the
way I put it was like, you know, like a Willy Wonka is amazing,
but he's not really a chef, you know, like the, the John George
aspect of it. And this is nothing to take away
or give too much credit to either one of the approaches,
but I am way more into just the classic cooking approach.
But I also found that you can't be well-rounded or talk shit
about something unless you have a full understanding of how to
do it. Because then it looks like
you're a quitter or it looks like you're, you know, just
talking shit from the outside. And it's really easy to hate
when you don't know how to do something, you know what I mean?
And. And Wiley is the Jean Schwarz
guy. Right, right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And and you know, like the other
thing was like I did an event, I do a lot of catering and event
production as well. And I did an event with somebody
and they were doing encapsulated that some sort of encapsulation
and they were doing encapsulated ranch or and I think the same.
Like reverse verification? Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was like, you know,
there's nothing impressive about because you.
Don't want to. You don't want to encapsulate a
ranch on your slicer. Pizza Yeah no, I mean that does
sound kind of sound bomb or at least at least efficient but the
you know the the they've the people that created the sodium
alginate calcium citrate situation that is genius but you
got to leave it with them you know what I mean?
Like or understand it and let it propel you to coming up with the
next thing. But like the more you maybe it's
not so much that you can't use it because it's not like I don't
encapsulate stuff, but the it's more of respecting it and and
treating it like, you know. Don't treat it like a joke.
Yeah, don't treat it like a joke.
And just because they made this thing, I mean, just think about
what it takes to come up with those two things.
I mean, that's not cooking. That's just brilliance and
science. Like, I, it's crazy to me.
Like I don't understand that aspect of things.
But now that they've done it, it's really easy.
Like now that I I mean. Like the person who invented the
wheel. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I think my analogy is just because you've learned how to
play Stairway to Heaven doesn't mean you wrote it right, Right.
Exactly. Yeah, just cuz you know how to
play it soft. Yeah, you're not gonna go do
open mics just playing Stairway to Heaven, Yeah.
Just just because, just because you know the fucking joke that
you saw on the stand up special and you're repeating it?
Yeah, yeah. Isn't being you're funny?
Yeah, 100. Percent right there.
There's a certain, there's a certain art to it and a lot of
respect to those guys that were doing that movement of, you
know, we have to classify it as molecular because I don't know
what else to call it. So for the audience listening
like, hey, we're calling it this.
Yeah. If if you have a better word,
tell me. Yeah, yeah.
But a lot of chefs that were doing that and I, and I was one
of them. I was one of those chefs that I
was, I was an early adopter of that style of food when I was in
California and I was doing that and I found it fascinating.
But I'll never forget when I came face to face with him.
This was the reality that I faced is I remember, I don't
know what I was doing. It was a mango sphere or
something. It was one of these spheres
reverse verification things. I remember I tasted I was like
but it just doesn't taste good. Yeah, yeah.
Right, right, right. Yeah, like it was like it tastes
like mango with a little bit of you're.
Doing it for the sake of doing it.
Right. It's like, I wanted it to be
interesting. I wanted to be provocative and
show people things that they've never seen before.
But it's like but it doesn't. It tastes as good as this.
Right. And it's in my opinion.
The thing about that, that was the thing about the WD-50
Hollandaise, it was perfect. It tasted perfect, like, and,
and it blew me away because again, I wasn't familiar enough
with the technique when I used to go there and I used to try to
figure out how they did it all the time, like, oh God, what do
you put in that? Like how to hold its form when
you fry it. Like I don't, I don't
understand. And I would sit there, I would
eat it every week and and you know, I've never sang with
Wiley. I've never had more than like 2
words conversation with him. And I would just sit there and
try to understand it. And then like a drop of the
hollandaise fell on my table like while I was eating and like
when it gets cold it solidifies and I could feel it.
It was like a dip and dot sort of thing.
And I was like, huh, Well, now, I mean, now I understand it.
But like, I think with places like WD-50, for example, and the
stuff that, you know, all those guys that I respect the hell out
of do. Yeah, The flavor is first, Yeah.
And while he's a. Pioneer and now he's doing
pizza. That's.
That's wild. Doughnuts or whatever.
Yeah, like the guy knows how to cook.
Like I think people forget like they they put him into this box
of like being this, but it's like the dude, this is a fucking
gangster in the kitchen regard. Like in any realm.
Yeah, in any realm. Like you think you can't saute a
fucking? Chicken.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think. You can't roast a chicken too.
Or make a fucking espanol. I think that's probably why I
was getting annoyed at the talk that I was listening to.
Yeah, so you do some work with Shaka Pen.
Yes. How does that come?
Come to be, By the way, also a fucking legend.
One of the best books ever, right?
La Technique, LA, I thought. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, I was lucky enough the, the, the one of my business
partners and former head of my company obviously took a big
interest in the culinary arts and, and our discipline.
And I found out about Jacques de Panne Foundation at their first
gala and we went and we were promoting our restaurant at the
time, Butcher Town Grocery. And we got to meet Jacques, got
to meet the family. And we just kind of, I don't
know if it was like the first time that we went, but my wife
and I kind of became fast friends with his son-in-law,
Raleigh and Claudine, his daughter.
And so, and we've been friends, You know, we've done a bunch of
stuff since like we went to the Derby together, Kentucky Derby,
all kinds of stuff. And I've been lucky enough to to
be able to cook for Jacques at like the Greenwich Food and Wine
Festival, and he came to the opening of our senior living
restaurant and Hudson Yards and all kinds of really cool stuff
has happened as a result of the JPF.
And I'm lucky enough now that they trust me to kind of be an
ambassador for them. So like for 90 for 90 Jacques
birthday initiative that they did last year, they had 90
cooking events and 90 different venues in honor of Jacques 90th
birthday. So Jacques is 90 and still like,
he still does demos like his. His hands are ridiculous.
PBS series back in the day when when he would like teach you how
to debone a chicken for Ballantine or the French and all
he's just he's fucking amazing like he's.
It's 1. Of the the greats, he's one of
the greats. He's in his own category.
Yeah, yeah. The coolest thing about being
around, being able to be at those events is seeing Danielle,
John George, Danny Meyer, anybody, anybody who who you can
think of the coolest people, the people that would be the coolest
people in any room are all. Enamored was Jacques like
there's no he is the most respected person that I've ever
seen in the hospitality industry and having to have had the
opportunity to hang out with him like personally and then you
know, like do stuff outside of events and stuff with him it he
is the most genuine real person that I've ever been around from.
I've never met him. It's so crazy, and it's almost
like a negative thing because we'll sit having a conversation
and all of a sudden we're equals in my mind because the
conversation is so normal and chill.
And I'm trying to relate. He was telling me about his
garden at one point that he was taken care of.
And I was like, yeah, would you grow?
I had this. Whatever.
And he was like, no, this wasn't mine.
This is Michelle Obama's like at the White House.
And I was like, yeah, we are not alike, but isn't.
That so cool that like everyone sees Jacques, then you see him
as like up here and and that's probably even better like that.
And I'll, you know, I have a very similar situation where
Thomas Keller sat down. I was at a table and was like
Matthew Peters, Philip Tessier, myself, Lauren Peters, Phil
Tessier's wife. And then Thomas came and sat
down with us and talking and it was like one of the best moments
I've ever had because he just was normal.
Like, he wasn't Thomas Keller. He was just, yeah, he was just
talking. We were just having a
conversation about whatever we happen to be talking about.
And I remember thinking to myself at that moment, it was it
was a very beautiful moment. I was like, you know what?
To me, seeing him normal is all is almost better than seeing
Thomas Kelly, if that makes sense.
And while you're saying that, though, that I just kind of had
this light go off like, you know, it's the other really cool
thing about our industry and what we do because you can just
because we all just cook, like ultimately it's just cooking.
And like to watch, like to see Jacques just move around like a
house party, you know, like. And.
And Raleigh, his son-in-law tells me that one of the best
meals, forgive me if I'm quoting this wrong, Raleigh, but one of
his best meals that he had was after they cooked a bunch of
chickens for a a dinner party. Jacques took the carcasses and
roasted them again. And they ate those as their
dinner the next night. Wow.
And Raleigh was like, it was like the best thing that I ever
had. How cool is that?
And And it's like, it's just you.
You demystify. Yeah.
Everything. And it's he he likes to paint,
right? Yeah.
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
So I have one of his one of his paintings that he, he did
lithograph. Yeah.
Yung Yun, who's part of Mentor BKB, gave it to me as a gift and
it's like one of my prized possessions on my wall in my
office. We have we have AI have it in my
house now, but we we got my my buddy bought the one of the
first Roosters the and it's this big.
It's it's huge. And we had it hanging over the
entrance of our kitchen at the restaurant.
So like everybody had to pass by Jacques.
And then when we open this place in Hudson Yards, it was behind
the the major D stand. So like everybody, you had to
pay homage to to Jacques every time you.
Walk. If Jacques is ever down here in
Texas, please invite me to. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'd love to
meet. He's well the big gala is April
9th at Chelsea Piers. Yeah in in New York.
I, I, I, I did a bourbon experience, the best of Kentucky
experience for an auction item for the JPF that they're going
to be auctioning off. And I'm kind of the I'm part of
the package as your your bourbon concierge phone a friend.
Yeah, what's up with the bourbon?
With the bourbon here. So having lived in Kentucky, my
company, my senior living company, Atria and Coterie that
I got permission to say they Adrian Coterie, that they're
based in Louisville, KY. And so I lived there.
I worked there for like 10 years, but actually, sorry for
20 years, but I actually lived there for a little over 8 and we
had a we have a restaurant there that closed and COVID, but the
bakery is still open, Butchertown Grocery bakery.
But I got kind of my indoctrination to bourbon with
opening the restaurant. I see it.
Yeah, yeah, that's for you. You can open that up.
Thank you and people. Can see it on the camera.
We've done we've done lots of single barrels.
So I got to learn a lot about Kentucky and Kentucky bourbon
and it's actually the only thing that I drink now.
When I do, it's only bourbon and now as.
Well, by the way, these days. Well, there you go.
Yeah. And now I'm working for this
company called Urban Still House and Horse Soldier Bourbon.
So that this thing I tried to I was trying to kind of slow down
and. People find it everywhere.
Yeah, that's distributed everywhere.
Horse Soldier bourbon is distributed everywhere and we
take it out, take it out, look at the bottle because of the
bottle is kind of cool. So this, the story about this,
this is started, the bourbon is started by the group of Green
Berets that went to Afghanistan after 911.
And this is not them kind of being sponsored and figureheads
for a bourbon company. This is them, they make it.
They they came back. The bottle is the, is the shape
of a canteen and it fits in a canteen holder.
Yeah. And there's some really cool
stories. If you you can Google it to look
up Horse Soldier Bourbon, I will.
And but the, the bottle itself, it's formed like all bottles are
formed in these little bottle forms that are made of steel.
And this one is formed with steel from the World Trade
Center. And so every bottle touches a
piece of the fallen World Trade Center.
And, and this it's, I'm lucky enough to be connected with
them. And we're kind of back full
circle with the starting on an aircraft carrier and being a
military cook and then learn bourbon.
And now I'm back home in Florida and yeah, but I think this is
one of my favorite ones. This is the the straight.
I think I know, I think I know what I'm having for dinner.
Today, that's what's. Up chef when we start wrapping
up I I usually have a couple of questions that I like to ask.
So the first one I'm going to ask you is if you have a a a
kitchen salt that you use like your all-purpose kitchen salt
for everything. Yes.
Which one do you use? I think all well, my pass, I was
just talking with my chef about this the other day.
My pass has plain mold and smoke molding and black mold and it's
I don't think the black is actually molding, but it's a
black crystal salt. I use all those for finishing
and then the kitchen is just only.
Kosher like diamond crystal, Diamond crystal, Diamond
crystal, yeah, yes. And do you have like a go to
finishing acid? Like is it lemon?
Is it vinegar? Is it something else?
Yeah, for I am big into zest, yeah.
And so also on my past, I have a bowl of citrus OK, and so and I
have a just. Rasp it really quick.
Yes yeah but I have AI always have an all-purpose vinaigrette
that is just citrus and olive oil and salt pepper, not
emulsified. I just use that so everything
gets a hint of flavor. Yeah, a specific citrus or just
any? Whatever's good, I, I vacillate
like and usually I'll try to combine all three like lemon,
orange and lime because I like, I like the real acidity of the
lemon, I like the sweetness of the orange and I like the the
limeyness of the lime. And do you do you have like a
specific go to olive oil that you use for finishing?
Moanin I like. And then The funny thing is I
have a well, my, one of my, my development chef Ben has a house
in Greece and, and he's got a little olive orchard and they,
he'll bring me back olive oil like once a year.
And so that, that's for the house.
But then at work, yeah, it's I don't really have one particular
one. I'm always into olive oil and
finishing oils. If you had advice to give to a
young chef, a young cook that's just starting out in their
career, and I'm asking this specifically because you've
worked in so many different styles of kitchens, Yep.
Where would you advise people to kind of start making their
bones? If if it was just a general
person that says I don't know where I'm going.
For me, but this is like my legit answer because I just tell
people to go cook anywhere, like go cook in a restaurant,
preferably not fast food, not there is anything wrong with
fast food. And like I, I could go down how
many rabbit holes that you made me think of with being recruited
by Taco Bell or I'm like just, you know, there is something to
be said for all of the studies and efficiencies that fast food
places have made. And I geeked out on that.
I developed a commissary and and I do all kinds of Labor studies
and it's that I could geek out on that as much as I could geek
out on flavors, but just cook. Go somewhere where you actually
have to use a pan, actually have to use a flat top and burn
yourself and cut yourself and figure out if it's you like the
you know, I always have. My other saying is, you know,
the the stove is the same whatever restaurant you go to.
Like the stove with the French Laundry is the same as the one
that Outback Steakhouse. And I'm like maybe a little bit
different Btus and a fancier brand, but it does the same
thing. Yeah.
And and Jacques, back to Jacques le Pan, they have a shirt.
He's got a saying, and I have the the shirt that says that
we're all equals in the eyes and stuff.
And so if, if you can, you can. If you can't, you can't.
Right. I love that.
And if you had your Mount Rushmore 4 chefs that should be
on there, who are they? That's a tough one.
Well, obviously, Ron Siegel how that we've been talking about
him, Jacques Thomas and oh, there's so many.
I'm just going to go Jose Andres.
There you go, chef. Where can people find you if
they want to follow you on social media, If they want to
eat your food, If they want to drink some whiskey, Where?
Where could they? Where could they follow?
Along so you follow me at on Instagram, I'm hand that feeds
my bakery is or the bakery that I'm partners with shout out
Amanda Butchertown grocery bakery online and then the
company that I'm working with now is horse soldier bourbon and
urban still house urban still house in Saint Pete, Florida and
one in Somerset, KY, soon to be more.
Awesome, this was fun. Let's go get some Not a Damn
Chance burger. Yeah, Yeah, let's do it.
All right. Thank you.
Cheers. All right, that's the show.
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