1 00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:02,240 Hello Chefs, This is Chef's PSA podcast. 2 00:00:02,280 --> 00:00:04,480 I'm your host, Andre Natera. On today's episode, we're going 3 00:00:04,480 --> 00:00:07,240 to talk about finding your unique style as a chef. 4 00:00:07,320 --> 00:00:21,240 Stay tuned. So before we get into it, quick 5 00:00:21,240 --> 00:00:22,720 update on something that I'm working on. 6 00:00:23,480 --> 00:00:27,680 I'm doing a super secret popup chef in residence. 7 00:00:28,260 --> 00:00:32,659 I'll share more on my Instagram profile, but coming out of a 8 00:00:32,659 --> 00:00:35,620 quick retirement to have some fun in the kitchen, I'm excited. 9 00:00:35,940 --> 00:00:38,780 Have to make sure I could still walk that talk. 10 00:00:39,180 --> 00:00:41,260 Someone said to me, he said you talked a lot of shit on the 11 00:00:41,260 --> 00:00:45,140 Internet and on your podcast. Can you still do it? 12 00:00:45,220 --> 00:00:47,780 Well, we're we're about to find out if I still got it. 13 00:00:47,780 --> 00:00:51,300 So I'm taking over a restaurant really briefly. 14 00:00:51,780 --> 00:00:54,420 Chef in residence. I did it because I want to have 15 00:00:54,420 --> 00:00:56,380 a little fun. I do miss the kitchen at times 16 00:00:57,530 --> 00:01:00,290 and this allows me to kind of, you know, see, see if I could 17 00:01:00,290 --> 00:01:03,090 still do it, See if I can still hang with the the top dogs in 18 00:01:03,090 --> 00:01:04,690 the city. More to come on that. 19 00:01:05,330 --> 00:01:08,610 I don't want to give away all the details, but I will be 20 00:01:08,610 --> 00:01:12,330 announcing more soon on Chef's PSA social sites. 21 00:01:12,330 --> 00:01:14,490 So keep your eyes peeled. I'll tell you more. 22 00:01:15,130 --> 00:01:17,250 Maybe even for those of you that are looking for work, you might 23 00:01:17,250 --> 00:01:20,890 want to come work with me. It'll be short, but we'll have 24 00:01:20,890 --> 00:01:22,210 some fun. For those of you that are 25 00:01:22,210 --> 00:01:24,490 asking, yes, I I do enjoy doing these things. 26 00:01:24,490 --> 00:01:27,420 Like I do guest chef spots occasionally. 27 00:01:27,420 --> 00:01:31,740 I did one in Dallas and Jose, I still do food festivals when it 28 00:01:31,740 --> 00:01:34,460 makes sense, right? I'm not representing a kitchen, 29 00:01:34,460 --> 00:01:36,220 I'm retired. I'm representing Chef's PSA 30 00:01:36,220 --> 00:01:38,100 podcast. So sometimes it doesn't make 31 00:01:38,100 --> 00:01:40,060 sense for me to be out there cooking. 32 00:01:40,460 --> 00:01:42,980 But for those of you that have reached out and said I'd love to 33 00:01:42,980 --> 00:01:46,020 do a pop up with you, would I be interested? 34 00:01:46,020 --> 00:01:49,140 Yeah, I'd be interested. But you know, the fact of the 35 00:01:49,140 --> 00:01:52,860 matter is I don't have an army behind me like I used to. 36 00:01:53,550 --> 00:01:55,990 Chef's PSA is a one man show. It's just me. 37 00:01:56,710 --> 00:01:58,190 Someone asked me who makes the comics. 38 00:01:58,430 --> 00:02:03,710 I do, Who writes the captions, me, who edits the books, me, who 39 00:02:03,750 --> 00:02:07,990 edits the podcast and the video and the audio and writes the 40 00:02:07,990 --> 00:02:09,669 scripts. Guess who? 41 00:02:10,190 --> 00:02:12,750 Oh yeah, it's all me. But in my quest for world 42 00:02:12,750 --> 00:02:14,910 domination, I think eventually I'm going to have to expand. 43 00:02:15,510 --> 00:02:19,150 I have a couple of surprises coming up on the podcast. 44 00:02:20,150 --> 00:02:23,830 Some collabs. I can't share all the details, 45 00:02:24,310 --> 00:02:27,430 but I think you'll all be happy. A lot of people asked me to talk 46 00:02:27,430 --> 00:02:29,750 on service, a lot of people asked me to talk on pastry 47 00:02:29,750 --> 00:02:32,550 projects and those episodes are coming to. 48 00:02:32,550 --> 00:02:35,710 And for those of you that have been asked now with regards to 49 00:02:35,710 --> 00:02:39,790 the subject matter, finding your unique style as a chef. 50 00:02:40,270 --> 00:02:42,510 When I was a chef, one of the things that used to frustrate me 51 00:02:42,910 --> 00:02:45,390 would be when I hire someone who has zero experience in the 52 00:02:45,390 --> 00:02:48,630 kitchen and maybe I was hiring them for something high end, 53 00:02:48,630 --> 00:02:50,030 right? I've always been a chef of the 54 00:02:50,030 --> 00:02:52,950 higher end kitchens and I've always had a great team of chefs 55 00:02:52,950 --> 00:02:56,270 behind me, Extremely talented sous chefs, extremely talented 56 00:02:56,270 --> 00:02:58,470 chef to cuisines, exec sue and so on. 57 00:02:58,590 --> 00:03:01,070 And when I run a kitchen, I expect greatness. 58 00:03:01,430 --> 00:03:04,430 Excellent. And we're always pushing to be 59 00:03:04,430 --> 00:03:07,830 at the top of the food chain or whatever market that we're in. 60 00:03:08,190 --> 00:03:10,670 And at times I would get frustrated because the new cook 61 00:03:10,670 --> 00:03:14,510 would come in and not even fully understand their own skill set 62 00:03:14,510 --> 00:03:16,670 yet like still trembling and holding a knife. 63 00:03:16,670 --> 00:03:21,860 Can't really dice an onion too well and green and then say 64 00:03:21,860 --> 00:03:25,420 things like when can I get my food on the menu And I'd be 65 00:03:25,420 --> 00:03:29,380 like, what's your food? And then they'd proceed to tell 66 00:03:29,380 --> 00:03:32,700 me and it has nothing to do with the type of restaurant that I 67 00:03:32,700 --> 00:03:34,820 was running. So for example, if I was running 68 00:03:34,820 --> 00:03:38,500 like a high end live fire concept restaurant, they'd want 69 00:03:38,500 --> 00:03:43,100 to tell me about their famous Enchilada casserole or whatever, 70 00:03:43,100 --> 00:03:44,380 right. They said, well, you know, I 71 00:03:44,380 --> 00:03:46,220 just came back from the Caribbean and I was like, this 72 00:03:46,220 --> 00:03:49,720 is into Caribbean restaurant, so my family's from here. 73 00:03:49,720 --> 00:03:52,240 We want, I want to do that food. It's like, great, that's not 74 00:03:52,240 --> 00:03:54,440 this restaurant. It'll blow my mind. 75 00:03:54,800 --> 00:03:57,800 How many people want to do their food, their food? 76 00:03:58,480 --> 00:04:02,480 They don't even have food. Like, they haven't even gotten 77 00:04:02,480 --> 00:04:06,960 to the point where they could create something that would be 78 00:04:07,160 --> 00:04:10,000 on the level of the restaurant where they maybe work, right? 79 00:04:10,000 --> 00:04:11,680 Because maybe they're, they're working as a prep cook and 80 00:04:11,680 --> 00:04:13,280 they're like, when can I get my dish on the menu? 81 00:04:13,680 --> 00:04:16,480 Like, focus on the onion. You got to learn how to dice 82 00:04:16,480 --> 00:04:18,769 those first, right? You got to walk before you can 83 00:04:18,769 --> 00:04:21,170 run these steps. And then occasionally I'd say, 84 00:04:21,170 --> 00:04:23,010 okay, let me see what you got. And they put up like this 85 00:04:23,010 --> 00:04:25,610 terrible dip. They're like, oh fuck, that's 86 00:04:25,610 --> 00:04:27,450 not going on the menu. No way. 87 00:04:28,650 --> 00:04:34,130 I'm, I'm, I'm being, I'm being rude, but the reason I share 88 00:04:34,130 --> 00:04:35,690 this. So there's that. 89 00:04:35,690 --> 00:04:39,050 So my advice, if you're going into a new kitchen, you kind of 90 00:04:39,050 --> 00:04:41,570 got to feel it out a little bit. Is that kitchen the type of 91 00:04:41,570 --> 00:04:45,870 place where it's collaborative? Everyone's inputting ideas, and 92 00:04:45,870 --> 00:04:46,910 there's a lot of kitchens like that. 93 00:04:46,910 --> 00:04:49,470 And I I have kitchens like that where I would encourage people. 94 00:04:49,470 --> 00:04:52,390 We'd have a certain day of the week where everyone was intended 95 00:04:52,390 --> 00:04:55,070 to be putting dishes forward. A lot of times they'd be coached 96 00:04:55,510 --> 00:04:59,070 by some of the sous chefs, but we'd look at all the ideas and 97 00:04:59,070 --> 00:05:02,030 say, okay, this is actually a really cool component, but it 98 00:05:02,030 --> 00:05:03,830 didn't mean that the dishes were getting on the menu. 99 00:05:03,830 --> 00:05:06,030 It's just an opportunity to express every now and again. 100 00:05:06,030 --> 00:05:09,390 So, like, whoa, wasn't expecting that that dish needs to go on 101 00:05:09,390 --> 00:05:12,160 the menu. Other places they meet at the 102 00:05:12,160 --> 00:05:14,720 end of every night, they review the menus, they talk about what 103 00:05:14,720 --> 00:05:16,960 they're going to serve the next day, and everyone's putting an 104 00:05:16,960 --> 00:05:19,480 input. And the final result of the menu 105 00:05:19,480 --> 00:05:23,040 is like this amalgamation of ideas from all those that were 106 00:05:23,600 --> 00:05:26,400 in their input. Other places, they might have a 107 00:05:26,400 --> 00:05:28,320 whiteboard where they write ideas down. 108 00:05:28,720 --> 00:05:32,040 Other places they might have a special, and different cooks are 109 00:05:32,040 --> 00:05:34,560 putting up ideas for the special, or maybe they're 110 00:05:34,560 --> 00:05:35,560 creating the special for the day. 111 00:05:35,560 --> 00:05:40,680 They have a rotation. Whatever the case may be not all 112 00:05:40,680 --> 00:05:44,080 kitchens are like that and there isn't A1 size fits all for every 113 00:05:44,080 --> 00:05:47,040 kitchen. Some kitchens you may never get 114 00:05:47,040 --> 00:05:50,200 a dish on the menu type a personality chef nothing But my 115 00:05:50,200 --> 00:05:52,880 food and other places. It's collaboration with the 116 00:05:52,880 --> 00:05:56,800 billion dollar question what is your food chef run into this 117 00:05:56,800 --> 00:06:00,080 problem When I was coming up as a cook early on in my career, 118 00:06:00,440 --> 00:06:03,480 I've talked about this before. My idols were the Charlie 119 00:06:03,480 --> 00:06:07,120 Trotters of the world, the Thomas Keller's the Ferran, 120 00:06:07,120 --> 00:06:09,520 Audrea's. You know, I was coming up in the 121 00:06:09,520 --> 00:06:13,480 late 90s, early 2000s as a cook and chef, and so those were the 122 00:06:13,480 --> 00:06:15,360 chefs that were the top of the food chain. 123 00:06:15,600 --> 00:06:20,280 And so I wasn't the only one. Every single chef during that 124 00:06:20,280 --> 00:06:24,240 time that wanted to make a name for themselves were all cooking 125 00:06:24,240 --> 00:06:28,000 like Charlie Trotter or Ferran, Audrea or Thomas Keller or 126 00:06:28,000 --> 00:06:29,640 whoever was at that moment, right. 127 00:06:29,840 --> 00:06:32,440 Maybe it was Emeril Agasi or Norman Bacon. 128 00:06:33,160 --> 00:06:35,120 A little bit earlier would have been Mark Miller and Dean 129 00:06:35,120 --> 00:06:37,970 Ferring and Stephen Pyles, but you had all these chefs that 130 00:06:37,970 --> 00:06:40,090 were expressing the ideas of others. 131 00:06:40,370 --> 00:06:43,250 And so a lot of times when they'd say I want to do my food, 132 00:06:43,690 --> 00:06:45,250 you know, I I was guilty of this too. 133 00:06:45,250 --> 00:06:47,970 I remember telling my chef I want to do my food and he's like 134 00:06:48,770 --> 00:06:52,370 present me a dip. And I did a dish right under the 135 00:06:52,370 --> 00:06:54,770 Charlie Trotter cookbook. It was a potato tureen. 136 00:06:54,770 --> 00:06:57,130 I don't remember what else was in it. 137 00:06:57,410 --> 00:06:59,330 It was definitely a potato tureen that I had made and I 138 00:06:59,330 --> 00:07:02,250 served it with a Curry oil. I have to go back and look and 139 00:07:02,250 --> 00:07:07,520 see what that dish actually was. I do remember the Curry oil. 140 00:07:07,800 --> 00:07:10,120 I remember talking to my chef and him saying, why is there 141 00:07:10,120 --> 00:07:12,880 Curry oil on this? And I said, well, Charlie 142 00:07:12,880 --> 00:07:15,880 Trotter does and he's like, you ain't Charlie Trotter. 143 00:07:16,040 --> 00:07:19,960 So what was my food? Was it really my food, or did I 144 00:07:19,960 --> 00:07:23,120 just want to serve food that I wanted to cop food, that I was 145 00:07:23,120 --> 00:07:26,200 inspired food, that I was looking at different cookbooks 146 00:07:26,600 --> 00:07:29,080 and say that's my food, it's not. 147 00:07:29,600 --> 00:07:32,280 I want to cook like Charlie Trotter, so I'm adopting that as 148 00:07:32,280 --> 00:07:35,830 mine or whoever the chef inspiration was. 149 00:07:35,830 --> 00:07:39,310 I want to cook like Gordon Ramsay or whoever Gran Accotts 150 00:07:39,310 --> 00:07:42,310 or Ron Audria. Today you might be wanting to 151 00:07:42,310 --> 00:07:46,990 cook like Rene Redzepi or the Roca Brothers or whoever, right? 152 00:07:47,230 --> 00:07:51,030 So what is your food? Is your food what you grew up 153 00:07:51,030 --> 00:07:52,670 with? Is it the food that was in your 154 00:07:52,670 --> 00:07:54,830 household? Is it what your mom used to cook 155 00:07:54,830 --> 00:07:56,670 for you or your grandmother or your parents? 156 00:07:56,670 --> 00:07:59,230 Is it what the neighbor's parents used to cook for you? 157 00:07:59,510 --> 00:08:03,270 Is it walking up to the little shack on the beach and eating 158 00:08:03,270 --> 00:08:05,990 the food right there? Was it going to the farmers 159 00:08:05,990 --> 00:08:07,590 market and coming back with something? 160 00:08:07,910 --> 00:08:10,470 What is your food? A lot of chefs face this 161 00:08:10,470 --> 00:08:13,190 identity crisis because they don't know what their food is. 162 00:08:14,550 --> 00:08:17,910 You could work for years under a certain chef and you can't wait 163 00:08:17,910 --> 00:08:20,550 to get out of their shadows. So you could express yourself on 164 00:08:20,550 --> 00:08:23,270 a plate to do your food, and then when the opportunity 165 00:08:23,270 --> 00:08:26,790 presents itself, you just end up cooking like the chef you worked 166 00:08:26,790 --> 00:08:30,870 for with a slight tweak on it. But it's still what you were 167 00:08:30,870 --> 00:08:33,419 taught. It's a version of what you were 168 00:08:33,419 --> 00:08:36,539 already shown. If you remember the movie coming 169 00:08:36,539 --> 00:08:39,059 to America, the first one with Eddie Murphy, like they're 170 00:08:39,059 --> 00:08:42,900 McDonald's or Mcdowell's, they had like their version of the 171 00:08:42,900 --> 00:08:45,220 Big Mac or the quarterback. I don't know where it was, but 172 00:08:45,220 --> 00:08:48,020 it was funny, like the exact same thing, just slightly 173 00:08:48,020 --> 00:08:50,620 different. And a lot of times that's what 174 00:08:50,620 --> 00:08:53,380 happens, is you work in a restaurant for so long and 175 00:08:53,380 --> 00:08:58,220 you've gotten really good at preparing a certain style of 176 00:08:58,220 --> 00:09:00,700 someone else's vision, and now you have your chance set back. 177 00:09:00,900 --> 00:09:03,730 What do you do? Do you replicate that vision or 178 00:09:03,730 --> 00:09:05,170 do you truly have a unique style? 179 00:09:05,370 --> 00:09:07,890 I don't know. They tell you. 180 00:09:08,410 --> 00:09:12,970 In most of my experience, when I've worked with chefs and they 181 00:09:12,970 --> 00:09:16,650 come with these ideas, it's normally ideas that they had 182 00:09:16,650 --> 00:09:19,610 from the previous restaurant where they were this chef's PSA 183 00:09:19,610 --> 00:09:22,210 that I say, no matter how well you do something, another chef 184 00:09:22,210 --> 00:09:24,690 thinks you're wrong. And the reason I say that is 185 00:09:24,690 --> 00:09:27,530 because when you're coming up in your career, you're shown 186 00:09:28,290 --> 00:09:31,400 something, whether maybe it's in culinary school and then you get 187 00:09:31,400 --> 00:09:33,520 out into the real world, or maybe it's one of your first 188 00:09:33,520 --> 00:09:35,880 jobs and it's a chef that you really liked. 189 00:09:36,320 --> 00:09:40,080 And they said all stock needs to have oxtail in it to give it 190 00:09:40,080 --> 00:09:42,040 flu. I don't know, maybe it's 191 00:09:42,040 --> 00:09:43,840 something like that. I know my chef said that to me. 192 00:09:44,960 --> 00:09:48,120 And so to this day, sometimes I put oxtail in my veal stock or 193 00:09:48,120 --> 00:09:50,800 in my beef stock. I worked for another chef. 194 00:09:50,800 --> 00:09:55,000 It's all stock for chicken has to be made with whole chickens, 195 00:09:55,480 --> 00:09:57,120 and it's shorter because it keeps it clear. 196 00:09:59,280 --> 00:10:01,890 And I used to do that. I don't do it anymore. 197 00:10:02,090 --> 00:10:06,730 Or other people were would say don't put too much celery in the 198 00:10:06,730 --> 00:10:09,610 stock. And other chefs I've worked for 199 00:10:09,610 --> 00:10:13,450 would say you need to make sure that you're putting pig's feet 200 00:10:13,730 --> 00:10:16,490 and chicken wings and necks. There's more collagen in the 201 00:10:16,490 --> 00:10:18,050 pig's feet. So you got to put that in there, 202 00:10:18,250 --> 00:10:19,810 got to skim the stock a certain way. 203 00:10:19,810 --> 00:10:22,450 You got to brush it with whatever the case may be. 204 00:10:23,130 --> 00:10:25,770 Every chef has a little something that they do. 205 00:10:26,610 --> 00:10:29,910 Grind the Bolognese mirror, plop through the meat grinder. 206 00:10:29,910 --> 00:10:31,350 Others are like, no, no, you got to broom. 207 00:10:31,350 --> 00:10:33,870 What, by hand? No, just put it in the robo 208 00:10:33,870 --> 00:10:36,150 coop. It's best if you do this. 209 00:10:36,430 --> 00:10:37,910 What's the right way? I don't know. 210 00:10:38,390 --> 00:10:42,270 There There really is no right way because someone could argue 211 00:10:42,270 --> 00:10:43,750 against it. No matter how well you do 212 00:10:43,750 --> 00:10:46,150 something, someone else can argue against it that their way 213 00:10:46,150 --> 00:10:50,590 is better because the end result is subjective, especially when 214 00:10:50,590 --> 00:10:52,990 the person is emotionally tied to the product. 215 00:10:53,380 --> 00:10:56,100 So coming up in my career, I cooked in a lot of Italian 216 00:10:56,100 --> 00:10:57,660 restaurants. I cooked in a lot of European 217 00:10:57,660 --> 00:11:00,860 style restaurants, French, etcetera, Mediterranean, 218 00:11:00,940 --> 00:11:03,460 Southwest cuisine. Also at one point in time was 219 00:11:03,460 --> 00:11:06,340 coming up in that Southwest cuisine style, ever wanted to 220 00:11:06,340 --> 00:11:07,780 cook like Mark Miller and Dean Ferry. 221 00:11:08,020 --> 00:11:10,900 And when I finally got my opportunity at bat and they said 222 00:11:10,900 --> 00:11:14,020 you could finally express yourself and do whatever you 223 00:11:14,020 --> 00:11:15,580 want. And now I'm the executive chef 224 00:11:15,580 --> 00:11:18,260 and I'm at the helm of the kitchen, what did I do when I 225 00:11:18,260 --> 00:11:20,060 finally was able to do my own food? 226 00:11:21,780 --> 00:11:25,020 I copied for Anna. I started doing bubble food, 227 00:11:25,660 --> 00:11:27,500 right? So this is like 2005, because 228 00:11:27,500 --> 00:11:30,620 that's what I wanted to do. Was it my food that I work at El 229 00:11:30,620 --> 00:11:34,020 Bulli? No, but I was fascinated from 230 00:11:34,020 --> 00:11:37,220 afar and I had the El Bulli cookbooks and I was watching 231 00:11:37,220 --> 00:11:41,340 what they were doing and I was idolizing that style of cuisine. 232 00:11:41,620 --> 00:11:45,220 And I wanted to understand the alginates, verifications and how 233 00:11:45,220 --> 00:11:51,530 to make mangoes into a bubble, right, and froth up sauces with 234 00:11:51,530 --> 00:11:54,650 less a thin or whatever the case may be, make a spaghetti noodle 235 00:11:54,650 --> 00:11:58,010 out of Agar. It was fun, right? 236 00:11:58,010 --> 00:12:02,530 But it wasn't my food. And so little by little I've had 237 00:12:02,530 --> 00:12:06,770 to start to rediscover who am I as a chef? 238 00:12:06,810 --> 00:12:10,090 What is my style? Is it this or is it that? 239 00:12:10,090 --> 00:12:12,370 And sometimes you get hired as a chef and you take on the 240 00:12:12,370 --> 00:12:14,290 identity of the restaurant that you're hired in. 241 00:12:14,530 --> 00:12:17,770 So an example would be you get hired in a Mediterranean 242 00:12:17,770 --> 00:12:19,250 restaurant. You can't say, well, I do 243 00:12:19,800 --> 00:12:21,200 Chinese food, right. If that's just not going to 244 00:12:21,200 --> 00:12:22,600 work, well, then you're not going to be the chef here. 245 00:12:22,800 --> 00:12:25,640 So sometimes you adapt to the restaurant and to the 246 00:12:25,640 --> 00:12:27,720 environment in which you're placed in. 247 00:12:29,200 --> 00:12:32,800 And other times you run a restaurant where you have 248 00:12:33,640 --> 00:12:36,920 creative control and not only are you driving the brand, 249 00:12:37,040 --> 00:12:40,480 you're also driving the identity of the food and the creativity 250 00:12:40,480 --> 00:12:42,080 of chefs struggle with this. I know. 251 00:12:42,080 --> 00:12:46,360 I struggle with you're always influenced by the current trend. 252 00:12:46,360 --> 00:12:48,320 You're influenced by social media, you're influenced by 253 00:12:48,320 --> 00:12:50,880 what's on TV. Where do your ideas come from? 254 00:12:51,240 --> 00:12:53,840 Do you just fall asleep and then these ideas pop in your brain? 255 00:12:53,840 --> 00:12:56,640 Do they come from external sources? 256 00:12:56,840 --> 00:13:01,840 The reality is almost all your ideas are regurgitated from 257 00:13:01,840 --> 00:13:05,200 external sources. Books, social media, your 258 00:13:05,200 --> 00:13:08,080 training, your parents, your experiences. 259 00:13:08,960 --> 00:13:11,200 Coming up with original ideas is extremely difficult. 260 00:13:11,520 --> 00:13:14,040 You could look at very original chefs, like I said, Farhan 261 00:13:14,040 --> 00:13:17,560 Audra, he revolutionized the world when he came out with the 262 00:13:17,560 --> 00:13:21,560 food that he was doing at Obuli. The molecular gastronomy 263 00:13:21,560 --> 00:13:25,600 movement changed the world. And I don't know if he copied 264 00:13:25,600 --> 00:13:28,560 that and if he did, I don't know who he copied it from because 265 00:13:30,120 --> 00:13:34,040 it's not easy to trace to say, oh, he clearly got it from here. 266 00:13:34,920 --> 00:13:36,760 Or you look at what Renee Rinzeppi was doing. 267 00:13:36,760 --> 00:13:39,120 He went through the whole foraging thing in the Nordic, 268 00:13:39,280 --> 00:13:41,090 the New Nordic. Where did he get that from? 269 00:13:41,090 --> 00:13:43,370 I'm sure historically people have always been cooking like 270 00:13:43,370 --> 00:13:46,690 that, but professionally, people weren't cooking like that on 271 00:13:46,690 --> 00:13:48,490 that level. So he redeveloped that. 272 00:13:49,450 --> 00:13:53,330 Thomas Keller being what he did in Napa Valley at the French 273 00:13:53,330 --> 00:13:54,970 Laundry. No one was doing that before 274 00:13:54,970 --> 00:13:56,250 him. Charlie Trotter, the same thing. 275 00:13:56,250 --> 00:14:00,010 So some of these greats, the mountain Rushmore of chefs, 276 00:14:00,010 --> 00:14:02,210 right, they marched to the beat of their own drum. 277 00:14:02,330 --> 00:14:05,890 They create their own unique style and they create and 278 00:14:05,930 --> 00:14:09,410 everyone borrows and copies or gets inspired by it. 279 00:14:09,730 --> 00:14:12,890 I'm no exception to that. I borrowed from all of them and 280 00:14:12,890 --> 00:14:14,490 then claimed it to be my own style. 281 00:14:14,730 --> 00:14:17,410 What's the what's the expression it takes a thief to catch a 282 00:14:17,410 --> 00:14:20,010 thief. Have you ever heard that people 283 00:14:20,730 --> 00:14:23,610 have to know how to steal before they can catch someone who is 284 00:14:23,610 --> 00:14:25,250 also stealing? Right. 285 00:14:25,250 --> 00:14:26,650 We're all getting inspired by social media. 286 00:14:26,650 --> 00:14:29,530 It's it's it's really easy to police it now, right? 287 00:14:30,890 --> 00:14:33,370 Go back and say, hey, that's the dish that so and so was serving. 288 00:14:33,570 --> 00:14:38,930 And so after all this time, I would say I was looking that 289 00:14:38,930 --> 00:14:42,690 dishes that I was cooking. So I'm working on this this 290 00:14:42,690 --> 00:14:43,810 menu. I talked about it a little bit 291 00:14:43,810 --> 00:14:47,490 earlier in the podcast and I'm creating this menu and it's 292 00:14:47,490 --> 00:14:50,650 basically the greatest hits of my career, just modernized for 293 00:14:50,650 --> 00:14:54,290 2023 in the environment that I'm And as I'm going back and 294 00:14:54,290 --> 00:14:59,130 looking at dishes throughout my career, I'm like, wow, this 295 00:14:59,130 --> 00:15:00,490 looks really bad. I would not, Sir. 296 00:15:00,490 --> 00:15:05,010 I would not played it this way, even stuff that was just five 297 00:15:05,010 --> 00:15:08,740 years ago or four years ago and was very cutting edge at the 298 00:15:08,740 --> 00:15:10,180 moment. I look at it now and say it 299 00:15:10,180 --> 00:15:13,260 looks so dated. It was delicious, but it looked 300 00:15:13,260 --> 00:15:16,260 dated. Plating styles evolved, 301 00:15:16,260 --> 00:15:18,300 ingredient trends evolved very quick. 302 00:15:18,780 --> 00:15:21,980 I would challenge you if you've been around long enough. 303 00:15:22,140 --> 00:15:23,660 So, you know, I know, I know a lot of people. 304 00:15:23,660 --> 00:15:25,700 Maybe you're writing culinary school, so this might not apply 305 00:15:25,700 --> 00:15:28,940 to you, but go back and look at the food that you were making 306 00:15:28,940 --> 00:15:31,540 that you were extremely happy and proud with just a few years 307 00:15:31,540 --> 00:15:33,820 ago. And look at it today and see if 308 00:15:33,820 --> 00:15:36,310 you're still proud of it. And I don't mean, like maybe it 309 00:15:36,310 --> 00:15:38,470 tasted, but just I'm talking about the plating and the 310 00:15:38,470 --> 00:15:40,150 aesthetics of it, the style, right? 311 00:15:40,150 --> 00:15:42,750 So food is like fashion. It's always moving forward. 312 00:15:42,950 --> 00:15:45,270 I think it'd be really interesting to do with chefs to 313 00:15:45,270 --> 00:15:49,710 say post what you did 10 years ago or five years ago, post what 314 00:15:49,710 --> 00:15:52,950 you're doing today and do side by side my food, five years ago, 315 00:15:52,950 --> 00:15:55,630 my food today. I think that would be fun. 316 00:15:56,470 --> 00:15:59,150 So you could see how far you can come, so you could see the 317 00:15:59,150 --> 00:16:01,670 techniques that you've learned. You could document your history. 318 00:16:02,270 --> 00:16:04,630 You could document what you've learned throughout your career. 319 00:16:05,190 --> 00:16:07,910 Much easier, right? Keep good notes, get the 320 00:16:07,910 --> 00:16:12,590 Evernote app, log everything, take great photos of your food, 321 00:16:12,590 --> 00:16:16,670 make notes and save them for later because you're able to 322 00:16:16,670 --> 00:16:18,630 document your career progression. 323 00:16:18,910 --> 00:16:20,430 And So what does that boil down to? 324 00:16:20,430 --> 00:16:22,550 Right? When I came up, as I said, I was 325 00:16:22,550 --> 00:16:26,150 working in French and Italian restaurants, Mediterranean 326 00:16:26,150 --> 00:16:30,760 style, and so now my food is this amalgamation of the thing 327 00:16:30,760 --> 00:16:34,240 that I learned early on on my specific stations that I made. 328 00:16:35,160 --> 00:16:36,680 I noticed that's what I like cooking now. 329 00:16:36,840 --> 00:16:38,960 That's my food and is it my food? 330 00:16:40,000 --> 00:16:42,200 Kind of right. That's what I was taught. 331 00:16:42,720 --> 00:16:46,720 It's the best and the things that I enjoyed most from what I 332 00:16:46,720 --> 00:16:49,560 was taught as a chef and the things that I crave now is like 333 00:16:49,560 --> 00:16:53,640 a properly made lobster bits, tornados, rossini gnocchis. 334 00:16:53,680 --> 00:16:56,920 It's not the complex things that I've made throughout my career 335 00:16:57,440 --> 00:17:00,460 anything. The more complex and showy thing 336 00:17:00,460 --> 00:17:02,300 are the things I'm most embarrassed by now. 337 00:17:03,820 --> 00:17:07,460 And the most simple and delicious things are the things 338 00:17:07,460 --> 00:17:10,900 I'm most proud of. And I still carry with me the 339 00:17:10,900 --> 00:17:13,220 dichotomy of a shot. What's your food? 340 00:17:14,900 --> 00:17:16,900 I don't know. You need to find that out 341 00:17:17,099 --> 00:17:18,940 anyway. If you want to support the show, 342 00:17:19,220 --> 00:17:21,460 you know what to do. Make sure you leave five stars. 343 00:17:21,619 --> 00:17:23,819 If you're watching on YouTube, hit the subscribe button. 344 00:17:23,819 --> 00:17:26,540 Make sure you leave a thumbs up. Go to chefspsa.com. 345 00:17:26,540 --> 00:17:28,020 You get all the books, all the merch. 346 00:17:28,420 --> 00:17:30,580 Go get the free ebooks. We'll see you next week. 347 00:17:31,100 --> 00:17:31,940 Hit the porno music.