On with Kara Swisher - Chef Matty Matheson of ‘The Bear’ on Culinary Stardom, On and Off The Screen

Episode Date: December 16, 2024

Canadian chef Matty Matheson has been a force in the culinary world for over two decades, but the non-foodies of the world recognize him as Neil Fak, the goofy, handyman-come-waiter-in-training on the FX/Hulu hit series The Bear. Aside from being the show’s much-needed comic relief, Matheson is an executive producer and a culinary consultant on set. Matheson first became chef de cuisine in his early 20s and now owns over a dozen restaurants. He also runs an incredibly popular YouTube channel with over 1.5 million subscribers and he’s authored three cookbooks – his latest, Soups, Salads, Sandwiches, came out in October. Kara and Matty talk about the good, bad and ugly of the restaurant industry, why he loves both haute cuisine and homestyle cooking and how his YouTube persona changes when he puts on his chef’s hat. Questions? Comments? Email us at [e-mail] or find us on Instagram and TikTok @onwithkaraswisher  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I needed a happy interview and I hope you are. If you're not, that's just the way it's going to go. I don't know what to say. You know, we'll see. I'm pretty happy. You know? Okay, good. I think that's your whole brand from what I understand.

Hi everyone from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. This is On with Kara Swisher and I'm Kara Swisher. My guest today is chef, restaurateur, cookbook author and actor producer, Matty Matheson. If you're a foodie, you've probably known about Matty for a while. He's had review worthy restaurants in Canada for more than a decade. He currently has 13 restaurants with varying cuisines. His third cookbook, soup, salads, and sandwiches came out in October. He has a farm and a bunch of other food-based business ventures.

If you aren't a foodie, you might recognize him from the Hulu FX show, The Bear, which has won 21 Primetime Emmys. Season 3 was recently nominated for five Golden Globes. Maddie got signed onto the show to be a food consultant and ended up with a role and an executive producer title. No, he's not the Calvin Klein model lead, Carmy, also known as Jeremy Allen White, or the evil sadist chef de cuisine who demoralizes Carmy at the fancy New York restaurant. Maddie plays Neil Fack,

the tattooed kind of goofy family friend who also is a handyman who starts out just hanging around the restaurant playing video games and ends up being some kind of emotional whisperer to Carmody as he's been going through what is clearly an emotional break while trying to get a Michelin star in season 3. One thing that's important to me is my son Louie is a huge fan of Maddie's YouTube channel and his show Cooking Something with Maddie Matheson. He has something like 1.5 million followers on YouTube and of course more across social media,

especially among young people like my son, who is also an aspiring cook and may not become a chef, but he certainly loves doing it. I wanna talk to Matty about his role in The Bear in front of the camera and behind the scenes. I wanna talk to him about his career as someone who didn't do well in school and found his passion through cooking and why he thinks food translates so well

to a younger YouTube audience. He's a big punk fan, but also a kitchen table philosopher of sorts. He's a really thoughtful guy despite his gonzo reputation. Support for this show comes from ServiceNow, the AI platform for business transformation. You've heard the big hype around AI. The truth is, AI is only as powerful as the platform it's built into. ServiceNow is the platform that puts AI to work for people across your business, removing friction and frustration for your employees, supercharging productivity for your developers, providing intelligent tools for your service agents to make customers happier.

All built into a single platform you can use right now. That's why the world works with ServiceNow. Visit servicenow.com slash AI for people to learn more. Visit ServiceNow.com slash AI for people to learn more. Thumbtack presents the ins and outs of caring for your home. Out. Indecision, overthinking, second-guessing every choice you make. In. Plans and guides that make it easy to get home projects done. Out. Beige. On beige.

On beige. In. Knowing what to do, when to do it, and who to hire. Start caring for your home with confidence. Download Thumbtack today. Support for On with Karis Fisher comes from Elf Beauty. In the corporate world, Elf Beauty is a bit of a unicorn. They're the only U.S. publicly traded company with 78% women and 44% diversity on their board.

That goes beyond the boardroom, too. They work to instill that ethos across all their efforts to make a positive impact on people products and our planet. Elf is doing it, and now they're calling on the corporate world to do that. They believe that doing good is good for business and you can see how in ELF's 2024 Impact Report. Visit elfbeauty.com slash impact to learn more. It is on. Hi, Maddie, welcome.

Thanks for being on On. I really appreciate you doing this. So let's talk about your cookbook to start with. You came out with your third one in October. You already have two bestsellers. In 2018, you published Maddie Matheson, a cookbook. And in 2020, Homestyle Cookery. This one's more focused, soup, salads and sandwiches. And I guess that's what cookbook writers do, start big and then hone in on specific courses of types of food. But in the intro to the third book, you wrote something I thought was interesting.

Let me read it. Sometimes cooking is scary or makes you feel uncomfortable. That's okay. Even I'm uncomfortable when I'm cooking, but the power of cooking always outweighs the fears and the anxieties. As long as the love is just a little greater than the hate or eating good tonight. I don't think that's what people expect with a glossy soup sandwich salads cookbook.

Talk about what you're trying to say there. I don't know. Every day, people are feeling feelings. And I think cooking is a way to kind of have a release. For me, it's relatively easy to cook. I don't have to really think it's relatively easy to cook. I don't have to really think about how I'm going to cook. It's more about what I'm going to cook. And I think a lot of people have to really think about what they're going to cook and

how they're going to cook it. And I think that can be overwhelming on top of everything else that's going on in people's lives. And yeah, I just think that food is one of those things that is, it's kind of an uncompromising love. It's a force that nourishes you. It's a force that, you know, you get to create and it builds character and it builds, I don't know. I just, I really love it.

But it's also like, doing it is stressful at times, you know, especially with kids and life and everything else, and then trying to manage time and manage a good meal. It can really sometimes get you in even a darker place sometimes, or it adds to the stresses of life. Right. So, tell me what adds to the stresses of life in cooking for you. What's the greater hate? And, oh, hate's probably strong, but you wrote that.

Give me a moment that causes you hate and one that causes you love, like an act of cooking? Well, love is easy. I think it's even like last night, I made some beef stroganoff. Mm-hmm, delicious. Yeah, I made this like lovely meal for everyone at home. And then my son was just like, I don't like mushrooms. My daughter Rizzo, she was like, I want shrimp. And then Ozzy, my youngest, is like, I want pasta.

And I'm like, well, you guys told me you all liked stroganoff, and we've had it multiple times, and that's why I made one meal. And, you know, the frustration sets in and then all of a sudden I'm trying to get them to taste it and they don't want to taste it and I picked the mushrooms out for my son and then he's like, I do like the mushrooms. And you're just in this, like, you're constantly in this negotiation of trying to- You're a short order chef is what you are.

Yeah, and then also it's like, I'm doing this thing and and like my daughter has to, you know, she's got gymnastics. My son has taekwondo. Yeah. All these things are happening. I have to have dinner ready by 430 and you know, but it's that thing where all of a sudden you're cooking with love, you're excited, the kids all said they wanted Shroganov and then they turn turned their backs on you. And then it turns into like, I'm negotiating against three, you know, uncompromising forces, you know? Yeah, I have four kids, I've been there. I've been there with that. Or else, we had one,

my brother's kid, my brother's also a great cook, and one of his kids would only eat things that are white. Like, just white food, like pasta, butter, parmesan, toast, things like that, which was difficult. And I was like, stop short order shoving your kids, give them what you want. And he said, you'll see. And of course I did. But you come from kind of a punk background. Writers have called your approach gonzo. Okay.

Is that how you would describe it? Sort of the shut the fuck up if you don't like it. You don't sound like that at all. Who are you cooking for? What's your style? I'm thinking of like fucks that's delicious and that kind of that. It's that genre of cook or maybe not. Yeah.

I don't know. I'm like, it's funny because it is like one of those things where I've always, I've had like multiple types of careers around things and I've done things a lot of the way that I've done, I've done them the way that I've done them. I've made cooking videos for over 10 years now. I've always kind of been myself and spoken the way that I speak. And I'm funny, I'm this, I'm whatever, I'm loud,

all that kind of stuff. But like, I think like in the restaurants, it's very different. I put my actual kind of chef mind at work and do those types of things and want to be a chef, you know? And I am a chef with our restaurants. And so it is like one of those things where it's like very different hats

that I'm able to kind of put on in those different scenarios of like, the way that I am on YouTube is certainly not the way that I am in a professional kitchen in one of our restaurants. Right. And so it is like a very different kind of scope in each situation.

And yeah, I don't know, like Gonzo, it's like whatever. I'm like, I don't know. Like, Gonzo, it's like whatever. I'm like, I have no idea. I am who I am and I've done what I've done. And I think it's just like, it all speaks for itself, you know, kind of thing of what types of restaurants I have and the vibes of those restaurants and everything that I care about

and how I feel about restaurants is what we're trying to kind of emulate in these spaces is like what I believe is really great hospitality and really great food. And like, that's all I'm trying to do. And I think it is like, you know, at a younger age, when I was like, you know, I was a chef when I was like 26. Like I opened our first restaurant when I was 26 years old.

I'm 42 now, you know, it's when I was 26 years old. I'm 42 now. You know, it's been a long kind of career of that. Let's talk about that later. You talked about how you weren't particularly good in school as a kid and culinary school changed your life. What do you think the environment, why a cooking environment worked where school didn't? Yeah, culinary school was an amazing thing because I think it was,

I wasn't good at high school. I wasn't good at going to math class, going to science class, going to whatever the heck it was. Nothing clicked. I never had that thing where I was like, I love English. I love writing, I love reading, I love science. I never had anything that I really gravitated towards.

In high school, all I wanted to do was go to punk shows and hang out with my friends and do kid shit. And so when I went to culinary school, it was like this amazing thing happened where I loved cooking and I was reasonably good at it, and I found a natural ability where before I didn't have, I never felt that. I never was great at sports.

I was never good at school. So then all of a sudden I'm in school, but I'm doing something I genuinely love, and I'm getting good grades. So then all of a sudden, you're like, oh, if I show up every day and I'm in my clean Chef whites and I do what the chef says and I, you know, make the food that we're making that day

in a timely, clean fashion and be efficient and, you know, maintain my station, all of a sudden I get good grades. And I was just like, this is amazing. And it was like a thing that like built self-esteem and confidence and all these things that I never really felt for years going to school. And so then I was just like, this is an amazing place. I loved it. So one of the things when you think about becoming a chef,

we're going to talk about the bear in just a minute, but it's the idea of having trauma and insecurity, for example. A lot of chefs, that's the idea. And it's usually a big complaint to people in the culinary world of trauma, insecurity, being verbally abused, et cetera. How do you look at the environment right now of the restaurant business? Yeah, I don't know. I think people are learning a lot. I think, you know, the brigade style of this, you know, singular chef person that has the almighty say is one thing.

And you know, I worked in great French restaurants and some were ran like that, and some were a little more collaborative and amazing. And I don't know, I think the landscape right now is a lot of people are aware of the history and aware of the unsustainable work that came along with a lot of those types of restaurants. And I think now it's this amazing thing where we understand what people want and what people deserve and how to give them that and create kitchens that are,

you know, a unified problem solving team and are giving people infrastructure and training on how to do what we want. A lot of restaurants, it was based on learning how to do something. You're shown once or twice and then you have to execute and then if you mess up, you would get in trouble. And I think that that type of learning and that type of teaching isn't really that sustainable. I think you need to be able to talk to your team members constantly, give them understanding if they're not catching something, help them.

You know, you get more bees with honey, you know? It's one of those things. And you're able to do that without yelling, and you're able to do that without yelling, and you're able to do that without being mean, you know? When you see that, what do you think? When you see the yelling show? You know, I'm thinking Gordon Ramsay, of course he's made it almost a brand and famous. Yeah, like it is, like one of those things where I think, if a chef's yelling, it means that they're not communicating properly.

And a lot of chefs, I think, believe that people can read their minds. And if you just leave somebody out on the lurch, like, trying to figure something out, and they don't do exactly what you think, and then you get frustrated by that dish not being up to your standards, then there could have been more communication. There could have been more teaching, more hand-holding, more thought on your side. But a yelling chef is somebody who's lost control. Now, speaking of control, you have a bunch of restaurants. Is it, I don't know, 15, 10, 11?

Yeah, it's like 13, I think, right now. So you have Prime Seafood Palace, you have Rizzo's House of Parm, Matty's Patty's Burger Club, the Bon Me restaurant. You've pushed back against the idea that you have an empire, but a lot of chefs do have an empire, and this feels like one. Talk about why you have so many restaurants and what's your goal in having all these different places. I think an empire is just a stupid word to use in a small business.

We're still ran, we run it like a small business. We're an independent restaurant. I'm not backed by some giant VC company or some development company, you know? So we are able to run our restaurants a little bit differently than these larger groups. And yeah, my goal is to make beautiful restaurants that inspire me and things that come from my background and come from the history of my life and things that I really connect with. And Cafe Rang is, you know, our love letter to Vietnam and my friendship and partnership with Rang is an incredible thing. And I think like Maddie's Patties is started from me and Pat Tenore

cooking cheeseburgers in Hawaii for kids. You know, they all come from something. So it's just like, I think building these restaurants and creating these spaces is just me showing the world and Toronto specifically, like where I come from and what makes me. That's the way that I want to present myself and give people food and give people a place to go and eat. Do you cook at all these places?

No. Do you set the menus? What's your role now when you have this many restaurants? Yeah, I work with all of our chefs in front of house. I create all of the restaurants and the design and the menus and work with all of our team members on creating these spaces. I'm working with all of the chefs on ideation

and writing the menus and then executing recipes and getting the recipes up to our standards and getting them to a level. And then I'm just constantly working with everybody, you know, just dialing in these businesses and dialing in our food and our beverage systems and working with them daily, you know? When you're figuring out what has to go between all the restaurants, is there a through line for any of them at all? In season three of The Bear,

they talk about non-negotiables, right? Carmy makes a list of things that are non-negotiables like personal hygiene, confidence and competence, no repeat ingredients. Richie has his own list, including an environment that embraces razzleazzle and Dreamweave, which are interesting. It sounds like something you might say, but do you have a non-negotiable list for your

restaurants or your teams and what's on it or what should be? Yeah, we have different, each space has, you know, I think it's just more of core values and things like that and our standards of how we show up for work and how we execute the job every day and how we uplift each other. And yeah, there's a bunch of that kind of stuff. Like there's a baseline of cleanliness and professionalism and all those types of things on all of our restaurants.

And then each space and restaurant has definitely a very specific, there's different talent pools. The talent pool at Matty's Patties is very different than Cafe Rang. Cafe Rang is very different than Prime Seafood Palace. They're all very different. And each one needs to be kind of nurtured

and given that kind of space to grow and become its own thing. And we need to be very aware of that. And each one is very kind of, you know, we work on each unit in a very specific way. Is there one that's all you in the idea, if you had a pick of the restaurants? Yeah, I don't know. They're all very sentimental to me. They're all very much a part of what I've done and how I've done them. And they all, the through line is things that I love. You know, Rizzo's House of Parm is my love of my wife's family's cooking.

Everything we do comes from an idea or a feeling and an experience that comes from my life. And the through line is that. The things that make me happy and proud and those are the things that like it's a very good starting point to have something that's real, that's meaningful, and that's something that comes from a very pure, beautiful place. We'll be back in a minute. Amazon Q Business is the new generative AI assistant from AWS. Because many tasks can make business slow, like wading through the mud.

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You know the saying, give a man a fish, he eats for the night. Teach a man to fish, he eats for a lifetime. Well, however you feel about seafood, it's great advice. And Greenlight thinks it's a perfect principle for parents teaching their kids about personal finance. Greenlight is a debit card and money app made for families. Parents can send money to their kids and keep an eye on kids spending and saving while kids and teens can build money confidence and lifelong financial literacy skills. The Greenlight app is designed to help kids learn how

to save, spend, and even invest wisely. I've tried Greenlight with my family and I think it's a good experience. There's a lot of games and interesting information that kids can read. I think it's really important to spend time informing your kids about money. It's the thing we spend the least time doing. My son recently did not know how to pay rent. He had never done it in his life and obviously lived in dorms or been living with me. So it's really important to have financial literacy. You can sign up for Greenlight today at greenlight.com slash Kara.

That's greenlight.com slash Kara to try Greenlight today. greenlight.com slash Kara. That's greenlight.com slash Kara to try Greenlight today. Greenlight.com slash Kara. So let me ask you one of your biggest projects is your YouTube show, Cooking Something with Maddie Matheson. Your channel has more than 1.5 million subscribers and of course, you have many more across social media. As I said, my son, Louis loves you and watches you all the time.

Cooking shows aren't new, they just used to be on television. Let me play a clip from a recent episode, I'd like you to talk a little bit about it. What's up everybody, I'm Matty Matheson and welcome today to Cooking Something. Cooking Something is a show where I'm taking food and I'm cooking something with it, okay?

You guys are at home being like, what the fuck do I cook? I don't know, I'm just trying to it, okay? You guys are at home being like, what the fuck do I cook? I don't know. I'm just trying to make something out of nothing, but we got something and now I'm cooking something and we're all here working together trying to make each other feel good, eat good. You're cooking at home, self-esteem, I've gone over this how many times.

You're cooking, you're making yourself feel good, somebody eats it, they're like, holy fuck, that tastes really amazing. They're like, yeah, I learned how to make that for Matty. And then they're like, oh my God, I love that guy, he's such a fucking idiot. And I'm like, yeah. And now we're here. Now we're here. You're a quiet, retiring type.

So can you talk to me about what you're trying to do here? You suddenly throw in self-esteem too, which I thought was interesting. But talk a little bit about what you're trying to do with this. In some ways, you're like a typical OG cooking show queen, like Julia Child. She had a very bullying attitude in the French chef and talked about empowering people, mostly women at the time. Talk about what you're doing here in the YouTube show you're doing. I just want people to get excited about cooking.

And maybe they cook what I cook, maybe they watch me just to laugh, whatever they get out of it, I can't really control that. But I think it is like, I think it's just an amazing thing that I'm able to reach a lot of people and get people excited about cooking. That's kind of it. You know, like it's a very basic thing where I'm like, I've had a weekly cooking show for a long time that's, you know, free and just on the internet. So if anybody ever wants to go look at stuff, they can go.

And I think it's just like a really cool thing that I love to have. And yeah, like that's all it is. Does that make money for you? Restaurants are often not money-making ventures. Obviously, the economics can be different. But is that something that's important economically? Yeah, for sure. YouTube is a place that I'm able to give people

free cooking videos, and I'm able to do 30-second, one-minute integrations within those that pay for making that. So it is something that provides a lot of joy to a lot of people and I'm able to make a couple bucks and keep it moving. Obviously you've been a name in the culinary world for more than a decade, but now people know you from playing this goofy family friend slash handyman, Neil Fack, on The Bear.

Season three just picked up five Golden Globe nominations. Congratulations. Thank you. As you know, your book is now on soups and sandwiches. The Bear is the name of the restaurant that started out as a sandwich shop called The Beef. And one of your character's major moments in season three is about soup, is specifically mirepoix.

I can take it. You sure? Chef. You know what to do? One of your character's major moments in season three is about soup, is specifically mirepoix. I need hands, please. I can take it. You sure? Chef. You know what to do? I believe so. OK, we're going to take it to the table.

OK, you're going to pour the broth into the bowls. Give them each a bowl. Say, this is our mirepoix broth. OK, you got it? Yes, Chef. Good. Go. OK.

Careful. Thank you, Chef. Thank you. What's happening in that scene? Because you don't play a chef. You're the only chef in this series who's not playing, chef. Thank you. What's happening in that scene? Because you don't play a chef. You're the only chef in this series who's not playing a chef. Yeah, I'm just Fack. I'm playing, you know, a handyman.

And you know, I'm Carmy's, like, best friend. And I'm trying to make people feel a little love in the middle of all the chaos that's going on. Yeah, in this scene, it's just like, I bring out this dish, Mirpoix soup, Mirpoix broth. It's everything that makes the Italian beef without the beef kind of thing was the thinking behind it. Hi, welcome. This is a broth from Chef Carmen's Mind, Mirpoix and broth. I pour it in front of you. Enjoy.

I took things a little too literally when chef told me to go and pour it in front of them. So I went and poured it in front of them and then brought it back to the kitchen and obviously they were supposed to have it. What are you doing? I poured it in front of them. Why the fuck is it back in here? Well.

We're a restaurant. Back to serve the food. I got it. What the fuck is this? Come on. What are you thinking? We have to be organized. Please.

It's sincere. It's a cute little mishap that obviously would make someone's head explode, you know? And it's just, I'm just like this like little velvet hammer of love and misunderstanding. Right, which is what your character is. So you're not just part of the cast, you're also a consultant and executive producer. Explain how this happened. Yeah, I've known Chris for a long time. Chris Storer, the creator and director and writer and all that stuff.

And his sister, Courtney Storer, is a close friend of mine. She's a chef as well and she's the culinary producer on the show. Yeah, we've known each other for a long time. Then Chris called me one day and wanted to know if I wanted to consult on this pilot of this show that he had. I was just like, okay, and we figured it out. And then I came and we shot the pilot and I got to work with the writers,

I got to work with costume and set deck and prop, and work with the actors on a lot of stuff. And then we got to go make a show. And then it just grew. Fax character grew a little bit more. I feel nobody knew if I was gonna be able to act a little bit, or be able to do that, or whatever. Were you worried about your acting skills?

Yeah, it's scary. It's doing something you've never done before. It's very scary. A lot of these people are amazing actors that have spent their whole lives trying to be these actors. And then I'm like, I have no idea. I've never taken an acting class. I don't know. Then I show up and I'm just trying to do what I'm doing. But it was an amazing experience because it's just like I'm trying to help them

be better actors by giving them a lot of information and stories and showing them how to move in the kitchens a little bit, and all that stuff. Then they were giving me the reciprocal of like helping me read my lines and working scenes with me and it was a really amazing thing Everyone on that show is so so amazing and fact is a real fan favorite some people on reddit say you you make the bear a Comedy I want to play you a short segment from season one where you're trying to convince Richie to give you a job at the Restaurant I graduated high school good start be serious man. I'm going to play you a short segment from season one where you're trying to convince Richie to give you a job at the restaurant. I graduated high school.

Good start. Be serious, man. I'm being serious. What might you bring to the beef as a new employee? I've got hearth. What's hearth? Heart. I'm nervous, man.

I got heart. Ah, you're going to need brain. Now, do you have any special skills or abilities, aside from being a fucking stroke? Well, A, I'm not a fucking stroke. And B, I'm really good on the keyboard. No, A, you are. And B, no, you're not. Well, A, yes, I am.

And B, I joined a jazz fusion class, so in your face. A, I've heard you fucking play, and you're fucking terrible. And C, it's a fucking restaurant. Why do I give a fuck that you play the keyboard? I'm a hard worker. I'm a nice guy. I got a great vibe.

Fuck your vibe. Don't ever fuck my vibe. I swear to God, I will fuck anything I want to fuck. You are not being nice. You will not fuck me. Talk about this scene. You're a very good actor, actually, as it turns out. Yeah, I don't know.

It's just like a really kind of oddly intense, crazy conversation between, you know, it's a thing where it's just like, we've all known each other since we were like kids almost, you know? And so it's just like, everyone's able to speak a little bit. Everyone's a little nastier, it seems. But yeah, I don't know. I was just like, I wanted to be a part of the team. I really wanted to be a part of it. I thought I would add value.

I, you know, obviously I probably feel like left out. And then just trying to be a part of the team. It's my family. I love these guys. I love the beef. I love, you know, everything about it. And I love Karmie so much. And now that Karmie's back and I just really wanted to be a part of it and try to help

and be there, you know? So well, speaking of family, the bear is about a guy trying to take over and launch a restaurant. and I just really wanted to be a part of it and try to help and be there, you know? So. Well, speaking of family, the bear is about a guy trying to take over and launch a restaurant. It's really about families, the family dynamics behind the scenes and how people working in restaurants become families.

Speaking of family, every week we get a question from an outside expert this week. He's more of an inside expert. Let's play it. Hey, Maddie, this is Jeff Swisher, Kara's older brother and the designated chef of our fairly large Italian-American family. I do the Feast of the Seven Fishes every year, and I have to say that your season two, episode

six, Feast of the Seven Fishes, gave me PTSD. Our mother, Lucky, has never exactly driven a car into the house, but metaphorically, I'm not so sure. I had a wonderful friend named Peter Dandrea, who sadly passed away too young. He was the head chef at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco. Occasionally, we would go out together to pretty well-known restaurants in San Francisco,

and the chefs would seem to try to outdo each other and make something special for the visiting chef. My question is this. If you knew that Thomas Keller and Dominique Crenn were coming to your restaurant, what would you make for each of them and why? Interesting. Those are two San Francisco chefs, just for people who don't know.

Yeah. When I was younger, whenever we had chefs come to the restaurant, odd fellows, parts and labor, I would always cook everything like myself and I would do these like elaborate things and make things off the menu and really just try to like show them the love and like cook all these, whatever, these stupid ass things. And now I have this like thing where when chefs come in,

I wanna very much stand on the food that we cook in the restaurant. I think that the food that we've chosen to cook at the restaurant is the best that we can create. The team behind all of our menus and all of our food, that's what shines. Now when chefs come in, we do what we do every day. We give them the same food that we give everybody.

If Thomas Keller and Dominic Crenn came into any one of our restaurants, we would do absolutely nothing different. We would give them the same service, and we would give them the same food that we give everybody, to the highest of our ability. Oh, wow. That's interesting. food that we give everybody to the highest of our ability. And I think that is, you know, later on with life and maturity and everything about that, I think that's the beauty is giving people something that we cook every day, something that we're proud of, something that we build and work on as a team. And I think that is good enough to serve any chef or any patron of any of our establishments.

That's a really interesting answer. Which of the restaurants would you think would you pick? Or you don't want to pick any of your children, I guess, right? If any chef came to any of my restaurants, I'd be excited. And I would be proud to have three Michelin star chefs, or the greatest chefs in the world, go eat a cheeseburger, or a bowl of pho, or a chicken parm, or have an extravagant meal at Prime Seafood Palace. I don't see it as anything better or worse. I'm proud of all of our restaurants, and I think that good food is good food. And I think you can have a beautiful cheeseburger

that's just as good as some, you know, expensive fine dining experience. And I think that's what I'm trying to do. We'll be back in a minute. Support for On with Kara Swisher comes from Quince. Giving gifts would be really easy if you had a blank check to spend on every person you love. You'll find all kinds of luxury items that folks would never buy for themselves. Price wouldn't be an issue and you'd win the holidays every single year. But like most of us, that's just not going to happen. We have to work around budgets and frankly some of our limited imaginations to pick out memorable gifts. Luckily, Quince can help. With Quince, you can treat everyone in your life to luxury quality clothing at super affordable prices. Pieces like their iconic Mongolian cashmere sweaters, which start at just $50, are guaranteed crowd pleasers.

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When you picture an online scammer, what do you see? For the longest time we have these images of somebody sitting, crouched over their computer with a hoodie on, just kind of typing away in the middle of the night. And honestly, that's not what it is anymore. That's Ian Mitchell, a banker turned fraud fighter. These days, online scams look more like crime syndicates than individual con artists, and they're making bank. Last year, scammers made off with more than $10 billion.

It's mind blowing to see the kind of infrastructure that's been built to facilitate scamming at scale. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of scam centers all around the world. These are very savvy business people. These are organized criminal rings. And so once we understand the magnitude of this problem, we can protect people better.

One challenge that fraud fighters like Ian face is that scam victims sometimes feel too ashamed to discuss what happened to them. But Ian says one of our best defenses is simple. We need to talk to each other. We need to have those awkward conversations around what do you do if you have text messages you don't recognize?

What do you do if you start getting asked to send information that's more sensitive? Even my own father fell victim to a, thank goodness, a smaller dollar scam, but he fell victim and we have these conversations all the time. So we are all at risk and we all need to work together to protect each other. Learn more about how to protect yourself at vox.com slash zelle. And when using digital payment platforms,

remember to only send money to people you know and trust. One of the projects you support is called the Matty Matheson Culinary and Hospital Bursary. It's a scholarship program for Indigenous students attending post-secondary institutions, especially culinary to hospitality. Can you talk about this program? Yeah, I just wanted to do something that I don't really talk about. I think there's a lot of things that were like, I'm in a place of privilege and a place of I can.

I can help. I can donate money to a bursary. And I love it. And I think having, you know, a place to put money into that supports the culinary arts and gets people into school and helps people, you know, I just had such an amazing experience. And I think a lot of people deserve a chance that don't have a chance. And I think just putting a little, you know, having that available is something that I'm really proud of and something that I don't really ever speak about either

because I think it's kind of whack. I think you should just be able to do things and not make it a thing. And I think it is, you know, the kids that have gone into culinary school because of that is amazing and like that's it. Have you seen, and more Gen Z people are looking for alternatives, say to college education, jobs and kitchens.

What are you seeing in kitchens right now? You have all these kitchens. Where do you think things are happening? How is it changing or not at all? You know, if you want to go to culinary school, go to culinary school. If you don't want to go to culinary school, don't go to culinary school. If you want to work in kitchens and you have a natural ability and you want to be able to learn and can show up and be a part of a team, then, you know, everyone's welcome. It's a matter of being able to learn and to be a part of a team.

I don't really... It's amazing to go to culinary school and get some basics and get a foundation. But, yeah, I don't know. A lot of young kids also are trying to be content creators first, obviously. You've been on YouTube, as I said, since the early days. Should people get in the kitchens or go to the creator studio? They're doing it in journalism. They're doing it in a lot of places. I'm going to just do journalism. Yeah. I, you know.

Because you can't taste anything on YouTube, but go ahead. No, you certainly can't. Yeah, I think it's very separate. I think there's professional chefs and people that want to be cooks and chefs, and then there's people that want to be whatever they want to be on the internet side and on social media. And it's very different worlds. And I think more and more people are looking towards

creating content and going that route, and good for you. And I think it's, you know, I don't want to crap on anything. If people are able to. You're not a crapper. No, I just want people to be happy doing what they're doing. There's people that want to be chefs. There's people that want to be like,

I got a lot of cooks and chefs in our company that don't give a shit about social media and don't give a shit. They want to be chefs. And that's an incredible thing. And yeah, I don't know. I can't imagine just all of a sudden one day creating content. I don't know.

It's a different world where I'm like, I had a long career way before doing any type of video. Way before content was content. So it's just like, I'm like this like kind of dinosaur, to be honest, where I'm like, I don't know. I don't think of what I do was content. So it's just like, I'm like this like kind of dinosaur to be honest, where I'm like, I don't know. I don't think of what I do as content. I don't think of what we do as anything. I'm like, I make cooking shows and do whatever the hell I'm doing. But it's like young kids, it's just like,

yeah, the world's yours, go get it. You know, like honestly, like if people wanna be chefs, go be chefs. If people wanna create content, good luck. And like, I think social media is pretty fickle. I think it moves pretty fast. I think, you know, trends come and go very quickly. I think just making a 60 second jump cut TikTok,

if you do that, you know, good, amazing. If that makes you happy and you can provide for yourself, then go get it. But it's like, it's really fickle, it's really crazy, and good luck to everybody. Honestly, I don't know. It's interesting, because in journalism, I'm like, because a lot of people are using content

just without doing the training, and I'm like, you should really just write stories to start with. I just feel like you should know how to cook an egg, in your case, right? Cook a good egg. Yeah, I just see it very differently. I'm like, I? Cook a good egg. Yeah, I just see it very differently. Like, I'm like, you know, where I'm like, I agree with you for sure. Like, why would, why are these people able to do what they do?

What's their pedigree? What is their, what is their knowledge? What is their thing? And the proof's in the pudding, where it's just like, maybe they don't have anything. Maybe, maybe they don't do anything, but they have a giant following. I don't know. And then, and then it's just like, there they have a giant following. I don't know. And then it's just like, there's a lot of that going on too. And it's just like, you know, it's one of those things. It doesn't really matter because if you want to be that, then be that. If you want to be a chef, go be a chef.

And it's just like, I just see everything as a very different lane where it's just like, who cares also? Like it is one of those things where I'm like, nothing actually affects it. Like I'm like, if there's all these like TikTokers and all this crap out there, I make fun of it all the time where I'm like, I don't understand it. I'm old. I'm like, I don't understand it. I don't, I also don't care. I have my fan base.

I give them what I believe is good quality stuff. And then Is there something you see and you go, no, no, no, no, no. Is there something that you go, no, please stop doing this? Is there anything? No, I don't waste my time thinking about stuff like that. I really don't think like that. Or do you see something you love? I like, for example, love watching people make candies.

Yeah, no, that's nice. I love watching Ina. You know, like it's this like, I love watching Ina. Yeah, like I that's nice. I love watching Ina, you know, like it's this like, I love watching Ina. Yeah, like I love watching Martha. I love watching, I love watching like beautiful. That's the OG. You just mentioned the two OG people. Well, yeah, but that's what I like watching. That's like, I love the way that they cook. I love the way they talk about food. I love what they do. And it is like, there's a lot of people out there that make beautiful content that I do love watching. I love what they do. And it is like, there's a lot of people out there

that make beautiful content that I do love watching. I love the softer stuff. I love the, like, you know, like, I'm not watching. Also, I don't go on YouTube ever. I don't watch anything I make. And I don't really... You just move along to the next thing. Yeah, I make, yeah, I don't have TikTok on my phone.

I don't really look at Instagram for it. Then please don't look at Gordon Ramsay's duets on TikTok. I'll just advise you that early in advance. What do you want to put in your focus next? Or do you like doing all these things? Yeah, well, I'm doing everything I want to do. We've created a lot of these things in the last couple of years, and now it's like, how do we make them long lasting?

How do we make them real? How do we make them- So have like an Ina Garten, Martha Stewart career, that kind of thing. Which has been going on for a while. Yeah, I've never had this big it moment. It's always been this slow burn. And I'm like, I think just continuously doing

what I'm doing and working hard on everything that we are doing is all I can do. And I think, I don't think I'm going to start a new business. I think I have enough things going on. And now I want to have all the things that I do have and make them long lasting and make them real. Will Neil finally get his wish and become a waiter? I hope so.

You know, I think taking the soup out was like, you know, two steps forward, one step back. I don't know. I think I'm not giving up. I think no one's going to give up on Neil. So I think there's good hope on that. All right. My last question, getting back to your book, your new book.

If you had to pick one soup, salad, and sandwich as your favorite, which would you choose? I know you write in the book that bologna is your childhood favorite. I love bologna and haven't thought of it in a long time. But what would you pick in the book that bologna is your childhood favorite. I love bologna and haven't thought of it in a long time. But what would you pick in the book right now? Do you advise people to start? Yeah, the soup, I would probably genuinely pick... I don't even think it's in the book, but I would just pick a chicken noodle soup. I'd pick definitely a tuna melt.

I love tuna melts. And a salad I would make, probably just like my Matty Salad. That's in another book. It's not even in this book, but I'd make the Matty Salad, which is just like green lettuce, green olives, onion, green beans, celery, oil, vinegar, salt and pepper. And that would be your favorite. Yeah, that's the salad I always make and I love and it always makes me happy, you know. Well, we'll end on that.

I really appreciate it, Maddie. Thank you so much. You really are an inspiration to a lot more people than you think. Thank you. It's very kind. to a lot more people than you think. Thank you. It's very kind. On with Kara Swisher is produced by Christian Castro Rossell, Kateri Yocum, Jolie Meyers, Megan Burney, and Kaylin Lynch. Nishant Kurwa is Vox Media's executive producer of audio.

Special thanks to Kate Furby. Our engineers are Rick Kwan and Fernando Arruda, and our theme music is by Trackademics. If you're already following the show, you get Maddie's special salad, tuna melt, and chicken noodle soup. If not, get whatever's on the menu, which is probably great anyway. Go wherever you listen to podcasts, search for On with Kara Swisher, and hit follow. Thanks for listening to On with Kara Swisher from New York Magazine, the Vox Media Podcast Network, and us.

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