The Joe Rogan Experience - #1782 - Daniel Holzman

Episode Date: February 22, 2022

Daniel Holzman is the chef and restaurateur behind New York City's The Meatball Shop and Danny Boy's Famous Original Pizza in Los Angeles. His new book, "Food IQ: 100 Questions, Answers, and Recipes to Raise Your Cooking Smarts," is available now.

The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. Hello, Daniel. Daniel, ladies and gentlemen. Food IQ. Big new book, cookbook. Congratulations. It's a great idea because there are so many fucking questions that so many people have

about like what is the way to do things? Like, what is better? Like, what is the difference between a cheap knife and an expensive knife? Do I need an expensive knife? So if you're a chef, anybody that lives in the world of food, you just get, like, you probably get pitched ideas all day long. Oh, sure. Because you're an entertainment guy. If you're a chef, you get the, like, what's the best way to cook the chicken?

Right. What's the best way to salt this? What's the best way to, what kind of pan should I buy? So do you have a stack of these? Like, here, read. So that was the idea. I'm like, I got a profit off this.

I'm tired of answering these questions for free. And this hat that you gave me is your L.A. pizzeria? Danny Boy's Pizza. Which, by the way, L., LA fucking needs really good pizza. Because the pizza in LA is a lot of hit or miss. There are a lot of pizzerias in LA. You're in downtown LA? That's a risky move.

You don't even know risky moves. When did you open? We're in the base, the ground floor of a giant building, like a giant corporate building. It's just ghost towns. Nobody was there.

Is anybody in the corporate building? For the last six months, it's been completely empty. Now people are coming back to work, finally. Paying off. When did you open it? We opened six months ago. Oh, no. Oh, yeah.

And it was perfect timing, though, because, you know, like COVID was. Danny Boy's Pizza. Oh, there. Oh, yeah. And it was perfect timing, though, because, you know, like, COVID was- There it is. Danny Boy's Pizza. Oh, there's Adam, handsome guy. That looks like a legit pizza place. Real pizzeria. I want a fucking pizza right now. I know. I should have brought you pizza.

No, no, no, no. I should have brought you pizza. It wouldn't have been right. I have to be there. You see that little bubbles on the crust? It's like a whole thing. I want to talk to you. How much time we got?

Like 15 minutes? You got as much time as you want, bro. Oh, yeah. I like that picture. That looks goddamn good. I'll tell you what. I always want to know, what is the purpose of wood-fired pizza? Does it make the food taste better?

Does it impart a smoky flavor to the pizza? It definitely imparts a smoky flavor. It's also hot, right? And cooking over wood is special. Yeah. You know that because you're a wood-fired cooking enthusiast. I've gotten really into it lately. I got one of those Argentine-style grills. Are you grilling or barbecuing also? I do a lot of stuff.

I'm obsessed with cooking meat in particular, but I got one of those Argentine crank-up. Yeah, amazing. Yeah, it's amazing. I love cooking over hardwood. What company did you get it from? I got it from Sunterra, Sunterra pro but um i'm having a whole outdoor system uh installed like you know with brick and mortar and everything by a company called grill works oh yeah ben grill yeah amazing they're the best right they did the uh that place that i love bizarre meats in vegas i think that they make some of the most stunningly beautiful grills out there um and they work really, really well. And great restaurants use them.

Yeah. The only thing that I would say is, you know, there's one piece of the puzzle that I've learned recently from these guys at J&R. J&R make really great grills as well, phenomenal grills. And they've got this fire brick that they line them with. You know what I'm talking about? Mm-hmm. And the fire brick that they line them with. You know what I'm talking about? And the fire brick, it holds the heat in a way that's really interesting.

I'm learning a lot about wood-fired cooking. It's something that's a little bit of an obsession. And I feel like the fire brick itself, if you can get that hot, that's where the heat comes from, and then the wood becomes the flavor. Are you a reverse sear guy? Do you like to cook? How do you like to do a steak? We should explain reverse sear for folks who don't know what cooking is.

Can you explain reverse sear for me? You're cooking it slow and then hitting it at the end? Yes, you're searing it off. You're cooking it slow. I like to get it to an internal temperature of 100 degrees, and then I sear the shit out of the outside of it. Unless it's a thick steak, then I like to bring it to about 120. And is this like a sous vide situation where you're doing it?

No, I just do it on the Argentine thing. I just have it cranked up way high. I have one of those meter probes. I really like those meter probes. So it's a Bluetooth probe. I stick it into the meat and it shows me always what temperature, and I have four of them. So I have four, like if I'm cooking four different steaks, I can, I have them numbered and it tells me, you know, where everything is at. And what I love about doing it that way is, cause since I've been cooking a lot over hardwood, cause I'm getting

all this smoke from the hardwood. so it's like smoky steak. It's fantastic. And then at the end, I sear the shit out of it. I feel like there are a lot of great ways to cook a steak. Yeah. And, you know, for a bigger piece of meat, that reverse sear, like a real thick piece of meat, a reverse sear might be the best way.

But for a thinner steak, maybe it's not necessary maybe i don't love it um but low and slow until you've got almost like prime rib texture and then searing the outside's phenomenal yeah there's something about cooking when that that as a chef it feels like cheating sometimes. Like people use a sous vide. You put the probe in there and it's like – it's not too easy, but it feels like you don't get the – part of it is like I made this over fire. I just threw it in the fire. And you ever throw it right on the coals?

I have not. You've never done that? I've seen people do it. Cowboy style, right? Is that what they call it. I work for this French French guy Laurent Monric and he He basically was like we were cooking these quails And the quails were dripping fat into the fire and the fire was flaming up and it was like starting to burn the skin And he's like, you know, put it in the fire put in the one We're like motherfuckers guys idiot like you can put in the fire it's gonna burn like what's

wrong with him like in france heat doesn't work the same way and he just like kicked the grill knocked the quail into the fire and it the the you know it smothered the fire because the oxygen wasn't there to to to burn and it like a perfect crispy skin, wasn't burnt at all. And I was like, oh, my God, this is incredible. This guy's the, you know, he's the Yoda of whatever. So now I've gotten into that and people freak out. It's definitely not the best way, in my opinion, to cook a steak. But if you want to impress your friends, you got a wood fire.

You know, a dry rub stops it from getting like gritty or whatever whatever you throw the steak right on the coals and people freak out they think you're gonna ruin dinner and then it comes out perfectly crispy it's cool do you have to when you do it that way do you have to brush off the ash or anything so the so like if you think about your coals burning i usually take like a wet towel and I throw them down just to Just to like get any of the ash that's sitting on Crazy lights. Oh, there's a shooting star in the ceiling. I thought that might have been like a near miss from your comment I've been listening your podcast now. I'm like freaking out do He freaks me out to the last three weeks I'm like I'm gonna what am I supposed to talk to you about?

The earth's about to end. And I'm like, yeah, this is how you cook a steak in the meantime. In the meantime, we have to eat. While you're at it. Yeah, while you're at it. So the wet cloth takes some of the excess ash that's sitting on the top of the coals? I think the two tricks are, first is I like to put a dry rub, like some sort of a spice rub on the outside of the steak.

What do you like to use? I like, depending if you're going to, if you want to go in an Italian direction, maybe fennel seed helps. I like coriander seed. If you like maybe a little bit more of a Middle Eastern kind of flavor, maybe coriander seed. Black pepper, if you just want to do black pepper and salt, like traditional barbecue 50-50 blend. That's generally what I do.

That works great. Just something to be a little bit gritty because then if you do get a little ash, maybe you mistake the texture. I see. You know what I mean? Yeah. And then I take a wet towel. I throw it on the, you know, so you burn your fire down until you got coals. Throw a wet towel on there just to kind of get any ash, any air and ash off.

Then you put the steak right on there. And you'll see what happens. The flames will come up around the steak, but the steak itself is protected. And you just got to be patient. You sit it there. You don't flip it. Don't mess with it. Because as soon as you pick it up, what happens is that the fat that's rendering off the steak,

as soon as it gets any oxygen, it's going to ignite and it will burn the shit out of your steak it's a nightmare so as long as you are patient you don't pick it up and then you just flip it once wait your time and pull it off it'll be beautifully golden brown try it i will try it um someone explained to me that um steel and cast iron they're much better conductors of heat than coals. And then if you actually, you would think that laying something down over the coal would make it cook quicker, but that's not necessarily the case. I think that that's true. I mean, I'm not like a scientist guy. I'm not a scientist, Joe.

Whenever you say I'm not a scientist guy, I believe you. I'm not a scientist guy. I'm not a scientist guy, I believe you. I'm not a scientist guy. I'm not a chef guy. But yeah, steel obviously transmits heat, which is why it cools down quickly as well, right? So if you've got a thin pan, you throw a steak in there, the

heat gets sucked out right away. Which leads me to this. Do you prefer cast iron or do you prefer carbon steel? Joe, it's for $35. It's in to this. Do you prefer cast iron or do you prefer carbon steel? Joe, it's for $35. It's in the book. Food IQ. It's in the book, ladies and gentlemen. Go to www.

So they're just different, right? So cast iron is thicker, traditionally thicker. I don't know what the specific heat of cast iron versus carbon steel is. heat of cast iron versus carbon steel is so like that would be the scientific term for how long how much energy it is gonna hold per you know joule of heat or whatever it is the scientific term for it but basically you're saying like there's a certain amount of of energy that's held in the pan that's going to get transferred into the meat and the more energy that's in there the longer it's going to stay hot even though you put a cold piece of meat on it. So like you get a thick cast iron pan, you heat it up in the oven or whatever it is over the flame for,

it might take 10 minutes to heat up, but then it stays hot when your steak goes in there. Steel pans tend to be a little thinner. So even if they're, even if they're, they're going to hold a lot of energy, they don't, they're just not as much mass of hot steel, right? Does that make sense? That does make sense. I think they're pretty much similar. I worked at a really fancy French fish restaurant, and they used steel pans for searing the fish.

And part of that is also that you can, like the problem with the cast iron pan, if it's too hot or too cold, you're kind of out of luck. There's no heating it up fast. Right. Whereas a steel pan, if it's too hot or too cold you're kind of out of luck like there's no heating it up fast right whereas a steel pan if it's a little thicker it'll react to the flame below and transfer that heat maybe so you can heat it up quickly if it's a little hot or cool it down so it's just a time thing it's not a quality of cooking thing i think it's a um a time thing and the type of thing you're trying to cook like a piece of fish maybe is six ounces

and um you know it it only takes so much energy out of the pan to crisp up before it cools down because you've we've all done the thing where you throw a piece of chicken or something in a pan and it sticks it gets like wet and all the heat the energy gets pulled out of the pan and like it'll crackle for a second mushrooms are a great example it's like you throw you're like i'm gonna sear these mushrooms you throw them in and then it's just like a pool of water like boiling and that's because you know the heat in the pan gets sucked out and then there's not enough energy to boil off the moisture that's getting pulled out of the mushrooms and you get you know boiled mushrooms which which are delicious luckily but boiled steak isn't as great. Yeah, boiled steak with the boiled mushrooms.

Not as great. So therefore, if you get that thick cast iron pan, you get it hot, you're going to stay hot throughout the cooking process, which is great. Steak, I want a nice, crispy, whatever it is, thick. But if I do a piece of chicken in there, maybe it burns, or maybe the skin's overly crispy.

Right. Do you have a specific way that you prefer to cook steak? Like, do you have a method? Like, if Danny's got a go-to method, I'd give you a two-pound cowboy ribeye. So that's what I feel like what happens is depends upon the piece of meat. That's what's so beautiful about, you know,

a cow's got all these different pieces and they're all need a little bit of different cooking style. I mean, when you cook a ribeye, you don't cook it the same way as you cook a New York steak. Maybe a ribeye has got, you know, if you think about a ribeye and a New York steak are coming right off like the back strap and a cow, I mean, you know, where, from an anatomy perspective, where it's coming from. So it's coming from like that strip of your back and you've got, you know, if you feel your chest, you've got the ribs up tops and they wrap around to the back and that's where the ribeye is.

So like the New York steak is coming from below where there's no ribs attached, but it's really the same strip of meat. Right. So it's very, very similar just that the ribeye has all that internal kind of like thicker pieces of fat in there so maybe cooking that that reverse sear where you're slowly heating it up and letting that that that fat melt because you don't want a cold hunk of like beef fat is has melts at a high temperature it's got a really waxy texture so you eat like cold beef fat in your steak, it's not going to be great. Whereas a New York steak, I like it more on the rare side

and I wouldn't mind even a thick steak, you know, cooking it a little bit faster, having it maybe just be warm in the center. So I think it really depends on the steak, man. Do you tend to cook over fire or do you sometimes cook a steak on just on a cast-iron? If it's a thinner steak, so I grew up in New York City in the book we talk a lot about

cooking Under the under the broiler in your house I think it's like a lesser utilized piece of kitchen equipment and I grew up in New York City where you didn't really have an Outdoor space you didn't have fire. So moving out to Los Angeles, being able to cook over the fire, it's like an obsession. You know, it's like all I want to do

because you didn't get that. But you can definitely cook great steak in a frying pan for sure. And like, you know, classic French technique where you throw butter and herbs and garlic in there at the end. And maybe you do a pan roast where you cook it over the fire and you throw it in the oven like that's a delicious way to cook a steak the fire

adds just that extra although i always find this funny you when you grill or or you barbecue it's like you don't really taste the smoke yourself and then the next day you go to eat the leftovers and it's like holy shit this thing smells like an ashtray it's amazing how much smoke is on there right I feel like you're you get you get quickly desensitized to the smoke yourself because you're just accustomed to the smell on it while you're cooking I mean think about it like we haven't you had that experience like you cook barbecue or you cook some some steak you grill it and then you eat it and it doesn't really taste smoky but then if you taste someone else that's making the same thing it really get that taste i think when you yeah well that's a i think

that's a function of the olfactory senses because your your nose is meant to detect changes in smells that's why people you ever drive through pennsylvania the farm country it smells like my my parents used to live in harrisburg when i used to go to visit them i used to drive through farm country and it just smells like fucking death it smells so bad but the people that live there don't My parents used to live in Harrisburg. When I used to go to visit them, I used to drive through farm country, and it just smells like fucking death. It smells so bad, but the people that live there don't smell it at all because your nose sort of detects changes in its smell more than it detects smells. Yeah, the paper factory. You're like, how could you ever live here?

Right, right, right. I've never stayed long enough to get desensitized, but I hear. Yeah, so maybe that's the same thing with cooking over the smoke. I think you're probably right. But I don't know i taste a difference and when i got really into it once i got this uh argentine style grill and i started cooking over hardwood i'm like i mean regular steaks are great but cooking a steak over fire over just wood there's something better like coal's great like charcoal lump charcoal's great but next level's actual wood so i built i don't know over christmas two years ago i've always loved to weld i've been like a

welder it's been fun i've seen your grills they're fucking top notch man they're really dope so two i thank you i'm really really proud it's like one of you know so one of the things i'm really proud of i i hired a welding instructor because i like, I'm really terrible at this. I'm self-taught. I hired a welding instructor. I spent a whole day with him. And then I ordered 3000 pounds of steel. I called,

I called the steel yard. And then the guy's like, Oh, like, you know what? I was like, Oh, come pick it up,

man. What are you talking about? And he's like, what kind of truck you got? I was like, I was just so, so shamed. I was like,

man, I got a Chevy truck. Like, what are you talking about? I can throw it in the back. And he's like, no, like how many pounds is it rated for? I was like, dude, this guy's killing me. I was just so shamed. I was like, man, I got a Chevy truck. Like, what are you talking about? I can throw it in the back. And he's like, how many pounds is it rated for? I was like, dude, this guy's killing me. I was like, I'm supposed to know this.

So I looked up in the manual and I'm like, I can't put that steel on my truck. Yeah, you can't even drag it. No chance. So they delivered it to my house. They're like, you know, classic, like curbside only. I was like, curbside only. Yeah, well, they're fucking, it's so big. They can't be responsible for moving that thing around, right?

For $20, he was responsible. I was like, yeah, I'll give you $20 to carry this shit inside. Really? Yes, 100%. That's it? I might have given him, yeah, I gave him $20. You made a good deal, Danny. I helped, I helped.

But yeah, that's the thing out here is offset smokers, you know, Texas is famous for offset smokers and barbecue. And that's the next thing I'm going to do. I'm going to get an offset smoker and start grilling on the firebox and doing the reverse here inside the. So I came like, you know, I came out here day early for it because thank you. You flew me out here. It's really, really kind, generous. My pleasure. Exc know i came out here day early for because thank you you flew me out here it's really really kind generous my pleasure excited to be out here i'd been out to austin one time before and it's like the barbecue's just legendary it's pretty awesome and so i i the last time i was here i stood in line at the barbecue and i i never liked brisket in my life like i'm jew from new york like brisket was like my aunt made brisket.

I don't know. We're supposed to love the brisket, but it just wasn't that great. I'm sorry. She doesn't listen to you. I hope not. I doubt she does. I hope not. Although you'd be surprised.

You'd be surprised. A lot of people listen to you, so you just never know. My aunt might be really angry at me right now. And I bit into that brisket of the barbecue after two hours and it was like a it was like a life-changing experience it was like fat held together by just a little bit of meat and i never i never had anything like that it was so they know what the fuck they're doing out here and apparently the history of it is explained to me by my friend adam curry is that it was german settlers that came in here like way back in the day and they were

you know they smoked meat they smoked a lot of sausages and smoked a lot of meat and something you know in this area you know how like Italian food on the east coast is very different than Italian food in Italy well that's the German food in Texas became very different than the you know the smoked meat that they would cook in Germany. And they developed with all the spices and the sauces that they use out here and the rubs, and they just developed this amazing method using those big old barrel smokers. Wow. I had no idea about that.

Yeah, that's the root of it all. I actually ate at the Salt Lick this past weekend, which is out in Driftwood. Yeah. I mean, that grill is so cool. It's amazing. It's just so cool. root of it all i actually ate at the salt lick this past weekend which is driftwood yeah have you been i mean that grill is so cool it's amazing it's just so cool that place is amazing first of all it's so big when you go there you can't believe how many people are eating juggernaut they're just making so much i mean they're responsible for like wiping out half the cattle

there's a lot of cows out here fortunately fortunately. But the fucking barbecue is sensational. Their burnt ends, oh, my God, they're so good. Everything was good. They have bison ribs, too. They were fantastic. I was talking to my buddy who moved out of here, and he's, like, telling me, you know, you got to go here. This is my favorite place. And I'm a chef, so people get a little bit self-conscious

when I prefer something they didn't like. And I'm like, guys, you got to understand, like, the barbecue out here, it's all at like a 99%. It's all so good. It's the best barbecue in the world. Better than anything else I've ever had. This one just happens to be like 99.5%. It's like a little bit better.

So, like, I happen to prefer this one. But, like, don't feel bad, man. Yours is great, too. There's so many good spots out here. You can't go wrong with Le Barbecue, though. They're amazing. I had that years and years ago. It was fantastic.

I had it yesterday again. Oh, okay. So I went to Terry Black's, and I had a meal in the morning. Because they open 30 minutes before everybody else. They're a 24-hour operation. I was in the smoke. That's the other thing. You can go into their smokehouse and talk to them, and guy is like, you know, is like tweaking out.

He'll show you the briskets. Yeah, he opened it up. It was so cool. And then I just bang bang. I went right over to what's like called Wathen's. What's it called? It's like there are two that are the most popular right now. It's called... Franklin?

No, it's down the block from Franklin's. It's such a cool vibe, it's it's down the block from Franklin's. It's such a cool vibe. There's like a little truck outside, you know, drinking beers online. Oh, OK. Family picnic picnicking. You got to help me out, bud. I need help.

Starts with a W. Yeah, it starts with a W. It's got a great name. What Terry Black's does better than anybody is beef ribs. Their beef ribs are fucking insane. And you pick up the bone and it just slides right off the beef ribs. Their beef ribs are fucking insane. And you pick up the bone and it just slides right off the beef rib. I've never been to

Franklin, you know, but I use his book. That's the book. Franklin's awesome too. I've had his brisket. It's insane. So when I want to barbecue at home, I go, I just follow the steps from the Franklin barbecue book. Well, Aaron has a bunch of good videos online too.

You can, he's got some YouTube tutorials. He shows like how to tend to an offset grill and the whole deal. He's his rib recipe. Like all those recipes. There are very few cookbooks like this, like where if you follow a recipe, you get the result like you would get at the restaurant,

you know? And it's not an easy recipe though. It's like, you know, wake up at four in the morning. Right. Yeah. All right.

I mean, it's a 12-hour cook at least, right? So I didn't do an offset. I did the firebox below. And I did that because, you know, first of all, I spent like a month and a half designing this grill. I mean, obsessing online. All the different types of- Can we see? Do you have yeah yeah i think i sent you like videos and pictures of this thing did you get it jamie or did uh i get it i think i got it i'll forward i can i can forward it to

you as well i'll do it because i got it right here give me one second but go ahead so basically like you know i obsessed over there are these amazing bread baking ovens in India that that the way that they funnel the smoke from below allows them to be extremely, extremely even, you know. And I just I don't know. I dorked out on it. It's like, you know, I get very excited about something. I want to make the best of it. You're making a one time. It's three thousand pounds.

You're not making it again. And I ultimately screwed up like we all do. pounds so you're not making it again um and i ultimately screwed up like we all do but um but i ended up saying you know i want to have something that's a little more versatile than just a grill that i can only do one type of barbecue on so i put the fired below with the idea that um i can get it raging hot i mean i can get this thing up to like 800 degrees and I can do classic pizza or I can do bread baking. And it's got stones that I can slide in and out of it. So it's a little bit more versatile. Getting the heat to be consistent when the fire's below is a challenge.

But you can do it. Pretty, you know, you can do it. You can get around that. What is the benefit of doing that versus an offset? Just because you can then – so I love to – this is my latest kind of like obsession with this thing is I like to get a fire going, cook on the grill right above the fire, and then close the door. So it's like a hybrid smoke roast, like a hotter – like you're barbecuing at whatever it is you know a hundred and instead of like a 275 your barbecue barbecuing like 550 for grilled steak because you get that intense smoke flavor but you also get a

more even like oven heat around the whole thing that that for me is really special and so have you experimented with offsets and done it this way and you just decided that? I've definitely smoked me on an offset. I mean, I'm like real excited. I also drank a coffee before this. I'm like, I want to talk all about this. There's more coffee right here if you want some. Oh, and thank you very much for this whiskey.

It looks awesome. This is apple brandy from America's oldest distillery. Oh, wow. In New Jersey. America's oldest distillery is in New Jersey? How is that possible? So this is this thing that I'm like, I don't have anything to do with these guys. I don't know them.

I just happen to like apple. If you look, I left the price on the top. I don't think it's true. I think Buffalo Trace is the oldest. Buffalo Trace was around before America. They're from 1773. Okay, so you're probably right. I think.

This might be the oldest distillery in New Jersey. Yeah, that makes more sense. But I was born in New Jersey. I was too. Where were you born? Newark. Newark, New Jersey. Yeah.

Wow. What a lovely town now. It's a mess. It's moving. So that's why you got tough. You had to get tough you had no I got out when I was really young Yeah, I moved out when I was seven, but I moved back when I was 24 wow yeah, I moved back for about six months because my grandparents stayed there One of the best one of the greatest pizzerias in America in Newark right now

Oh, Newcrest some amazing Italian food back in the day especially they had incredible bread like these bakeries where my grandparents would go walk down the street and buy bread wow it was the italian neighborhood so this is apple brandy um which apple jack so in in france they call it calvados right they make make brandy out of apples it's very delicious it tastes like reminiscent of the apples, you can taste it, but it's great. Should we have a little touch? Yeah, let's have a taste. Have a little touch.

Although I talked to a buddy of mine that was on your show. Who's that? Tiller Russell. Oh, okay. And incredible, incredible director. And I was like,

hey man, you gotta give me some advice. You know, what can I, what do I do? He's like, just stay away from the, stay away from the bows.

Why did, he didn't get licked up. He's like, stay away from the bows What can I do? He's like, just stay away from the booze. He didn't get licked up. He's like, stay away from the booze and whatever you do. He's like, the CBD isn't just CBD. It is. That's not true. Taylor's lying. He's like, yeah.

He's like, just. It smells great. He's like, you'll lose sight of. Nah, you'll be fine, dude. I'm a chef, man. I've been drinking since. Yeah, that's the thing about chefs, right? Cheers, sir. Thanks.

The thing about chefs is they fucking party hard. It's sometimes a little scary. I didn't know that until I met Bourdain. What's up, Jamie? I was looking up the history, Joe. It's America's oldest distiller. Wow. What is the year?

It says 300 years. What? 1698. Jesus Christ. So it is older. Wow. It's older by It says 300 years. What? 1698. Jesus Christ. So it is older. Wow. It's older by almost 100 fucking years. That's insane.

Yeah. Wow. That's wild. I just don't want to disagree because I didn't actually know. Buffalo Trace is the oldest whiskey distillery? Like, what is this? What is this? This is brandy, right?

Yeah, it's apple brandy. Is there a difference? Yeah. Whiskey is made from grain and apple brandy is made from fruit. That's interesting. Me, huh. Wow. I feel like it doesn't get its due.

I don't know anything about these guys. I'm worried. I was like, man, I'm going to go on this show. I'm going to say, and then it's going to turn out these guys have some sordid past and we're going to get in all kinds of trouble. All I'm saying is I think it's delicious. I think that apple brandy is really delicious and it's going to turn out these guys have some like sorted pass and we get all kinds of trouble. All I'm saying is I think it's delicious. I think that apple brandy is really delicious and it's inexpensive. Like the bourbons these days are so great, but they're pricey as hell, man. Really old stuff is for sure.

And this stuff is like, this is their fanciest one. It's seven and a half years aged. It's really good. It's like 40 bucks, man. It's fucking really good. Just the distinction for buffalo trace just oh all this continually operating distillery oh so that place must have like closed down and then reopened yeah that took a day off well maybe in the 30s the 20s it was

josephus daniels that started that whole prohibition thing yeah you know um buffalo trace had an exemption during the whole prohibition they They operated and made whiskey for medicinal purposes. Is that, I heard you made a, is that your own? Yes, that's, Buffalo Trace and I worked together with Fight for the Forgotten, and they developed like a special blend that's just for me, a special, like they gave me a bunch of things to try, and I chose one, and that's the one that they bottled up. So we have a giant jug of it over there.

I just, you know, Buffalo Chase is one of my favorites. They're awesome. And it's also fairly priced, which is, for me, it's important. It's like, you know, man, a $1,000 bottle of whiskey, who am I? The people that are behind it too, they're rock solid. They're rock solid folks.

But I've made, I've done, you know, I've been fortunate enough to get a lot of like, get to go to France and make wine or go here and Make this and it's very funny to be like and you're gonna make this I'm like this is a paint by numbers. I'm not making this I'm not making this whiskey Let's be making whiskey and making well I mean the people that wind up doing that that is a fucking labor of love I mean because the amount of time and effort involved first of all like here like for example this brandy

This is seven and a half years old. Yeah. So this has to sit in a cask for seven and a half years for the bottle. I mean, that's a great business model. You're like, oh, I got this great idea. I just need $100,000 in cash. And I'll see you in the decade. In like 10 years if it comes out right.

That's a Buffalo Trace thing, too. Those are all eight years old. But that's why all these young distilleries are starting with gin. Because they're like, we can put out our gin right away. That'll hit our P&L and we can start some cash flow while we're waiting for the stuff that needs to age. Or tequila or vodka, right? Those are things that don't necessarily have to be aged. Does tequila have to be aged?

Tequila doesn't. And vodka, a lot of those guys are just like buying medical grade, you know, ethanol and putting a label on there, you know. And it's great. They really are. It's really phenomenal. You can do that. You know what I heard? You would be so rich.

Oh, you already are. But if you weren't already rich, we could do that together. I'll get the booze. You put your label on there. Well, as long as it would be, it would have to be good. And I'm not, well, I actually do like vodka martinis, but I like them extra dirty. So what I'm having is like a lot of olive juice and the liquor i love those i feel like i'm fucking james bond when i drink them you know

what i'm saying if when you when you start liking gin is when you got to worry about yourself that's like why because it's like if you like the flavor of gin there's alcoholism at your like maybe just barely holding that thing i don't know if i've ever had gin you've had gin you've had a gin and tonic you've had it yeah you've had a gin and tonic. You've had a tank. Yeah, I know you're right. You've had tank and tonic in your day. Come on, you've been at that bar.

I have had a gin and tonic. Yes, I have. But I don't know if I've ever, I could not tell you what gin tastes like. If you give me a glass of vodka, I know what vodka, whiskey, obviously. I'm a big whiskey drinker. Gin tastes like juniper berries, right?

Juniper berries like juniper, isn't it? Juniper berries, right? Juniper berries like juniper, isn't it? Juniper berries, yeah. Juniper berries, juniper is the thing that fucks everybody up in Austin. Really? Yeah, that's the allergy that everybody has. They call cedar fever. It's actually juniper that they're allergic to. I don't know if it's in the cedar family or what the deal is, but that's what everybody tweaks about. I love the way I said that. I was like, oh, of course, it tastes like juniper. You're like, oh yeah yeah because i know what juniper i'm constantly tasting that's the only reason why i know about junipers is because everybody free i don't get allergies to the shit out here but some people fucking they like my wife gets it and some people get it bad

out here this it's weird this town i was getting you know so i had like adult onset allergies and they got worse and worse and worse i started I started getting shots. And it's amazing. It's fixed me. Really? I went to an allergist in LA. What were you getting allergies for? It started out with hay fever-y, normal-y stuff. And then it moved into stone fruit.

I was eating cherries. I may or may not have been smoking marijuana at the time. And I was eating these cherries, and my mouth started to tingle and i was like i don't know what i did i had to pull i was like this is not this is not healthy you call them stone fruit stone fruit like anything with the stone stone pit like uh like a chair starts with cherries early in the season then like you know peaches and plums have that hard rock hard pit would an avocado count as that too because it's kind of a fruit man you're so far ahead of me. I have no idea. It's a fruit, but I don't know if that's a traditionally stone fruit. I don't think so. I've been on this wacky diet since January where

mostly what I eat is meat. I just eat meat and fruit. I don't eat any bread. I don't eat any pasta. And I've only like cheated a couple of times. I had like a bowl of ramen once and, and I had a cheeseburger with a bun on it. Is that – I mean, what was the goal? Well, the goal is for me – I don't know what it is about eating pasta and bread. First of all, I fucking love it. I love pizza. I love a meatball sub. I love pasta.

But I bloat. My fucking gut gets fat. grows I gain weight and it doesn't matter how hard a train you look like an Eastern European man I look like me yeah that all goes to my gut like but when I stop eating like that it goes yes a beer belly yeah but I feel better like my joints feel better when i eat like this i have more energy my brother's been trying to get me to go gluten-free because he's you know he's the same thing he's like you don't want a fucking pizzeria i know it's not happening it's not although we do make a great gluten-free pizza i gotta tell you i'm really proud of it what do you use for the

so my buddy vincent rotola's got this pizzeria called good pie in vegas and he's he won the i've heard of that place the world championship for pizza. It's like a pizza finale. People get really into it. Really? Where is Good Pie? Where is it located? Man, this is like that opportunity.

He's going to be. Well, we'll find out. You've got to find out where it is. It's probably in one of the casinos? There's actually a great barbecue place right across the street. One of the best barbecue places outside of Texas. What's that? It's a stand-alone.

I think it's downtown. Oh, okay. It's an old downtown area? Yeah, that new strip that's just being really popularized. It's cool down there. There it is. Good pie. Good pie.

Pizza. Oh, that's a nice area. That's a fun area of Vegas. That's like a neighborhood. It's such a cool... I've been about to Vegas hanging out with him because he really helped me with this pizzeria. I've been going out there And I don't even go to the strip

I don't even go to the casinos I'm like I want to visit It's cool I fucking love a great pizza I really do But he won with his gluten free That was his thing

So he No shit So he won this This amazing You know Italian pizza competition With his gluten free pizza So he won the overall

With the gluten free Or did he win the gluten-free? I feel like there's somebody out there that should Google this. I don't know. Yeah, because I have a hard time believing that gluten-free pizza beat the regular nasty for you pizza. But he helped me out with my recipe and now I'm, you know, yeah. So I stole his recipe.

Well, that's nice of him. Very nice of him. And so your place has been open for six months. How long have you been making pizza for did you were you making it before then i've i've worked in restaurants and been the chef of restaurants that have pizza programs so i've definitely been like pizza adjacent but the thing about it is until you live and die day in and day out and do it and it's your responsibility to build it you don't really so this was like i want to learn how to make pizza about four years three years ago i went out to vegas and i started asking vincent

questions i got like four friends all named vincent that are pizza pizza analysts all of them are named vincent i got an uncle named vincent probably makes pizza too i um the guy across i grew up on 83rd street and first and, and right across the street was Gino's Pizza and the guy that worked there, Vincent. And I asked Vincent, I kept on asking these questions, and he was like, yo, man, you got to talk to this guy, John Arena. This guy is the, like, he's the pizza Yoda. And any time I would start asking people, like, questions that got into, like, the science of pizza and really you needed to know, always pointed back, you got to talk to this guy, John Arena.

So Vincent hooked me up and he takes you on as an apprentice. Like he wants to make sure you're going to respect the craft before he starts talking to you. Because so many chefs are like disrespect what goes into making pizza. Great. Really? Why do you think that is? to making pizza great. Really?

Why do you think that is? I think because we don't necessarily appreciate how difficult it is, the science and the art and the craft that goes into it. And we think like, yeah, man, I make a great chicken. I can make a great this. I'm a chef.

I can do that. No problem. That's just pizza. And then you start making pizza and you realize like, no, it's not just pizza. If you want to make great pizza, it's it's a specialty it's it you have to be a great Baker and then it just it's really really deserves a lot of respect

I would just say that that it would be I was gonna say that rather that would be akin to breaking baking or being a great pastry chef or something like that so that I mean this guy John arena he's's the guy that that could can can explain and knows the history of it but you know the baker was the brewmaster was the pizza in the town when you know before that were those were separate jobs like it is very much being a baker um and it's that's a whole amazing art form you know and there's incredible advances happening in the world of baking now even though it's like one of the oldest things people have been baking bread for thousands and thousands of

years in the last 20 years people have changed the whole game it's amazing what's going on well it's just it cooking is so exciting now i think what's going on is uh you know you have this incredible history of cooking right but now what you have is a lot of people sharing stuff online. And I follow probably 30 or 40 cooks and chefs online, and there's a bunch of pages that have these very quickly edited, almost like a one-minute cooking show of how to put together a great meal or a great dish. And it's exciting, and I think it's because of the cooking shows on television and the cooking shows on the internet and all these small little shows that are on TikTok. And

for me, it's Instagram that I watch. It's really exciting because it's making people enthusiastic about cooking. And I think it's introducing the option of becoming a cook, becoming a chef to a lot of people out there. I feel like today more people want to cook than ever before. And fewer people know how to cook than ever before. Like in the fifties, you know, um, folks stopped cooking, you know, between microwave cooking and more and more people entering the workforce, few less time advertising really made it feel like, you know, you should be guilty for taking time to cook and you should really just, you know, microwave your dinner. Fast food restaurants came into the equation and people started trading home cooked meals for ordering in and going out. And so, you know, cooking is handed down from generation to

generation. It's a hands-on learning experience. And so if your parents or the folks that you would learn from don't know how to cook, you're not going to learn how to cook. And so when that stopped in the 1950s, you know, really after world war II, um, uh, we lost kind of three generations of institutional knowledge. And when you lose that knowledge, there's no one to teach you how to cook. And then all of a sudden the internet comes around It's like oh here's a new opportunity to spread the you know, communicate these these techniques in this learning and so more people are now interested and They're starting to learn they're looking for resources. It's cool

That was I mean like that was the the whole idea of this cookbook was like There's so much bullshit out there. So many people want to make their job seem interesting, overcomplicate stuff. And so many people are intimidated because you start learning how to cook. And it's like, you know, if I'm not, if it's not great, it's garbage. And then you, if you really break it down though, it's pretty straightforward and simple.

Like you learn a few techniques and it goes so far. And it's like a great you give yourself the greatest gift you and your family the greatest gift you can ever give like through the pandemic you know i felt bad i felt bad my buddy my buddy daniel sharp was moving he got stuck with me he was supposed to go to he was like on a three week three month asia vacation and it was like can i just like crash with you for a couple weeks and i was like his itinerary just got shut down so he got stuck with me he's a chef he's one of my best friends and we were just eating it up like i mean out doing we would go to the supermarket be like yo you can only go to the supermarket once once a week you know once every two weeks we're gonna

get enough food and like three days later we're like all right we ate all that let's start again i mean we were just cooking amazing amazing meals and then everybody's angry at us they're like all right we ate all that let's start again i mean we were just cooking amazing amazing meals and then everybody's angry at us they're like yo man we're you know we're eating like the last box of macaroni and cheese that we got it like i'm like so sorry guys i'm eating like you know were they angry because you were showing it to them oh yeah my instagram was like it was like look at this is these lobsters that we just, you know, we just did like fried Chinese lobster with black bean sauce. It's incredible.

And I was writing this. So like the cookbook was a pandemic project where it was like, so I was testing out the recipes and writing the recipes for the book. So it was like, we had to cook, you know, all the whole time. It was really fun. It was a fun time.

I mean, it was, I don't want to say that. It was a difficult time for a lot of people. And it was, it was a, I ate well. Do you think that people starting out, like if you've really never had any experience cooking, do you think that a culinary school or some sort of a class is the way to go? Or do you think you should just start simply and slow from a book or an online tutorial? I was talking to my buddy, Kyle. Kyle, man. So Kyle came down here with me. I was like, yo, I'm going to Austin. I'm going to be there a day earlier.

I'm going to be eating barbecue. You should come down here and let's have some fun. And he came down. He's got a couple of restaurants up in San Francisco Bay Area. He's an amazing chef and he's a great travel buddy. And just yesterday I was like, yo man, talk to me about culinary school. What do you think?

What's our opinion about that? Because I went to culinary school. I dropped out. I didn't make it through. He went to culinary school. If you want to be a chef, I don't think culinary school is necessarily the best route if you want to be a chef of an independent restaurant.

If you want to be a home cook, independent restaurant. If you want to be a home cook, there's a lot to learn quickly from culinary school. I think that's good as a non-matriculated kind of class by class. That's a great opportunity. Taking some cooking classes as a home cook, you learn a lot. If you want to be a chef, it's a hands-on experience in the restaurant that's going to get you there. But I think there's definitely a use for taking cooking classes as a home cook you're not the only one who's told me this this is that that sentiment has been echoed by a lot of great chefs that i've talked to said the same thing my problem is also though you know for a certain there are a lot of culinary jobs out there and like you know think

about all the hotels and all the cruise ships and all the corporate cafeterias. There are so many culinary jobs out there. And if that's a goal, if you want to work in one of those jobs, then culinary school can be a great road to give you the needed, that can be a great route to get one of those jobs. If you want to have a standalone restaurant, maybe something more avant-garde, maybe something where you're, where you're a little more creative than culinary school might not get you there. And it, and it can put you at

a disadvantage because you get, you know, unless you like, I got, I was very lucky. I got a full scholarship. The James Beard foundation gave me a full scholarship to go to culinary school. And so it worked out for me, but for so many folks, like to go to culinary school. And so it worked out for me. But for so many folks, like you go to culinary school, you come out with big debt and then you can't afford to take a job at a restaurant that's paying minimum wage because you need to pay back that loan. So if you get a job at a restaurant, the restaurant will essentially give you a task. And then if you show effort and show that you have work ethic and show that you're really interested They'll slowly train you to learn new techniques and cook things

I guess and and this is this gets into like a whole nother issue that's going on right now with the labor laws and how they've really kind of changed the way that with the labor laws and how they've really kind of changed the way that people in restaurants learn how to cook and cooks come up in the business so i kind of came up at in the as the last of the in the world where the apprentice system was still kind of a piece of the puzzle if that makes sense so i went and worked at le bernadette super fancy french restaurant i was like you know 15 years old 14 years old and i you know i his chef was like i can't pay you you know you're not legal to work but you can come and work for free so did you always know that you wanted to be a chef i i love to cook um and when did you start i started when i was very young i get pictures of cooking

with my mom um very very young and she she kind of cooking with my mom. Very, very young. And she kind of supported me in that. So we had, you know, like making pasta in the kitchen and hanging the noodles off the back of chairs and having, you know. She was very, very supportive of my interest. When I was 13 years old, I got a job delivering pizza at a pizzeria across the street. Gino's Pizza.

Vincent. How'd you deliver them? On a bike? Walking. And I had a harmonica. I would play the harmonica. I thought I was the coolest kid in the world. It was not cool.

Meanwhile, my partner, Michael, who I ended up opening a restaurant with, Michael's, you know, we should talk about him, too. This guy's a very cool guy, very inspirational. He was a cool kid. He was delivering on rollerblades, making twice the tips quick. He's getting around, you know. But delivering pizzas, and then I was working at this Mexican restaurant, Sam Alita's, I was delivering Mexican food, and I was like, man, these guys in the kitchen are so cool.

Like, got tattoos and the fire and like everybody says yes chef and you know i just i was really attracted to the kitchen and um i started i started spending time in the kitchen and um i was working at this vegan restaurant mike mike was delivering he was uh so he was delivering vegan food and other things on his rollerblades he was like 14 years old yeah he was like a so he was delivering vegan food and other things on his rollerblades he was like 14 years old yeah he was like a green machine selling weed he was like son of a bitch you just order you're like you're you're vegan vegan seven layer dip and you get a bag of bag of at the time it was like i don't know it was like the first time that they had uh chronic they called it

chronic it's like fresh and green and green and this this I was in love with this this girl that she was she's amazing my best friend at the time and her father was the maitre d of this fancy French restaurant he came in and I was working in the kitchen because whenever I wasn't delivering I was in the kitchen I loved it you know I was like learning everything I could and the chef had just cut herself you know like just cut herself and she had to leave and they were like we got to close the restaurant and uh and i was like oh like there's like two more dishes to go out and he came in he was like i was the only guy in the kitchen it was like busy restaurant's full he's like 14 year old kid friend

of his daughters he's like you know you know you're the chef here and i'm like yeah like absolutely he's like you should come i work at this you know fancy french restaurant you should meet the chef and uh he got me an interview and i went and worked there so like 15 14 years old i go and work go to this fancy french restaurant i had no idea after school and the chef meets me and he's like he's late he's, you're lucky because I was taking a haircut because otherwise you would be fired already. I was like, oh, my God, I have no idea what's going on. And he's like, but you can come and you can watch. Like, you can't touch anything.

You can watch after school on Wednesdays. You come, and on weekends. I started working there, and it was fun, man. It was super cool. What kind of tasks did they have you do initially? The first job was I got to bring the fish from the refrigerator to the guy that was going to cook the fish like i could carry it across the kitchen and then i got to clean calamari my dad called me the calamari kid he was like he had a whole whole whole song for me i was

like the the squid kid um i remember one time i went in and i was like the chef was like you know the calamari some of it has gone bad I need you to smell every piece and I walked in and he's like I was like chef I smelled every piece of calamari he's like I know look in the mirror and I was like my nose is all black from like the squid I was like oh man and then uh and then he had me clean lobsters it was the first time I ever cried you know you got to like rip these things apart so barbaric and I was like was like, I'm not doing that. I start crying. He's like, you can rip them apart or you can be fired. I was like, Oh my God, crying. And you weren't even making any money. No, I was like 14 years old crying over these lobsters, like apologizing to everyone. Actually, there was a guy, Manuel, he set one free. He took a, he took a lobster. He was like,

I'm going to set, I don't know. He threw it in the ocean? I think he put it in the East River. We were a little drunk. He might have made it. It was brackish. He might have made it to the ocean. And then I got to open oysters. I was the oyster guy for a long time. And then eventually I made it up to a hot app station, which was like, you know, it was like a big deal.

But I had a bad attitude was a trial i had a bad attitude man i had a bad attitude i met this guy roy troy he was he was the he roy troy's amazing chef from la he's got incredible he's got a he's he's a legend legendary character now but he's um still still a dear friend he he um he was on the station with me and he describes it he's just like this little kid like you know i came in from culinary school i just wanted to learn and this kid was just such an asshole i was just like you're an idiot you have no idea what you're doing like stand there don't touch anything watch don't talk that's how you talk to him yeah i was just like how old are you 15 years old this guy like punched in the face i got punched in the face a few times did you i a few times i I laugh because, you know, I wrestle.

I don't wrestle. I wrestle. You do jiu-jitsu. I do jiu-jitsu. You're a black belt under Henzo. I'm a black belt under Henzo. And I laugh because, you know, everybody's got, like, the one story. The one time recently they got into some fight. I've been in, like, 20 fights, and I've never won a fight in my life.

I just got beat up every time. Really? Because I was always a scrawny kid. Oh, back in the day. And I would always get, you know, I haven't been in a fight in like 20 years. Is that why you started training? I started training because I got to San Francisco and I was scared. And I had a chip on my shoulder.

I recognized it. I really, I was like 20 years old, 21 years old. I was starting to work in kitchens in San Francisco. And I was like man like i'm supposed to be from new york like i'm supposed to be tough and these guys are like i'm scared it's not fair what were you scared of you know you walking home i was living in the tenderloin and and you know i was like i'm gonna get mugged and tenderloin's rough it's a rough neighborhood you've been there lately is it nice you might you might step in human on the way home neighborhood. Have you been there lately? Is it nice? You might step in human shit on the way home. Yeah, well, have you been to my neighborhood?

Stop by my house. And, yeah, man, I just needed that. I went to Half Gracie Jiu-Jitsu. Oh, that's a great place to go. This guy Kurt was like, I was like, you know, I'm scared. I really want some confidence, but I don't want to have to do anything. Kurt Oceander. Crazy character.

Oh, he's a wild dude. Amazing character. I learned, I mean, so basically. Is he okay? Didn't he just have some serious health problems? He and I don't, I have not kept up since he and Half had their like little issue. So I'm not really sure what's going on there at all. I follow him on Instagram and he was hospitalized for something yeah i'm not sure he definitely he

definitely pushes really really hard in his life so yeah he's not a young man he pushed really hard yeah he was like every now and then you're like there's somebody that you you vote most like you you least want to get in a fight with that guy like kurt would just eat my heart out like it doesn't matter how good you are how much better you are I'm like that guy's gonna beat me up cuz he's gonna raise the level of violence. He's gonna eat my heart I'm scared. Yeah, and he's gonna have a smile on his face. He's a scary guy and an amazing wonderful character So I went in there and um, he put me together with this girl that had been training for like two years And he was like, you know

Give it a try. See what you think and like 30 seconds later. like two years and he was like you know give it a try see what you think and like 30 seconds later i was like twisted over you know yelling uncle and i was like he's like yeah she's been training for two years i was like if i if i'm here for two years am i gonna be that good he's like yeah like if you give it two years and you invest that time you'll be able to feel more confident like you can you know not worry about getting beat up and i did and i really fell in love with it and two years later she's like i mean she i think she subsequently transitioned but was is like a world champion so i was never going to be as good as her he was he was lying to me she's really great but uh what a great experience subsequently

transitioned yeah i think she's a man now. Oh. But she. Really transitioned. Yeah, she transitioned. But she could kick my ass as a girl and she could still kick my ass as a guy. So either way, she's badass. Tough. You meet a lot of those characters in jujitsu, like people that you would see on the street and think nothing of.

There's a guy named Jeff Noodles at hanzo gracie in in new york and he's like he's just such a nice guy and he's not a big man at all and he would just kill you he would just kill anybody you know there's a lot of those guys out there it's interesting i call them nerd assassins i mean i kind of feel a little bit like that guy because i'm definitely not a you know i'm not an intimidating person right especially now that i'm like 20 pounds pizza overweight yeah you were telling me uh over the last how long six months six months 20 since you opened up the pizza place i went from 182 to maybe i'm a little less than i went from 182 to like i'm like 197 now so that's what i'm saying about pizza man that's why i don't fuck with bread anymore well i mean i'm like seven days a week on pizza that's crazy not a casual yeah you gotta abstain i'm like seven days a week on pizza. That's crazy. This is not a casual. Yeah, you got to abstain.

Pizza is a once a week thing, I think. It's delicious. It's fantastic. I mean, if you could do it every day. But do you know who Mikey Musumechi is? No, I want to know. He's a world-class jiu-jitsu practitioner who eats only pizza. And?

He makes his own pizza. See, he's not the – because there's a pizza jujitsu guy from New York. There's a guy whose Instagram is pizza jujitsu. No, no, this is a different kid. He's a very young guy and he lives in Vegas. And he's top of the food chain. G and no G. He's phenomenal.

That's Mikey. Wow. He's the perfect nerd assassin. Yeah, but how old is that guy, man? He's very young. I want to say Mikey's in his very early 20s. You can eat pizza every day in your early 20s. If you go to his Instagram or it might be on his YouTube, see if you can find the pizza.

There you go. A lot of pasta, too. That's him making pasta. But he's either eating pizza or pasta. Oh, this is him at an Italian restaurant, and he's pouring olive oil all over his pasta. But if you go to his YouTube, you can see he actually makes his own pizza. He's got a pizza oven, and he eats once a day. So he trains like literally 10 hours a day plus.

I mean, he's fucking driven. And he trains seven days a week he's an animal and uh he will eat one meal a day after he's training he'll eat like a couple massive pizzas wasn't that like colin powell's thing cooking with mikey so give me some volume on this this meal is about 7 000 calories so i work really hard all day so i could eat what i want at night so he had problems with his weight cutting for, you know, tournaments and such. Yeah. And so he tried a bunch of different diets, and one of the things that he,

look at this, he's got a giant fridge filled with pizza food. Yeah, he's got good ingredients. Oh, yeah, yeah, oh, phenomenal ingredients. You can tell he knows what he's doing. He's making good ingredients. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, phenomenal ingredients. You can tell he knows what he's doing. He's making amazing pizza. So he does the whole deal himself. And this is sort of a part of his thing. It's not just that he eats pizza, but he actually makes it.

So every day he trains really, really hard. He's a world-class competitor. but he actually makes it. So every day he trains really, really hard. He's a world-class competitor. And then he makes pizza at night, and that's what he eats. I've done so many diets, you know, and the secret to dieting is actually not dieting. It's just eating what you want, and you're satisfied. How old is he?

23. Yeah, he doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about. The secret to dieting is not dieting. Just eat pizza and work out like eight hours a day. Yeah, the secret to dieting when you work 12 hours a fucking day strangling people. And that's his sister, Tammy, and she's also a world-class jiu-jitsu. This guy's hysterical. Yeah, so he's got a little pizza oven in his backyard. These ovens are super popular now, like all these little gas drives.

Yeah, cool, man. They get hot and they work. Yeah. There are people in LA that are like setting up like taco stands with those and making it on the street. Really? Yeah, it's cool. Oh, no kidding. Yeah. Again, this is like, is that as good as a wood fired one? Like, does it impart the same flavor or is it okay enough? I think, you know, I don't, well, look, I make New York-style pizza right now, so it's not wood-fired traditionally. So I think you can make really great pizza in there,

but it's not going to have that smoky flavor at all, right? Right, but is the smoky flavor necessary, or is it just different? I think that it's just different, for sure. As opposed to, like, steak. Well, like, the thing about pizza because if you follow how pizza you know i'm and again like i'm not i want i don't want to speak out of turn because i'm not like an expert expert on this but i you don't want a fucking pizza i want a pizza

restaurant i've been studying it for a couple years like so basically you know the italians came through came to america through new york and so that's where the first kind of pizza came on the scene. But then as the Italian diaspora starts to spread across the country, you see different ingredients being incorporated in different towns. And then the pizza starts to change based on the local preferences. So it's like, I got a pizzeria. I'm opening up over here. This is the type of cheese they've got here. So that's what I'm using. Or maybe this is the type

of cheese people like to eat. So that's what I'm. And so they get really specific and you start to see like, okay, well, this is now traditional Neapolitan pizza, New York style pizza, you know, Chicago style pizza, Detroit style pizza. Those are, they're these kind of defined terms because those are the, that's the pizza that's developed in that area. And so now people say, well, we can just, we can mix it up. Like we can do a New York style pizza, but we're going to do it in a wood fired oven and we can, and there's nothing wrong with that. It could be really, really delicious. with that it could be really really delicious so when you say like is it better or should it have the wood it's like well if you're going to make a neapolitan style pizza you should do it with in a wood-fired oven because that's what was traditionally done um and yeah it's really

delicious that doesn't mean you can't take that same dough and bake it in a non-wood-fired oven and also have a delicious pizza it just it A, different, and it's not necessarily then authentic to what it was supposed to be. It's interesting how different regions of countries have very specific ways of doing things like Bistecca Florentine. So good. Oh my God. I mean, it's just a steak. It's a large porterhouse steak, but they figured out the way they like to do it over, I think they mostly use olive for the wood right isn't the hard wood they generally use the wood so i don't know what exactly sorry i didn't mean i was i was me being like i have no idea so i'm just gonna ask you a quick question that was the other thing till i said he was like just ask him a question um does the wood does the flavor of the wood like

i'm always interested in this and i do this at home all the time. Like I get, I've got orangewood, I've got almond, I've got oak and I've really been trying to tell like, can I taste the difference between the smoke

from one of these woods versus the other? Some of them like mesquite has a really distinct flavor. Yeah, I was going to say that, mesquite does. You know,

or alderwood has a really distinct, but a lot of these woods, like I think it's just that that happened like in Italy by the olive vines, they had all vines. So that's what they used. Maybe, yeah. You know, like almond wood in California is super traditional because, you know, the almond

farms have to, uh, have to, um, change over their trees every however many years and they sell off the wood. Right. So I feel like or post oak in texas is like you got post oak yeah there's a lot of oak here and but the guys at uh terry blacks that i talked to about it they generally prefer post oak because they say it's got a nice clean smoke they like the the flavor it imparts it's not overwhelming i think was their way of describing it.

It also burns really long and slow. So like bang for the buck money-wise, oak burns. Like when I cook with almond wood, it takes twice as much almond over oak. And orange wood is super quick. And that for like trying to maintain a steady temperature over a long period of time, I would imagine something like post oak, because that's why Terry Blacks probably uses it. They have these enormous smokers that they have to maintain at a steady 250 for 24 hours a day that they're cooking.

Yeah. Other than cleaning them out, they're just rolling. He showed me the wood he's got. He's like, this is a week's worth of wood. I'm like, holy shit. That's crazy. It's so much wood. Yeah, I mean, thank God there's plenty of trees out here so maybe there's a financial reason that you know the oak

burns longer you get more bang for your buck on the flavor the flavor i mean it does work it's pretty phenomenal i don't know what uh franklin uses or what salt lick uses or some of these other places but i mean the cost of wood has gone up i mean it's in in la it's like you know people would shit their pants it's like a quarter quarter what is like $500 you know really it's just so much money Wow and there's all kinds you know the government is really you know there's the pollution thing is a thing for them so they're like we want to cut down on people using woods there's all kinds of incentives like as a restaurant you can't get wood I think you can you know I gonna make everybody

have electric in their house one pretty. Yeah, they're stopping fireplaces because apparently that's a big issue in terms of like pollution, particulate pollution and what smoke from a fireplace does, which really sucks because it's the best smell. When you go into a house and the fireplace is cooking and it's warm out, like if you're in Colorado and you've got a fireplace and it's January, that's amazing. You get inside the house, you smell the fireplace, and it's cool. You smell it outside when you're getting close to the house. I think the thing that's, you know, you just run into this all the time now because everybody's so, like, staunch in their politics and everybody's got their opinions. But it's like, you know, I'm in L.A. I'm like, I don't give a shit about the fireplace. It's like 1,000 degrees all year long.

Like, no problem. Right. And then, but, you know, people in Colorado are like, yo, man, the fireplace is really a piece of our, you know, whatever it is. History. So depending upon where you're from, obviously you care more or less, but there's nothing I like more than the smell of a fireplace. I think the thing is it's fine if you live in a small town

and you're not really contributing that much. But if you live in a large city, you have a few million people in your city and a few hundred thousand of them are burning fires at the same time you might have a problem and maybe if you're a firefighter you're like these jackasses are just like burning their houses down like you know yeah there's definitely that and then trying to work on this calendar and this guy's just like in LA there's an issue with barbecues too like there's barb there's warnings like sometimes when there's high, like the Santa Anas and it's dry out, they're worried about embers flying from someone's barbecue and starting a fire.

Lands on your roof and that happens. Fucking happens, yeah. It's also like, I came to Austin. This whole town smells like just grilling meat. You can't. It really does. As soon as you get out of the plane, you're like, wow, I can smell the barbecue. Well, there's a salt lick at the airport.

It was good. Yeah, not bad. You go right away. And so in L.A., you're like, I mean, I am that annoying neighbor that makes my whole block smell like wood fire. And I love it when someone else is doing it, but I can understand how if you're like, you know, that's not your favorite flavor. I don't think the problem is the smell. I think the real problem is the pollution. I mean, people are worried about what it's actually doing to air quality.

Well, that's the, like, for whatever you want to say about long-term environmental impact of, there's a real air quality issue that exists, like, no matter what, no question about it. Like, you're in L.A., your lungs start aching downtown. I mean, it's like you can't even see the mountains through the haze and then it'll rain you're like holy shit there's mountains out there it's crazy it's dirty are you living in downtown no i live in venice on the beach oh that's a that's a little better quality except for the bullets i've got a great tent right by the ocean nice gorgeous hey um jamie i emailed you uh his uh grills all the stuff that he's created. Did you get a hold of that?

Yeah. So this project of you making grills, there we go. Oh, look at those eggplants. Look at that. So this is the steel. So like, oh, man, I'm so excited. You made this all yourself? Dude, it was three weeks with a welder, and I was so obsessed.

It was so fun, man. I got that God bless cowgirls what's the hammers for well i wanted to do axe handles and i went to home depot and the axes were like 25 so that's your hand the hammers were like four bucks i was like i'll go i'll upgrade to the axes later wow so this is a an interesting setup what is this is like an outdoor like so raised and lowered grilling space so basically you know i didn't have the i didn't go with the traditional you can raise the grills up and down on a on a wire with a with a with a turn knob i decided to do um and i was inspired by this restaurant this restaurant's a restaurant called Echabari in northern Spain,

which is like probably one of the most famous grill restaurants in the world. And they do their grills like this where you can pick them up and put them down. So the pieces from the inside of the grill can come out, and they can't lever off of any height there, and you can stick them in. So you can raise or lower your grills like that um and then you can also i liked it because you see that basket with the peppers in it there like i built that out of stainless steel and the idea is i built all those grills out of stainless steel so you can kind of like put different pieces of equipment in so you built all those grates you wired up wired all those rods welded all those rods down and everything

if you were to look closely you'd see that they're they're very very jagged and if you were to also try and cook anything on there you'd notice that they're too far apart stuff's falling through so i definitely built them myself i made the mistakes you know right it gives you such a great respect for the people that do this man that's a beautiful piece of equipment though. I think that looks amazing. Thank you. And so, was this a video? Oh, it's just the God bless. Oh, it's your opening up.

Oh, so that's what I'm talking about. That's not the firebox. So the firebox is down below, but that's me grilling. Like there, you can see that's the picture. You got the fire underneath inside the oven space. And you can kind of close it down. Right, so you explained that. So you're not really doing an offset.

You're smoking almost like a Kamado style. And you can do either way, or you can put the fire in the firebox down below. It holds a really consistent 275. Oh, so you do have a firebox on top of that. Go back to the earlier. Oh, so below that, that bottom thing opens up and that's a firebox.

Exactly. Oh, so that's great. So you have many options. So you can either put the fire up top or down below. And I like that because I've got these stones

that slide in there so you can bake bread on multiple levels. Oh. You can grill at multiple levels. You can put five, two, four, six briskets in there.

Do you ever do a pizza on that thing? Yeah, and you can do pizza on the stone. On the flat rock? Or you can put five no two four six briskets in there do you ever do a pizza on this one or yeah and you can do pizza on the on the stone flat rock or you could put the put the fire at the back and get like that Neapolitan 900 degrees shrimps nice or just you know it's great it's got to be very satisfying also to cook on something that you literally created with your own hands the only problem with this grill is that I've had like 30 people in my house and I've never used more than 10% of the capacity. I mean, on paper it looks so small. Yeah, no, that's huge.

What is your grilling surface? Like what's the distance? I mean, it's literally, you could put a whole pig on the right side and six briskets. It's huge. Oh, wow. It's a four foot grill. So that part over there. Have you ever done a pig

over it? Like a rotisserie style? I've never, I've got a rotisserie for it and I've never, my sister-in-law bought me a rotisserie for it. I've never actually done a whole pig on there. That looks amazing. That's gotta be so cool though, to go out in your backyard and see this thing that you made yourself that you can cook on. It makes me so proud and happy. And I also feel like such a psycho because it's so big. And it's like, you know, eventually what am I going to do when I go to sell this house? I'm going to get a crane?

No, it comes with the house. It comes with the house. Yeah, sell it and build a new one or give up. Or just like go down to Venice Beach and be like, here's $20 and you can take all the scrap metal you can have and give them 24 hours. Oh, you would pay $1,000 to not deal with those people.

I think what you should do is sell it with the house or never move. Chef's kitchen. You rent it out. Chef's kitchen is a big commodity. Chef's kitchen and a massive homemade smoker slash grill with multiple cooking surfaces outside. I mean, that alone would get

people excited about, like a guy who likes grilling, who's looking at your house like, mean, that alone would get people excited about, like a guy who likes grilling, who's looking at your house like, holy, that would be a giant selling point. It's a buck a piece of wood these days. That's what it really comes down to. So every time I cook any steak, I'm like, it cost $11.

Right. It cost me $11 worth of wood. Yeah. And so when you cook steaks, are you cooking steaks, so you're doing it in the top box? You're putting the fire above it. So most of the time, if I'm cooking a thin steak, like a steak, that's, you know, regular inch thick steak, I'm cooking, I'm creating a fire. And this was what I was talking about with that grill works grill, which I think are phenomenal grills. But if you look at the, if you look at the base of my, of my grill space,

not the barbecue space, but the grill space, it's lined with fire bricks and it's got a round. And what I like to do is get a big fire going that heat up those bricks and get a lot of heat in there that even if I were to turn the fire off, I could cook the steak on there. Because the heat is going to continue to that keeps the consistency because you know like if you cook in a classic weber grill it's it's a really gratifying experience they're amazing grills but it can be challenging because you're either on the ups upswing or on the downswing like right it's either getting hotter and hotter and hotter or it's getting colder and colder and colder so you're like i gotta stage it perfectly i gotta get the steak on at the right moment my vegetables on at the right stage it perfectly i gotta get the steak on at the right moment my vegetables on at the right moment or or i gotta put more charcoal on which can be tricky

you know weber has a steel kamado now and those are phenomenal yeah it's insulated they have uh it's very nice the and they do it what's nice about the way weber built theirs is it's very portable because it's not that heavy really i dropped Yeah, but it's still. I dropped a big green egg once. Oh, Jesus. You know what happened? Did it destroy? Oh, yeah. It broke apart. Curtains.

I had a Kamado, a Komodo Kamado. Have you ever seen one of those? Those are amazing. Komodo Joe. Yeah. Phenomenal. Not Komodo Joe. It's a company called Komodo Kamado,

and they make these beautiful, artistic, artisan Kamados. It was fucking huge. This huge blue thing in my backyard. They gave it to you? No, I bought it. You bought it? Yeah, and you had to lift it up. It took forever to order it.

I designed it. You know, like you get to pick the color of the tile and the whole deal, and you have to season it and break it in because it's like the real deal. It's like, that's what it looks like. Oh, yeah. That's gorgeous.

Gorgeous grill. Gorgeous. Yeah, I mean, it's a huge Kamado. Us, everyone. Just on size, and it's got the feet. It looks like a penguin. Mm-hmm. Gorgeous grill. Gorgeous. Yeah. I mean, it's a huge Kamado. Us? Everyone. Just on size. And it's got the feet. It looks like a penguin.

It's beautiful. And then they have a gas attachment if you want to start the grill with gas. But I never used that. But look how pretty that is. Gorgeous grill. They make the best looking grills. How much is that grill, though? It's very expensive.

Like $4,000? I don't remember. Maybe more. I don't remember. Again, I left it in my old house i said you can have it my buddy kyle that i was talking about from oakland he's got that komodo joe those are also and then i and then i got a they gave me a big green egg again then i broke it i dropped it and then they gave me another one i was like guys i'm so sorry because i was like chef they were like you know you'll take pictures with it early on in the days they were like he'll take pictures he'll take pictures with it. Yes. Early on in the days, they were like, you'll take pictures, you'll help sponsor.

I was like, I'm going to take a picture. It's not going to sell it, dude. Yeah, Big Green Eggs are great. Phenomenal girls. Kamado Joe's, those are great too. Kamado Joe's is very well designed because they have the way they use the upper, you know, the baffle when it changes the temperature and adjust things. They've got a bunch of like very smart sort of improvements.

Also, the way it opens and closes is a little easier. Yeah. They have springs on the lid and everything like that. It's very, very, they took like the existing Kamados and they made them better. I feel like, you know,

again, like you've got traditional barbecue and then you've got like grilling two completely different things, although often conflated people don't you know and then these are kind of these hybrid like you know barbecue ovens which you can grill on and it's confusing for people how i'm supposed to use this stuff yeah there's luckily there's plenty of tutorials online on how to smoke on a kamado or how to grill on a Kamado. But the thing about the ceramic, for most of them, the ceramic is what's retaining heat.

But like I said, Weber makes one that's way easier to move around. I think they call it the Summit. And it's just a thick insulated steel, but it's like a fraction of the weight. And there's another company that makes one that's aluminum. They make an aluminum insulated Kamado. That's supposed to be, it's supposed to be the same thing. It's all about. Insulating.

Yeah. Although, I mean, I feel like there's two pieces because one of them is insulating so that the coals last longer, not wasting the energy. But then the other thing is that the actual, the thing heats up and it holds the heat so that it radiates its own heat yeah and then that keeps it consistent like when you open and close the lid does it lose all the heat and if the if the stone is hot it'll just immediately pick back up right um right that's the benefit of the ceramic of the thicker ceramic grills. That's why they're so fucking heavy. And they're huge.

It's expensive. They can break. They're a pain in the butt. If you want to move the thing, it's a nightmare, but they're great. So what I'm doing with the Grillworks one is I'm having a whole thing built. So it's going to have stone underneath it and then in all around it and then it's all bricks and everything so the entire thing will be set up specifically for that grill works grill i i love that i love that i i just got i got cautioned by a guy basically who was like you know just make sure that you you you have the stones in there to retain the heat otherwise it

can be very it can be more challenging to maintain a consistent fire just from the fire and the coals. The one I have has stones in it. It does, huh? Yeah. They're phenomenal grills. I mean, all the restaurants, that's what they use because they look beautiful. And they're like crazy grill dorks who just make the-

Exactly. Every best chef uses it, and then they take the feedback, and they just make it better and better and better. Well, when I went to that place bizarre meats have you been to that place very cool guys have you had him on the no jose how do you play andres you know he's he's also like a very special man who like feeds the world i mean yeah and he's an incredible storyteller he takes his shoes off and like off and paces and tells you a story, and you're just enthralled. He's incredible.

He's got a big beer belly family. He's an amazing cook. All right. Well, his restaurant's incredible. That Bizarre Meats place is amazing. But one of the beautiful things about it is you go there, and you can see they have it as a centerpiece, these grills where you can watch them cook on it.

So as you walk in, you're taking the smell in of all the burning wood and the meat, and it's all being done right in front of your face so you can see it. See if you can find any images. There's videos of bizarre meats in Vegas where you can see them cooking on it as you walk in, but it's my favorite place to eat in Vegas. Look at that. God damn, that looks good. See if you can find, like, there's... there's gotta be some video of it.

I went to a party that he was, uh, that he had at the Aspen Food and Wine Festival, and when you walked in, he was standing there with a whole leg of a birico ham. Mm. And he was making a birico ham and caviar tacos and giving them out. There he is.

So he's got, does he have a place at the, it says the SLS hotel in Beverly Hills as That was Bizarre Foods. It was kind of like his very avant-garde restaurant. I'm not sure if that's still there. Jamie, go back to the, no, no, go back to where you were, go back to where you were and then pick up, go back, go, no, go back and then go to. Go back to where you were and then pick up. Go back. No, go back and then go to the top video. That one right there.

That one shows the actual restaurant. Yeah, he had one of those legs and he was just making like putting caviar. So there you can see how the grill works. That's a grill works grill. Yeah, exactly. Phenomenal grills. Yeah. And it's just, it's also like the experience of being there is, you know, it's exciting.

My brother's building a house and we've been talking about what grill to put in. You know, we're like designing this outdoor kitchen. It's so hard because you want to put, you want to get fit everything. You want to get it right. Yeah, you want to put, and he's got a big pizza oven and you want to be able to do all the different stuff, right? Right. And he's a big entertainer. He loves having people over he's like a hollywood guy his house and i'm gonna cook there so yeah it's a whole thing so he's setting it up he's setting it up he's like if i gotta make

it nice so my brother brother will come over and then you know nice i'm a big party favor yeah well that do you uh enjoy doing that like cooking not just at work, but also for home gatherings and stuff like that? So my partner, Matt Rodbard, and I, that was like a big piece of the puzzle for writing this cookbook was like, I love cooking at home. And there are not a lot of chefs that love to cook at home. Like home cooks and chefs is a very different job. I like the organizational kind of piece of running a team and inspiring and teaching and all that stuff. But I really love to cook hands on. And when you open and own a restaurant, you don't get to do it as much as maybe people would think.

You're mostly telling people what to do honestly you're like plunging the toilet man you're doing anything you can to keep the thing afloat because it's a tough business and you're and you're hustling and so you're doing whatever you have to do and not always um really spending the time i mean obviously there's chefs that are maybe better organized that they can just put their power like now i've done it for a while so like i'm really in the kitchen stretching pizza dough all day long and it's awesome. But cooking at home is a different,

there's a different level of pressure, right? And you can really experiment and have fun with the food. So I love doing that. And cooking the dinners at my brother's house, friends would come over. You know, we still do every Sunday, we do a Sunday supper.

Everybody comes over and, you know, some days it's like we're rushing home from the beach in the summer and we're just making whatever we can but other days it's like we go to the farmer's market in the morning we make it a whole day affair it's the best you know the kids are running around and they want to help it's great you know there's a thing about like preparing for a meal and like looking forward to it over the course of the day and getting ready and getting everything set up it's why americans love thanksgiving like we all get together it's like the one time there's like it's only religion no religion free holiday we all like get together

and just cook you know the only people the turkeys didn't didn't they don't they don't do as well they don't but i'm not a big fan of turkeys. Here's the thing. So let me just call this out. I went to the barbecue yesterday. I had the turkey, and I mean, I shit my pants. It was so unbelievably delicious. I've never had turkey like this before. Really?

I've cooked the turkey different every single year. I've gotten like really i'm really screwed up a couple years i made some spectacular the turkey at the barbecue is i don't know how they do it i was like how did these guys do it it's so moist and tender and delicious you should try it you'll i think you'll be shocked well i've had the turkey at terry black's it's really good and i've had turkey myself that i cooked on a traeger and i really liked it it was very good that's the first time i'd ever smoked uh turkey using a pellet grill. Was it tender?

Oh, yeah. It was fantastic. It was delicious. And I did it with the super smoke setting. Traeger has a super smoke setting, so it accentuates the smoke in the cooking surface, in the cooking area. And so it was very smoky and delicious.

I feel like those grills are so good. They really, really work. But I'm not allowed to use them. I'm like a chef, so I'm like, man, I can't do it. I can't cheat.ills are so good. They like really, really work. Oh, yeah. But I'm not allowed to use them. You know, I'm like a chef. So I'm like, man, I can't do it. I can't cheat. Because it's cheating. It's cheating.

Well, I love cooking on them because like I'll use those oftentimes like for the reverse sear steaks because I'll set it at 225. I'll set the super smoke. I put a thermometer in there. I got a Traeger app. So it tells me like what temperature my meat is. I could be watching TV and it's like, okay, we're at 110. Time to pull.

Yeah. I'll pull it at 110, and then I'll sear it. The only thing that they don't have that I really wish they would do is make a direct fire option so that you could sear in the same thing. There's a company called Lone Star Grills, and they make phenomenal offset smokers, but they also make a really good pellet grill. But it has a setting where you move this grate aside, this plate in the bottom. It exposes the fire. It exposes the fire, and then you crank it up with the lid open, and then it has direct flame. So then you're cooking literally right over the fire and it's

still just wood and fire because you're using these pellets. The pellets are essentially compressed sawdust from hardwood. And so that option, I wish Traeger would, uh, would figure out how to do that because Lone Star Grill has it. And they, I i mean they make amazing uh just traditional offset smokers too i um i feel like people don't understand it's one of the most confusing things for people to understand the difference between like barbecue and grilling and then you know and and when and where and how and why to apply um uh the technique to which type of meat, right? Because, you know, if you were to like barbecue a ribeye, you'd really ruin Christmas. It would just be like a big old waste of, you know.

But if you were to grill like a brisket, it would be a nightmare. You'd fuck that up too. It would be like chewy garbage. Yes. And so like how do I know? And the answer is, you know you know it's pretty as a chef like this is where the like food iq questions come into mind it's like well as a chef it's really really straightforward and easy like the more an animal uses a muscle the tougher it gets

you know the more the more sinewy you know tough stuff is in there the longer and slower i have to cook it to break it down and like the the leaner and the less used a muscle, like the more tender and the faster I cook it and the more I can eat it rare. And it's like, that's just basic and makes sense. And then grilling is for quick cooking or fat, you know, quicker cooking and barbecuing is for longer and slower.

Plus because it's in a closed box, it's moist. So it's like kind of almost like dry braising the meat and it breaks it down so like i feel like that is where people because i often see people being like oh i'm like you know i threw this flank steak in my traeger i'm like oh fuck that up oops yeah it's it's a it's just that flank steak is a good example, right? Because it's a thin cut and you really want to just sort of sear it quick on the outside. Like I said, they all have their different things that work well with them. I really like Traeger's and any kind of pellet grill for game meat because it's so lean and you just really want to just sort of get it up to temperature.

And then I generally sear it on a cast iron skillet. So that reverse cooking technique that you're talking about, you know, is it's a very it's very safe. Right. Because I don't want to. This is where. So when I think when I think about the temperature at the inside of the meat, like I want to cook a piece of beef to 125 degrees, let's say, or like 120 degrees. I want the final temperature inside to be rare, medium rare. If I cook it at 400 degrees, by the time that it gets to 125 in the very middle and it's right, like it's going to be really overcooked on the outside. It's going to be really overcooked on the outside it's going to be challenging and that and and whereas if i cook it at 130 degrees really really slow maybe a 270 degrees very very slowly and let it come up to temperature it's going to be perfectly cooked

all the way through yeah and then i sear the outside so for something like either very very lean um uh game meats or like we were saying for a thick piece of ribeye where I really want that fat on the inside to have a chance to liquefy. I think it was like, what's his name? Franklin. It was here. Yeah, Philip. Philip Franklin. Philip.

He was talking about like, you know, cooking this like Wagyu steak slowly up high on the grill and the fat starts to liquefy it's like he's doing the reverse sear on that meat um even though he he didn't admit it he was reverse searing he was he was like i don't reverse here but i do this thing very similar that is exactly the same thing well at bizarre meats they have like the upper deck where it's really only like 90 degrees it's just like slowly yeah it's just slowly and taking in all the smoke and they get it up to i forget what their internal temperature is and then they drop it down and put it over the flames so that was like when we're writing this cookbook i'm like okay well this is an opportunity to really test stuff out so one of the fun ones is i always have steak in the freezer i always have steaks in the

freezer i got this guy do you know did we talk heritage foods usa or no i've heard of them yeah like this guy this guy patrick mart Martins, it's a phenomenal story. He's like basically took heritage breeds that would be extinct otherwise. And he's out there meeting farmers and convincing them to grow these animals for him. And then he's buying them and distributing them to chefs. Now you can go online and get them directly to you, but you go online, you get the steak, and it's got a little QR code,

and you can visit the farm. And I've been with him. We had a restaurant called The Meatball Shop back in New York. Visited all the farms, and we got all of our pork from these guys. So I've been to all these farms, like Amish farms, where they're growing these incredible, close-to-extinct species of animals, like keeping them alive on the planet.

And I just like completely lost track. Was it the CBD? There's no CBD. There's a CBD in my booze. You were talking about heritage breed animals and slow cooking and oh man heritage farms i've completely lost track of myself really yeah okay well heritage breed food you know heritage breed pork there's a company called butcher box they sell heritage breed pork that's one of the things that they have i've there there are so many different breeds out there and they all have their own specific

qualities and for for different reasons and like makes sense that if you lived in you know the lamb from whatever island in in in in scotland you know was bred for the fur and then the meat might have been a little bit tougher but then you know if you cook it in this way it's delicious and it all works together but then if you take that lamb and you try and cook it in a different way maybe it's not as right if you cook it in this way, it's delicious and it all works together. But then if you take that lamb and you try and cook it in a different way, maybe it's not as great. Right, if you don't know what you're doing. It's kind of like, oh, so during the pandemic, writing this cookbook, I had a chance to cook, you know, a lot, really scientifically,

like say I'm going to cook different types of meat, different ways and really try and get, is this working? And I always have steak from Patrick in my freezer. And I think they're the best steaks in the world. I really think, like, best steak in the world. Really? That's strong words. He's got this Akiyoshi beef that's just unbelievable.

What is that word? Akiyoshi. It's like a Japanese. It's the Japanese breed of cattle that they make Wagyu beef out of or whatever it is, Miyazaki, like, you know, beef out of or whatever it is miyazaki like you know beef out of but it's been bred with angus in their few few guys i think here in texas that that are they're that are selling these cattle they've got super high fat but they're tender like angus they're unbelievably delicious and i always have these steaks in my freezer and i'll come home from

jujitsu i'm like ravenously hungry know, I just like had a 23 year old guy trying to beat the shit out of me and I had to defend my black belt, which is, you know, like you know what, that's like you get a little older and you go like, dude, this guy's 23 years old, he's got a purple belt and he knows that if he taps me in front of the instructor, he's gonna get his brown belt,

so he's just like coming at me and I'm like, dude, I'm like, you know, I've just ate like pizza for three months, homie. And I'm so hungry. And I- Keeps and i honest though it does you gotta gotta defend it you know every now and then i'm like i'm like the problem is that i'm gonna beat you and then my arm's gonna hurt for a week right and you're not gonna remember but i'm gonna i'm gonna remember yeah those are those are the times but the i took i would take the steak right out of the freezer and throw it right in the broiler and And I was like, holy shit, you could take a steak, try it.

Frozen. Take a New York steak, frozen, throw it in the broiler, like four minutes each side, and it comes out perfect. It's delicious. Really? I've heard people say that before. You know, that they, like many people say that you should bring a steak to room temperature, but I've heard many other people say no,

you should actually put it on cold, that way the middle of it will cook slower i think for a thinner steak it's soup it's very helpful right because if you want to keep a rare like we i don't know i used to go to when moon's over my hammy what is that place denny's denny's yeah and they have that real thin steak and i was always like medium rare never right never worked out but if they had frozen at first maybe probably came from the freezer you just just ask for rare. Rare. Go rare. You gotta go rare at Denny's. Go rare, go home.

It's just so small. Moons Over Miami is such a great name. It is a great name. But if you freeze the steak when it's real thin, you have a better chance of keeping it rare in the center. Isn't that like what steakums are? Aren't they like frozen? You slap it right on a grill? Right on the grill.

I used that for my... I did some Philly cheesesteaks the other day with those. Philly cheesesteak is, I mean. It's amazing that they nailed it. Like, again, that's like a regional dish that you think a steak sandwich is universal, but nope. They should write about that in the Bible. It's just God's food right there. It's the best, you know, that'll change a man. It's so delicious yes a phil a great philly cheesesteak is like

and it's there's such good people in philly man philly's such a great town it's a great town they're just working they're like you know this is six dollars the sandwich is six we were gonna so i had this restaurant called the meatball shop and we were like you know we were talking about what we're expanding to a different city because we've got a bunch in New York. And I went to Philly and I was like, shit, man, we can't come here. They got the best sandwiches in the world and they're $5 and they're all over. We're just going to get crushed. We're going to be like, yo, take this $13 meatball sandwich.

They were like, nope, no chance, no chance. Yeah, they've got the market cornered with authenticity. They're so good there. Yeah. Well, Philly is a great place for boxing it's a great place for comedy it's a great place for hip-hop i mean it's like there's so much great shit that's come out of philly it's just real people problems yeah real well real people that's the thing when you have cities there's like good and bad of cities right but one of the good things is that pressure creates diamonds like this

all those human beings together there's something i felt that i was in texas last year i do i go i do big like kind of like adventure backcountry heli skiing trip every year i was in alaska and i was like these people are really like they're not the i wouldn't necessarily say that that i want to be best friends with every person I've met on the street here. But I know that if I was in trouble, I'd want this guy to come bail me out. What part of Alaska were you in? I was deep in Alaska. I drove, it was like five hours from Anchorage or six.

But for someone in Alaska, five hours. I went to a restaurant in Alaska and the kid's menu was called the Texas size. Because they're like the little boys down there. I was like shit these guys are it's a big state they're resilient humans up there they're they are a different breed of people when you have bears in your backyard you're a different person it's also like the winter it's surviving through the winter there you're you're planning ahead but that and there's a sense of real camaraderie. Yes. If you don't pull over when somebody is in a ditch on the side of the road, you're killing that person.

That person is not making it. Exactly. Yeah. I grew up in Boston, and there's something to that. The winter gives people a different sense of community. You help people. We would help people get their cars out. You see someone stuck, and their wheels are spinning. You help people. We would help people get their cars out. You see someone stuck and their wheels are spinning. You pull over. You see what you can do. There's a thing to that

that doesn't exist in Los Angeles because there's a diffusion of responsibility. There's too many people. You don't feel like you're a part of their problem. Like, eh, they'll be fine. But when they're not going to be fine, like a place like Alaska, that develops that sense of real connection with people. Yeah, I've huddled under an umbrella in a rainstorm in New York and you're like best friends with whoever it is. And then you can, you know, fuck you. You're done. I don't need to be your friend. For that moment, we got brethren.

Well, that was the thing about New York post 9-11. Like post 9-11, New York was a beautiful place. Like I hate that that's what brought it out of people. But there's a thing about 9-11 after the attacks where it felt like people were more friendly, more connected to each other. It felt just different. It felt there was more love in the air. I think about this all the time when I think about like if we were to define some of these terms like in the kitchen you know amongst restaurateurs people are always talking about like I care about my employees and and I'm like well what does it really mean to define the word

care about somebody like what does that mean it's like I'm gonna put their needs in front of my own like you know that means I'm caring about them. And so there's like there's the there's the there's the image of of caring because I say I care or like whatever that is or donate to charity. And then there's the real like life caring about somebody when it's going to be more inconvenient for me to stop and help. And I'm going to miss something maybe important for me, but I'm going to take the time to really care. And I feel like in certain areas, folks are more interested in the image of caring than maybe in the real caring. I think that's well put. I think that so many people are interested in looking like a good person. And whether it's on social media or whether it's lip service, the way you talk to other people about it,

but whether or not you really care, genuinely care, that's a different story. I wish that, but we're never going to, or hopefully we're not faced with an opportunity to really where the rubber meets the road. But every now and then you're like, okay, shit's hitting the fan. I got to grab one person to help me.

Who am I really going to call? Am I going to call my best friend who I bitch to? Or am I going to call the person I don't really like but I know is going to come and help me and get me through the problem? I don't know. I'm sure that when human beings lived in tribal groups, our bonds and our connections were far deeper. I'm sure. Because we relied on each other so much more. There were no supermarkets.

There was no refrigeration. You had to get food every day. And everyone had to carry their own weight. And you were struggling. There was no, you know, you got lucky. Or you were skillful rather than you got an animal and the whole tribe eats. But then next thing in the morning, you're back to work again. There's no time off.

Then next thing in the morning, you're back to work again. There's no time off. And, you know, that kind of life is a brutal, vicious way of life where it's, you know, there's no hospitals. So if you get hurt, you don't survive generally. If you get an infection, you don't survive. If you get an attack, you don't survive. You're basically just, you're not going to make it very far. But that finality of existence probably brought people closer together and i think one of the things that's it's contrary to

what you would think like the the logic would be that if life was easier you'd be happier but i don't necessarily think that's true i think there's something about life being too easy that it fucks people's heads up because they need a certain amount of struggle in order to have a meaning for their existence. I think that's how we're hardwired because of hundreds of thousands of years of hardscrabble living to try to get by. And then within the last, you know, X amount of years, it's been pretty fucking easy to coast. You know, I mean, there's more fat people now than there ever been. This is the first time in history where poor people are fat.

It's, you know, back in the day, fat people were super attractive. They would paint these Rubenesque models because it was so rare that a woman was so opulent that she had the ability to get overweight. Well, there's also a different definition today of what, quote-unquote, what being fat is, right? Like, I think that back in the day, there were fewer people that were really morbidly obese, which is, you know, like I went to the doctor a few years ago. Doctor said, you know, you're morbidly obese.

And if we look at what that means from a medical, forgetting all the other, he said that to me, I was like, I was 210 pounds and I'm five, eight. And that, that hit, that gets me there. Yeah. But that you can't, they do that shit with BMI. That's nonsense. All I know is he said it's unhealthy. You're not obese. I'm technically obese. If you look at the body mass index, I'm technically obese. So maybe the doc, you know, from a medical perspective, they're saying, look, is this a healthy weight that you're weighing? And then, you know. It's not.

It doesn't work that way. It doesn't work that way because you're just doing it on an average of body height. People are built differently. They're just built differently. Their bones are different width. They have different size hands, different width shoulders. They're just built different. Their bones are different width. They have different size hands, different width shoulders. They're thicker. Like Samoans, for instance.

There's some guys that are heavyweight kickboxers. Like, for example, there's a guy named Mark Hunt. Mark Hunt is about 5'10", and he was one of the greatest kickboxers of all time. And he's a heavyweight. At 5'10", he was like 260 pounds. He's a thickweight at 5'10 he was like 260 pounds he's a thick big fucking dude he's not morbidly obese he's just built different some guys are built tiny and frail you can't compare a guy who's 5'10 who's tiny and frail with tiny bones to a guy like Mark Hunt or a lot of other thick a lot of Italians that are

big, thick people at shorter, shorter statures. It's just, you can't do that. That body mass index, it really should be about body fat. Like how much body fat, what percentage body fat do you have? Now, if I'm measured by body fat, I'm not obese at all. I'm not even close. But if you look at just the BMI, I'm technically obese. So this is, this is like a big, you know, people are like, hey, you're going on Joe Rogan.

This guy's, you know, got millions, you know, it's like the most listened to, whatever. So many people are going to hear this. Like, what's the one thing that you would want the world, if you could change something based on this, like what would you want? I would say, well, we should really do a little bit better of educating people how to take care of their bodies, how to eat. Like you go to school and every period is an educational period. And then recess is when you eat. And they don't teach us anything about the importance of what we put in our bodies, how we eat, how it's going to affect us. And it's maybe, you know, the most important decision we're going to make for our long-term health period. And I wish that, I wish we would put

a little bit more energy into that because what you're talking about right here is like, man, if, if people really understood what type of body they had and how to take care of themselves, we would be in way better shape, man. We'd be in a way, we'd just be in a better shape as we all feel better about ourselves when we are healthy and, and, and, and, and, and able to perform right. For sure. I think, you know, I mean, in a perfect world, it would be a normal part of everyone's day to exercise instead of this thing that people dread and people procrastinate about and most people put off if you look at the percentage of people in america that are like legitimately obese not by the body mass index but by percentage of body fat it's on it's unusually high although it's getting better

isn't it getting better i feel as though really visually from what i like if you were to look at like you know 10 years, it was the first generation of children who had a shorter life expectancy than their parents because, you know, congenital heart disease was, was, was just such a massive killer. And it felt at that time, just from observation that, um, that folks in the last, I mean, certainly in the last 10 years, health and health related exercise has been very, way more popular certainly in the last 10 years, health and health-related exercise has been way more popular. Like the gyms are constantly all over the place. Whether or not people are following through, it's definitely, there has been a rebound. You don't feel that way?

I think there has been a popularization of exercise, but in terms of the amount of people that are fit, I don't think there's been that much of a change, unfortunately. And during the pandemic, I think it's actually dropped off. You know, one of the things that we were talking about recently was children during the pandemic. There's been a big upswing in obesity amongst children, unfortunately, and big upswing in the amount of fat gained and weight gained for kids because, you know, for two years, they can't go outside. Yeah.

Yeah. Unfortunately, you know, the hope is that that turns around now and that we were kind of we see the light at the end of the tunnel and we're getting out of this thing. But I, you know, it would have been an amazing it's an amazing opportunity for during the pandemic for people to take care of their health and realize that that's like one of the primary factors of whether or not you have a good outcome versus a bad outcome from COVID. It's a huge, I mean, there's many factors, right? But that's a primary factor. Obesity is one of the biggest comorbidities. There is no, there's just, nobody has ever once argued that there's something negative about being in good shape. Like there just exactly you know i don't care what side of the aisle you sit on if you're in better shape

you know it's better period yeah um and there's no amount of exercise like there are people like my friend i was talking about my partner at the meatball shop this guy might turn out the guy is health obsessed and it's like great you're health obsessed what what you know like no one's shaming you for that man like every time i want to get a whiskey he's out in the gym like good for him like that's a good thing being health obsessed um you could be obsessed about a lot of things why not be obsessed about yeah your health you know he's got a um he's got a uh a protein-based breakfast oatmeal that he just launched it's with gary do you know gary vaynerchuk sure he's he partnered with him and he did this thing that's very how do you get

a protein-based oatmeal so basically he was like and i don't want to mess it up he's the guy you should look at it's he's he's um he started this company called creatures of habit based on he was he started bodybuilding he was he got bodybuilding his bit he was he got his pro card and it was his breakfast every morning he was like i eat my oatmeal and i put all i put i put protein in i put nuts and i make this delicious breakfast and and uh um i want to i want to i want to i want to sell it i'm going to start selling it for folks. So does he have like a whey protein? He's got, I think it's, I don't think it's whey protein. I feel like there was a reason that he is the type of, I mean, he's like, you could talk to this. You should have this guy on the, you should have him on.

Looks good. He's incredibly. Oh, pea protein. It's pea protein. Chia seeds, digestive enzymes, pumpkin seeds, Himalayan pinks. It looks great. Everything he put in there, he's got a reason for it. Stevia.

So you're getting your sweetness without sugar. Looks good. I think you'll be into this guy because he's got a really cool story. He struggled. He was living on his own at 14 years old. He's like the coolest kid I ever met. And he was my best friend for years and years and years. We opened this restaurant together.

We fought like cats and dogs. We went to therapy, couples therapy together. It was a nightmare. And we ended up not talking, breaking up for years. And then we recently reconnected and we're like, you know, I love you. I love you. I get some of that free oatmeal. Give me some of your protein oatmeal.

I eat oatmeal and it's like small on a hand grenade. I got like nine minutes before. Before you have to take a shit? Oh, yeah. Right away. Especially with coffee. Just right away. Yeah.

It's like a pack of cigarettes for other guys. Yeah. Oatmeal and coffee. Those are the ones. Are you a coffee drinker? I drink coffee every morning. Do you pay attention to it? So Matt Robbard, this Food IQ guy,

he went to Ethiopia. He's visiting coffee plantations. The motherland of coffee. He's obsessed with it. And he was like, dude, you're just embarrassing yourself because I was a milk and sugar guy. Because I'm like, it doesn't taste good. Add milk and sugar. It's like melted ice cream. cream i don't care and he's got me on there's

this company yes yes please plz and they do a coffee subscription and they basically send it to you every week and he was like he subscribed me he's like you know get this coffee i get that same from black rifle coffee black i saw that in the store because of your your pocket is good coffee it's the best. They're the best. And they're great people. It's an awesome company. Tell me, is the caffeine in there, do they have different coffees with different levels of caffeine?

Oh, yeah, for sure. It's really on how much you roast it. Like, Dark Roast actually has less caffeine, believe it or not. People think it's a stronger cup of coffee because it's a dark cup of coffee. It's not. Lighter roasts are actually, there's less time in the roasting. It affects the bean less. The flavor is different, and you get more caffeine.

Actually, I'm wearing, this is a Black Rocks jacket. You got the Black Rocks. You got the Fuji match shirt on. Yeah. I love those guys. Yeah, they're great. They did my garage. I like their geese, the Fuji geese, but they fall off my ass.

They don't fit me right yeah i got the wrong like that's wrong for a fuji gee what do you use i i like oh i used to i've got a bunch of old atama geese that are still great they're still in in business you know yeah they're great geese you know but that's my favorite thing you go you travel to a new city you go train and you buy a gee nice and then every now and then they don't wave the maffy and then you're like oh fuck yourself i'm coming back here i bought 170 dollar gee and you didn a gi. Nice. And then every now and then they don't waive the maffie. And then you're like, oh, fuck yourself. I'm never coming back here. I bought a $170 gi and you didn't waive the maffie?

People are like, this is obscure talk here, kids. Your coffee thing, if you're really into it, you get into the flavors and you get into drinking it black. I used to always add cream to my coffee and I still do if i get starbucks because no offense starbucks but generally speaking their black coffee does not taste that good a lot of it is like overcooked and burnt did you i read that howard schultz's um biography and it like turned me into a huge starbucks fan because the guy is just so inspirational you know he like brought like he brought coffee culture to America like I mean coffee didn't exist here before like the espresso culture and espresso bars he just you know for whether you like the coffee or don't or whatever you say he was it's

really phenomenal well they have that one machine if you go to that one machine that was it called a clover yeah like sucks the coffee yeah what is that called yeah is that a quote yeah but i think starbucks like bought them all right yes they're like this is too good yes he no he partnered with the way it's part of his book he like found this guy that was doing this thing and he was like i want to partner with you and bring this to the world it's like it's a genius piece of kit there was a starbucks near my house in california that had one and i used to always get that i would drink black but other than that i just pour some cream in there, and it's good enough. But I generally like a dark roast black coffee, and I've gotten – it's a thing that's like you get accustomed to the flavor and the taste.

Yeah, that's the machine. It's really wild. Like you pour the beans in there, and then you have to kind of whisk it and stir it, and there's some sort of a vacuum pro it is called a clover right and there's a vacuum process that creates the coffee and it's the perfect temperature coffee and then you got this weird hockey puck of grounds that come to the top and then they just sort of scrape that hockey puck off a little squeegee it's amazing but i so this is my matt and i have this conversation all the time

because I'm like, you know, part of coffee culture at a coffee bar is the like theater of it all. Yes. And so when you go to coffee, but then I'm like, we're writing this cookbook and I'm like, dude, can we just actually make coffee

and taste it all these different ways and try and break down what's really important? Like, do I got to steep the beans and then wait 10 minutes and then start again and get the rest of the water in there do i have to you know is that is that a blooming process really matter like how long before i grind the beans and we came to the conclusion that like oh some of the things are and and and look if you got a morning tradition that includes you know putting on your monocle and putting on your bow tie and fucking hand grinding your beans. That's hilarious.

Your pince there. But for me, we were like, actually, fresh grinding your beans makes a huge difference. And then I love a pour over coffee. And blooming the coffee matters. Like getting it wet first and then putting a little more water in afterwards so it has some time. You know what I'm talking about? No, explain that. makes really great coffee, like an old bun machine, where the drip comes down slow, so it gets the ground coffee wet,

and it gives it a chance to, like, absorb the water, and then the flavor to filter out. Whereas if you just pour all the water over dry beans right away... Like a French press. It doesn't... Well, French press, it steeps it in there, right? Right. Like French like french press you pour it in you let it steep in there and then you strain it out but a lot of people when when they do like a pour over coffee or whatever they're doing they

just put the beans in their filter ground beans in their filter pour the hot water over and let it drain through and you leave a lot of the flavor behind whereas Whereas if you get it wet, let it sit for a minute, and then pour the rest of the water through, you get more extraction of the flavor. So when you say get it wet, like how wet? Well, I put 20% of the water in. So for me, I do 21 grams of coffee and 350 grams of water. Jesus.

And that's an eight- Very specific. Well, everything is this way. I'm a psycho about everything I do. I mean, meat i got i do by the by the percentage weight everything's percentage weight for me really you don't just like salt bay it no no i mean i do the salt bay after i weigh it first you know obviously um no everything everything for me is is is that's the way you get great consistency and that's the way you can really figure out what you did wrong and get it better is by adjusting it incrementally, right?

So that 21 grams of ground coffee for whatever it is, a full-size cup of coffee. This is a beautiful one. Do I get to keep this one? Oh, yeah, sure. I just offered that to myself. No, no, no. See, yeah, it's for 100%.

I like this one. It's for you. Thank you. That would be great. Thank you. You're welcome. I'll drink my coffee and look at you every day. All no, no. It's for you. Yeah, it's for 100%. I like this one. It's for you. Thank you. That would be a great, thank you. You're welcome. I'll drink my coffee and look at you every day. All right, beautiful. I'll get weird.

It's handsome. So I take the first 100 grams of water and I pour it over. And then I go and I do some of my morning activities. Before I start the shower, I do my, and then I come back and I finish the coffee the other how much time in between depends upon what i have for dinner the night before really oh so you take a shit take a shit and then i come back i'm gonna finish but so like 15 minutes yeah it could be any amount of time it's just really it should it'll i don't like to drink my coffee super hot so i don't mind that extra time to cool it down a bit but i think you just want to give it about two minutes for the coffee to bloom for, to, for the,

whatever, you know, there are scientists that would explain like the starches are absorbing the water, which is allowing them to release. Because if you think about pouring coffee over, it's like little ground pebbles of coffee beans. You pour the water over and you want the water to have a chance to leach out the flavor that's inside of the ground.

And like espresso is really fast and you grind it really, really fine, right? Whereas maybe a French press is going to steep for quite a while, so you grind it quite a bit coarser. And so pour over maybe is somewhere in between, but it still needs a few seconds to steep. But that's what you prefer, the pour over? Yeah, I'm a pour over guy. I had a guy on my podcast many years ago, Peter Giuliano.

Is that how you say his last name? He is like a legit coffee expert. Like I just started kind of getting into coffee and I was like, well, there's got to be a guy out there that really knows coffee. And I got this guy on and he gave me a full, he's like a fanatic. What's his name? Does he own a coffee company or is he? I don't remember. Coffee Science Foundation?

Science. This guy's a real coffee. Coffee Specialty Association. He knows so much. There you go. But one of the things that he explained was that all coffee comes from Ethiopia and that this idea of Colombian coffee

and then coffee in South America, it was brought to South America from Ethiopia. And then they had to deal with a bunch of issues like coffee rust, like mold growing on coffee and stuff like that because Ethiopia is a very arid climate and they would just dry the beans out in the sun. But you couldn't do that in these very moist South American climates so that they had to come up with a completely different method of processing the coffee.

Processing the curing beans. Yeah. Interesting. Very interesting. Because when you think about coffee, a lot of times people think of Columbia, right? You think of like Juan Valdez and the Colombian coffee. I mean, there was a commercial when we were kids of the guy with the donkey. Yeah, absolutely.

The can. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was great. Everybody's got that can. I put my money in there. But it all came from Ethiopia. One of these kids got a coffee company in Jamaican Coffee. Oh, really? And I don't know.

I don't want to advertise it. He stiffed me with a bill at a restaurant. Really? I was like, you're so rich. And he just jammed on the bill. I was eating with him. We were eating dinner together. And then he was like, yeah, I gotta go.

I was like, oh. Bill came and I was like, damn, this guy's got so much dough. And he didn't even offer to pay? He was out. He was out. Blame it on the marijuana, I guess. Well, there's a little bit of that.

Dine and dash is a good excuse. But he told you he was leaving, right? Yeah, but then he gave me like a pound of coffee a couple weeks later. He was like, you should put this in your restaurant. I was like, oh, homie, if you wanted to, you know, pick up.

Send me a thousand bucks. Pick up your portion. That was like $38. Oh, you're complaining about $38? Yeah, I'm a Jew from New York, but I remember every penny that's ever been stiffed. What did you guys go to eat? Oh, man, where was I? I was with.

What were you eating? I can't tell you because it would betray the restaurant that I was in and the folks that I was with. And you eating I can't I can't tell you because it would it would it would betray the restaurant that I was in and the folks that I was with and they would be

really upset you know like this is again like 11 million people are gonna be googling this thing I'm gonna get hate mail

okay I understand I understand but is it 11 million people it's a lot do you know them all but yeah

I don't think about it I try not to think about it otherwise I'd be weirded out by this conversation if you if you thought about the amount of people. How many people know that I take a shit between when I put the water in the coffee at the beginning? Don't think about it.

Don't think about the numbers that are listening. It'll fuck up the experience. It doesn't bother me. Good. It seems to not be bothering you at all. But there is a pen and paper here, which makes me feel like that's my. But occasionally sometimes like mine is like scattered with like little things that I'm supposed to remember and I rarely check. But there's, like, a few people that I've booked because of conversations that I've had with people.

Oh, yeah. You take a note. You want to get back to something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I don't want to interrupt you, but I don't want to stop your flow, but I have a thought for later. How long did this book take to write? We spent a year on this book, Matt and I. The writing, because there's 120,000 words in there.

So listen, like you work in a restaurant, you teach people how to cook for a living. And the way I think about it is most cookbooks explain how to do an individual task, but don't really take the time to explain the why behind what you're doing is important and Kind of like if you lead a horse to water and you beat it over the head and you can't keep it alive necessarily But if you teach it to drink or fish it'll like feed itself for years, you know saying I think you fucked that thing I know what you're saying Right a horse if you if you give people the the the the if you explain the the why behind what they're

doing it gives them the like entrepreneurial authority to make decisions in the kitchen and gives them the confidence to like cook with without being so people are scared a lot of times of changing one thing because they think they're going to ruin the dish because they don't understand what they're doing. Right. So we were like, we want to not just write a cookbook, but we had this column together where it was 100 questions from my friend, the chef. And it was like, I got a question. Can you explain what's going on here so I really can understand it? And this was expansion of that where we were like, we take a question we we have an article that explains what's really going on

and then the recipe for me is very delicious but the real goal of the recipe is to like help illustrate for instance like you go to the supermarket there are all these different types of olive oil you're like they're like 30 for a little bottle and then this one's like a gallon for 10 bucks like why are they different i don't really understand am i supposed to do something oil like they're like $30 for a little bottle and then this one's like a gallon for ten bucks like why are they different I don't really understand am I supposed to do something different with them but as an American we're just like you know the most expensive is the best so I'm just gonna buy the most expensive one I always wanted to know about that like what what is the difference in all

oils so there are depending upon the extraction and the yield from the crop and the the and the real estate price of where it's being grown, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. The different olive oils have different strengths, different flavor, you know, strengths of flavor. So some of them are very, very light flavored and neutral and they're great for salad dressings and for cooking with. And some of them are extraordinarily pungent, like can be spicy and fruity. And they're really like a seasoning for finishing something with. So we then take, we explain that, you know, how that process works, why that is, why a $30 olive oil, if you were to, you know, $30 for a small bottle of olive oil,

if you were to cook with it, it's just like a big waste or make a salad dressing. It can be really, bottle olive oil. If you were to cook with it, it's just like a big waste or make a salad dressing. It can be really, it can clash with the lemon and be very spicy, bitter, and unpleasant. And, and then we illustrate it with a recipe that says, Hey, we got this, this pasta where we're going to saute the garlic and the light flavored olive oil. And then at the end, we're going to finish it with a, with this finishing expensive olive oil. So you can really see like, now I understand. So now from then on you're going to understand how to use this ingredient and you'll never have a question again you'll never have like you'll never have to go back to the recipe if that makes sense

how does one know like is it based on price like how do you know like what's like a more robust and it's 10 bucks a 10 bucks a liter basically for the lighter flavored stuff and $30 a liter is the expensive stuff. It's basically what it comes down to for restaurant pricing. So, you know, you see a bottle of, you know, Colavita or whatever it is and it's a big bottle for $8 and it says – it's always extra virgin olive oil that I'm using. It's always extra virgin olive oil that I'm using, but the less expensive stuff has got a bigger yield. They're getting more out of it. It's less concentrated.

It's a milder. It's a milder olive oil. And what is a really good, expensive, strong-tasting olive oil? What companies? There's a company called Laudemio that, for me, is the number one. Spell that? L-A-U-D-E-M-I-O, maybe. Laudemio that for me is the number one it's a bit and like spell that l-a-u-d-e-m-i-o maybe it's got a great look laudemio i'm probably it's like fresco ball did the santa gata the laudemio oh i'm not allowed to do it oh shit they told me if you do accents you're done no

accents you can do accents italian accents yeah i'm italian who's they that you're not the guy that's you're not that's okay It's okay. Those are my people. Those are my people. Oh, wow. So Laudemio oil, it's so expensive. Look at that. It's like a tiny bottle. But this stuff is-

$44 for 16 ounces. This stuff, for me, it's like liquid gold, man. There are a lot of great finishing oils out there. And like anything else, it's a seasonal product that gets pressed in the fall, and you've got to use that years. If you leave it sitting around, it's not going to be good anymore. And are you a guy that will sprinkle a little bit of that on a steak and then add some salt to it after you're done? I love that. Yeah.

The first time, like, that beef steak of Fiorentina, the first time I had olive oil and lemon and salt on steak, it was like. I got obsessed with, before I got this Argentine grill, I got obsessed with watching Italians cook steak over wood. Because there's, believe it or not, and I don't know a fucking word they're saying. They're just talking in the native tongue over there. And they're cooking these steaks over wood and then eating it and going, oh, oh, with the hands and serving it and it's it's pretty amazing and there's a bunch of restaurants in Florence that specialize in just steak which you think of steak houses as being

very much an American thing but in Italy this is their thing, and they almost universally are cooking over wood. And so I got really into it. There's a, I mean, I've definitely had some extraordinary experiences in Tuscany with those steaks, and then in Florence with the steaks. And then, you know, you think, well, maybe it was just because I was like, because you get high on the experience of being there, and you're like, I don't know, was it really that good? That's why I went back to Le Barbecue, because I was like, because you get high on the experience of being there, and you're like, I don't know, was it really that good? That's why I went back to Le Barbecue, because I was like,

I don't know, man, that was the first time I ever had it. Let me go back, and then you eat it again, and you're like, nope. This is really good. They're doing something special, and that's how I feel about Florence. The steaks in Florence, it's something special. It's a specific type of cow as well, correct? It's what they call the Chianina cow. There's that Dario the Butcher who's made it all famous

because he's, I don't know, he's like reciting from, what's that poet, Dario the Butcher's, anyway. There was a book by a disciple of Mario Batali's who wrote about it and really blew this guy up. And he's this crazy larger than life character. They're working cows. So they're tough if you try and cook them. They're cooked very rare.

And it's one of the few instances that you see a thick, tough steak cooked blood rare and it can be tender because generally more working cow makes a tougher meat, right? So you got to cook it longer and slower. It's a little counterintuitive. That's why when you see like the grass fed meat and people talk about it not being that great, it's like you don't really know how to cook it. It's not supposed to be like when

you go down to Argentina, you don't necessarily get like a thick steak like you do in America. It's a different way of cooking this specific thing that makes it great for what it is. I was going to ask you about that. Do you prefer a grain-fed steak or a grass-fed steak? So, like, if I want a thick-ass ribeye and it's going to be delicious, like, American experience, it's a grain-fed steak is the American steak experience that I know and love. The flavor of grass-fed beef is you know is phenomenal right and it can be a richer flavor it can be rich and fuller and you got this i love i also really like

a toothsome texture on a steak whereas we really we we put a high we put a high um a price on tenderness here where here america amer Americans generally whereas I like I like a toothsome steak and grass-fed can have a great texture chewy texture which I like yeah I don't get that whole need for everything to be something you can eat with your gums like you got your teeth yeah I just give it a couple years make fake teeth man you can get new teeth if you lose a tooth I just don't I don't understand this. I think it's a lazy thing, like a not wanting to work even when you're eating. But America, I mean, America has the greatest meat in the world.

I'm a big America guy. Like, I love my country. I really, and I love the food here. I think, you know, I love McDonald's and I love the fancy. I love it all, man. You love McDonald's? I love it all. Do you like love McDonald's? I love it all. Do you like Filet-O-Fish?

I've never had the Filet-O-Fish. That's what I love. My wife loves the Filet-O-Fish. That's what I love. I eat the chicken nuggets. I'm a nugget man. Oh, God. With that barbecue sauce.

Chicken dicks. It's just chicken dicks and assholes. I know this is not part of this podcast, but just so you know, only three birds have penises and chickens are not one of them. They got that cloaca. Yeah. But only three birds. Chickens don't have.

So there's no chicken penis in a chicken nugget. Chicken asshole. Good call. You're right. You got me on a technicality. If there were ducks. Ducks have giant dicks. They're the longest penis of any animal.

And they're corkscrewed like a fucking drill. And they can become erect and ejaculate in less than a half a second. Wow. And they can do fly-by. There's a whole book about it. And unfortunately, almost all duck sex is non-consensual. Non-consensual. And they fly-by and do it.

But they never know. It's like it's half a second. Yeah. Yeah. It's really something else. It's awful. But that's why, after that, that's why they took away the penises from the rest of the birds. Duck is a goddamn delicious bird.

So here's the thing about- I had some duck the other night from a local Chinese restaurant. It was phenomenal. Duck fat is special. The same way the pork fat is special. For fries? It melts at a low temperature, and it can be very more- It's like you almost never see cold preparations of meat with a lot of fat except for pork and duck because that fat melts at a low temperature.

Do you ever have a cold lamb? Yes. And it can be kind of waxy. Cold beef is the same way. The fat doesn't melt in your mouth. I eat a lot of cold beef. You do? Yeah, because what I do is I'll cook like because I'm on this wacky diet and I don't have a lot of time.

So I'll set aside, like, I'll cook, like, four or five ribeyes. And then I slice them up and I'll put them in, like, a sealed glass Tupperware type deal. And then in the morning I do my training and then I'll eat. And I eat, I just pour some hot sauce on a plate and I dip the cold steak into the hot sauce and I eat it. What kind of hot sauce? My favorite right now currently is a company called Senor Lechuga out of Brooklyn. And they're fucking phenomenal.

Do you know these guys? No. Who's Senor Lechuga out of Brooklyn? Well, my friend Andrew who runs Half Face Blades, he sent me a, he's a former Navy SEAL who's a knife manufacturer. He makes knives. And he sent me one that he – oh, look at my quote on there. Legit as fuck.

Look at that. Look, habanero, onions, reapers, they have all these different flavors like Andrew's has. Um, it's got, uh, I think he uses reapers and you love it. Super spicy like that. Oh, you're a real man. I,

I have, I have like a hot ish guy. I like it hot. Um, he, um, he has, um,

truffles, I think, um, dried tomatoes or something like that. I think that's what he has, but he sent me a giant batch of it. It's phenomenal. It's really delicious. It's got a great taste, but it's also very spicy. And so what I'll do is I'll pour a bunch of it on the plate,

and I'll dip these slices of cold steak in. And that's generally like, I would say that's like 80% of the time that's what I eat for breakfast. So listen to this. So like, this is a cookbook. We have the last chapter is like project. Some cooking, we're obsessed with cooking shit fast here in America.

Like, you're like, I gotta cook this. And everything you look online, it're like, I gotta cook this. And everything you look online, it's like, yo, how can I make a roast chicken in 10 minutes? 10 minute abs. You're like, you can't. You can't make a roast. There's lots of great chicken dishes in 10 minutes. Like, roast chicken ain't one of them.

And so there's a hot sauce recipe in here. It takes like three weeks. And I really, it takes more than that. But you should, you got the book. I really think it's only got five ingredients. It's a fermented hot sauce that I've been making for years. I got obsessed with it. So you make your own hot sauce too.

I make my own hot sauce and, you know, not to sell, man. Just for, I used to make it as a meatball shop. I used to do it at the meatball shop. And I, man, we got it embargoed by the health department. It was a whole thing. What happened? Okay. meatball shop and uh i man we got it embargoed by the health department the whole thing um what happened okay so so i had this commissary kitchen in brooklyn and and i was fermenting hot sauce which is you know i don't think you're allowed to do this um i did a bunch of research about it but i knew you weren't allowed to do this so i labeled it man I don't think you're allowed to say this

I'm going to get in trouble but that's okay it's worth it I labeled it like like fermented hand soap because I thought the health department would come in and be like oh he's just like making hand soap it's like non-edible fermented hand soap like it'll be fine and they were like what's this and I was like

oh it's like hand soap and they just didn't buy it at all like how stupid do we think you like zero chance and so they they were like this is hot sauce they made me they went they went to every single one of our restaurants i had like nine restaurants at the time and they put an embargo on my hot sauce i had to like lock it up why what's wrong with i don't understand well because it because if you're gonna ferment something they're worried about like bacterial growth not doing it right and killing a bunch lock it up. Why? What's wrong with, I don't understand. Well, because it, cause if you're going to ferment something, they're worried about like bacterial growth, not doing it right and killing a bunch of people,

which frankly I should be concerned about as well. Yeah. But come on with hot sauce. Is that even a situation? Has anyone ever died from? Nope. I mean, no one has ever died from,

from fermented. So basically. Overregulation. You could do that in Texas. They wouldn't give a fuck. They'd give you a gun too. People are just dropping dead from hot sauce right in the left eye. Ultimately, I had to give a sample of it to NYU and they did like a three-week incubation process and then I got it unembargoed.

And so this has now been proven to be safe. NYU has a fucking hot sauce lab? now been proven to be safe. NYU has a fucking hot sauce lab? They had to put it in an incubator and they try and grow negative bacteria out of it so they're like, as if you left it in your cupboard. But isn't that like the whole

reason for hot sauce in a lot of climates? Like a lot of like, that's one of the reasons why Mexico uses a lot of hot sauce. I was under the impression that those spices actually kill a lot of the bad bacteria. Like, isn't that one of the reasons why they use wasabi in sushi as well? I think that's a fallacy.

Oh, really? Yeah, yeah. I think if you have bad meat and you put hot sauce on it, you just get spicy bad meat. I don't mean it that way, but I mean, I think that- No, no. I think it's actually a fallacy. Oh. But let's Google-

Can we look that up? Yeah, let's Google that. Because I remember watching this thing, maybe I was reading something, where a Japanese sushi chef was talking about how foolish Americans are to eat sushi without wasabi and that wasabi actually helps protect you from the potential bad bacteria of the sushi. I imagine a world where that Japanese man believed what he was saying was true and said it with great enthusiasm. But I always thought if you think about places where it's hot, hot temperature.

But they'd also grow, that's where chilies grow. Chilies grow where it's hot. It kills a specific bacteria, H. pylori, which can cause digestive problems, but it doesn't kill

all bacteria and it doesn't kill parasites or anything like that. Well, yeah. But, okay, so some bacteria. So they probably figured it out in some place. So there's probably something to it. Now, is that just hot peppers?

Like, all hot peppers? This says, and this thing I looked up, specifically Japanese wasabi. Oh. It said other things. You might be getting a mixture of... This is what CNN has an issue with right here, because he's like, listen, you're fine. As long as you eat the chili, you'll be fine.

I don't think I said that. Yeah, this says, sadly, you're not getting real wasabi at your average restaurant because it's difficult to make and very expensive, so it's a mixture of- Horseradish. It could be horseradish with green food coloring. Yeah, Phillip said that, too. You know, Phillip was the head chef at Sushi Bar ATX.

Is he opening? When is he opening his sushi? He's got another place that's opening up very soon. I believe it's going to be in March, and I will most certainly announce it on my Instagram and fuck up his entire organization. Oh, actually, so the very next thing talks about a myth about mixing wasabi with soy sauce,

and the very first sentence is, don't do it. Wasabi's original germ-killing purpose is no longer valid. You're not getting real wasabi. Can I ask where you're – is this like a – I went to – it's grunge.com, and it's sushi myths that are very stupid. Okay. Let's go with hot, spicy food, like hot peppers.

Try that. Google that same thing. So I typed in wasabi. Does wasabi kill bacteria? Right, but let's just Google hot peppers kill bacteria, like spicy peppers, because I think that was what I had heard first. And I think Bourdain might have been the one who told me that. I mean, I never speak poorly about the dead, so I would know.

Capiscums, there you go. Including chilies and other hot peppers are in the middle of the antimicrobial pack, killing or inhibiting up to 75% of bacteria, while pepper of the white or black variety inhibits 25% of bacteria. So that is true. So spicy food does kill some bacteria, 75% of bacteria. Wow, man. But look at this.

Spicy food really does not kill bacteria in another one. Wow man Look at this spicy food really does not Kill bacteria in another one What are the fucking It's complicated Who's right I think that we get to tie We both get to live to fight another day That's a big

Does spicy food kill bacteria Yes hot foods kill bacteria There are two main reasons why spicy foods kill bacteria. The first thing you read, it comes from a 1998 article. No, right below that. I know, but I'm saying the first thing you read. Oh, I say in 1998 they thought that. What about that one before that food vision that says it does?

Yeah, click, see when that article is. 2021. It says it does. So what are they basing it on? I know, but that's why I said it's like a blog, so. That's the problem, right? This is just fake news. God damn it. 100% fake news.

Sorry to say. Go back. Go back. Go back to what you just saw and scroll down a little bit. So it says, yes, hot foods kill bacteria. The two main reasons why hot foods kill bacteria. Heat from the spices killing off any harmful bacteria in your mouth some of these spices contain an ingredient called cap yeah capsaicin I always say that wrong which can help stop harmful stomach bugs

like e coli and salmonella does spicy food kill stomach bacteria some of the spices contain an ingredient called capsaicin which helps they're repeating themselves I wouldn't go with this is a shitty blog all right that's I know I think you should go to Harvard you know I would never pull that it's probably Russian disinformation probably that food boy that's exactly what it is go to half face blades senior lechuga sauce because this is my absolute favorite. He just sent me a giant jar of it. And this stuff, I'm pretty sure it has,

I think it has dried tomatoes in it too. I think it has like reapers. Truffle reaper it's called. Yeah, go to it so I can see. It's up, it's up, it's up. Oh, sorry. That's it right there. Wow.

Yeah, oh, heirloom tomatoes. So it's got heirloom tomatoes. It's got winter truffle and reapers. That stuff is the shit. That is my absolute favorite hot sauce. I'd love to try this. I'll get you some. I'll get you some.

I'll have some sent to you. Truffle infusion right on you. A hundred percent. Wow, he's got a lot of ingredients. His stuff is so good, man. I'm telling you, it's both spicy. I don't like just want, you like that's like you know they have that no offense to the show

but that hot wing show where you eat it's hot the wings it's funny have you been on that show? I don't want to answer questions while I'm crying it doesn't make any sense I talk enough to not do anybody else's show

but when you do like the flavor of something and it also has a kick, that's what I like. That's why I like the Senor Lechugas. I think that that's something that people lose sight of. And I could not agree with you more emphatically. Yeah. Like the spice of these chilies, especially when you're talking about something like habanero, which is so spicy. It's got a really special

like floral fruity flavor. And then people just want to kill it with the spice. You're like, yo man, it's a seasoning. Right. It's not just for the heat.

Like we could just put cayenne pepper on there if you just want. You lose something. You lose something by just, it's like a macho thing I think. Guys want to just like. Although some people are born with a different,

like my step sister, my sister-in-law my brother's wife stephanie she um she loves spice so much that i'm like there's there's something about your tongue that's different as she likes by so much that as a little kid she heard that her aunt had pepper spray in her purse. And this is a legitimately true story. She went down after everyone went to sleep at like seven years old and sprayed herself in the face with pepper spray. Oh my God. Woke the whole, and she just, you know,

everybody's like, what did they do? What did they bring to the hospital? They're like, no, they laughed at me. They just laughed at me. Oh my God, that's hilarious. Yeah, so she likes spice in a way where I'm like, it's not just liking spice. Like your tongue is not picking up

the same sensitivity that my tongue is. I think you're 100% correct about that because my kids vary wildly. And my wife has a sensitivity to spicy food and I love spicy food. So I have one daughter that hates spicy food, doesn't want any spice and I have another one who's a little savage who has seen your lechuga and

just she puts it she'll like pour it on like she'll like we'll have like chicken and she'll dip like drumsticks into this hot sauce and be chewing on I'm like are you okay like in the beginning it freaked me out but you know she's fucking 11 and when she was like nine, she was doing this. I was like, this is wild. This kid is concerning. This kid's a savage. I thought she was like playing it up.

Like she was going to start crying. And then, but nope. She's like, this is bad. And she laughed. She's like, it's not even that spicy. Like something's going on with her mouth. It's very different than my middle daughter. My main problem with the spicy is that I like it from here to here.

But like. You're an asshole. Oh, my God, dude. middle daughter my main problem with the spicy is that um i like it from here to here but like your asshole oh my god the gift that keeps on giving that snake bite is no i just can't do it i mean it is a weird feeling when you're your assholes on fire from the food you ate in your mouth like what's going on inside that's the other thing there's this uh guy named paul saladino he's uh he's he goes by this uh the name carnivore md and he's a firm believer that most of the foods that people eat are not necessarily good for you to thrive on and he believes that like meat and fruit are the safest bets and he thinks that hot peppers are bullshit it's like it's really not good for you. They create leaky gut. They create inflammation. Like when you're taking in that spice, that is basically defense chemicals

from these plants so that you don't eat them. That's what they want. They want you to not eat them. So you bite into it, it's fucking horrendously painful and that keeps animals from eating them. But then at the same time, those same spicy, you know, birds don't have a sensitivity to spice.

And so the flowers are designed in such a way as to attract the birds to eat them to spread their seeds. So you're like, man, I'm not a botanist and I'm not an evolutionary scientist. But like clearly there's a lot of information we don't know out there. And there've been, I mean, with talking about the gluten stuff and they're making their leaps and bounds. Every day they're discovering new information

about the way our bodies work and process food. And we're gonna get to the bottom of it very soon because there's a lot of bullshit out there. I mean, there's so much bullshit when it comes to food and it's so annoying and like you know my mom was like is a real hippie she eats like she's like only mashed organic food and then you know we all made fun of her and like 50 years later turns out she was right and the hippies won and like you should eat only like organic, healthy, natural foods. And you shouldn't be eating all this chemical crap. So I feel like over the course of the next however many years, we're going to start to really see how our body works, unlock these.

And then, you know, some of the shit will be right and some of it will be. Have you eaten in Italy? I have. I've traveled a bit. Do you notice the difference in the way your body feels when you eat their pasta? Okay. So I got to, this is a big myth. This is a big myth that I got to debunk.

How so? Okay. Well, I don't really know what I'm talking about. So I want to start with that as a caveat. And then I want to get into a lot of the pasta made in Italy is made with American wheat. A lot of the pasta that we think of as Italian, they actually import a lot of their wheat. So I don't believe that it's, I don't believe that genetically the wheat is,

and I'm not, again, I don't know this. Like we need to get, who's the scientist? I was just on some show the other day and I said something and they were like, well, Neil deGrasse Tyson was on here last week and he said, oh, he doesn't know jack shit about wheat. I was like, that guy doesn't. But my friend Maynard Keenan,

you know, the lead singer of Google, he owns, well, he owns Merkin Vineyards, so he makes his own wine. But he also- Isn't a Merkin a male? It's a girl. It's a toupee for your vagina. I think it's a pretty unisex.

Is it? Maybe. I mean, I could definitely wear- Well, that's him. He's a silly boy. He likes to- So he did that on purpose. He's a brown belt in jujitsu, too, by the way.

I'm not going to talk shit. Yeah, he's a legit athlete and a real martial artist and a great guy. Just a genius person. But anyway, my point is he told me that what was going on is, and he makes pasta and makes breads and his osteria. He has a really great osteria in Old Town Scottsdale, Arizona. Where's it called? Merkin Osteria.

It's really great pizza, really great food. He's just an awesome guy, and his wine is fantastic too. He's got a lot of really interesting experimental wines. He has an experimental champagne that he made and great stuff. But anyway, he told me that they used to have wheat that was essentially lower yield, and it had less complex glutens in it. And through manipulation over the years of, you know, just selective growing, they've developed a wheat that is a higher yield per acre. But the problem with it is it's like a denser, thicker wheat with more complex glutens.

And with some people, they have more difficulty in processing that wheat. Now, he said when you get wheat that is from Europe, that is heirloom wheat. And he likes a mixture of them, by the way. He doesn't necessarily. He's like for the bite and the chew, he likes a little bit of the more complex wheat that people have a harder time digesting but his take is just have it in moderation don't eat it all day every day but eat it occasionally the problem is that i as a chef i get very hung up on this like gluten-free thing it's very difficult you know because you just get people coming in your restaurants with their allergies and they're 99 of it is bullshit and so um i get

like a visceral negative reaction when anybody has and i put a smile on my face and i'm like i serve people and i want them to have a great experience so i don't want to be rude but i'm just like have you ever done one of those food allergy tests because you said you have allergies right to hay fever and stuff like that you should i't do it. You should. I know that I'm allergic to gluten. I know. How could I not? You should smell. That's what I'm saying. I think that's real. And I think,

listen, nobody loves pasta or pizza more than me. I fucking love it. When I'm eating a big bowl of pasta, I'm a glutton. I eat way too much of it, whether it's lasagna or spaghetti. And that's how I get fat. You know that Felix is one block away from my house. Oh, yeah.

One block away. That is the best restaurant. That is literally one of the absolute best restaurants on planet Earth. That guy makes pasta. Oh, my God, does he make pasta. And it's so good. It's so good. I guess it charges you for it.

Yes, it should. That was $100. You're on fucking Abbot Kinney in the middle of, it's expensive over there, even though there's tents everywhere. But point is, that place, I'm eating pasta. Fuck my diet. But it's like, for the most part, my body doesn't react the best when I have a lot of bread. I feel like that is the Eastern European kind of like body shape of a beer belly is some sort of must be some sort of gluten, you know, sensitivity or whatever, or, or we get it

from, from that. And we all look the same and it's great. Look, I support it. I mean, until my wife loves me, loves my belly, and I love it. I would have a hard time giving it up, man. I don't give it up. I don't give it up, but I've cut it way back. Cut it way back.

Like the other night, I had tacos. We had some CM Smokehouse, another fantastic place in town. Nick, the owner of the comedy club that we work at, Vulcan Gas Company, he went to CM Smokehouse and brought a ton of fucking insane tacos back to the green room. Oh my god, it was good. And I'm not, I wasn't going to leave

them there. I had to indulge. With wheat flour tortillas. Wheat flour tortillas that are cooked in beef tallow, apparently. So good so good yes it was so good it was phenomenal because in California were mostly mostly corn I like corn tortillas I love corn tortillas too I love authentic Mexican food I'm a giant fan of like real legit Mexican food so we talked about I talked about this all

the time trying to like figure it out like Mexican food. So we talk about, I talk about this all the time. I'm trying to like figure it out. Like Mexican food is one of the greatest cuisines in the world. You know, like why does a country develop a, this amazingly complex food? Like why do they have a relationship to food that allows them to make it one of the things that they put their energies into? Like, you know,

you look at Japan versus Japan and China and Vietnam, and then you look at other countries in the near vicinity, and you're like, wow, these cuisines are so spectacular. You look at Mexico, and you're like, why is the food here so good? What is it? Italy, I mean, different areas in the world have cultures that are surrounded by food and love for food. But, like, why is Mexican food so good?

Why is it breakfast, lunch, and dinner? Is it the confluence of ingredients? Is it the people's passion for it? I don't know. Well, there's so much going on in Mexico, right? First of all, there's a giant emphasis on family. That is a big part of Mexico and also a big part of Italy, which maybe like one of the reasons why I'm drawn to it it's because like my grandmother used to cook she used to make her own pasta she made her own

sauce they grew the tomatoes in the backyard I mean I remember to this day my grandmother rolling out the flour and rolling out the dough to make pasta make lasagna and make all different kinds of pasta. And there's something about those meals where the whole family is together just going, oh, this is incredible. It's like there's an emphasis in a lot of Latin cultures, like Italian being one of them and Mexico being another one of them, where the emphasis is around these family meals.

where the emphasis is around these family meals. And there's something about Mexican cuisine that is, like I said, I'm a giant fan of spicy, which is also a factor for sure, right? Because like a fantastic carne asada with like a little bit of a kick to it. And it's like there's something about like mole, delicious flavors. And I'm just, I just, I think there's so many different exciting flavors that come out of Mexican restaurants and Mexican cuisine. And there's a guy in America that's like the guy out of Chicago, you know, Rick Bayless. He was an anthropologist doing his master's degree in Mexico and was like, fuck this. I give it up. This is so good.

And he just devoted his whole life to studying and promoting and cooking Mexican food. He was an anthropologist? Yeah. Oh, wow. He's such a smart guy. And when he talks about food, it's just so inspiring.

Yeah, contagious. And he knows, and the towns and where it came from, he takes a scientific approach. Have you seen the Pasta Granny's Instagram? No. It's like all grandmothers in Italy making pasta by hand, and they're 100 years old, and it's fantastic. Oh, wow. That sounds great.

The Pasta Granny's? Pasta Granny's is great. I follow Rick Bayless on Instagram. Oh, my God. Those ladies all look like my grandmother. And they're all just like, you know, making pasta. Oh, yeah. There it is. Look at her go. You know, these hands. Oh, my God. Those ladies all look like my grandmother. And they're all just like, you know, making pasta. Oh, yeah. There it is.

Look at her go. You know, these hands. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah, exactly. Look at that. But Rick Bayless, I saw him speak a bunch of years back in Chicago, and I was so inspired by that guy.

And his food is as good as it should be. Like, you know, it's not just that he writes about food or talks about food. His restaurants are fantastic. What is his restaurant in Chicago called? XO, XO something? I'm losing the name, and it's embarrassing because I should know it. It's out, Jamie. You'll find it.

But he took a lot of shit. People are saying he's culturally appropriating Mexican culture by cooking Mexican food. It's like, my God, why are you even concentrating on that? The man loves this food. He's promoting Mexican cuisine with honor and respect and dignity and passion. He's so enthusiastic about it. It's only helping people.

There's nothing this man is doing that is in any way, shape or form wrong or disingenuous. Not in any way. The guy worships Mexican cuisine. I mean, I was watching a video on his Instagram the other day where he was talking about going into a Mexican supermarket in Chicago. So he's showing all these incredible ingredients that he's getting from the supermarket and how he's going to use them in his meals. I feel like I was just talking to my buddy about that yesterday. Like when, how does it, how do we, how do we, you know, like, look, like I don't look, my name is Daniel. I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings. Like I just want to be a good guy out there and the world is constantly changing. Stuff is evolving. So like I need, I need the rules. I don't want to be, I don't want to be in trouble for something when the rules change out from under me so like if someone could help me to understand

better exactly where the line between appropriation and you can't let them do that here it's called frontera grill you can't ask that question because the people that are going to answer are assholes the people that are going to be the ones that want to tell you what you can and can't do are assholes. Because generally speaking, reasonable people are going to understand exactly what you're doing. You're not an Italian guy, but you're making pizza. There's not a fucking Italian that gives a shit about that. I get nervous. That's what I got.

I was like, am I going to get in trouble? That's my people. They don't fucking care. If your pizza is great, they love it. They'll say, oh, fucking Daniel makes the best pizza. They don't give a shit. And thank, they love it. They'll say, oh, fucking Daniel makes the best pizza. They don't give a shit. And thank God they don't. It's not the people of that culture.

It would be a few really noisy people that just want to get attention and just want to be negative and complain and just shit on people for no fucking reason. And it's just because they know that it's it it's a it's a hot button you can press it and you can get attention and for rick bayless it didn't work you know no one really cares he's a genuinely you know you watch his videos the guy fucking loves mexico he loves it i mean he's i can understand someone being like i don't know why this guy's the foremost expert when he's like some white guy from chicago He's not. He's not the foremost expert. He's just an expert. He's just a guy who loves the cuisine.

There's probably a thousand people that know much more about it that live in Mexico. But here's a guy speaking English right there that's promoting this amazing, delicious food. And he has a great restaurant. You can go enjoy his food. But the fucking thing about cultural appropriation that's so crazy is we live in a giant melting pot of cultures, and that's one of the cool things about America. Look, we're both

experts in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, right? I mean, we literally learned a martial art that was created in South America, or it was stolen from Japan. Well, improved upon, though. For sure, the difference between the way the art was practiced before, when Count Maeda came to Brazil,

versus when Elio Gracie and Carlos Gracie perfected it, when they went over it and really worked on the ground game and concentrated more on the ground game, and then when Hickson and Hoyce and all these people took it out to the rest of the world, it's a different martial art. And it's a martial art that has come out of these cultures melting together. And that's beautiful. It's not negative in any way, shape, or form.

We represent it. Both of us are black belts in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. I have a black belt in taekwondo, which is Korean. I mean, we're involved in this melting pot of ideas. In all fairness, you would definitely see that, like, you know, think about, like, the cultural appropriation of playing cowboys versus Indians, where you're like, okay, that's insensitive for somebody to be like, let me play this game where I'm pretending to shoot Indians when you're like, dude, these are Native Americans that were slaughtered

while we just like- Yeah, that's a different story. That's like pretending to be Holocaust guards. Exactly. There is clearly a line where some stuff, like there's a gray area maybe, but there's definitely some stuff

where you're like, yeah, man, that's not okay. Well, here's why that's not okay, right? Also, like even Germans shouldn't be playing Holocaust guards, right? Like, you shouldn't be playing a concentration camp guard if you're fucking German, right? Because it's a horrific part of our culture. The idea of cowboys and Indians, the problem was in movies— I don't think there are Germans playing Holocaust guards like a thing.

No, they're not. I was like, that's not a thing. So you can't. Yeah, you can't. But, you know, when we think of cowboys and Indians, we don't think of genocide. We don't think of the fact that this entire culture of Native Americans was eradicated off of a continent, which it actually was. Actually, in real life was, yeah. We think of it in terms of the films that glorified this sort of Western trek that the settlers did.

Manifest destiny. Yeah. this sort of Western trek that the settlers did. Manifest destiny. Yeah. But that's a good point, in that we're talking about a different thing, because you're talking about tragic, historic. Like if you made a funny movie about the Trail of Tears,

people would be like, what the fuck is wrong with you? Or just perpetuating some sort of a negative stereotype about a people where you're like, yo, man, I can completely understand why, where there's a line. And I'm like, right. But you don't get that from being an American person who loves Brazilian

jujitsu. There's a difference between being like, I'm going to open a Chinese restaurant because I love Chinese food and I want to cook the food. I want to learn about it. And I'm going to open a Chinese restaurant where, you know, my waiters have to use a fake Chinese accent and pretend to be Chinese.

So you'd be like, well, one is inappropriate. One is. Yes. There's a very, very different, very different. But the Brazilian jujitsu thing, you know, I don't have any. I mean, that's like that. First of all, the evolution and it being better was put put to bed, you know, years ago because they were they did it. They were like, let's get those two guys in the ring and see who wins.

I mean, really, it's the most important moments in the history of martial arts, really. And then Horian created the UFC. The UFC was created by Horian Gracie. And he did it literally as an infomercial for the effectiveness of Brazilian jiu-jitsu. And he decided to do it with his brother Hoyce, who wasn't even the best guy in the family. Hoyce openly admits that his brother Hickson would tap him left and right. But Hickson was like the nuclear bomb. It's like, we're going to go in, we're going to shoot you with bullets for a little bit. And then if this doesn't work out,

if somebody beats Hoyce, then we're going to bring in Hickson. That game that I used to play of, you know, whatever, Wing Chun versus American boxing. And then UFC came about and we were just like, okay. I went through my own version of it because I was a black belt in Taekwondo. I won the state championships and the U.S. Open and a bunch of tournaments. And I thought I was pretty good at fighting. And then I started kickboxing. And I'm like, oh, my God. Like, getting punched, it's so much easier for them to punch me in the face. Like, and you're trapped in a ring.

Like, you can't move around. Like, Taekwondo was mostly on mats, right? You weren't fighting in rings, so you could kind of get the fuck out of the way. It was like, and when you're engaging, you're engaging because you want to. You don't get cornered. So as soon as there was, like like a way where someone could corner me, and then I realized, okay, there's a lot of effectiveness in learning how to punch. So I learned how to kickbox.

Then I got into Muay Thai, and I was like, oh, my God, leg kicks are horrific. Like why doesn't anybody else kick the legs? Because Taekwondo, you can only kick above the waist. Kickboxing, like American-style kick you can only kick above the waist kickboxing like american style kickboxing was all above the waist and there's a very famous fight with rick rufus who was uh rick the jack rufus who's uh one of the best kickboxers of all time and he fought this guy from thailand i forget the gentleman's name but there's a video of it and it's called uh the fight that changed kickboxing i believe it is it's kickboxing versus muay thai it's rick the jack rufus and he and he hurt this guy early in the fight but this

dude just kept chopping at his legs chopping at his leg and eventually he crumpled to the ground his legs were destroyed and rick became a practitioner of muay thai and his brother duke is one of the best kickboxing coaches on earth right now. And he runs his academy in Milwaukee. But this was like this progression of trying to figure out what worked. So at first, I realized, well, you've got to learn how to use your hands. You've got to learn kickboxing. And then it was like, oh, Jesus, you've got to learn how to kick legs.

And you've got to learn how to check leg kicks. And then it was like, no, you've got to learn how to kick legs, and you've got to learn how to check leg kicks. And then it was like, no, you've got to learn how to not get strangled. Because then in the early 90s, the UFC came around in 93. And I remember watching that going, oh, no. And then training jujitsu, the first time training it, realizing how helpless I was. I was like, God, I spent so much time learning all these things. They just figured it out. Like, nobody knows what to do once we get them to the ground.

Yes. But now there's guys who can do everything. And that's the beauty of what mixed martial arts is. What mixed martial arts is, it's like you can't just know jiu-jitsu now because you won't be able to take certain guys down and they'll fuck you up standing up. And certain techniques that even we used to think were kind of useless in Taekwondo, when people started doing the UFC and getting taken down,

now people can utilize those techniques as long as they know other things. Like there was a brutal knockout in Bellator this past weekend with a spinning back kick to the body. And you're like a roundhouse kick that you would never – No, spinning back kick. It's a spin. You spin and you hit with the bottom of the heel. Roundhouse is like thigh kick. Roundhouse're like a roundhouse kick that you would never- No, spinning back kick. It's a spin. You spin and you hit with the bottom of the heel. Roundhouse is like tie kick.

Roundhouse is like standing here, you kick like this. Spinning back kick is you turn and spin with the body. Go to the Bellator Instagram page. This was one of the most brutal spinning back kick KOs I've ever seen. He fought this guy

Ren Counter. Chase Ren Counter? I think there were a couple of Henzo guys in that kick KOs I've ever seen. He fought this guy, Ren Counter, Chase Ren Counter? I think there were a couple of Henzo guys in that fight. Chance Ren Counter. Weren't there a couple of Henzo guys? Wasn't Neiman? Yes, Neiman Gracie. He lost a decision in the finals

against a really tough wrestler. He's a great wrestler. So watch this. Back this up. Back this up. So watch from the beginning. Watch this. Boom!

Broke five ribs. Ribs. And Chance Rent Counter is a famously tough guy. Like really rugged, tough dude. And he just caught him perfect with that kick to the body. And if you go to the Bellator Instagram page, it shows you his ribs. Oof. Because they did an x-ray on his ribs. Oof. Because they did an x-ray on his ribs.

Have you ever had a broken rib? Yeah, I've had broken ribs. Nightmare. It's not fun. But he has- For a comedian? You like to laugh? Yeah.

Well, this was before I was a comedian, luckily, but it's still not fun. Not fun. He has five shattered ribs. They're just cracked. His lung filled up with blood. Yeah, one of his kidneys is fucked up like that's how hard that kick was and it was just perfectly placed but that's a taekwondo kick and like in the early days of ufc people thought well that stuff's all useless you can't do that anymore you got to learn jujitsu but it turns out that if you know how to like if you look at that look at

the impact jesus christ that is that's the perfect landed kick because it's on the side of the body. I mean, it's like full heel digging into the ribs, instant knockout, and then go click on that right. Oh, that just shows you the, and then I think there's a, maybe it's on his page. If you go to Chase's page. That poor guy, you look at him and he's just done. That's on his page. If you go to Chase's page. That poor guy, you look at him and he's just done. That's it. Impact. Chance.

I say Chance, right? Yeah, I say Chase. Sorry. If you go to Chance's page, it'll show you the, that's it right there, Black Eagle 170. Yeah, go there. Click that and then go right and you can see the ribs. Look at that.

Wow. Bro, five ribs shattered with one kick. I mean, that's horrific. Wow. Yeah. Crazy. Look what it says in his description. And he's like literally one of the toughest guys I've ever seen fight.

He said, no way I'd envision my Bellator return playing out this way. Congratulations to Korshkov. He said, look at this, feeling pretty chipper for a man with five broken ribs, a punctured lung, half full of blood, and a bruised kidney.

Wow. That's a kick. Thank God you're a chef. Right? Thank God I just talk shit for a living. I love spending time in the gym and i love getting to be part of that like training camp when the guys are getting ready for these fights and seeing them and getting to work with professional like no other sport in the world you get to work as an amateur right you never know no other sport in the world could i be like oh i'm thinking about playing a little basketball let me just like hop on with the knicks and help

them out with their training camp but you know going down to that basement in new york and being part of you know the the training camp for these guys and was extraordinary experience oh yeah it's amazing right and then not having to go in the ring was the second the next extraordinary yeah i would you train now? So I'm training. There's a place called Street Sports. Oh, Hanato Magno. Hanato Magno, who is one of the nice guys. So he gave me my blue belt.

Oh, no kidding. I went from half. I went down there. And I've been splitting my time. There's the old Kron Gracie team. Kron took off, but their team. He went to Montana. He went to Montana. He was out. But his team started this Gracie Orig. Kron took off, but their team went to Montana. He went to Montana. He was out,

but his, his team started this Gracie originals gym. And I think that, that Hanato Magno street sports has one of this guy, Adam is one of the best jujitsu teachers I've ever worked with. He's an incredible teacher, you know, like they're, he's a great practitioner, but he really can teach. And I love training with him. And then the Gracie Original guys are right around the corner from my house, man. They just like open a gym. And that's everything, right? That whole area is a great area for Jiu-Jitsu anyway.

There's so much, the whole by the beach. Because so many of those guys like to surf too. I tried to go into the, what's the name of the, whatever, the Nogi guys down there. And I tried to get in there and they were which place they weren't nice to me it was during covid people freaked out during covid man what's the nogi place uh what's uh what's the name eddie um oh 10th planet 10th planet and they weren't nice to you i was like yo man i got a black belt from from hanzo i'd love to come in and just check

it out they're like yeah you can't oh well that was because they literally weren't open. They weren't open, but they were open. So they were like really cagey. Well, they were worried about people, you know, setting them up. Closing it down. But they're, you know, they're very friendly. And if you ever want to train there, just let me know. Well, it's right by my office and I'd love to train Nogi there because I'm having a hard time finding, you know, I was training. Well, I trained there too, you know.

I have black belt under Eddie. That's what I would. And he's there. He's there teaching those classes. All the time. I'll connect you know. I have black belt under Eddie. That's what I would, and he's there. He's there teaching those classes. All the time. I'll connect you guys. I would love that. I'll connect you.

Yeah, 100%. And then I went up a couple times to that Gracie Baja Northridge, which is an incredible academy, man. Yeah? Nice. It was like all the guys come through there during their training camp for the Pan Ams or whatever. Well, what a connection of gyms. Oh, my God. oh my god gracie baja has i mean they're all over the world it's an amazing amazing uh talent pool there was a um there's an old guy gene labelle you know gene sure no gene he's been on the podcast i um i trained he he was he used to teach a class at uh

this go cal high stop yeah yeah and um I trained there a couple times. That guy, he did a, he, he did like a fingers under the pectoral, like nipple twist, sweep the leg, Danny, Johnny on me. That was one of the most,

he was 83 years old and he put me on my ass. I was like 22 years old. I've never, you can't let him do a technique on you. He just, he, well, that was his favorite thing to be like,

he loves to give out pain. He's like, I'm going to teach the class this move. I need somebody to step up. I was like, oh, I get to dream with Gene LaBelle. He was just like, I'm going to smack you. Gene told me a funny story on the podcast of some guys, some young guys trying to break into his car. And, you know, he was like, at the time, he was like 60 years old.

And they're like, get the fuck out of here, old man. And he's like, oh, okay. Somebody wants to go for a ride. He was an amazing guy when in he was when he was in his prime there's a very famous uh match he was one of the very first mixed martial arts matches i don't know if you know that he actually had a uh a mixed martial arts match against a boxer and uh where he had when he was a national judo champion so he had his judo gi on and he had like a mixed rules fight with a boxer. How'd it go?

He strangled him. Put him to sleep. But you could watch it on YouTube. It's pretty interesting. My big brother has his brown belt under Hinata. Who's like the nicest guy in the world. Hinata's a wonderful man. Yeah, I started training with Hinata in the late 90s at John Jock Machado's.

One time I got to train with John Jock, and he was very nice to me, but he put me to sleep. Oh, yeah, he's the best, man. He put me to sleep. He had this red belt on. He's like 100 years old, and I was like, he just beat the shit out of me. No, he's in incredible shape. And he's one of the rare guys that, you know, I've known him since,

I think I met Jean-Jacques in 98. And he has really, from all this time, never really been injured and never really been out of shape. And trained so controlled and so relaxed and just everything is perfect position. He's an amazing guy to learn from, you know, because his knowledge is perfect position. He's an amazing guy to learn from, you know, because his knowledge is so deep. It's like from the roots of jiu-jitsu from the early days,

but also like continuing to train. He's never stopped training. A lot of the older guys, they get injured, you know, but he's been really meticulous about his physical training and his diet and being healthy and also the way he trains. He's not a guy who explodes. Everything is slow and smooth and technical. He's very, very inspirational.

I feel like at a certain point, I guess you lose the ego. Although, Half never, he'll punch you right in the face. He's a savage. Half is a known savage. Didn't he just go to jail recently for beating somebody up? He's like punching someone right in the face. He's a savage. Ralph is a known savage. Didn't he just go to jail recently for beating somebody up? He was punching someone right in the face. He was like, oh, you got the cameras on? Oh, I'll never punch you?

He was like, ah. And they had the Thundercats. I was trying to make, he was like the Thundercats logo on his gangland. I don't know. It's a whole story. It's a whole story. Brazilian gang. Listen, man, thank you for being here.

It was fucking three hours already. Was that actually three hours? Yeah, look, it's four o'clock. Isn't that crazy? I would talk to you forever. I here. We just was fucking three hours. Was that actually three hours? Yeah, it's look it's four o'clock And they're crazy. Well, I would talk to you forever. I know we could do this again. Let's do it again I love you. I love you for this. Hey, I'm so sorry. I gotta say this But my buddy John Bush is a big fan. He met you once he's a jujitsu guy and tell myself What's up, and I got it just shot him out. No shout out to John Bush I'm John Bush. This is the website for your book.

It's called foodiq.co. The book's available right now. I got it in my hands. Is there an audio as well? There's no audio. Yeah, you can't really have an audio for a book like this. You need the images and everything. But it's very beautiful.

There's a lot of very cool images in it. It's very thorough. And I fucking love cooking. And I love talking to you, man. So thank you very much for coming in it. They're very thorough. And I fucking love cooking. And I love talking to you, man. So thank you very much for coming in here. Good luck with the book and everything else. And next time I'm in L.A., I'm going to eat your pizza. I'd like to cook some meat with you.

I love it. Let's do it. Let's do it. Thanks, brother. All right. Bye, everybody. Thank you.