The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 676: Jesse Griffiths Earns a Michellin Star

Episode Date: March 17, 2025

Steven Rinella talks with chef Jesse Griffiths, Ryan Callaghan, Janis Putelis, Randall Williams, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.  Topics discussed: The Hog Book and The Turkey Book; Jesse's restaurant, Dai Due,  just won a Michelin Green Star and is Steve's favorite restaurant; why it's illegal to remove a billfish from the water in the US; Randall's love of estate sales; FHF's sweet new EDC pack; Michelin stars and tires; cock fights; how everything served is from around here; cooking aoudad; a new use for an old cut; Jesse's recipe for belly meat remoulade; arguing about star anise; a routine with turkey wings; approachable and creative; heart, liver, gizzard; and more. Connect with Steve and The MeatEater Podcast Network Steve on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey American history buffs, hunting history buffs, listen up, we're back at it with another volume of our Meat Eaters American History series. In this edition titled The Mountain Men, 1806-1840, we tackle the Rocky Mountain beaver trade and dive into the lives and legends of fellows like Jim Bridger, Jed Smith, and John Coulter. This small but legendary fraternity of backwoodsmen helped define an era when the West represented not just unmapped territory, but untapped opportunity for those willing to endure some heinous and at times violent conditions. We explain what started the Mountain Man era and what ended it.

We tell you everything you'd ever want to know about what the mountain men ate, how they hunted and trapped, what gear they carried, what clothes they wore, how they interacted with Native Americans, how 10% of them died violent deaths, and even detailed descriptions of how they performed amputations on the fly. It's as dark and bloody and good as our previous volume about the white-tailed deer skin trade, which is titled The Long Hunters, 1761-1775. So again, you can buy this wherever audiobooks are sold. Meat Eaters American History, The Mountain Men, 1806 to 1840 by Stephen Rinella. This is the Meat Eater podcast coming at you shirtless, severely bug-bitten, and in my case, underwearless. The Meat Eater podcast.

You can't predict anything. The Meat Eater podcast is brought to you by First Light. Whether you're checking trail cams, hanging deer stands, or scouting for elk, First Light has performance apparel to support every hunter in every environment. Check it out at firstlight.com. F-I-R-S-T-L-I-T-E.com. Join today by world famous Texan Jesse Griffiths author of the very creatively titled the hog book and the turkey book just comes right out and tells you what the book is yeah you don't need to look at that book and wonder what those books

are about no by design yeah I've accused him of being a wild hog apologist. Jesse Gribbis knows how to make phenomenal stuff out of wild hogs of all varieties and the hog book tells you all about how to do that. Top to bottom. Anyone that tells you oh you can't eat them and you can eat them when they're this age or eat them at that age or eat them when they're 120 pounds, 120 pounds or pregnant or not pregnant. Or if you ever want to know like what is actually up about wild hogs, um, from a guy who has handled more, this is a bold statement, but I'm gonna stick by it.

We can vet it. I'll be honest. A guy that is handled. Okay. A guy that is handled and served more wild hog meat than anybody on the planet. I mean, I don't know. It'd be hard to quantify, but an awful lot. How about a lot? A lot, a lot. Hundreds, if not thousands, they entered a lot, seen a lot of them dead, served a lot of served a lot of them, eating a pile of them. Yeah, no

The hog book is no It's no guesswork. It's no rumor. It's just like what you know to be true From a career of working in them. Yeah, it's like answers to questions And people would you know over the years be like what you know can you eat them if they're 120 pounds and over can you eat a boar can you eat them a South it's not pregnant you need a South it is pregnant you know what's your favorite recipe name it and you know just kind of a compilation of answers the questions that I got and then follow that up with the turkey book which tells you everything you'd ever want to know about preparing turkeys

preparing every part of every part of every turkey. Yep, definitely. That one was more of a kind of dress for the job you want deal. Really wanted to spend a whole spring turkey hunting, so we documented it and then did a bunch of recipes. Good deal. Those are both available at TheMeatEater.com. Correct.

And then what we're going to, Jesse's been on the show a few times before. He recently got a Michelin star for Dai Duet. Yeah, but to be clear, a Michelin green star. Well, I know, but I'm saving that. Oh, sorry, I ruined his. Can you, Phil? Backtrack us a little bit, I just ruined it. I was toying with reading this Mercer Lawing's

Dai Du Due review. I'm just going to read the first line. My quail plate was very good. Fantastic. Actually. How many stars? I don't want to do it. I don't know. You know, it's the odd dead meatballs. Very good. Building up a little more. She's gonna hurt. All right.

The nil guy, steak. Steak? He would have preferred the chimichurri on the side. Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God. He sounds like my kids. And that Mercer Lying was on episode 407, California's War on Woodside.

Would have been a great dish if they had just put it on the side. Can we pause for a second? How does this make you feel right now? Across the board, very bold flavors. Never had a meal quite like it. There you go. Oh, that's what I'm talking go oh there's a little more in

there I'll share with you later it's my favorite it's like I said God mass it died away is my favorite restaurant oh that's super kind of you know and nothing I like about it we've talked about this when you're on the show before like something that most restaurants would be like, it'd be like in glowing neon signs and shit outside. But like at the bottom of Jesse's, I don't know if you changed it, at the bottom of Jesse's menu,

it says everything is from around here. Yeah. Yeah. From the author of the Turkey book, right? Yeah. Just in little letters at the bottom of the menu. Everything is from around here. Meaning it's like all local stuff. It's like all Texas. We call that an economy

of dialogue. Everything is from around here. It's not sandwiched into the description of each dish. No, they don't put farms in there. It's just everything is from around here. Do you still have that slogan? Because I'm wearing the original shirt. It says eat a hog, save the world. Yeah, that's, that's, that's more hashtag, um, you know, feral hog apologies, apologists, propaganda. So we're going to talk Jesse a bunch about food, cooking food. Well, I want to know real quick how many

Michelin star restaurants or Michelin green star restaurants, uh, serve things with like a ramekin of something on the side. None of them. You need to put that chimichurri in a squirt bottle. You said, yeah, we could get it in a little packet. Then you could open a plastic bag. What is a green star? That's what the whole show is about.

Oh, we're going to build up to that. I didn't read that. I didn't read the notes. No, it doesn't say that. It's still lives in my head. Now, we're going to turn the heat to Yanni. After all that praise, now we're going to criticize Yanni up and down. You're on a little tear this morning. Well, kind of set the surprises. I should have read the notes. Well, Yanni killed the sailfish just so he could get cool pictures of it. Oh, look at this the sailfish to remove sailfish from the water in the u.s. so I'll tell the story Yanni went to like a little party a party in Guatemala yeah it wasn't like a 50th birthday party oh well we went on a fishing trip to celebrate my celebrate my brother-in-law's 50th birthday we

didn't do much partying okay Yanni went on a birthday fishing trip to celebrate my brother-in-law's 50th birthday. We didn't do much partying. Okay, Yanni went on a birthday fishing trip. While at this birthday fishing trip, he committed a terrible sin, which I didn't know about. I'd like to point out too that I did it. I did it. The captain and the mates were like,

we don't really do this, but I'm like, I really need the grip and grin, you know, from the gram. Caught a sailfish for no reason. Then for no, just to screw with it. Or as Mitch Hedberg said to make it late for something and lifts it out of the water and takes a picture. Then Brendan Rund, I can't remember. Was it run to your run? He was on the show. I think it's run D from the nature conservancy who was on the show. I think it's Rundy. Rundy from the Nature Conservancy, who was on episode 538 discussing a subject that now seems so incredibly dated, which was, does wildlife win or

lose with renewable energy? And he wrote in and saw Yanni's Instagram post. And he, like many people do when they have a problem with something, reached out to Corinne. In the U.S., I didn't know this, it is now illegal to remove billfish from the water unless you're keeping them. They did a satellite tagging study on white marlin. If you, oh, if you leave a white marlin in the water, when you catch it, the mortality rate, now don't do that crap where you say a number

that's gonna make it, Phil knows what I'm talking about. Well, you guys all, you can see it. I can't do like a take a guess. Oh, Jesse, take a guess. And try to like play, work with me here. Don't, don't make it look bad. If you catch a white Marlin and leave it in the water, catch and release fishing, you leave it in the water

and release it. What do you think the odds are he'll die? One in 10. Good, good job. No, it's only 1.7. It's only, it's only 1.7%. Wow. 10%. Right. So you were off by a, what do you call that? Exponential? No. Factor of 10. Off by a decimal point. Is that right? I'm not sure. About, yeah, 1.7%. I'm not a math guy. He thought 10 and 100. You're making this too complicated. He thought 10 and 100 die. And thought that was a good.

And thought that was good, but it's only one and a half and a hundred die if you leave him in the water. If you act like Yanni, guess what the odds he'll die is. Am I taking another guess? Try to, you know, make it be that it'll work in my favor. Four out of 10. Ha! No. 33%. So close.

Yeah. But even higher. So Yanni now has this laying bed at night, wondering that, But Yanni, you can think, One out of three. You can flip it around and say, chances are, he swam away and he's just fine.

You know what, here's what the odds are. It's like in paper, scissors, rock, there's a one and three, right? Paper, scissors, rock. So here's Yanni. Who says that? I guess Steve. Rock, paper, scissors. Rock, paper, scissors, rock. There's a one and three, right? Mm-hmm. Paper, scissors, rock. So here's Yanni. Who says that? I guess Steve. Rock, paper, scissors.

Rock, paper, scissors. So I'm saying, if you're throwing, right? Every time, if you're throwing it, you got a three choice. Every time you throw, let's say a scissor, that means Yanni killed a sailfish. So rock, nope. Paper, nope.

Scissor, yep. Scissor, yep. Rock, nope. Unless, nope. Scissor, yup. Scissor, yup. Rock, nope. Unless you like scissors a lot and you throw it more often. Then you kill more sailfish. They kill more sailfish. Do you feel bad about this, Yanis? Am I making you feel bad?

No, it was an honest mistake. You know, had I known this prior to, then like I said, the mates and the captain, they don't do this. They do, they have like a GoPro on a stick, so you just get it next to the boat and the GoPro shoots from way out in the water back towards the boat. Wasn't good enough for you.

So out of the other 40 some fish that we caught, that's the way we took pictures of, the few that we took pictures of. Most of the time, they don't even touch the fish. They just, they have a pole with a little, it's like, I don't know know what it's like a paper cutter oh basically on the end huh disgorger no it's not a curlicue no no it's literally a paper cutter and it's just taped to the end of this pole and they go right they go down the leader

and just cut the line right above the hook and just don't even touch the hook and just let the hook rust out. They catch so many of those sailfish down there. We caught 40 in three days. It's nothing for them to catch 40 in a day. And they'll catch them with other hooks in the corner of their mouth, just like you would see a trout, you know,

you can see the, you know, it's been hooked and caught before. So they do it by, they're trolling. Like a see a trout, you know, you can see the yeah, you know, it's been hooked and caught before So they do it by their trolling Explain the process of catching the stale fish Yeah, it's pretty cool. It's more in depth. It's more in depth and more sort of Involved for the anglers then a lot of the trolling type fishing I've done in the past where a lot of times you're just in a boat, the mates set up the rods, the baits are in there, you're trolling,

the captain's running the boat, the fish bites a bait, it's pretty much on, a mate grabs the rod, makes sure it's hooked, and then he hands it over to the angler and you basically reel. You know, that's like your job. They don't take the boat out of gear to make it extra hard for you because you got to fight like the current and the fish fighting. But here with these sailfish, out of, I don't know, the 10 lines that are in the water, there's actually only four hooks in there. Everything else is just a teaser, meaning it's just a decoy, right right and so if you imagine these fish are hanging at the thermocline

Which is roughly 80 feet. That's what it was when we were there That's where they're hanging and they're looking up to where to find their food as they're cruising around the boat comes over the top There's all the prop wash and whatever and then in that prop wash behind the prop wash. There's all these There's like a whole you know School of baitfish swimming is what it looks like and there's all the smoke that's coming off of them. They call it smoke It's the the smaller wash coming off of these teasers, right? So they look up and go oh my god That's what I've been looking for, you know, they swim up the 80 feet And so when you're in the boat you're sitting there and you're just watching all the teasers and then all of a sudden in one

Behind one teaser some of the teasers are like a group of baits you see the bill all of a sudden just above the water swatting back and forth right because that's how they kill a Flying fish or I don't know if it's sardines whatever else they eat but they whack them, stuns them, they turn and eat them right? So at that point the captain usually because he's up top in the bridge so he can he has a better angle to see it all. So he's they give you a really good job of explaining how it's all gonna go down and like what most importantly what right and what left is because just as like when you're guiding fly fishermen and you tell them to get cast to the right they cast to the Left and then you say no Jesse the other right

So the same thing happens here because he goes Right long teaser and like one of the anglers goes and grabs a rod on the left side of the boat He's like no the other right. It's like stage left and stage right where everybody gets confused. Yeah, we had real problems with that. So as soon as like, as an angler, your job is to grab one of the baited rods, hopefully the rod where you know the bait

is the closest to said teaser. So if it's the right long, you grab the rod that's got the bait in the right long position. You take it out of the downrigger clip as soon as you have it in your hands you take you take it out of you put it to free spool put your thumb on the on the spool and you're holding it and at that point the mates are reeling all the teasers in right so the sailfish is in there amongst all these teasers he's trying to swat and kill something to eat and also they all disappear and then, he's trying to swat and kill something to eat, and all of a sudden they all disappear,

and then the captain's like, hey, you're 10 feet behind him, reel up. So you flip it in gear, reel up like 10 feet, and he goes, stop! Go back to free spool, and you're holding it, and he's like, wait, wait, he's right behind it, and so the sailfish looks up and goes, oh, hey, I got one. There's the one. Whammo, and he eats it, and you feel like a slight tug on that rod, is at that point you take your thumb on that, lighten up on your drag, and let him eat it, and basically count to four.

This is the fun part, I already told you this. Count to cuatro. Count to cuatro, yeah, you can do it in Spanish if you want. And then at that point, you flip your drag, engage your drag, he's on you fight the fish If you're gonna do it on the fly, which is very popular down here. There's basically one extra step There you have no baits in the water at all. It's all just teasers. There's no hooks, right? So there's like a dozen

Teasers just going behind the boat. Yeah. Once the fish comes in behind it, you grab your fly rod, you have about 10 or 15 feet of line in the water, it's like dragging behind the boat. So your rod is already dragging there. You know, you dump it in. You get it ready. So it's you're loading your rod by that drag behind the boat. Again, all the mates reel up all the the teasers, they bring them in, the fish is still there like, whoa, what's up?

But they bring him in close, because he's following those teasers in. So if you jumped off the stern, you could land on top of the sailfish. I mean, that's how close he is. So you don't cast at him? No, no, you do. So you're holding it on one side,

you've loaded your rod, and depending on if that sailfish comes in on the right or the left You're gonna make one back cast and then shoot your line. They actually want you to cast behind him So when the fish is like, oh, where'd everything go? And then all of a sudden you start stripping and that bait, you know comes right by me goes. Ah, there he is Is the captain still on the throttle? No so to make it like legally caught by a fly rod he can't be in gear. Because he can't be trolling. Yeah you because otherwise exactly you're just trolling that fly so

basically before you cast he comes out of gear you make one cast if it's what was hard for me to remember was that if it was the left side of the boat you had to cast and then run over to the left corner because you didn't want to strip your fly into the prop wash because the fish loses sight of it because it's you know it's so white in there. Got it. And so you want to move over to the left side to keep your fly out in the clear water but I don't know. I tugged it once or twice He ate it and then you freeze just like you would when he eats the bait right and basically he takes all the slack out Of your hands it comes tight, and then if you still have it you know Mentally in you to remember. Oh he turned left then you would sweep the rod to the right or vice-versa

You know to make sure you get that hook set. Cause even the fly is circle hooks, right? So they really want to make sure you can't set the hook. My brother-in-law missed quite a few fish because couldn't overcome the instinct to set the hook. Yep. Yeah. Everybody loves setting the hook, you know? Does it put up a good tussle on a fly rod?

Yeah, you know, honestly, the tackle we were using even for the bait rods was pretty light. So both of them were pretty good. But what you learn pretty quickly is that as soon as he's on or she, they're going on a mad dash run, amazing jumpers. And actually I found out that the less pressure you apply with a tackle,

the more they stay towards The surface and the more jumping you get if you hook them on super heavy-duty stuff and just bear down on them Which you could these fish don't really go over a hundred pounds much Then they'll sort of sound on you and not really jump So they actually keep the tackle a little bit lighter to keep them near the surface so you get the exciting jumps And I mean we had multiple fish that jumped excess of 20 times probably. What is the reputation of a sailfish for food quality?

I gather not good. No, no, I think it is good. I think it's just fine to eat, but they're really trying to protect the resource there. What happens there a lot, even though it's completely illegal, even in these Guatemalan waters, is we're fishing probably 30 miles off, but these pods of fish, and they don't really know exactly the numbers, but it

must be thousands, because I mean there's a decent-sized fleet there that might be catching, you know, 30-40 fish a day per boat. But these pods of sailfish will move in closer to shore and once they get into that like three four mile mark the gill netters come out and Hammer the shit out of them. Oh, and so the fleet will be catching them at three miles for multiple days But the word gets out and then all of a sudden one night of gill netting and the fleet goes out They're like hey, where's all the fish? Well, they went home. No kid. Yeah. Yeah. Istio forest, which is a great, um, great family name Istio for a day for the, the sailfish. But, um, yeah,

super fast growing species can hit five feet in its first year. Really? Yeah, so, but like Yana said, you know, not super heavy. So I'm, they are considered overfished by and large, but it sounds like they're real fast growing. So like the ability to rebound the population would be. Damn.. Did you guys catch any tuna Yanni? No that was definitely sort of a it would have been a plus like it was a possibility tuna and Dorado but we saw neither of those as well as marlin we did raise one Marlin meaning same thing

He came up off the you know thermocline and came into the teasers But when I got I was up in the bridge happened to be up there and I got to see me it literally looked like He came up there and then was like swimming alongside the teasers like hey guys He wasn't in there like I'm gonna mess you up He was in there for maybe 30 seconds and then just disappeared. Oh, that's cool. So yeah, it was all sailfish But yeah One of the highlights, you know such the fishing was great, but man you just forget how good Local food is like I haven't been to that many tropical places to eat

Pineapples where they grow on trees. And it's just like, it's nothing like a pineapple from the, you eat in the United States. Same thing with the mangoes, the avocados, you know, they, what else? Papayas that we ate. And you know what they do a lot down there? Well, we were talking about this is they season their fruit a lot. A lot of salt on the fruit, and then that thing called the, Tajin? Yeah, Tajin. My wife's been making that.

Yeah, you were saying. But yeah, so great food, just very fresh. Everything down there is very kind of light and fresh. Didn't eat a lot of heavy stuff. So yeah, super fun trip. The Blue Bayou, sail fishingodge, if you're interested. Oh, they're like dedicated to sail fishing. Oh yeah.

Yeah, Jennifer's, my wife's cousin, Rob Orr, is one of the captains at the Blue Bayou Sail Fishing Lodge. So you can go fish with Rob if you want. He's gonna show your picture off and he's like, I pretty much guarantee you can't catch this one again, but there's a one and three. Phelps has a new thing this spring. They're coming out with what they call the prime cuts, turkey diaphragm calls. And one of them is called the Clay Newcomb prime cut.

And I'm not just going to talk about it. I'm going to, I'm'm gonna blow on it here. I'm a simple turkey hunter who likes a simple system. I usually carry one, maybe two diaphragm calls and a single pot call every year. Don't even carry a box call. I wanted a versatile diaphragm call that was the best of two worlds. I wanted loud and raspy, a call that I could cut on,

but also one that was soft and subtle that I could purr and kiki run on. I love to make those raspy cuts and the soft subtle purrs on the same call and I find many of them I can't do both and this call that I worked with Jason Phelps to build simplifies my turkey kit. These prime cuts come in a three pack. There's the Clay Newcomb call but also Steve Rinella and Jason Phelps' favorite turkey diaphragm cuts.

You can check all these out along with all the other meat eater and Phelps turkey calls at store.themeteater.com. I've never even laid eyes on a sailfish. Alive. I only laid eyes on one other one that we caught out of Oker Coke, North Carolina ones, with Rob Orr too, but yeah I haven't seen many of them. Well you know who we got we got we're working on coming on is some University of Wyoming Clovis experts. Here's what titillated me about it, what got me excited is we were down at University of

Wyoming meeting with the archaeologists down there looking at some collections, and these guys are like very esteemed archaeologists and they are still firm believers. Clovis first, Clovis were the first Americans, and they are big believers in the Blitzkrieg hypothesis. Overkill. They're big believers in the overkill hypothesis with mammoths. Meaning we always give, we always have Melter on. Do we need a stage of debate? Well, Melter likes him. It's collegial. Well, that's what I. It's collegial. Well, that's what I mean.

But you know, Steve will do his absolute best to create some sort of rivalry there. No, he set it up. He set it up. I know you guys have, they're like, they're respectful. They're respectful colleagues who, I gather, respectful colleagues who just disagree on a couple things. Love it. World could use more of that. And so he's gonna, he's coming on and they're gonna, we're working on getting them on and they're gonna come on and lay out the case and it's good.

I don't wanna like, I don't wanna get my, I don't wanna do my own version that's not that good. They're gonna lay out the case that like, Clovis first. Yeah. We got to- Mammoth hunters. We got to... Mammoth hunters. We got to see a mammoth skull

that's being pieced back together. We got to see some giant mammoth tusks that you keep like lowering down to look further back on the shelf because they just keep going. Like just giant tusks. And Steve got to live out one of his wildest fantasies and see someone doing arche archaeological drawings in person.

Like a guy looking at a Clovis point. Which is my favorite art. Sketching it in fine, fine detail. He's going to hook, I'm going to get, I'm going to get an original from him and I'm going to frame it, put in the studio. Yeah. Oh, that's cool. What else happened down there? I walk into this office and there's this giant bone laying there. I said, damn, What's that off? He said that's a rock And I thought the dinosaur bone. He said so the guy that brought it here He said you can have it if you want Dude it looks it looks like it looks like the head of a big it looks like a chunk of a femur in the end of the femur

Yeah, like hundred percent hundred percent Our bags are already getting heavier because we've got some beautiful books from them too speaking of bags. Oh Yeah, well, let me do one more thing. I'm gonna talk about that bag. It would not have fit in that bag It was a big rock. Um, I'm gonna talk about that bag. I want me do one more thing then I'm gonna talk about that bag. It would not have fit in that bag, it was a big rock. I'm gonna talk about that bag, but I wanna do one more thing. Cause Randall, I've been spending a lot of time with Randall driving around,

and Randall's been telling me about just the world I wasn't aware of that he's involved in. What's that? Estate sales. Oh yeah. Randall waits for old men to die. Well they're dying anyway. I didn't really know this either. No, Randall waits, old men to die. Well, they're dying anyway. I didn't really notice either.

No, Randall waits. I think that, I was telling Randall, if he wants to get serious about this, that he would start finding garages that had a lot of interesting stuff and then check on the wellbeing of the man. Tell us some depressing stories. Be like, how is Bob feeling?

Couldn't help but notice the garage. Well, when you drive past like a ranch and you see, it's just, there's shit everywhere. And you're like, man, how does a guy get all that stuff? It's by buying that stuff when that guy, you know, leaves this earth. So Randall goes on estate sales and when he was looking, I was watching him, he was showing me an estate sale and he was looking at things that would, because I have like bad organizational problems. Like I like things reorganized and was showing me an estate sale, and he was looking at things that would, cause I have like bad organizational problems,

like I like things reorganized, and you can buy like buckets, buckets of assorted sockets. Yeah. Oh, that was like when you like went and bought like a bucket of assorted files. Yeah. Okay, and then I have one of those. My Randall is like an active estate,

he like him and his friends look at estate sales. Didn't know this. Great tools, all kinds of tools. I mean, I'm a Craigslist guy too. I'm an eBay guy to some extent, but you remember I had that, there was this amazing one in Livingston recently and the guy had just an unbelievable collection of taxidermy. Like multiple full-body bear mounts and Buffalo like shoulder mounts. I think I probably sent you a

dozen things from that. That all got... I'm a bargain hunter. The real collectors caught wind of that. Yeah the real collectors caught wind of that. But yeah this guy in Livingston had an unbelievable taxidermy collection. Oh so those things actually brought some money? Because I thought after we had our podcast with Hayes he explained that those things really didn't have much value. Oh I got priced out of the I mean well you got to know your market. I had I think I had Sydney was all in on a couple of them up to like five six hundred dollars. What mounts did you want to have of someone else's? I don't know there's just they're like

full-body goat there were multiple full-body goats there were like crazy did you want to have of someone else's? I don't know. There was just, they're like full body goat. There were multiple full body goats. There were like crazy Rams. Yeah. The right price. I don't know. Yeah. Somewhere to put it.

They're amazing. Antelope, like dozens and dozens of antelope in this collection. Yeah. And how much were you willing to spend? Like a couple hundred bucks. Not, not enough, but the, well, the, what those states, he was showing me was rock bottom prices. Yeah. But there's still like nine days left on it. Yeah. And the way he worked it is they got a body. So he's got a body in a certain town and a state sale comes up in that town.

The body's like, Hey, let me know. And I'll go pick up what you need. And so then you kind of preying on these families, you know? No, no. You're preying on these families in a time of grief and need. No, I don't think you're preying on them at all. They wanna sell it. It's making life easy. Yeah, I mean, honestly, like.

When my uncle rancher was passing away, his truck doors, you know, cause you're always like driving around fixing stuff and then you're, you're ending up with things that you're not going to leave out in the field. So you'd, he would throw them in his truck, uh, all the big organizational slots in the, in the truck doors. Yeah.

Which dirt uses for his shampoo and toothpaste and stuff like that. Yep. Well, so this Is this medicine can? I have corndog sticks in there, those little- Jeff's were full to the top with nuts and bolts and I mean, more packed than a hardware store shelf, right? Full to the top with nuts and bolts and sockets and stuff like that. and what we ended up doing

Because his shop was kind of like that too. So instead of doing like the estate sale route of like Who wants to bid on this coffee can this Folgers coffee can from 1970 full of assorted? No drivers and stuff. We just called Pacific Steel the recycler, right? Oh. And had a dumpster delivered and then filled it full of all that stuff as recycling instead of taking the time to go through and sort it all. Got it. That's the way to do it. Yeah. Yeah. Or hopefully Doug Durin's listening. Yeah, well hopefully Randall wasn't calling him ahead of time and being like, yeah, you're getting old. I bet all your friends are dead. Huh? That's gotta be depressing.

Oh, anyway, I also think like Craigslist, when you see somebody who's like, they're like a tradesman and they're, they're getting out of the business, you know, you fight like storage units full of ladders and stuff like that. Yeah. Tell the story. You told me the, the, the told, these depressing story you told me about an estate sale. The death. I think we could tell this one. Um, you had to wrench something out of some raving widow's hands. No, this is actually, I mean, it could have happened, it could have happened anywhere, but, um, yeah, my buddy, uh, his, I believe his grandfather when he passed they had an estate sale at the house and They're upstairs and they they hear a gunshot in

the basement and a guy had gone to use the bathroom and had a Had a handgun in his belt went off and had a handgun in his belt, went off and killed him in like, in the middle of the estate sale. So it's sort of a dark story. Yeah. It's not really related to estate sales. Yeah, no, it kind of happened.

It could have happened anyway. He wasn't trying to steal the gun. No, no, no, he brought it with him. Is there some like old- But it made this whole experience like especially traumatic. Old estate sale law that's like, Is there some, but it made, it made this whole experience like especially traumatic sale law that's like, well, if you die at an estate sale during the estate sale, you become part of the estate sale. I wanted him to tell that terrible. Yeah. It's just kind of really kind of ruin the show. But as you were telling me, I thought it was going to be, I had him tell it because I made the same

mistake I made when he started telling it. I thought it was going to be someone fiddling with a gun for sale at an estate sale. And then he gets done with the story and I realized there's nothing to do with the estate sales. And here he is telling it the damn podcast. Yeah. Who asked him to do that? My own volition. I mean, I will say like estate sales, if you want to find a bunch of old like reloading presses and stuff like that, like I missed the golden ages of just stocking up on on brass and all these components and you know, reloading hand loadings got a lot more expensive. So there's a lot of guys with just closets full of stuff.

Yeah, it's basically planning on your own estate sale down the line That's one way to look at it. Yeah Yeah, all you kids that are 15 to 25 years old right now make a note that in 2072 ish you're gonna want to check call up Randall's wife. Oh, I see how Randall's 2072 that Come get married. I'm not gonna get that far. I didn't want to say you're gonna die young Huh? That would make me at 2072. I'd make me like 80 Something, right Someone asked me what I'm holding my hand. Yeah,, what is that? Good Lord, what is that?

What is that, Steve? The FHF EDC packs are out. All American made backpack. Made out of, they call it challenge sail cloth, waterproof. Paul's been making these and I've been getting to wear all the different ones he's come out with It's got all the kinds of inserts for them. They're sweet What what's your big finding on on the finished product here? Love it

What's in the pack? No, this is my like this is my travel bag. This is this is literally my EDC bags I keep my laptop and everything in here. I got it all figured out. Cords, I keep my cords here. Oh, that's a good spot. Keep my spectacles and my shades in this side pouch. You really need to know all this? Yeah, it's durable. Up here I keep pens and whatnot.

That's where I keep that stuff. Stick a holster in there. He's got an insert so you can put like, you can put your pistols and whatnot in there. I keep my laptop in here. Well, it's actually right here right now And I got one of these document bags Hmm when it's super full of stuff, is it comfortable to like hustle through the airport with? Yeah, do you love it? Yeah, I will say we've been it's like the kind of thing that you can kick like I just cram it under my seat in front

Of me on the airplane. You don't have to worry about busting a seam. No, it's ergonomic. It's a sweet pack. It's ergonomic. What's that? Not ergo, like therefore economic. It's got a MOLLE panel in the back so you can add another little pouch.

I put pouches on there now and then, but in the end I went for just the total streamlined thing. Cause you can just kind of move around like a grease high speed. Yeah it's just like you feel like a greased hog wearing this thing. We've been traveling a lot and you haven't you haven't had to look for things you haven't been losing things in our travels. No because I got my system totally dialed in and um and like I said man it's hard to find a completely, like I said, US made, I love it. The challenge sale material, is that, that's like actual?

You can't mess it up. Sale, like? No, it's just a thing they call it. It's a thing they call it, but you can't mess it up. You can't mess it up. At least I haven't been able to. I mean, you probably could sale with it, yes. Right. Yeah. Sale through the airport. In a real. I haven't been able to. I mean, you probably could sail with it, yes. Right, mm-hmm.

Yeah. Sail through the airport. In a real... And that's available at the FHF. No, there's sweet backpacks. And I'm kind of like a little finicky about backpacks. What? Yeah, it's one of the areas

where I get a little finicky about stuff. One of the areas? There's a handful of areas that I'm very finicky. Duffle bags, backpacks, I'm like, I have big opinions about those things. You know, it's very rarely where I'm like, you know, Steve would have no opinion on this. There's certain, I was telling Randall though,

there's certain things where I had to walk away. Like I have, I vowed to I will not I No longer will argue with anybody about anything to do with calibers Don't do it or I quit For a while I quit arguing about gear. I just want to like you're dipping your toe back in Yeah, yeah Group of crew members that are more, you know, their mindset is more akin

to his mindset about gear. And so the arguing is more favorable. Oh, echo chambering. Yanni once observed it. Yanni observed one time that he's like, Steve always has a different headlamp, but somehow he always has the best headlamp. It's just because he has it, it must therefore be the best. All right, Jesse, what the hell is a green Michelin star, man? What's a Michelin star?

Yeah, let's talk about that first. And what's a Michelin tire? Yeah, so the Michelin company, who owned vast rubber plantations in Southeast Asia. Did they? Oh yeah. And they made tires. And so they started making a travel guide

many, many years ago. And they would rate restaurants, mostly in France, and to get one, two or three Michelin stars was very big deal. And it had their- To encourage people to drive around and wear out their tires. Wear out their tires.

Yes, yes, exactly. And so you could get one, two, or three stars, and it was, for a very long time, it was based on, you had to have very fine cutlery, service standards, glassware, consistency, it had to be, I mean, for three Michelin stars, was unattainable. It was like very few restaurants in the world had them. One star, incredible honor right there. And a few years back they started kind of changing

it up, like where a Michelin star could maybe just mean it was just an exemplary restaurant. And then famously, I think two or three years ago, they gave a taqueria in Mexico City, a Michelin star, just a place on the street. Like no servers, no nothing. It was just these very simple tacos, and they got a Michelin star. And that kind of shifted that whole kind of narrative

as far as what it meant to get the star. That was probably a little bit of a rebranding for the Michelin brand themselves, I'm guessing, right? Just moved away from white tablecloths and French high cuisine. Right. I mean, in a way, it was just like a little confusing, though, because you still have restaurants shooting

for three stars, but I think they still save the three stars for that white tablecloth experience. And then a couple years ago, they came out with the Green Star, which is what we got, which is a sustainability star. And it's all about sourcing, direct purchasing, ethical processes, even like employee programs, things like that. And so due to our, the way that we source almost everything, um, I guess we were considered for it. We don't, you don't get nominated.

You don't put in for it or anything. And then specter comes along. You don't know who they are, right? No, the food's still probably got to be pretty good though, right? Yeah. Yeah. Like you could be making hot dogs off roadkill

deer and it doesn't mean, yeah. Yeah. Uh, yeah, that is a component of it. They, they list as one of the tenants of it is. and we also got a bib gourmand, which is means you make the guide. We didn't get a Michelin star, but we made the bib gourmand, which is means we're a recommended Michelin restaurant. And then also a green star. And at last count, I think, I think there was about 32 restaurants in the United States with green stars. Wow. I've seen some headlines recently. I want to dive into just a little bit about Michelin stars and what it means for restaurants. I would think it's like all positive, right?

But I feel like I keep seeing headlines. There should be a word for when you just read a headler, like I used to say I was reading a thing. Yeah. But then now it's like in all honesty, I didn't. I don't want to follow up question about this. I've seen like headlines alluding to the idea that it's not all like that, that there's negatives to a Michelin star for a restaurant. Sure. But how, like what? Well, I mean in all honesty and with regards to all the restaurants that

they got Michelin stars and in, in, in Austin, I think I'd say three or four of them were barbecue places that got the star. Okay. I, you know, I feel that that's a wonderful thing for them. Personally, I, you know, having been in the industry for so long and having kind of this maybe antiquated idea of what a Michelin star meant, really didn't want one in the way that like, I never felt like our restaurant was a, in the classic sense, a Michelin star restaurant.

And also you, you will start to have to deal with a good deal of scrutiny. And these days that scrutiny is, can be, you know, just, it's pretty mean. Sometimes you wonder if it's worth it and you will see stories. Because if you're on top, if you're on top, people just try and knock you off the top or. Right. It's, I mean, the irony of stuff like that is like, well, we don't think you deserve a Michelin star. And then you have to be like, well, we didn't ask for it. Yes. Like somebody else said that, or, you know, if you get like a, you know, top 10 restaurants or something like that, you know, be like yeah, but you don't deserve that. I said well. We also didn't make that call

You know somebody else said that now here now. You're kind of coming at us I mean, maybe I'm too sensitive to be a restaurant owner. Maybe maybe it's probably not even the right word for it, but There is a good deal of scrutiny Probably some turnover that that like employee turnover that can come with it too, because it's like, Oh, Oh my gosh. I just got a Michigan star at the restaurant that I work with Michigan star, Michigan star. It's a very different system.

That's our system coming forward. That we should do that for every time we're on the road. Yeah. You can tell me. Hello, Michigan. A Michigan star. Uh, it's like a Michigan.

Hello. One and a half. What is that? You get two of them. But right, like you could have some employees be like, oh, holy shit, this is a great thing for the resume. Yeah, maybe hop around a little bit more. Just, you know, that's, that's, you know, kind of punch, punch that card a little bit. You know, oh, I worked at a Michelin star restaurant.

Sure. Definitely could happen. Um, I think that, you know, in our case, this green star, when I, I knew that we were in the contender for that from the questions that they started to ask me. Like we were getting these emails and I was like, talk about your sourcing pros practices, who sends you the emails? Michelin. So when you're dead giveaway, Yeah, yeah. We knew. Then I was very, very happy, because I think that if I had

to pick one of those two things, I would absolutely take the Green Star, because that is the goal that we've worked to since day one, was just like having really equitable, fair, good food, purchase from our neighbors, like high quality, local stuff, and just really sticking to those guns, you know, purchase from our neighbors, like high quality local stuff, and just really sticking to those guns, you know, wine, beer, everything. So the Michelin, the Green Star was really the one

that I thought was like, yeah, that's actually, that is a recognition that we will definitely take. What happens when someone, I don't wanna harp on the negative, but why do you hear stories of people, aren't there stories of people, aren't there stories of people turning them in? Yes, Marco Pierre White, very famous chef.

Not the Green Star. Not the Green Star. Yeah. Sometimes they'll get mad. This is probably the old days back in France. So he was like a white tablecloth guy. Certainly. He famously made Gordon Ramsay cry. Whoa. Yeah. Like he was like a white tablecloth guy. Certainly. He famously made Gordon Ramsay cry.

Whoa. Yeah. Like he was. About what? About not being a good cook. Marko Pierre White is like the. Well that's sort of, I mean, what goes around comes around, right?

Yeah, Gordon Ramsay was very young at the time. Yeah. This kind of speaks to this whole thing. You know, like these guys are the ones that are working 120 hours a week. Just like excellence. Just the screaming, these guys are the ones that are working 120 hours a week. Just like excellence, just the screaming, the throwing of the bands, just the, the kind of nightmarish old kitchen situation that we think of.

Got it. Um, and then, you know, if they go from like three stars to two stars, then maybe they just take those two stars and throw them back in Michelin or something. I'm making that story up, but you know, it would be, it would be a spite kind of deal. And, um, stars were, I mean, in some circles probably still are highly,

highly sought after. And it's like, I mean, a life goals, you know, they want one star, two stars, three stars, you know, and, and, but I, you know, we're not really playing that game. Yeah. Well, me, how I became aware of it is, um, my wife and I were eating dinner with Jesse in Diidue and I said well how's business been? And he said it's been great because of the Green Michelin star. Yeah. I mean definitely we saw a huge influx of people from that. So

people cared about it. Yeah. Well, Austin or Texas, you have to submit to Michelin to be inspected, and you have to give them a whole bunch of money, like millions and millions of dollars to come in and do the inspections. Once they do that, they come in and they inspected Dallas, Houston, Austin, San Antonio. Then from there, they're going to start making, for the first time ever, because no restaurant in Texas ever had a star.

And they came in, and the guide came to Texas. And so you'll have, I think it's some sort of Texas hospitality or state tourism. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. It's like kind of, yes, please come do this thing. And then it brought in, they brought in the inspectors, and's like kind of yes, please come do this thing. And so and then it brought in

They brought in the inspectors and then a bunch of restaurants in Texas for granted stars a couple great two I think just two green stars in Texas and and then a bunch of stars for restaurants in San Antonio Austin Houston Dallas and And really boosted all of that. I mean it was huge in in the restaurant business. It was talk of the town for a little while. You know what you said to us when we were eating dinner that I still don't fully understand? You mentioned feeling weird or I can't remember how you put it, feeling self-conscious or weird

or whatever eating in your own restaurant. Yeah, a little bit. I like it. I like that place a lot. And I mean, it's more, I like the price is right too. But yeah, sometimes, you know, just sitting there and feel like I should be working, but. Oh, so that, okay, that's what it is.

Yeah, I don't work nights anymore. You look like you're slacking. Yeah, I hung up my night shift spurs a while back. But you know, like when we went down there and interviewed Teddy Nuggets, we all went and ate with Jesse at a Diet Dewey. And I do remember Jesse was an awesome host, but he was like looking around at everything as much as hanging out with us at the table. Like, keep an eye on it's a hard, hard thing to do.

Yeah, it is. Would you, cause you said like your employee programs are part of your, your green star and your, um, Jesse came up with employee challenges as part of their employee programs. Cause you know, like, uh, it's a high stress environment. Yeah.

Um, and you were telling me about one last night that was, I thought, fantastic. Yeah. I can guess which one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, every, well, I try to do it every month. Sometimes I can slack a little bit, but I, we try to give all of the back of the

house employees, everybody in the kitchen, we give them something that could be a gift card, it could be an oyster knife. It could be, it's something. It could be a steak. And from that, they need to deliver back almost like an essay about that. And we will, it'll be very clearly defined. Like the first one we ever did, we made everybody go to a specific taco trailer and order the tacos there. And then I wanted them to report back on how the onions and the cilantro were cut because it's very very important because they're cut with Michelin star precision like beautiful always super consistent and just like in your

Salon tro in the kitchen Finally chopped with the knife well that was there the shit up when you're supposed to. The stuff is finely chopped with a knife. Well that was there. Stems no. It was report back on the importance of that. Back up, back up, back up. Stems or no stems? Stems all the way. With cilantro, absolutely stems. Hmm. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, stems are good. You can't start at one end and go to the other end? You can. Kind of bunch it off with your hand. We're really digressing, but I've been here before. The stems on cilantro can be used as an aromatic, like onion or garlic. You can cook those, like put those in the beginning,

like with your carrots and stuff, and they'll add a little bit of cilantro, but a nice, beautiful cooked note. But also, like when you're chopping cilantro, stems are fine. Okay, so you wanted a report on this. Yeah, that's an example. And then another would be the you know, we're facing big shift in how oysters are gathered in the coast and so you have

Farmed oysters and you have dredged oysters and we're trying to support the farmed Mariculture of oysters or that I get a year full about this from the oyster dredgers. Oh, yeah Yeah buckle up so But but we had one of the oyster dredgers? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Buckle up. So, but we had one of the oyster farmers come in, bring a bunch of oysters, we popped a bunch of sparkling wine for the staff and everybody sat there and ate oysters and she gave a presentation on oysters. So we learned a little bit about oysters. So every time I'm just trying to pick a topic, we really want them to connect with, I mean we're a very meat a topic. We really want them to connect with,

I mean we're a very meat heavy restaurant. We really want them to connect with what that means. And so we took all the back of the house staff out to a farm and everybody killed a chicken. And we funneled all the blood from the chicken into bread crumbs and herbs and then we pan fried that, everybody ate it, we stewed a bunch of chicken. And then everybody took their chicken home.

And so then they had to kind of report back. And I'll give them a list of questions. You know, like, how was that? Some people were bawling. Some people were just like, you know, no problem. And then they have to kind of report back on that lesson. I feel like you could get yourself in a mild little bit of hot water with that routine.

Oh, I love it though. I mean, it's, yeah. How so? Picture down the road, there's a headline, and it says, Texas restaurant man makes employees kill chickens. Yeah. Yeah.

You follow me? It's the first sign of like being a serial killer. Right? Yeah. And people see that Texas, and that's all they needed to hear. Why only back of the house? The people that just read headlines would have a problem with it.

Yeah, I'd be like, yeah! That's as far as I'd get. That's a good question. Mostly because I feel that they don't earn as much and they are also there and I always have this two-way street principle with everybody that works there, but you work really hard for us, we educate you and give you as much knowledge

as we possibly can. Like there's no secrets, any recipe, any technique, anything that anybody at that restaurant knows should be always shared. And so we try to add value to the back of the house experience through that, through this program specifically. And so we have about 14 people in the back of the house. They all participate and they always do.

It's great. There's, there's, it's really fun. So is that not changing at all? Cause you know, I did a few years in the restaurant industry. That's what I call Long Tong Yachty. And Tuscanini's. Yeah. When that light bulb goes off and you're like, wait a minute, how much did you make tonight? And then you look at your paycheck and you're like, it could be half or a third of your,

you know, like a two week paycheck and they cleared it in one night and cash tips. It's like very hard to stay in the back of the house and I've always thought that you know someone would be working on and I think at some places they do even pool tips with the back of the house. We do. Right? Oh you guys do. But even then it's still... It's a disparity. There's a clear disparity but that is again why we introduce that. Our back of the house managers every month they get a cookbook. So if you've worked there for three years, you've got 40 cookbooks. Anyone you want. Pick out a cookbook, you get it. And then we do this, you know, there's pretty good health benefits, mental health benefits, things like that. Just

trying to add value to the back of the house experience because it's a hard job and it doesn't pay as well as front of the house. And so just being able to add stuff like this is, you know, a effective benefit that we can extend to them. So I'm sorry, the chicken deal, we didn't get to get to this last night, but like Pete, you had people go home, roast their chicken, and then report back on that. That was the next month. So yeah, so after they killed the chicken, you know, they reported on how that the whole thing went down with them, you know, and then reflecting on that,

you know, because we deal with lots and lots of dead animals coming through the restaurant, you know, just, and you got to see, well, 14 of them die, you got to do one yourself, you know, hopefully that sticks, you know, and helps with waste and things like that. You're not going to be like, yeah, whatever this quail I dropped, you know, or dropped with waste and things like that. You're not going to be like, you know, whatever this quail, I dropped, you know, or no, dropped it. Of course it's going to trash, but, um, but, you know, like just have that respect that that we're really trying to instill on them. And then the next month, yes, they roast the chicken.

And then since there's, you know, a million different ways, always said, it's just roasted however you want and report back on how you roast it. So we get into kind of technique, and everybody is comparing notes on that. And we just make it kind of a fun interactive thing where everybody's just exchanging information. And it's all done through a chat. So it's like you're submitting a written essay.

Well, I got it. You know what? This won't matter to anyone but me, but you're combining two, you're probably talking about chickens, killing chickens and collecting the blood and all that. That's colliding with the different thing that's in my head right now, which is I'm reading a new book about... I think we can all agree that's never happened to me. I'm reading a book about the battle of Manila.

The Oxford university press just put out a book about the battle of Manila. Okay. In the Philippines, World War II. Okay. MacArthur. Yeah. Okay. I don't want to give the end away.

Did he return? Yeah, he returned, but, um, my God, man, like the Japanese knew they couldn't win. And, um, I'm getting to the chickens in a minute, Japanese knew they couldn't win. They killed a hundred thousand civilians in Manila, just as like a departing gift. Anyhow, years ago I was in the Philippines and I went to cock fights which is probably of the days I've

spent in my life one of the most influential days I've ever had in my life was being at the cock fights where Where they, you know, they lash the blades on those chickens. It's hard to follow the action because the chickens fight fast. It was great. But the thing that struck me is they got a big kettle of boiling water and they got a big funnel. All these cocks, I'm sure this has not happened in a lot of more affluent places. This is down way in the south of the Philippines, just north of Mindanao. But they, when the cock fights go on, as soon as your cock gets killed, you go and it's like a little assembly line. You make soup. They drain the blood into the funnel. It's collected in the bucket. They got the boy

in the water. You plunge your deal, pluck your rooster, and everybody that's leaving is leaving with plucked, everybody that's leaving is leaving with plucked roosters. And I imagine a lot of those don't, a lot of those fighting cocks don't wind up in a cook-bitten pot. Why not?

Because people just aren't gonna, people don't want roosters probably. I don't know. They eat bulls after bullfights. Well hold on, if they're gonna go through that, and that's as much, if it's that much of a process, they're not being forced to pluck their birds, are they? They have to be eating them. No, no, no.

It's probably an energetic level to it. I know, but you're saying they're not getting eaten. I bet you. I'm not like, I wanted to get get into I wanted to get into going to More cock fights I see I used to hang out with this Dominican dude And he would go back to Dominican Republic just to go to cock fights and I was gonna go but my wife was pregnant She thought I was inexcusable that I was going to cock fights. Well, anyway, I didn't go I've only been to one cock fight But what I'm saying is that trend cock fights and roller pigeon derbies there. You can't do them here, but a bricardium, you know, the

writer, bricard, Bilger, you ever hear him? Um, he's the guy, you know, like noodling for flatheads became a huge thing. Brickard Bilger, like made that he had a book noodling for flatheads is about like Southern tradition. He wrote a piece, a big piece about cockfighting, the back like illicit underground cockfighting in the US. Anyhow. Have you read Clifford Geertz's, the Balinese cockfight? No. It's a classic anthropological study.

Where he goes to, he goes to Bali and he, he, it's just this deep analysis of how you can explain all of these, like all of Balinese society, by the way, that the cockfight unfolds and how people behave around there. Maybe I'll read that. Yeah. I didn't know you were such an aficionado. I'm not. I went to, I went to, I spent a day at the cock fights. It was one of the most influential days of my life. And I'm just, I just thought, I guess, I don't know. Maybe a big cock fighter can write it in and tell me, I bet you, you could go to a lot of cock fights

and not see the cocks handled as a culinary item with quite the level of precision that one sees in the Philippines. Yeah. Oh, I see. I see. So I'm trying to get to, they're even collecting the blood, which Jesse was just talking about. Gotcha.

Jesse, you will get in trouble if you do a monthly challenge and it's cock fighting. I think since your restaurant based, the killing of a chicken. Yeah. It's funny that you bring up cock fights because we were just hanging when we hung with heffelfinger in Arizona we talked about cock fighting and he was like the hip-hop hypocrisy You know of saying that you can't do that here But then to go and buy a chicken breast and to know how that chicken in the environment that it lived in and what it was Subjected to versus the life that a cock Fighting cock lives

like if you're if you had pet chickens you would Always choose to have your chicken live the life of a of a fighting cock versus one that's grown in You know american uh poultry breeding farm. I just had my first little bit of teenage idealism spring up in one of my kids who's 14. Short-lived. He got the watch and animal rights videos that hack on industrial farming.

And he declared he's only gonna eat wild meat. No more fast food. And he was showing me a video where it was like a conveyor belt at a chicken producing facility. It's a conveyor belt full of eggs and chicks that goes into a grinder and it's just unwanted. It just like never ends. Just a conveyor belt, little yellow chicks and eggs and just whatever into this grinder. 10 million chickens a day. And he's like, man, and this is just like the unwanted little chicken babies. And he said, he's like bowed up and down. He's never going to ever eat anything but wild meat. And I'm like like welcome to welcome to being a teenager

you'll find these things get harder and harder to stay true to the older you get that was all point of that exercise is like this happens ten million times every day you just did it once and it was kind of oh yeah yeah so definitely worth the second look walk through just so people get a sense of how you guys run stuff at your restaurant. Pick a thing like how you guys do your own beef tallow or how you guys do, what were you talking about the other day, what you guys do when you get a bunch of blueberries?

Just something like that. Oh yeah, and your fermentation, like you guys have months long, months long prep processes. Sure. Yeah, cause I was with you one time and you were all hopped up. We were down in South Texas and you were all worked up about buying

every piece of citrus you could find and every pecan you could find. Oh, I just made a run. Like, filling a van full of that stuff. Yeah, I just, well, that place that you and I went to closed, so we have to go even farther south now Yeah, and so we just we it wasn't that much farther we drove we drove further down that highway and finally found a citrus sand and I rolled in there and

We bought I think 12 cases of lemons. It's the first time we'd had lemons in months And brought them back and everybody's joyous So pick anything like what I'm trying to, what I want you to do is explain an example of, because in, in Diadu, everything is from around here. So you're, you, there's a season, there's seasonality. It's not as severe as the North, but there's still seasonality in Texas. So talk, pick an example of something where what you,

what you needed to do because you can't just buy lemons whenever you want, right? Yeah, I mean lemons are always a really good example I think you know it's because like something as simple as iced tea also tea, you know So we use the Yopon holly, which is the only plant that naturally contains caffeine in North America and it grows as a Like a invasive understory in East Texas and so we get the Yopon holly leaves and make tea out of that. How do you get those? There's actually a couple producers that make it. They

are out there harvesting it and then they do the whole drying process and then supply tea which is really cool that they're making that product out of out of this this I mean it's everywhere. So your tea is from Texas? Yeah. You know, I can see a campaign like we put the tea back in Texas. That's pretty solid. And so, but most of the year if you get iced tea and you say, hey, can I have a lemon with that?

We're like, sorry, you know, and we have to give that, we don't say sorry, we spend it in this like more educational direction of like, oh, well, we only source things from here. So sometimes in October, you know, barring a hard freeze the previous February, we will see some lemons and you know, for a brief window of time, if you wanted a lemon with your iced tea, we had it. But we go through like we just recently had our pork producer, a domestic pork producer, went through a, he just ran out of product, you know, and he's like, listen, I need six to eight weeks to get caught back up

and we're not gonna have any pork for a pork chop or bacon, all this stuff. And so we, it was fun, we totally pivoted to feral hogs. And so we, uh, it was, it was fun. We totally pivoted to feral hogs. And so we were just, uh, you know, having conversations with our, the processor that, that handles all the hogs, you know, like what we're, what we're looking for. Luckily it's at, it's at peak time of year for feral hogs. Like kind of their, when they're ripe. I can see it like cradle in the phone between your neck and your ear as

you're, you're loading your 50 round mag on your AR. And so we, we had to, we had to pivot to that, which was, you know, very, I mean, on brand for us, at least when people, cause like the pork chop is a very popular item, but they would come in and be like, Oh my God, that pork chops good. Well, we don't have it right now, but we do have these much smaller wild boar chops prepared in exactly the same way and did a bunch of just different things But we were having to process, you know for every domestic hog We're having to process three 70 pound feral hog carcasses But luckily they're all of you know that they're at their fattest right now because we had a really really killer Acorn pecan drop. How long does that run for when they're fat?

It depends on weather. So when you get like your tree mass drop in October, November, but we had most atypical year and we still have pecans dropping right now. And it's late February, March. So we've had a really incredible year, relatively dry. So all that stuff sits on the ground really well. And so the feral hogs have maintained a really high level of fat in the

regions that have those trees prominent. So like Hill country and just to our Southeast. And that's where we try to get our hogs from. And so, uh, they just look really good. So it was very, very, uh very optimal timing for that lag to happen, where we could just shift into the feral hogs because they were so fatty. But that's kind of the level of thinking

that we have to put in an organization. We have to call the processor and be like, listen, man, we're gonna need you to cull out four, five, six whole feral hogs weekly of optimal fat content and get them to us in this interim and made it work. There was a restaurant, do you remember that restaurant out on, it was out in the San Juan's, San Juan Islands on the Willows? They wanted to be in a real controversial deal because they were acting like, you know when I said, the name of the restaurant, Phil, which restaurant it's kind of what that, uh, that the menu is based off of.

I don't want to get it over my waiters here, but I don't want to like someone fact check it wasn't on VAT. No, it wasn't on bash. I don't want to like, yeah, willows. And there was like an expose. I don't want to like, what's the call when you say something? Oh, this is coming back to me now. Yeah. We don't want to pert not planters. I don't want slander. Anyways, they had a thing

where it was like, everything's from around here, but then there was a, nevermind. I shouldn't have brought it up. I mean, and to be fair, we, there, there are some things, you know, like there's some flour and sugar. Well, no, no, no. I mean, no, it was on Lummi Island. Yeah.

Willows in. I wasn't going to do that, but I mean, it was like a more like what the point I was going to make is that you, cause you couldn't get the pork chops you wanted from the guy you wanted from, you pulled them from your menu as opposed to running down to Costco. Right. And a lot of places, unfortunately, that say local, or we use local and organic products whenever possible, aren't doing it.

It's widespread. Widespread. I do want to point out that it permanently closed in 2022. So, you know, you're... Yeah, it was a, they were, it was a little, uh, um, deceptive. I went there and I could, I smelled the fish, not just the fish was on my plate. I smelled the fish. I was like, no, man, it doesn't seem right. It doesn't seem right. It doesn't add up.

When you say local, whenever possible, you leave yourself a lot of, uh, well, it wasn't possible. It's yeah. Or more to the point, it depends on how hard you want to try to, to get local. They would do this thing where they're like, they, they serve some sea cucumbers and she gestures out the window. Lee being like, right? She gestures out the window as though they were caught, they were picked right there. Or it's all that like our friends at this, our friends at that, our friends at this.

And then you look the stuff up and you're like, sure they're friends? You know, kind of like, and then like everything's from the garden, but the garden's not that big. Yeah. And it's in, kind of like, and then like everything's from the garden, but the garden's not that big. Yeah. And it's in, it's in, it's in a temperate rainforest. Right.

And there's like limits to how much you can grow at that latitude. Certainly. And you just, after a while, it's like, come on, man, like running with it hard. Yeah. You know. But just like what you said about the I mean think of the ability Logistical ability that you need to have to forecast and work around your primary

Hog protein supplier saying like six to eight weeks. We're out I mean, I think that's plenty for people to be like, oh this green Michelin star thing is pretty cool, but boy Cisco truck Every Wednesday sure right I mean it's all it's enabled by the fact that we have such a good relationship with with that producer You know and we've known him for 17 years and so when he he called he gave us for plenty of head start and It enables us to do it, but I think people expect that of us You know and we expect that of us, you know, and we expect that of ourselves too. We're not gonna ever purposely not serve something

that we don't know about. We've been misled before. We've been cheated. You know, we've had farmers show up and swear up and down that they grew this thing and then we find a little grown in Mexico sticker on one of them. No, really? It's happened, it's happened.

And it's like, what do we do at that point? You know, it's like a very confusing, it's a conundrum. And you will have people just, and we had one guy in particular, like he misled us for years about product. And it was devastating because I was like, man, that's our reputation right there. Like we stake everything on this. And I think he just, he got into a lie and then never got out of it. And then when we found out, we were just like, we kicked him to the curb. But like, don't ever come back here, man. It was rough.

Well, so what about something like quail, right? So, I mean, you deal in like the exotics, which would be a Neil guy and the odd ad that we mentioned, and then feral hogs. We've covered a bunch, like there's a legal way to get those to a resale market. But yeah, what about quail? How does that work? Yeah, you have game birds or game animals, and then you have wild game, I think. And I think there's two distinct categories,

and we're also very upfront about that. Duck, you know, duck, you know, there's some restaurant in New York city that's just like, you know, advertising that they're selling wild duck. I'm like, you want to probably tap the brakes on that. First off, you're not, you know, it's just, but you also don't even know enough about the topic to know that that's been illegal for more than a century.

Um, and, but you know, it just sounds good to them and, uh, but we, we serve farm raised duck, you know, uh, we serve farm raised quail and, but then beyond that, if we're presented with an opportunity to source like true wild game, we absolutely will. And we were in Texas where it's, where it's pretty easy.

Um, it's facilitated by, uh by TDA, the Department of Agriculture, and we can get nilgai. This is why we tend towards nilgai especially, is because they don't like corn and they're field harvested in the wild by broken arrow ranch, by shooters and helicopters. We tend towards nilgai because of that, because it is such a pure ingredient. Um, it's an invasive, uh, we'll get some access here and there. Um, and then feral hog has to be trapped live and then brought to the processor and killed with an anti-mortem inspection and then, uh, post-mortem inspection, and then we can get them like that.

We can't go out and shoot them. And if you have them in your back, your truck, we can't take those either. Do people show up ever? A couple times. There's been a lot of offers, a lot. Hey, we got all that you could ever use. And like, that's not how it works really. There's very strict protocols behind that. And then lately we've been sourcing a lot of Audad. And the Audads on the menu, those are maybe coming from high fence places, maybe coming from low fence places,

or catching them in big pen traps. But we're putting Audad on there as part of a, like a wider campaign to just educate people on the periodability of Audad. Well, yeah, talk about- Can you go into that more? Cause I'm doing an Audad hunt in Texas with my boyfriend and Corey actually in April. Yeah, I mean, to me, Audad are kind of these,

they're like hogs in a lot of ways, but they just inhabit, I mean, in impact. And they inhabit different regions, the Far Hill country all the way out to West Texas, where there's a lot of them. And they're widely not eaten. And so by we have them on our menu, you know, when you say widely, let's just like set the stage here to be a rough I ate one down to the bone. I found it to be a pretty rough meat. Did you did you let how is that prepared? We made it, I made it everywhere.

Oh, you made it? I mean, you made it, okay. Tough or rough is like, it wasn't palatable. May I preface the question? No, no, did you cook it in a dry heat method? Like, did you grill it or smoke it? I made jerky with it. We made barbacoa with it.

Oh, okay. We cooked its lungs, not its lungs, we cooked its kidneys, heart, liver. And then I did various like roasts and whatnot. I never, it just wasn't, you know, to me it wasn't, I wasn't like, oh my God, I can't wait to get another audit. Was it flavor or texture?

Flavor, strong. Really? Yeah, it just wasn't my favorite. Yeah. But everything can't be your favorite. No, I love it. But also I have to be really clear. I've never had an Audad from West Texas. We've only eaten Hill Country Audad. Mine was from very West Texas. Yeah, so maybe Sagey. Yeah, it was just, I kind of got, a lot of times you eat something, like take javelina for instance. If you just took like, if you're cooking a javelina,

you're gonna be doing steps and processes, right? You can't just, you don't, no one just takes like a javelina steak and throws it in a pan, right? It's like a thing that requires you to bring a certain level of expertise to it. I found Audad to be the kind of thing where you need to bring a level of expertise to get something that you would be comfortable just serving to friends that come over for dinner.

Sure. It wasn't like fail safe. Yeah. I think that a lot of people go wrong and they might treat Audad like venison and then that same person might treat venison like beef and so you're you're kind of failing. Um, and that it's, it's a particularly, it's, I mean, it's a metaphorically tough meat. I mean, it's tough animal, you know, they. Chewy.

Yes. Yeah. And, uh, that mean when you're cutting an audit, like you can get tired. I felt, you know, it's like the meat is just like, it's got a density to it. Like, you know, after I break down an odd add, I feel like I've had more, like 40% more resistance than I would if I just killed a dough, like a whitetail. And the way that you approach cooking it, I mean, it's very simple, I think grind and stew, but you know, you have to incorporate like what into it.

It has to be cooked for a very long time, but I really like it. We grind it, we make meatballs, like your friend mentioned. Um, make meatballs out of it. And we can aggregate all animals that way too. We could get a yew, we could get a ram, doesn't really matter.

All goes into the pile together. Um, but more than anything, we're just trying to, you know, illuminate the sheer fact that you can eat this thing and promote it. Probably the only restaurant in the hemisphere that's got all that on the menu. I don't know of anybody else that even has access to them.

And then when people say, where do you get them? I'm like, mm-mm. I'm sorry. Is there any tender part of that that you'd like cut small and stir fry? The tenderloins and the loins tend to be part of that, that you'd cut small and stir fry? The tenderloins and the loins tend to even be a little on the dense side. If you, and back straps have not a horizontal grain to them.

They have a slightly offset grain. And with an odd dad, you have to be particularly careful with that and that you have to nail that that 90 degree on that on that slight offset. I'd say it's sitting at like 30 degrees off. It's not just straight down. And if you don't nail that, then you've still got this slight angle, this diagonal grain running through your slices. And if you get it super thin, it can be really good. I, we cooked an audad next to a whitetail one night, just did steak frites, you know,

with like a Bordelais sauce. And everybody liked the audad just as much as the whitetail. But I had to slice it super thin. I love them. I, you know, we're in a way so lucky that we can, you know, like me and my daughter hunt a lot and we could, we could kill Axis hogs and Aud Ed only. And these are all these high impact invasives and it feels pretty good to do something like that.

And especially Aud Ed, it's like, it's almost a goal now. I'm going to be an apologist for those as well Try to get more people on board with at least are equipping people with better methodology to make it more palatable Yeah, you turn you turn the world on to hogs and all you're gonna do you're gonna help people figure out how to do audads Yeah, I'm probably gonna call you and I'm trying to figure out what to do with it. Where are you hunting? Way south bordering Chihuahua. Oh yeah okay yeah so that's yeah west Texas. Yeah. You know I always put in, I always draw for the, I hunted them out in west Texas but I always draw, I always put in in New Mexico but I haven't drawn in New Mexico yet. Yeah yeah you'll be out in the

Davis Mountains probably. Because you do like public like in New Mexico. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You'll be out in the Davis mountains probably. Cause you do like public, like in New Mexico, you can do like public land audit hunts. Yeah. The grain, the differentiation in the grain and the, and the backstraps as you're talking about, is that something that's like characteristic to sheep in general? No, deer too.

Deer too. Yeah. Like if you have a larger deer, uh, loin, and I'm the ones that deer back back traps that I deal with are way smaller than what you guys have, elk or deer or even larger white tails. And so if you like, just take a really close look at it and you'll see that it's just slightly offset and then when you're slicing it out, you're going to, if you come in and you hit it at a very slight angle, you're going to be getting that true 90 degree on it.

And that's where you get the most tenderness out of that slice. Gotcha. No, I thought you were, yeah. Okay. How do these audads come to you? Same way. In what form? They're, they're trapped in the same types of traps that the feral hogs come in,

or are trapped in. So you've got your, like your cell phone style, drop gate traps. Okay. Um, and so they'll just wait for them and drop the trap on them. And we've been so consistent that we've been able to get them because then our processor is talking to trappers and then once that incentive like stream is reached they know oh we need more Audad and so they start bringing us more. But what I mean is how do they show up at your place? In what form? Either trim or whole carcass depending on what our needs are.

Cut off behind the ears? Yeah. Yeah, skin and gutted, whole carcass. You don't have a big old pile of them horns laying around now? No. Got it. I got a question. So you're saying like the odd ad like it needs like moisture water, so I Defrosted some

Rib meat that I had sliced out from White from whitetail. Mm-hmm, and I seared on a cast. I was just in a rush. I wasn't trying to prep a meal I just want to eat some meat. So I just like put some dry rub seasoning oil through in the cast iron pan, just a couple of minutes. I'm already reaching for my dental floss. I'm reaching for my dental floss stick right now. We had a quick meal. For three years. As an aside, I don't always like soft textured meat. I don't always want like a really soft back strap. Like I'm used to eating tendon, which sometimes can be like melt in your mouth, right?

But sometimes it's chewier. So I'm like, I think the breath of meat textures that I'm comfortable with and happy to gnaw on. Like that's, I mean, in Asian cuisine, right? It's just not exactly the same. But I felt like the meat was, it was juicier and yeah, like there was a little bit of chew, but it was juicier. Then I used some of the same rib meat and I like, whatever, did Chinese five spice, daikon, blah, blah, blah, threw that in the pressure cooker for 12 minutes. Now that meat was so dry, but like kind of pull apart and I really didn't like that.

What happens? It's collagen. So belly is very specific to this where you're gonna have these striations of lean meat, very dense lean meat, a very thick and solid layer of collagen or silver skin and then typically layers of fat. And you might repeat that a couple times.

And so collagen isn't gonna melt into gelatin so it hits about 190 over a period of time. Now a pressure cooker can achieve that. But if you just cook it really quick then then you're not gonna hit that I mean you might hit 190 but you're not gonna hit it for two or three hours that it's gonna start to break down I was you know like pork I mean people sometimes are surprised like you know pork is cooked through at one temperature but it shreds at a different way. It's cooked through at 160, 165,

but when pork shoulder starts to fall apart, that's 195, 200. And so that's that collagen breaking down and then fat and things like that. So... But the meat itself feels drier. Like I wanted it... Yeah, that's possible too.

I don't have a ton of experience with pressure cookers, so I don't know really what happened there. If you had braised that maybe with some sort of liquid, like it was in maybe a more moderate temperature, you might have had a more silken experience. For me, braising meats like stew meat, or if you wanna make a sugo or a ragu or bolognese, chili, bourguignon, no better meat than rib meat. Okay, but you're but you're doing that

slow and slow on You know what dish years I've been making a fair bit when I'm having company over is that one That uh is that one that German-style roulade. Oh, yeah. That is one of the most popular, because we did it on the show down there at the Etteria. And I rolled that whole belly up. People love that. And it's accessible. And it's a new use for that cut

that they just didn't really consider before. And it's so easy to peel that whole thing off. You gotta be, I mean, you gotta be decent with a knife. So what Jesse does, like if you're sitting there at home picture, like picture you got a skinned out deer carcass laying there. A lot of guys are gonna remove the rib meat. You're just gonna kind of go between the ribs

and get all these strips that look like a jerky strip. Not suitable for jerky, but it strips that look like a jerky strip. Not suitable for jerky, but it's gonna look like a jerky strip. Picture that you came in and removed all the meat in one big sheet so that you got every rib you come to, you gotta skin around, not skin around, every rib you come to, you gotta flay around the rib, up and over, up and over, and you wind up with,

like you basically remove that deer's side as a sheet. And then Jesse lays. Mustard. Yep, good seedy. Bacon. Good seedy mustard all over it. Yeah. Pickled jalapenos. Yep. Onion.

Onion. What else you putting there? Just, yeah. That's it. Mustard, bacon, onion, and then some sort of pickle. Traditional German would be just like a gherkin or like a cornichon style pickle or dill pickles even. And then you roll that up. Roll that up, tie it, and then braise it.

Man, them suckers are good, man. They're good, good. I've been cooking the hell out of those when I get a piece that's good. Yeah, I love that. I always take that off the deer. You also don't have to go in and get that that meat between the ribs. A lot of times I'll just take that whole sheet off and then later I'll come in and peel that or cut that meat out the intercostal or the finger. Yeah, but it just depends on what time of year it is because like if if

there's your time of year where you can see through If, if you're telling me here where you can see through. Yeah. Yeah. Like if you kill a buck, that's been, if you kill a buck that's been gone through the rut, I mean, you gotta get in there to wind up with a whole sheet. Yeah. Because they lose so much weight. Yeah.

Yeah. If you take, take the hide off, it basically turns into jerky in 12 hours on its own on the boat. Yeah. Like you leave it hanging in the wind and all of a sudden it's like a glass. You can kind of see through it. But yeah, that is a good dish. There's one I texted you about the other day because I like your...

This is more of a... Hey, can I do a follow-up? I want to have a follow-up question. Because I think oftentimes I look at that slab of meat and I'm like, man, it's all covered up and foamy purple bloodshot You know, how do you deal with that? I mean if you've lost part of it, then I don't I don't mess with bloodshot stuff. I cut it out

Well, but it's not it's not like it's actually where the impact was or even where like the little you know The impact is but it's just like the yeah the blood and the purple stuff is spread like at some point do you do some cleaning I trim what I can but if you've lost one of your sides or flanks or whatever you want to call it it is what it is mm-hmm all right yeah I do it I do that cut when I see a piece that is suitable but I've made I did it with, I pulled a big sheet off of a mousse. It was too much. It's too much. It's like, yeah, there's a lot going on between the layers of all the good stuff in the middle. It just winds up being like, yeah, I could

see that. Yeah. It's too much of a good thing. Yeah. What was the other dish you're talking about? Well, I texted you. So when you and me and Katie ate dinner, one of my favorite things you guys make is that, that brined pork chop. Oh man, that thing is good, dude. So I had some, uh, I had some wild hog. I had a wild hog backstrap that had a nice fat layer on it and I asked you about your brine. It was a very simple brine. I feel like you put some things in there that are dumb. The star anus? Yeah, it's just I don't think it matters. I think it absolutely matters. You're the chef. So I made smothered pork

chops the other night and it's the key to that is that you brine those. And if you have a leaner feral hog, this is great. You cut those pork chops, but you brine them with that star anise, dust them in flour, a ton of onions, and then some stock. And then cook that down, and it just makes this nice oniony gravy. But then when you go in and you eat it.

Can you back up? I got too confused. Just little thin slices of backstrap our pork chop But I wanted I haven't told you what I did with it. So you can't correct me Well, I'm just I'm a little worked up about the star anise right now I want to give it away. Yeah, explain did you omit it from the brine? Yes, of course you did You know what I did. Okay, because if I wanted to taste like that I'd put that on the meat rather than trusting that my brine is gonna like you know you got to admit dude you have to admit sometimes people are putting things in

brine because it looks cool in your fridge. Okay. You don't agree. That star anise is absolutely if you like the pork chop at Didoui, the star anise is a key component to that. So you're telling me, you're telling me that if I Pepsi challenged you and I do one of your pork chops? Yes. Yes. Let's do it. Darn, Denise is such a... I'll run down to Rose Hours right now.

I would like to see it. 24-hour run. Oh, I was thinking you and I can fly down to Dite Austin Oh, yeah, I do a and we could have I'm gonna make five I'm gonna make this in the body. I have your team. You got me five Okay, and I'm gonna have one of them. Uh-huh be with star on ease. I got it I'm gonna have you eat it and you tell me what one had in the brine in the bag. Got it. Yeah. Yeah It was pretty good you tell me what one had in the brine in the bag. Got it. Yeah. Got it. It was pretty good.

Anyways, what I did, what I, I want to hear your opinion. You know, better me, but what I did is I soaked my, it was, you know, a wild hog backstrap. It's not a giant thing. I just did the whole thing in the brine. Okay. Then grilled it and sliced it. Yeah. Absolutely. Son of a bitch, that was good, man. Yeah. It would have been better. Tell me what I should have done. Put some anise in there. It's a key. It's so good.

You think so? It's just a key. You don't think it's just mental masturbation? No, not at all. I always compare it like a feral hog, especially it's got a bit of that overt, strong flavor to it. We won't use the G word as like a rough piece of plywood and the star anise is some fine grit sandpaper coming in and buffing that up.

And it's just like, it just helps it. And that's, I mean, the whole entire spice trade. Were we talking about this last night in Venice? A little bit. Yeah, it's just like the entire spice trade. But I do want to just let you know that you're in a safe place if you haven't actually thought about your menu and the ingredients, it's okay to just say that.

It feels like I wondered why I was putting that there. Stupid of me. Lying in bed tonight. I never knew it was so stupid. Was he just sitting on the shelf? Staring at the ceiling. I never knew it was so stupid to make one of my number one favorite dishes the way I make it at my award winning restaurant. I'm glad I talked to that young man at that podcast.

The, but the, the, the entire spice trade was there to kind of mask, uh, strong meat. And so the spices, I think have a very, uh, clear role in that. And it's not overt and people that hate fennel or licorice and stuff like that typically still like the pork chop. Okay. So I was maybe a little wrong. I don't know. Um, I'll try. I've ripping through just for funsies here. Uh, some, uh, Google reviews of, uh, die Dewey.

Oh no. Uh, and I think this would like fallen in a Steve's review category. This person, um, had a pastrami sandwich. Really good, but a little heavy to pick up. Yeah, the pastrami is pretty serious. But I don't understand what your expectation of a pastrami sandwich would be.

There's too much, I got too much sandwich. So the dining experience was great, knocked you a star for your parking situation. Yeah, when I was pouring the concrete out there I was looking around thinking maybe a couple more but I was like I think this is enough. I also just like think of how many restaurants there are in the planet that has no parking. Correct. None. Yes I would like to address that person right now and be like we rent that building not our parking lot.

That's the thing when you when you're checking out a product on whatever website, and then you're wondering, it has some one stars, and it wants to be something that's, like, the delivery guy left it at my neighbor's place. One star. We had a guy who commented, he know, he was very disappointed in you personally because of the parking situation at the University of Montana. He said I would have thought you could have done a better organized event than to have

parking like that. Oh, I'm not impressed about that. Turkey season's coming up. Oh yeah, what? 15 days from now, me and Yanni will be looking at goblers 14 days from now and hopefully get a couple upside down on the 15th. Roosting them. What are people dumb not to do this turkey season with their turkeys? I mean, we're gonna go negative. We're gonna go baseline on this

and I recently had an experience where I spoke to a lot of turkey hunters in one confined area. And the number that still aren't taking the legs is, is, is pretty stunning. I just don't get it. Like, I mean, I mean, they're tough. It's like, well, you didn't cook them long enough. Legs.

Um, I think there's a lot of value on the wings. Montana, I just, I had no's a lot of value on the wings. Montana, I just, I had no idea. You have to take the wings according to the regs. I thought they undid that. I feel like I just saw that. You know, I mean, last year I read those regs. You're still supposed to take the wings.

Of course you did. I mean, I think that- Well, I know that they undid it on a lot of other birds. Okay. So I don't know if they didn't undo it. Right, I didn't, I mean, obviously this is not what a lot of people do. Right. But like, if you, it is not hard to pluck a turkey. I will argue with anybody. Like it just does not take that much time. Um, but if you go all the way out to the wing tips, like those things are so full of, there's like probably more fat and collagen in that little

section than a lot of the the bird itself. So like making a little stock out of those wings is absolutely worth your while. Yeah I've got a routine with the wings. I am and we covered this last time. I don't pluck my birds because I my what I use for, I don't need the skin on there. I do mostly like fried turkey or cutlets off of the breasts and then just slow cooking and shredding those legs. But every once in a while I'll pluck one just to look at it and have that skin. But I don't know, just utilize more of it.

I don't get the time deal. He sat under a tree for seven hours and take you 30 extra minutes Can I give a I'm gonna give I'm not asking if I can I'm gonna give a people leg a way to think about turkey legs So let's say you just skin the turkey leg out, right? So you skin the breast back like your breast and the bird. You keep skinning. So you get to the thighs. I like to take and cut the foot off at the ankle. Take a filet knife and insert it and skin up.

So you know, you got like where the skin meets the feather on a leg? That part's hard to pull. So take a filet knife and make a skinning cut, like you're skinning a deer's leg out, make a skinning cut a few inches up the leg. Then you skin it, it goes quicker. It helps, because it's hard to skin that part

the other way around. I freeze those so I got the drumming in the thigh, and I put them, and if you match them up, if you're smart about your geometry, you can match them up in a bag, and you actually wind up with a rectangle in a freezer bag. them up in a bag and you actually wind up with a rectangle in a freezer bag. Yeah. See, I'll even do them purposely part them out because I feel like the drumsticks take so much longer than the thighs that I now cook them separately.

I agree with that. I like that. Okay. And also two turkey legs is quite a bit. I'm not, well you know, he had, let me finish. Hear me out now. It's like that front of house, back of house tension. I need to be better. Walking through a one, this is just one man's approach. This is one man's approach.

Right. So then come cooking time. I got one of those, uh, any, like I have some of those, when I got them time, I got one of those, like I have some of those, when I got them, when I got married, I've been married a long time, those La Crusay, the giant oval La Crusay thing. Those are nice. All right. So nice.

Lay as many of those two, three, four, whatever, drumstick, thigh combos. Those, you can put a season's worth of turkeys in there if you got two turkeys. Put them in there. I cover them with liquid. If I got stock, I do it with stock, but you don't even really need to do that

if you're just short on time. Then I put foil over it to help not lose my liquid from steam and just put it in your oven at 300 degrees and forget that you did it. If you gotta go work to work for nine hours, forget, just add more water and forget that you did it. Leave a sticky note that says, do not mess with oven so that your wife doesn't come in and turn the oven off because you're not home and haven't been home in hours. And like all you're doing is you're getting it to the point

where you can like tear it up and then you'll pick it and you'll have a giant bowl to pick meat Now Get a bunch of get a cast iron skill and put like a quarter inch of beef tallow in it or whatever Bear grease and cram that shit on that pan Until the burnt the bottom is burning shit on that pan until the bottom is burning. Flip it until the bottom is like crispy. That's right. A recipe this way. I was going to say this should be a great approach

for a cookbook. Yes it is. Oh man. A little bit of star anise. And then you taste all that. And it's just like, you just do whatever you want with that. Certainly.

You put it on tacos, you put it on sandwiches. I freeze it again and mark it like camping. And then you go camping and no one feels like doing anything. So you open that bag up, dump it into a pan with barbecue sauce and have more sandwiches. It's like, it's not that hard. Yeah. Let's write the next book it's like oh it's like oh wow now i have a giant pile of super good stuff to eat right it's so easy i can like do anything with there is a couple things that you can even i think to make it better one we talked about this recently you can't make it better yeah well no it is like instead of like After you shred it back into the liquid and let it sit for a day or two

Just soaking in that liquid and let that Suck that moisture back in it makes a huge difference for any Wild game you can't make it better And then I would say too when you're gonna go with the big, you know, bear grease cast iron skillet fry session, you can't overload a pan because you're gonna bring down your temp too much. So you gotta do it in batches

so you get that nice crisp that you want. I disagree. Because if you put all those four legs all in there at one time. You can't do four, no, no. I mean, you don't have to have an impressive cast, no. I didn't mean that. Yeah, like you got more mean you don't have to have an impressive cast. No, I didn't mean that Yeah, like you got more than you can. Yeah, we can't like two inches. Yeah, no, you got more

That's a that's a great clarification You wind up if you got like if you got like a like a ten inch skillet I don't know. What do you got like you're making three quarters of an inch of meat meat pancakes? Yeah, you got three quarters Yeah, you're right. You can't pile them on there. You just have a big it'd be all steamy and you wouldn't get what you're after. This is carnitas. Now how important... I was trying to make it sound... Oh, can you sound a little fight between me and Giannis? How... Can I have a question first? How important is it to you? Because you didn't mention this in your recipe here. I want to know if it's

important to you that before they go into the liquid that you would sear or broil those legs to sort of crispy outside, put salt and pepper on them, you know, do that. I was trying to do, I was trying to do the thing where I'm talking people into how easy it is. So I was leaving out all these little added things

one can do. I feel like, well, If I may. But yeah, I want to know the answer. So does it make a difference? What he's describing is it is I mean there's other cultures do this but but most notably Mexico does it where they there's this very slow gentle cook followed by a crisping caramelization at the end so the carnitas effect. If you were to do that in the beginning where you're getting achieving the Maillard reaction on the outside getting those sugars're getting achieving the Maillard reaction on the outside of getting those sugars caramelized

on the meat and then cooking it and then doing it again, probably not necessary as much, because you're gonna achieve that at the end. You're gonna get that crispiness at the end. So I would just go, I would side with this. Straight to the liquid. Straight into the liquid, yeah. That's good, saves me time.

I'm a bird plucker because I don't like bring, I don't do like packaging in the field. So I have that skin as my barrier to dirt and everything else. And then when I get home, I inevitably am pulling the skin off of everything, but then I'll, I'll throw that in the stock pot or, um, what I've done.

And I'm, this is experimentation at home is, uh, salt that stuff, cut it into strips and just let it like sit there. Um, it's not like very moist anyway, but then, um, fry it really. So now he's making chicharrones. Exactly. Yeah.

There's shit really? Yeah. Yeah. Huh? Yeah. I mean, it's kind of cheating. Like there's not a lot to that turkey skin, you know, and it fried things tastes great.

So, you know what I made one time? I actually made this way more than one time, three times is you ever skin the whole damn Turkey out? He is way more than one time. Three times? You ever skinned the whole damn turkey out? Three is way more than one. Yeah. Well, hear me out.

You'll see, you'll appreciate it. Especially if you're a sailfish. Mm-hmm. Nice. That's it, that's the episode. You ever skin a whole damn turkey out and then lay the hide out and then you grind the Turkey up.

You grind the dark meat up plaster it on that hide. And then you take the breast meat and cut long strips and plant and lay those all out. And then you take like pistachio, yeah. Gallantine, gallantine, gallantine. Yeah. And then roll it up like a sausage and then braise that. That's pretty good. That sounds like not intense. Yeah. And then roll it up like a sausage and then braise that. That's pretty good. That sounds like not intensive. Yeah. But why don't you just, can you settle the fight between me and Yana? So this is going to be the final word. Okay. I'm so excited. Do you know about the fight? No, you do.

I have no, but Sam Bates has been moderating the fight. Ah, yeah. Then I do know. Please let's go. fight. Yeah, then I do know. Please, let's go. If you're rating food, R A T I N G, you're rating, you're rating a dish. You could use the synonym judging your judging food. Do you feel that if if you're judging a dish, and there's a bunch of criteria, and then those criteria get like a one to five score. So they're additive, right? Like they all need to work in, like, they all need to work in

synchronicity, or they all need to, what am I trying to say? It's a holistic. It's a whole, yeah, you're making a holistic score with like five criteria, and all five criteria are scored one to five. Mm-hmm Do you feel that saying approachable and creative? creates a conflict Where if it's one it's less likely to be the other and if it's the other it's less likely to be the one I'm sorry. So there's a scale that site goes from approachable to creative

No, no, no. I mean, the question is really, can something be creative and approachable? It can, yes. In some circumstances, I agree. I just feel like in some cases, these things are offset. Approachability and creativity, meaning we were just talking about, let's say you were the first guy to ever make a gallantine.

You would get a very high creativity score. Yes. But approachability, someone would say, she, I'm not gonna skin a whole damn turkey out like that. I'm gonna give that a one. That's not very approachable. That looks impossible. I just think, so my argument is that there's a conflict

in scoring a dish, there's a conflict between approachability and creativity. Yanni believes that they are perfectly aligned. I wouldn't say perfectly aligned, but if you can create something, which is kind of one of the key tenets of writing recipes, is how do you achieve both of those things? You know, how do you, so much has already been written. So if you were to like make a really simple brine, you know, that's easy. That's

approachable. But if you want to make it really good and really creative, you put star anise in there. Can you answer the question? I did. Who wins the fight? I'm gonna go Yachty because I think that you, it doesn't have to pull, you could have high scores in both because I think if it was easy enough,

and then it was just like, and it was something like, oh, I never thought of that. You know, like, that's great. That's a great little trick to do. And it's just like, it's easy. You can be creative and then you can still, I mean, you wanna inspire people that cook game to actually do it. You don't want to have these crazy complicated recipes, maybe a couple,

but for the most part you want something approachable, but you gotta have that. What's the thing? What's the, what's the icing on there? What's the thing that really kind of makes that recipe shine? You gotta have a little bit of creativity, or every recipe needs to have this one different technique, different ingredient, or something that is simple that's just gonna elevate that beyond all the recipes they've already seen.

I've been making grilled cheeses for a while, my whole life. And only a few years ago did I discover that you can make a traditional grilled cheese, and then you finely shred some Parmesan on the outside of the grilled cheese, flip it back and forth, and then you have a crust of cheese on the outside of your grilled cheese. That is a perfect example of that. That is approachable and creative. I'd say five and five. Okay. I didn't come up with it. Just seeing that. He's got his wrong his wrong answer face I put it to him he

came out Yanni's right I'm wrong okay do you ever just make a regular grilled cheese we'll never think about don't stop there and then add another layer of cheese and another piece of buttered bread and just flip it over and then start making layers of grilled cheese and have maybe two or three grilled cheeses all in one. Different cheese in each layer. That is interesting. You're basically describing a Burger King Baconator without the patties and bacon.

I've never had one of those, but I've made many grilled cheeses that have four or five layers of bread. A Baconator might be a Wendy's product actually. The Burger King one was called like a stacker or something? Yeah, yeah, BK stacker. You could get a quad, you get four patties. It was great.

Sorry, I got this way off track. Yeah. Tell people what else they're dumb not to make this turkey season. Ah, I mean, you know, the heart, liver, gizzard, it's good stuff. It's, of all those delicious animals out there. That's some of the mildest, especially that liver.

I love it. Okay, so what do you do with it? I mean, it's a simple pate, really nice. Walk me through it. Make it creative and approachable. You're gonna sear the liver till it's about medium. So like I'm dumb, so. Okay, you're gonna put it.

I got a turkey liver. Okay, then I do what? You're gonna put it. I got a turkey. I got a turkey liver. Okay. Then I do what you're gonna, you're gonna season it with salt and pepper and you're gonna put it in a hot pan with some butter and you're gonna get a little brown on it. Okay. And you're gonna cook it till it's not super firm, a little pink in there and you're gonna remove that and then in a blender, you're gonna blend and there's probably gonna be some sort of shallot or onions chopped up. So it'd be

good to have your buddy's turkey liver too. It would be helpful. Yeah. Yeah. If you've got a couple, it's going to, it'll, it'll help. And it'd be also good if you got the golf sack off it. Do that little green thing, but cut around that. Get out of there.

Yeah. Uh, and then that you cool it off a little bit and that goes into a blender. Uh, and you blend it, uh, until it's a smooth pace and you're adding a little bit of cold butter, um, every couple seconds till it kind of until it's a smooth paste and you're adding a little bit of cold butter every couple seconds till it kind of It's smooth and it's incorporated Check the seasoning there's you know add some sort of booze and there is usually good a little bit of Brandy or Applejack something like that is usually nice Just a few drops of that and then if you really want to make it good

You're gonna you're gonna pass that you're going to pass that, you're going to press it with a spatula through a little mesh bowl strainer. And that's going to remove any of the sinews and just the little stringy parts that are in a liver. They might be hiding in there. Yeah. And then that'll get it super smooth. And then you just chill that and then you eat that with a little bit of warm toasted bread.

So good. Okay, hit me with a gizzard. Here I got a gizzard. The gizzard, my favorite way to do the combo is what me and Kyle cooked last time. The real thing was the ragu, where we, you know, grind the heart, liver, gizzard all together and then render out a little bit of bacon or pancetta until that's browned and then you add that ground heart, liver, gizzard in there. Then you grind some carrot, onion, celery, put that in there and cook that down. Little tomato paste, little stock, and then hit that with pasta. That's fast.

It's yeah. I mean like less than an hour and you get these three really distinct textures. You know, we were talking about that, you know, the gizzard, you know, it's got a little strength to it. Uh, the liver smooths everything out and the heart's kind of in between. You get a little bit of, I mean, I prefer pancetta, but I make a lot of it out of hog bellies. But smoked bacon is delicious as well.

Little bit of tomato paste, and then that just slow cooks. And then you just cook some pasta, toss that in there, ton of pecorino or parmesan. Is that recipe in the turkey book? It is. Darn right it is. It is. I took everybody's collective turkey offal and made made that one big batch last year at the end of turkey season and then Packaged that up for camp meals. Yeah, that's cool. Me and Yanni, that's that's on the menu. Oh good

We're having that. You want to know another one I stole from you? I took one of your domestic meat recipes and converted it to a wild meat recipe. Is that at Dai Do Wei, you guys do that, I don't know if you're still doing it. You got all those chicken hearts? Oh, the skewer? Yeah, which you're like, he's cooking chicken hearts

in fat and then skewering them and then putting them on a hot grill. So I take a, like a small little, I don't know how to even describe it man, like a, I don't know man, like a really heavy sided, like imagine like an enamel Dutch oven that's like dinky, you you know because that way I'm not wasting so much of my fat right a little crock yeah I take like a little crock and just put all a bunch of hearts in there and top it up you could top it with olive oil if you needed to but if you had like beef tallow or something top it in there and just ever so like turn your burner down about as low as you can get it and offset offset it even

it's just like you're trying to do you're trying to do like a confit which is a super low heat right it's not it's not bubbling like fry oil it's like a little bit like now and it's like a little bloop yeah bloop bloop um because if you overdo it it'll they'll mush out on you, but I do it like that. And then I skewer them. How long does that take the oil? Oh man, maybe I do them for an hour. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a little fun. Yeah. Duck hearts, grouse hearts, turkey hearts. You want to cut them up. They're pretty big. Yeah.

Probably half them. And then get a have either a live fire or on a grill and then I put yeah and I don't know if you do it. I can't remember if you do it but I do. I put some cayenne powder on there, some chili powder, something spicy. Yeah, hot honey would be really good. And then that is good. My kids will walk by just eating those little things. They love them. Yeah. The chicken hearts at the restaurant, my daughter's favorite. You still serve that dish? Mm-hmm. Yeah. That's a good one. I mean the corn feed

technique is just so applicable to so many things. You know, just for, you know, getting it tender and then coming in on the grill afterwards and just getting it cold and then putting it on the grill and just you've got that tender meat and then you're adding in the char and sear and smoke it works on a lot oftentimes I limit myself with doing cone feed because I feel like the amount of Oil or fat needed and the cost associated with that. So I've a few times I've done it in a bag Suvi style, how do you feel about that? I feel like it just doesn't work as well. I get it though.

I have a kind of unlimited source of it. I would say just try to match your, like he's saying, match your cooking vessel to the quantity of meat and save as much of that fat as you can. And you can reuse the fat. Yeah, that's what I started doing more. I got a shelf above my thing. I got little glass jars full of various oils that have had various things happen to them. And everyone knows not to mess with them. They just get the new stuff. But I'll be like, Oh, I remember that oil and I'll just use it for something. Yeah. You know, you can read it. You might want to go in and get that that

liquid bottom part out of there. Because sometimes that can spoil. But if you've salted the meat previously, usually there's enough salt in that layer that it'll keep it from going off. But, but if that's another reason you put it in like a glass jar or something tall sided, so you can see it, maybe scrape it out and get that part off the bottom. You know what the fur trapper, Stu Miller does with his old fish fry oil? No, he saves his old fish fry oil, puts it in a squirt bottle. And when he's set in a koon cuffs, and you get, let it dribble down the bank and get into the creek or whatever, you know, flings a craving on them.

Fish fry grease. I've had really good. It's like everything a raccoon could possibly want right it's like grease and fish Really good luck with with crane legs and goose legs in the doing it the sous vide confit style Yeah, and man. Yeah a lot of times. It's like Dealing with the big vat to do a bunch of legs and Like a meal for one person pretty darn easy in the sous vide style Yeah, buddy of mine shows up at the tailgate with those so after a long day hunting just pulls that out of the cooler cold

Already done. Yeah, and just cuts that vac bag open and just hands out pheasant legs to people so you're having a beer and a cone feed pheasant legs to people so you're having a beer and a confit pheasant leg. It's delicious. That's cool. Do any of you guys do it the Seth and Kelsey Morris way because I know that they're pretty anti plastic and I put myself into that camp too where I just I don't know, I can like heating plastic. It doesn't sound like food. It gets you to have to sous vide in a silicon zip lock, I don't know. I think they pack a mason jar full and then put the mason jar in there. Seth's been reading up on that taint shrinkage.

Yeah. He's gonna start a podcast called Taint Talk. It could be, maybe it's about that, but it's like, I don't know. My reasons are different. I don't care about that, but just like, we're going to try to get them sponsored by Tate cookies. Tate talk by Tate's. I have a recipe in my first book where you take a teal

and you put it in a, in a pine Mason jar with some park cook beans and sausage and bacon. And then you put it in a water bath and cook it in the, in the jar like that. It's really good. Oh yeah. That's a good way to go. Let me hit you with another one. Yeah, why not? Just set it in a,

put your fat and your meat in a glass jar and set the glass jar down in there. Yeah, totally. Yeah, totally. You take more fat again. Or use a silicon bag. You can pack it in there pretty good. Let me hit, so you did the guts.

We covered skin, uh, the guts. You, we covered, uh, skin. We covered the guts. We covered the legs. So you just throw the breasts out. Throw them out. I got a good one on this. You find Jesse's turkeys. Everything's gone with the breast.

Not true. That is my birthday meal. My birthday is mid May. And so it's like, it is Turkey and dewberry cobbler fried turkey. Um, along the lines of sous vide, I think that, uh, I, this is how we cook our Thanksgiving turkey breasts, wild turkey, wild turkey. Okay.

I put them, you know, we sous vide them, uh, all like I'm dumb. Like, yeah, yeah. Tell me the whole thing. So you're going to use what essentially would be poultry seasoning. So you're going to use what essentially would be poultry seasoning. So you're going to have thyme and oregano, maybe some garlic, maybe some lemon, rosemary, and then most importantly, a little bit of celery.

I have a jar of your poultry seasoning. There you go. Dried or fresh? We talking. Doesn't matter. You can use celery seed, a few celery leaves, just kind of get that in there. And you can just change up your herbs as you want and then season your turkey breast as you want it.

And then put it in the bag and then. I might do that. You take it to me shortcuts here. Is this in your book? It's a hundred percent in there. Okay. All right. Go on, go, go the way you go.

I just want to make sure people can get it, but it's in the turkey book. It's in the turkey, but still walk us through it. Yeah. And so if you're listening and you're like, what now? It's in the turkey book, it's in the turkey book, but still walk us through it. Yeah, and so if you're listening and you're like, what now? It's in the turkey book. Take your turkey breast, season it with those delicious things, salt and pepper. So you haven't sliced the turkey breast yet? No, no, it's a whole turkey breast.

Got it. Could be tenderloin on if you want. I usually remove the tenderloins. Yeah. But, and I've got that whole turkey breast in there and then seal that up to three days before you're going to cook it and then just let it sit and then all that seasoning will basically act as a brine. Um, and then I cook that in a water bath at 140 degrees for three hours on the

nose and it is phenomenal from end to end perfectly cooked. And you didn't add any fat in there? Uh, no, no oil, perfectly cooked. And you didn't add any fat in there? No, no oil, no butter, no. Sometimes, and past Thanksgiving or two, I've gone in and taken that, and you can time it. It's like, everybody's getting here at 12.30, you know, like at nine.

Well, why are they coming at 12.30? That's how they do it. What do you mean? At night? No, p.m. I mean, yeah. Yeah, afternoon. It's Thanksgiving they do it. What do you mean? At night? I mean, yeah, after Thanksgiving. Lunchtime. Yeah. He just picked a random number. Just a little early. He can count back early hours. Well, anyway. Is that central time? You would think every one of those things, Steve, wouldn't have an opinion on.

I know. I know. Oh, no, I love all this because I was, I had the same thing like I would in the end. I'd be like, well, you're supposed to put a bunch of butter in there, but not necessarily. You could if you want it. But what I'm getting to is I have in the past couple, uh, thanksgivings taken it out of the bag and then seared it in a lot of brown butter or just butter. Uh, and just one side and it just got a nice light sear on it. I actually don't want to cook it that much more. Like that 140 on turkey breast. It's just, it's so spot on. Three hours, 140, wild turkey.

Just super moist and then just slice it out. You know, make some turkey stock, gravy with giblets and so forth. And then mashed potatoes. You mean giblets? Giblets. You call them giblets? I guess I do. What do you call them, Randall?

Call them giblets. I think that's right now that I hear it out loud. Tonitis. Yeah, we were talking about this yesterday. What was the word yesterday that we couldn't figure out? Yeah, and I told my favorite tonight a story. Yeah We'll never know It's nice to hear a non

Cutlet non fried turkey breast recipe that you know really high on no offense to cutlets and turkey breasts. Oh yeah. I mean, our fried turkey. I love fried turkey a lot. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Okay, so we cut, oh you know what? Here, we left one off. Let's say you did your, so we got the guts, the skin.

You said, let's say you pull off the tenders. Oh yeah, okay. Okay, hit me with, so now you've pulled your tenders off. Uh-huh. Now hit me with the tenders. There's a cool visual trick. Actually, this didn't go in the book. I cut it out with a knife, but since now, have you seen the fork trick where you hold, you notice that there's that really thick sinew that runs down about half of the tenderloin. Grip that in your hand and put a fork behind it. Just so that the two tines are around that sinew. So it's straddling the sinew. Yes.

And then pull your hand back and push the fork forward. And it just pulls that entire seam right out. Why is that not in the book? Nice. I came to it after, you know, we published that thing pretty quick. I mean, there's a hot tip. No, it's good. It's really cool. Huh. And it gets that seam out of the tenderloin and then you throw that in your stock

I would grill tenderloins. You can kind of weave them onto a skewer Mm-hmm to kind of give them more get them more even Yeah, I would say that or more fried That's not not not too creative with that. Okay, we missing anything? We missing any parts of the turkey? I think you should just walk us very quickly through just like you take those tenderloins, basic turkey nuggets. Yeah, I brine them and then brine a little bit of buttermilk

so that you get a really good adhesion. So wet brine? Yep, yep, can be simple. I mean, that's, you know, could just be salt and water. Maybe add pickle juice in there if you'd like. Aren't you gonna correct him about how it drives you crazy when people say that? Oh, dry brine, you remember?

Yeah, it's fine. You're not a fighter, are you? A little. He maybe is the kind of guy that forgets his pet peeves. Yeah, yeah. That's funny. And then a little bit of buttermilk or yogurt, whatever, just some kind of thick dairy and then, uh, and then it goes into the seasoned flour, which is going to be, uh, most importantly, again, it's going to contain celery seed.

Like out of all, all those spices, I think celery is the celery and black pepper, kind of the most important things for a turkey for poultry in general That's gonna give you that KFC. You're like, oh That's what that was It's always what's the key to getting it really like that thick You know batter on there is like I feel like I'm in there and it's all buttermilky and then Do I put them all my basket first and drop it all at once? Are you going straight out of that buttermilk and dropping it?

Let them sit and I'm sitting the refrigerator for 20 30 minutes hour or two doesn't matter You let them sit also as your you've got your your your dredge your flour And maybe a little buttermilk maybe drizzle a little bit so you get these little beads in there and then what that's gonna do when that adheres, you're not just gonna have a thin layer of flour on there, but you're also gonna have these little beads of like buttermilky flour, so they're gonna give you a little more of those like cracklin' textures.

A little drizzle of that in there, bread them up really well, and then just set them in the refrigerator, get them cold in like 20 minutes. And then when that, but what about when it gets kind of doughy? You don't mind that? No, it's going to be fine. You don't mind it getting a little doughy. No, I don't mind. You know what my kid's been doing? He just makes a god awful mess the way he does it, but he cuts the turkey breasts and makes little, a bunch of little tenders and then he just keeps doing it.

it makes little a bunch of little tenders and then he just keeps doing it dredge flower dredge flower because he's looking to try to build up like a long john silvers later i feel like you're going to get some like doughiness dude and he drops him in the deep fryer and dude that oil is so so full of just all that garbage man. I think one round. And he eats it and walks away. I would go one round on the dredge. Yeah, he learned it on the internet. That's awesome. I'm hungry. Okay man, the turkey book, the hog book. What's next?

I don't know. I mean, I say that in all honesty, I'm batting around some ideas and everybody likes to pontificate on what, you know, the blank book. The deer book. The deer book, right. It would be obvious. I get a lot of requests for Audad, but I don't think there's a book worth. I wouldn't be worried about there being a, with you, you'll find a book worth, but I feel like you might not find the audience. Right, yeah, the marketability of that would be more, very, very specific. Dude, I feel like, yeah, but if you keep going,

like the way you're doing it, people are gonna be like, I need the series. Yeah, oh right, right. They're beautiful, and it's like hog, turkey, deer. Or you could do the fish book. Bowhead whale. I like fish a lot. The bowhead whale book. Yeah. The fish book, you'd probably want it. Yeah. Like for, I don't know. I mean, you have, you have a great sense of what to do.

Like, you know, hogs in and out. There's a lot of misinformation about hogs. It's a great book. Um, turkey book. You got a lot of experience. I mean, you have a ton of venison experience. There's a great book. Um, turkey book. You got a lot of experience. I mean, you have a ton of Venice experience There's a ton of interest. It's America's deer people are hunting them from top to bottom side to side the deer book. It's true I will say it's the front-runner But I want to be non-committal and because you could be cute and be like the squirrel book, but that's just cute Yeah, you're just being cute, you know and a little too niche. Yeah Yeah, you'd be squirrel but it's like representative of the rodent book, right?

You like beavers muskrats the beaver book nutria Yep, people would love it. I got something Jesse and I are doing please This will be super fun Buddy of mine Eric Johansson out in South Dakota. He's, he wouldn't like me saying this, but he's kind of like a poster child for, it'd be like quote unquote progressive farming practices these days. So real heavy on you know easements for wetlands and native grasses and and Stuff like that, right? But which in turn happens to be like really really good for wildlife

So he's got on the family farm out there He's got just an unbelievable Wild pheasant hunting situation and lodging and stuff and and he's a big Believer as am I and like the habitat work of Pheasants Forever. So we and Jesse included here have come together to we're gonna do a hunt that we're auctioning off at Pheasant Fest this year as a fundraiser for Habitat and yeah so we're gonna... So the fundraised money goes to where? To Pheasants Forever. And you're gonna hunt this property that is a demonstration of... A lot of really good practices. Yep. And you two both gonna hunt? Yeah we're both gonna hunt, Eric's

gonna hunt, I'm bringing Snort out there, Eric has one of Snort's cousins too. So that's fun and it's super cute obviously. How many days does the winter get to hunt? I think it's three days a hunt for two people. Jesse's gonna be leading the cooking but I've been emphatic about the fact that he's not shackled with cooking. I'm there to help as much as possible as allowed so I can learn stuff too. And then, yeah, we're going to hunt, lodging, and you just got to get your butt there, but it is a really, really incredible. I've been lucky enough to go out there and hunt with Eric a couple of times and he always says, um, your dog's invited. If you would like to come, that's okay. What's up with the thousand dollar? I'm seeing a note about a thousand dollar gift card. Yeah. And I'm not

related or related. No, that's related. So then, uh, first light we're throwing in a thousand dollar gift card. So to the winners, to the winners. Yep winners yep so 500 a piece to get get decked out just grease grease the wheels a little bit and I'm gonna be available to help you with getting outfitted in your upland stuff from first light so thanks guys up fun yeah I've already started we shot a few pheasants this year and I always started playing with the menu. Nice. I love pheasant. Yeah Yes, oh What about the game bird book? Could be I love poultry a lot. So

Just go bird book the bird book Do you do the deer book cuz I want that book People are gonna be like blowing me up right now when you can write the deer book because I want that book People are gonna be like blowing me out right now. What are you gonna write the deer book? Well, hopefully you have all these names already locked down somewhere and I would cook that book from front to back if you did it Yeah, right Remember that movie where that gal Julia Julia Julia Julia. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, right. Right. Right. I do a book called Steven Jesse. Do you know that movie? Steven Jesse. Steven Jesse, where I cook all this stuff.

Who are the actors? Kevin Bacon, Paul Giamatti. Bam! Kevin Bacon, Paul Giamatti, dude. That's it. Yeah, man. Unreal. All right. Beautiful. Or I also get the jackass guy. Oh, Steve-o. No. Johnny Knoxville. Yeah, yeah. I've checked in lately though. I don't know if I'm older and he is some kind of-

No, he's way gray. He's grayed out. I don't know if I'm passing. Hard years on those boys. Yeah. Thanks for coming on, man. Yeah, thanks for having me. Hog book, turkey book, deer book. Get two of them out. Are you gonna bundle them? When the deer book comes out.

Yeah. The trilogy. You should maybe do a version where you can just get them in a little box, so like a little pair. Yeah we'll wait until that third one comes out. Oh, then you do a box set. Good luck, man. Thanks. When you go to Austin, Texas, and everybody eventually finds themselves in Austin, Texas, go to Dai Duet. Unbelievable dining experience, man. Thank you. Again, what does Dai Duet mean? It literally means from the two. It's part of an Italian phrase. It means from the two kingdoms

of nature, choose food with care. You know, so funny, we took an Uber when we left. Guys like, how do you say that? You should go on and ask the owner. I was like, it's die due. Yeah, die due. Unbelievable binding experience. Thank you. And not stuff Unbelievable. Dining experience and not stuffy man. No, not stuffy. It's meant to be a neighborhood restaurant. Yeah. And the waiters and waitresses, the waitress, they don't act weird. The waitstaff doesn't act weird. They don't like whisper and sit with you. Start telling me what you don't want to hear. It's just like, it's just a great dining experience, man.

Now they are the backbone of it. Well, what I have tonight It's just like, it's just a great dining experience, man. Yeah, they are the backbone of it. Well, what I have tonight, they don't, it's like, they don't do all that garbage. My friends. Yeah. It's a delightful little dish. Well, tonight I have from my friends at the winery. Yeah. It's like, oh my God, don't do any of that. This is cool. They're cool. They come up and take your order and talk to you.

Try. Like you're a person They're cool. They come up and take your order and talk to you. Like you're a person in a restaurant. Not like you're in like an online, like call for company, a 1-800 number or something. It's a great, it is a great restaurant. Yeah. I like it. I like eating there. And if you see Jesse eating in there, come up come on be like dude, should you be working? Lazy ass. Yeah. All right. Thanks, man. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks, Jesse If you've hung around with a lot of old turkey hunters, you have no doubt encountered those little plaques where you take a turkey's leg and foot and bend its fingers and dry its finger so the turkey's giving you the bird. It's funny because it's like the bird, but he's giving you the bird. Well, check this out. We just made a turkey call called the bird and the artwork is a turkey's foot giving you the bird.

Not only does it look great, it sounds great. This is a call that idiots can make good turkey sounds on. It's got a machined, polished, and engraved acrylic pot. It's got an anodized and laser engraved tone board and a crystal playing surface, but the artwork is under the crystal. So when you're scratching your little prep spot, and there's a perfect place for a little prep spot without ruining the artwork,

when you're scratching your surface, you're not scratching off the artwork. It's got a diamond wood peg with an acrylic topped striker. Again this is like it's just a very easy to use pot call. You'll sit down you'll scratch the little spot you're going to make great turkey sounds. Trust me. Find your new turkey pot call and a full assortment of meat eater and Phelps turkey calls at PhelpsGameCalls.com.