WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 850 - Tom Colicchio

Episode Date: September 27, 2017

Top Chef's Tom Colicchio discovered a passion for cooking at a young age, thanks to a book his corrections officer father found in a prison library. Even now as a celebrity chef, with restaurants around the country, Tom still marvels at the simplicity of cooking. He talks with Marc about food trends, the respectful competitiveness he has with fellow chefs, and being politically engaged around food sustainability and hunger issues. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Alright, let's do this. How are you, what the fuckers? What the fuck, buddies? What the fucking ears? What the fuck, Knicks? What is happening? I'm Mark Maron. This is my podcast, WTF. Today on the show, I talk to Tom Colicchio, the Top Chef guy.

You know him, the chef guy from Top Chef. I think we just wanted to chat. I like chefs. I haven't talked to a chef in a while. In another life, I wanted to be a chef. I believe I could do it but anyways there's a couple things i want to tell you about if i could because i have the the platform here to do it if you want to come out and see me and brendan mcdonald as we are as we are out and about with the new book waiting for the punch we have events in new york and san francisco uh so

far up to this point that's where we got in new In New York City, we'll be at the Union Square, Barnes & Noble on Tuesday, October 10th at 7 p.m. You don't need tickets for that. In San Francisco, we'll be at the Alamo Drafthouse on Friday, October 13th as part of Litquake. You do need tickets for that one. Go to Litquake.org to get them. And if you want to win a king-size casper mattress or get a brand new luggage set from away or get some signed posters from me pre-order waiting for the punch and then upload your proof of purchase to enter our sweepstakes go to markmaronbook.com to pre-order

now all right you want to do that can you do it so i got oh you know what i wanted to bring this up because um you know pete davidson was on the show on monday and it was an amazing conversation it was a very candid conversation a very forthright conversation about uh mental health his mental health issues mine to a lesser degree we talked about his borderline personality disorder uh and and here's the fucking fucked up thing about our culture is that the interview got turned into a lot of clickbait by all the usual places all the garbage outlets you know the the portals of uh psychic garbage that we are allowed into our fucking brain through our eye holes. And, you know, the headlines were almost all sensationalistic, making it sound like he was in a crisis or something.

And it just it wasn't the case. He was having an honest, respectful conversation with me about mental health, which is something people in this country are hesitant to do because the shitty tabloid culture stigmatizes it and makes it seem wrong. It's just a shame that people would take it out of that context and sensationalize it. You know, that it was just an honest conversation. And it's just it's just fuck it, man. It's the opposite of helpful. It makes people less likely to get help, less likely to feel like they are OK. It's just it's just fucking irresponsible. And I just wanted to put that out there.

Because Pete did a brave thing. And he's a good kid, that Pete. And he's doing all right. That's what I got to say. All right? People got to talk about mental health. You keep hiding shit,'s just then everything is a lie and all the entire cultural dialogue is a big lie and everyone's afraid to talk

because they're going to be exploited or bullied or ripped apart or ostracized man are we going to make this experiment work can we be a fucking community of humans in this country is it possible all odds are against us right now but i got some feedback on um the size of my new feral friendly feral stray cat's face. I told you about Big Head. I told you about that, you know, he has this huge head, but he also has this huge set of balls, which needs to be taken care of, and I guess that's on me.

I don't know if he's domesticated, but he's pleasant sometimes. He's an odd cat. He looks like he's got this big old head and these big old balls and you know and his body looks like a bicep like he's just this little monster and i like him all right but he's a little erratic you can touch him you can pet him but sometimes when you're petting him he hisses like he you don't know if he's hissing in pleasure generally with a cat it's not pleasure and he he attacked me the other day and i i don't i went out here my my you know sarah the painter my uh my girlfriend thinks it had something to do with my

balls because i went out there naked to feed him which i do sometimes in the morning out back no one can see me i'll go out naked and put the food down. And that little fucker big head attacked my leg and bit my leg. He bit my fucking leg out of nowhere. As I was walking away, after I picked up the bowl to fill it with food, he attacked me, bit my leg. And Sarah's like, well, that's

because he saw your balls and he saw you as a threat of his territorial threat. We had a little cockfight i had a cockfight with the cat and uh i didn't uh i did i did not attack him back i let him win that one but to the question about the connection between balls and head i got a few emails sort of putting it together um but this was the first one from Allison, subject line cat balls.

I was listening to today's podcast and I had to stop what I was doing, juicing prickly pears. There's magenta shit all over my kitchen. To answer your inquiry about the relationship between cat cheeks and testicles, I'm a vet who works at an animal shelter. So I have the pleasure of working

with a variety of cat testicles of all shapes and sizes. The answer is that Sarah the Painter is right, of course, in parentheses. Cheek slash jowl size is a testosterone-dependent trait in male cats. Cats who are neutered before one to two years of age will never develop jowls, and if they are neutered later in life, the jowls will stay, but will get saggier once the testosterone disappears isn't that the way with everything though anyway basically there's a direct relationship between the size of a cat's balls and the size of its cheeks get that majestic beast neutered thank you for everything you do for your outdoor colony keep telling cat stories

boomer and deaf black cat 4e forever got it i just had to figure that out in real time 4e forever 4e is forever well thank you allison for clearing that up now we know why i have jowls it's because of my balls oh No, I meant the cat. I meant that's why the cat had jowls. There's another email here that I'd like to read you because I think it's encouraging and important, and I believe it's real. Sometimes I get emails that are not real. They're just people fucking with me.

But this one sounded real, and it sounded, I don't know it was encouraging i don't think it's going to take the country by storm but it'd be nice if it would uh this is uh from william bill subject line i'm sorry i've made a huge mistake hey mark i just watched too real on netflix that's my special by the way which you can watch on netflix i must admit this is the first time i've ever watched a comedy special great job it was very funny i guess i owe you and the country an apology so here it goes i'm sorry i voted for trump i'd take it back if i could as gob from arrested development frequently says

i've made a huge mistake i'm 44 years old and I was a conservative talk radio Fox News junkie since high school. After 25 plus years of living in the echo chamber, I've finally broken free. The Donald has managed to do what no one and nothing else has been able to do. I'm off of conservative talk radio and off of Fox News. I'm off of conservative talk radio and off of Fox News. Just couldn't listen to one more sycophantic broadcast praising and or excusing inexcusable positions, policies, and tweets. I've been amazed at how much more open and receptive to new views and opinions I've become since stepping back from the spin machine.

I'm not ready to vote a straight Democratic ticket, but I no longer dismiss news and views from the other side your wtf podcast has been an important part of this transition for me it's been super healthy to get new views from someone i enjoy listening to my brother-in-law introduced me to your podcast this past spring a couple of highlights for me have been the al franken interview and the president obama interview keep up the great work thanks bill see that's basic logic without even being political is that when you see people that you've grown to trust support behavior and ideas and actions that are heinous you have to question the whole goddamn operation don't you

well bill i appreciate that i appreciate you uh you sending that and i and i believe you and and i and i have to assume that others are are somewhat sensing that uh it's a real shit show it's a real history changing brain bending completely terrifying shit show a fucking circus of corruption and greed and racism and violence hey but cooking's great i love to cook i want to get better at cooking occasionally i'll have a chef in here get get some tips, but you can go look that stuff up. I love to cook because it takes me out of me. And sometimes when I have time off, like I've had over the summer, I'll spend a lot of time doing food prep, doing cooking, making things I enjoy. I'll spend hours and hours making beautiful food that I like to eat,

that's healthy. Hours and hours of prep, days of working on the food and I will eat it in minutes in fucking minutes and I cannot seem to not do that oh did I mention today is my birthday which will be yesterday when you hear this I recorded this

Wednesday and if you're listening to it Thursday I will have turned 54 already I'm 54 years old I woke up 54 this morning and um I feel all right I feel okay I don't make a big deal out of it going to dinner with Sarah the painter got some nice calls appreciate all the well-wishers on twitter and email thank you i made it another year i've had uh 54 in a row now with no breaks got close to taking a break but i stayed uh i kept uh i kept at it i kept at this life thing so look let's listen to me and tom calicchio the top chef guy he's a jersey guy and as you know

i'm genetically jersey so this is me and tom hi it's terry o'reilly host of under the influence recently we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talked to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative.

It's a night for the whole family. Be a part of Kids Night when the Toronto Rock take on the Colorado Mammoth at a special 5 p.m. start time on Saturday, March 9th at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton. The first 5,000 fans in attendance will get a Dan Dawson bobblehead courtesy of Backley Construction.

Punch your ticket to Kids Night on Saturday, March 9th at 5pm in Rock City at torontorock.com I'm talking. Alright, you just walked in. You're talking about a restaurant down, where is it? Necco Park?

No, Silver Lake. Silver Lake, yeah. Squirrel, yeah. I've been there, I think, once. I don't know. But I have to assume that when you walk into a restaurant, they're like, holy shit, Tom's here. How do you pronounce your last name? Colicchio.

Colicchio. Tom Colicchio just walked in. So there's panic in the kitchen. No, no. So last night we did a 10th anniversary party at Craft, my restaurant here in Los Angeles. I've been there. And Jessica Caslow, who owns and is a chef at Squirrel, she cooked with me last night. Johnny and Vinny as well, and Ludo.

You're dropping names. Johnny and Vinny. They're your guys over there? No, no. The guys that own Animal. Okay. Oh, I've been there. Yeah.

And so, you know, Jessica knew I was coming and so, yeah. But that does happen, I guess. You don't ever drop in just to drop in? I do. A lot of times,

I don't want to be known. I just kind of drop in, you know, just kind of try to sneak in and just have it. Because, you know, the problem is we chefs, we go into each other's restaurants and we get

what we call food fucked. Yeah. You know, just too much food starts coming out and you feel obliged that you have to eat it all. And before you know it, you're rolling out of there, you know, 10 pounds heavier than when you walked in. You feel like shit. It is a little, it's, you just, that's happened to me and I'm not a chef. Right, right, right. If I go to, like, I like Alex Garnicelli, right?

So I'll go to a restaurant and she'll know I'm coming. And then they start, you know, doing chef's table kind of stuff. And you're like, oh my God. And before you know it, you're just like. Nine desserts. I'm ill. Yeah. It's like, were they trying to kill me?

Is he trying? Well, I imagine with you, it's like, I know what's happening. They're trying to kill me. They're trying to kill me. Exactly. Get me out of the way. Yeah. But, oh, so what's her name over there at Squirrel?

Jessica Kozloff. Now, what makes her, like, I'm just curious because, like, I can cook, but I'm not a chef. And I'd like to be, but I didn't go that way. Usually after that you get, well, you know, I'm not a chef, but I have a wok. Yeah. I don't know. I have a wok pan. Right, right.

Yeah, because it's easy to saute in, not because I wok cook. But when you say, what makes her stylistically interesting as a chef? She's doing food that I think, at least that I want to eat now. There's a certain freshness to it, a certain meaty-sy to it,

and it's just damn delicious. Yeah. I mean, she does this rice salad with this egg on it, this crispy rice salad with egg on it for breakfast, and it's just, I can eat it every day of the week. Oh, that sounds good. It's delicious, yeah. But now, that's not something you would think of.

No, no, it's not the kind of food that I cook, and that's probably why I like it. She did this thing last night that was so cool. She did cabbage. Yeah. Right? And braised cabbage, and so it was kind of seared a little bit

and a big wedge of cabbage braised in what well she basted it so she seared it first in a lot of butter and then started basting it in sauerkraut juice huh

and then took dehydrated sauerkraut juice and used it as a garnish and then some chive blossoms you know garlic chive blossoms huh and fried preserved lemons

it was just just absolutely delicious. Now, just saying that, I understand the logic of it and the aesthetic of it and that it's like a mildly crowded cabbage, braised cabbage with lemon and whatever. But do you just marvel at the ingenuity of that? No, actually the simplicity of it. This is, when you get down to it, it's a wedge of braised cabbage. Right.

But it's not about how, it's always about what. Not about what, it's about how. Yeah. It's not that you braise cabbage, how did you braise it? Right. What did you do there? You did something a little different. But it seems like creative, like it seems like outside the box.

Dehydrated sauerkraut juice. Yeah, listen, it's absolutely creative, but out of the box, but at the same time, really simple and basic too. Now, where'd you grow up? New Jersey. Where? Elizabeth. Now, where'd you grow up? New Jersey. Where? Elizabeth.

Yeah, my grandfather is from Elizabeth. My uncle said everybody's from Elizabeth. You search back and you go back, someone in your family's from Elizabeth. Why is that? I don't know. Do they all come in that way? Yeah, I think from Ellis Island, if you went left on the river, you went to New York, and you take a right, you went to New Jersey.

And you're right there. You're at Elizabeth. But it wasn't a nice place. How old are you? 55. Do you have family there still? No. I think I have one cousin left.

Uh-huh. Yeah. But what was it like there when you grew up? What was the business? Yeah, my father was, well, he had a barber shop when we were young, and then he- In the house? Yeah. No, no, not in the house.

No, he had a shop. And then were young, and then he- In the house? Yeah. No, no, not in the house. No, he had a shop. And then I think he lost it paying a gambling debt. I think. Something they didn't talk about. Some gangster got the shop? Yeah, I don't know. Something like that. But anyway, he was a correctional officer in a county jail.

Oh, really? Yeah. That's heavy. Yeah. Coming home from that. He went from barber to corrections officer. Yeah, exactly. In the county jail.

Yeah, I think it was one of those things where he was still young and it was 20 and out. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then he did that his whole life? He did, and he actually passed away before he retired. He was 52 when he passed away, so it was 28 years ago. Yeah, he was young. Of what? Lung cancer.

Oh, smoked? Yeah. Oh, my God. A lot. He just grew up with that, I guess. You know, that's the world that you lived in then. Yeah, yeah. He started smoking when he was a teenager, probably, and he was good for a good two to three packs a day.

Wow. Did you ever do it? I did. You know, it's funny. My first trip to Los Angeles, I wasn't crazy about it, but I was 24 years old, and the only good thing that came out of it is I never smoked a cigarette again after that trip. Oh, really? I was 24 years old. And you'd been smoking?

I'd been smoking probably a good pack a day. Yeah. And I was here. I was working just for a couple weeks. And I was staying in a motel somewhere. And I had to walk up two flights of stairs. And I was out of breath. And I was 24.

And I was like, fuck this. Oh, really? I got to stop this. I never smoked a cigarette again. It scares you. Yeah. Wow. So what do you mean just out here working for a couple weeks?

You weren't a chef then? Yeah. I was a sous chef in a restaurant in New York called Quilted Giraffe, and we had three weeks off in August. Yeah. And so I asked the chef there that I was working for to get me out to Los Angeles to cook, and so he sent me out here to work at a restaurant called Rex, a big old Italian restaurant.

And I spent about a week in the kitchen and said, I've got to get out of here. That was it. And so I took whatever money I had and ate around and then I tell them back home. So like when you grew up how many siblings do you have? Two. I have an older brother and a younger brother.

Okay so there's three. You're Italian full on. Your mom is what does she do? My mom you know she just took care of us when we were young

and then she you know in the first job she had at the house, she worked at a photo store or something like that, helping process film. But then she started working at a school cafeteria. She managed a school cafeteria. So they're a straight-up working-class family.

Yeah. I shared a bedroom with my two brothers. For the whole time? Oh, yeah, until I left when I was 18. Yeah, exactly. But what is, because I was talking to frank about it frank's an italian kid from new jersey my part my part-time assistant guy and it seems to me that there was a time where you could go like anywhere in new jersey and philadelphia and in that area where you can find a pretty good italian restaurant almost every other block you're a jersey guy right where well

i mean my mother's pompton lakes my father's jersey city but i didn't grow up there got it you know we were out by the time i was six but yeah genetically i'm jersey right so no there's a in our town there was an italian restaurant that was there forever called spiritos yeah and that's where we would go my father would take us there on fridays yeah um he would play softball and then we'd go there and they had, you know, decent pizza. They had great veal cutlet and ravioli. Yeah. It wasn't veal cutlet

with Parmigiano, just fried veal cutlet with sauce and then ravioli on the side. Yeah. And that's what we ate. We had an Italian salad and if they felt like splurging,

we would get the imported provolone cheese, not the domestic stuff. Yeah. But it was good, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The restaurant's still there. It's still there.

It's still there, yeah. Now what makes, like what is the difference, like, because I, like what do you think, okay, let's talk Italian food here. Now, yeah. The restaurant's still there. It's still there. It's still there, yeah. Now, what is the difference? Because I... What do you think... Okay, let's talk Italian food here. Now, wait. See, I don't go to too many restaurants here,

but I'll give it a shot. I don't know restaurants here that well. No, I don't either, dude. But I mean, I'm of the belief that we don't have top-notch Italian here. Well... Angelini's Osteria is good. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And I guess Mario's place is good. Mozza, you know. But I mean, I only ate there once. Right. But like, there's no... Angelini's Osteria is good yeah and I guess Mario's place is good Moza but I mean I only ate there once right but like there's no like the old school like Dentana

and places like that yeah I guess that's right yeah it's kind of old school Italian yeah but I don't know if there was a huge Italian contingent here like there was

like they were all in Jersey and Philly well they were in San Francisco yeah they were all up north yeah yeah

so that's where the Italian is yeah I think so I think so listen I'm sure there's a million people now that are going to be like jumping down my throat going, what do you mean?

How do you not eat there? There are good Italian restaurants. There are great Italian restaurants here. That's probably true. Yeah, there are. I just don't know them. So how do you go, what drives you to cook? Did you love it when you were a kid?

I mean, I was- Do you have a knack for it when you were a kid? Yeah, I did actually. I was about 13, 12 or 13, and I started cooking and doing simple stuff. Like I watched my mom make pancakes and said, well, that's pretty damn easy to do. I think I can handle that.

It's kind of fun though. It's immediate kind of. And then I was, God, about the best job I ever had. I was 13 years old and we belonged to a swim club, an Italian American swim club in Clark, New Jersey called the Grand Centurions.

Yeah. And they had a snack bar type thing. Yeah. And the guy hired me there to scoop ice cream and run the cash register. And within a week, I was cooking. Doing like grilled cheese and burgers and steak sandwiches and sauce, stuff like that.

And I just loved it. This guy was paying me $275 a week under the table and I work in a pair of flip-flops, you know, shorts and a flip-flops, maybe a shirt sometimes. It was great. And I just- Because you're on the grill.

Yeah. I just loved it. And so I found it, it was easy. It's engaging though. It was very easy. I understood it. And, you know, I had a problem with like dealing with recipes, looking at recipes and trying to figure out recipes.

I most likely would have been diagnosed with ADD. Yeah. And I would kind of stumble upon them. And then I got this book, I think I was about 15, and my dad came home, and he said he got it in the library. So I'm not sure what the hell this book was doing in the jail's library. Yeah. But it was Jacques Pepin.

Yeah. And it's a book called La Technique. Yeah. And he just talked about how cooking isn't about recipes, it's about techniques. Yeah. And once you learn techniques, you can throw the recipe book out and just do whatever you want. Is that true?

Absolutely. It freed me up completely. Listen, it's like playing guitar, right? Yeah. Before you get creative on a guitar, you have to know the basics, right?

Yeah, yeah. And then once you understand how to, you know, if you can get one, one, you know, pattern down for... You learn a couple scales. For scales, yeah.

Once you get, you know, if you can play a pentatonic scale, I mean, you can do a lot. Sure. That's exactly right. But like, so, okay, so what are, so you're 15 and you read that book? Yep.

And what are the basics? Well, the basics were, you know, how do you cook a green vegetable? It's the same no matter what green vegetable it is. How do you make a good stock? How do you make a couple of mother sauces and then you can go from there? Yeah. You know, how do you butcher a few things? And, you know, you get some basics and then you can kind of do whatever you want.

How do you cook a green vegetable? You blanch it? Well, yeah, exactly. In boiling water, you don't cover the pot. You make sure it's salted. Yeah. Those are basics. Keep it quick, and then you can saute after that.

Yeah, exactly. Right? Yeah. And so one, and then- Do you blanch broccoli, Rob? Yes and no. It all depends. It depends on what I'm doing with it.

Okay. But it depends. Do I want that roasted flavor, or do I want like a fresh green flavor? Right. Okay. Right. So if you're on what I'm doing with it. Okay. But it depends, do I want that roasted flavor or do I want like a fresh green flavor? Right, okay. Right, so if you're roasting it, you just roast it. If I'm roasting it straight up, I'll roast it, but then I'll be getting a different flavor.

Okay. But that's exactly right. So how do you treat each thing and what's the effect that you're looking for? I just want to throw a very specific question in there. And so it's, you know, I just found that cooking was easy. It came easy and I enjoyed it. And my dad, I guess, suggested and wasn't, I listened to him that often, but he suggested

I become a chef. And I was like, all right, sounds cool. If he's into it. Yeah. If I got his support. But like, but you know, because like I cooked, I did some grill cooking when I was younger. I did. I was not good at it and I couldn't handle, like I fucked up a few times in restaurants,

but I liked the excitement of it. Yeah. Oh, I did too. Like you got all those dupes up and you're just sweaty and you're like, oh. There's nothing like it, man. When it's busy, you're walking to a busy kitchen. I have a steakhouse in Vegas and I walk in there and it's a busy, busy place and I walk in and just kind of, all right, guys, keep doing what you're doing because I can't figure

it out. Really? It's insane. Yeah. There's just, what is it? Got a big line? Like there's a line in back. There's two. We have side's insane. Yeah, there's just, what is it? It's got a big line? Like there's a line in back? Well, there's two.

We have side by side. Yeah. And there's just a pile of meat cooking at any time. It's great. It's awesome to see. Which restaurant's that? It's called Craft Steak. Craft Steak in Vegas.

Which hotel? The MGM. Oh, yeah? Yeah. But okay, so you got the knack, you got the basics from Jacques Pepin. Is that how you say his name? Yeah, yeah. Do you go to school?

No, I plan on going to culinary school. And at the time, you had to work in two restaurants before they'd accept you. And so, you know, I filled out the application and the whole bit, and I started working- For which one? Culinary Institute of America. And then I started working around,

and I think this was my fourth restaurant job. I finally decided to take a shot at cooking in New York. Yeah. And I was at the Quilted Giraffe, which was a four-star restaurant, considered one of the best in New York, maybe in the United States. The Quilted Giraffe. The Quilted Giraffe, yeah. And within four months, I was a sous chef there.

And at that point, I was like, I'm like... So you just get a gig, you get the job as a what? Well, my first serious restaurant job was at a restaurant in Elizabeth called Evelyn's. It was a seafood restaurant. We would do a thousand covers on a Saturday night. It was just insane. But it also, you know. Fresh fish.

Well, kinda. But it also opened me up to the restaurant world. You know, I was a 17 year old kid and there was a lot of restaurant subculture. Older waitresses around. Sure. They were older, like 23, 24, going to college. Yeah. So there was a lot of, I had a lot of fun.

And just that kitchen too, right? There was nothing like it. I mean, it's just. I used to tell a story about that. When you've just gotten through a lunch rush or a dinner rush and you're out back just covered in grease smoking a cigarette. So good. Yeah, that was it.

Yeah. And we, you know, I was going to the, then the drinking age was 18. Right. So, you know, you'd go out with your friends after work and just, you know. Yeah. You know, just get totally inebriated. Yeah, and manage to wake up.

Break into the restaurant to eat. Yes. There's stuff like, yeah, exactly. Yeah, you've been there, huh? Yeah. And so, but anyway, so that was the first job. And then from there, I moved to, and I worked in, you I worked on the line.

I worked in the bakery. I worked in the prep kitchen. So you understood it all. And then I ended up going to a red sauce Italian restaurant in Union, New Jersey. And then from there, went to a hotel to try that out. Red sauce Italian restaurant? What is it? That's a way of, that's a certain type of Italian?

Yeah, it's the red sauce Italian. One red sauce. Not that northern Italian stuff. Right, right. Not the whiter sauces. No. Or just oils and fish. that's a certain type of Italian? Yeah, it's the red sauce Italian, not that northern Italian stuff. Right, right, not the whiter sauces. Yeah, yeah. Or just oils and fish. We didn't do risotto.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was veal parmesan, chicken parmesan. There you go. That kind of stuff. Spaghetti and meatballs. Yeah, yeah. All set. Franchese and yeah. So, and then from there I went to a hotel

and I was there for a couple weeks and they made me the night chef. So I was in charge of the kitchen at night and I was so over my head. At a hotel. Yeah. And I would go and look at books and do dishes. In the city? No, this was in Secaucus, New Jersey.

Oh, Secaucus. Yeah. We used to drive by that. My grandmother used to say that it was all pigs. It used to be. Yeah. Pigs. I mean, you know, back then in Meadowlands, you used to go by Meadowlands and see pheasants,

you know, in there. Yeah, it was like just swamplands and it stunk. Yeah. There was a smell to it. Well, it was all the sulfur coming out of the ground. Is that what it was? That was natural? Yeah, yeah, exactly.

All right. Sure. It was Jimmy Hoffa decomposing. Yeah, a lot of Jimmy Hoffas. That's what they told us, exactly. And then I worked in a decent restaurant doing new American cuisine. Well, wait, tell me what happened when you were over your head.

So you were working on hotel. No, I would work on these dishes and just kind of nothing. I mean, they all loved it. To me, I'd look at it and go, no, this isn't right. You had to make the menu? Yeah, yeah.

And so I was in charge of the specials. So I would come up with two or three specials a week or whatever. And all along the way, you're picking up skills. Yeah. You're learning shit. Yeah.

You can make a good meatball. Yeah, I could do that. My mother taught me to do that when I was a kid. So anyway, but then I ended up going to this restaurant called Evelyn's. I'm not Evelyn's. 40 Main Street.

And it was a good restaurant. Where is that? This was in Montclair, I'm sorry, Milburn, New Jersey. Short Hills, Milburn. And I was a cook there, and that did really well there.

It was a good restaurant. We got a three-star New York Times review, the whole bit. Italian? No, no, it was like New American. Oh, yeah. And we changed the menu every day, and so we all sat together

and just kind of contributed to the menu, and it was a blast. And then I left to go to New York at the Quilted Giraffe, and then went back to 40 Main as a chef. Oh, after. After my first chef's job. Yeah. Now, tell me, what are the ranks?

Because what does a sous chef do exactly? Well, this is the way I put it. People always ask, are you still cooking in the kitchen? No, cooks cook in the kitchen. Sous chefs cook a little less. Chefs cook. We really don't cook, but it's our recipes. It's our style of cooking.

It's our management style the whole bit. So you give up the addiction? No, no, no. It's still there. So if you go to see a classical piece of music, right? You go to see an orchestra play. Who gets top billing? The conductor, right?

You're playing a piece of music that was probably written a couple hundred years ago. Right. You don't expect that conductor to jump in the pit and pick up the oboe and start playing or something. Sure. No, it would be just chaos. I don't even know if he knows how, though. They may.

They probably can play instruments. I'm sure he can play piano or something. I don't know if that's true. Probably. They probably can. We don't know that. But the chef, you're in the kitchen expediting. Yeah.

You're coordinating everything. If you have to go back there and jump behind the line and start cooking, everything comes to a screeching halt. So you want the chef out there, you know, at least coordinating things to a certain extent. Managing everything. Yeah. Yeah. But, but that, so that's the big payoff is you get to not be dirty anymore?

Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. You don't, you don't, it was the muddy python. How do you know he's the king? He's the only one who ain't got no shit on him.

Because I went over, like years ago, like I've only, I've interviewed like, I guess you're the third or fourth chef really. It depends whether you consider Bourdain a chef.

So I talked, I don't know if he does. No, he probably doesn't. Not anymore anyway. He used to be. Well, he claimed that he was sort of a shitty chef.

Yes. Yes. Yeah. But I've talked to Scott and Alex, and I went to Scott's restaurant, and he cooked the famous spaghetti for me. It's butter. It's butter. It's what the difference is. Right. That's the magic.

A little butter and tomato. That's good, though, right? Yeah, it's fine. It's good. I mean, again, simple. How simple is that? It's so simple, it's maddening. It's fine It's good I mean Again simple How simple is that It's so simple

It's maddening It's all about timing though Because you eat it At the restaurant You're like oh my god Yeah This is insane But that's all timing

What do you mean It's when do you put the butter in You know when do you know Once that Once that pasta is cooked Yeah And you mix it And you put it in with the sauce

And you're finishing it with the sauce Yeah It's just the timing Of getting it all right Where Right It's just the consistency of getting it all right where it's just the consistency of the sauce because the starches of the pasta really play into that as well. Yeah. Because you use some of that pasta water. Right.

That has to go in there. And so a combination of the tomatoes, the pasta water, fresher and a little bit of butter and some olive oil. And there's a certain moment where it all just comes together. Yeah. And they have to eat it at that point. You got to eat that right then. Doesn't keep.

No, no, no. No. It doesn't hold very well. So do you do though like when you know you go to someone else's restaurant you're like how the fuck did he make that there are times yeah there so there was a great chef who um you know his name was pierre gagnere he still um he had a restaurant in a little town uh near lyon called saint etienne and i would go there saint go there. Where? Saint-Étienne, it was in France. Okay. And I used to go there. And this guy was one of the early guys

where I'd look at and go, how the hell did he do this? Really? And then I'd go and try to reverse engineer and figure it out. But. Was it simple? No, no, a lot of it was, so you know. French is complicated though, right? I remember looking at this one, yeah, but this was kind of avant-garde stuff.

I remember looking at this one dish Yeah, but this was kind of avant-garde stuff. I remember looking at this one dish and it was a lemon consomme. But, you know, I'm looking at it and saying, well, this is interesting because lemon's not clear. Lemon juice isn't clear. Yeah. Right? But this is crystal clear.

So how do you do it? And so I figured out, well, you clarify consomme with egg whites. So can you clarify lemon juice with egg whites? The answer is yes. Oh, you can? And so, yeah, I'm assuming that's how he did it. That's how I ended up doing it. It's egg whites or egg shells with egg whites. So can you clarify lemon juice with egg whites? The answer is yes. Oh, you can? And so, yeah, I'm assuming that's how he did it. That's how I ended up doing it.

It's egg whites or egg shells? Egg whites. Well, you could put shells and stuff in, but, you know, just the proteins from the whites, you know, collect all the fat and stuff. So that's how you... Yeah. And so, yeah, and so it worked.

And so, but he was fantastic. Still is a fantastic chef. So, all right. So you teach yourself, you end up at the Quilted Giraffe. Yeah. And then you're back at the other place. Yeah. Where you do your first head chef job.

Yep, yep. And as a sous chef, you're working alongside the chef to sort of execute the shit. You're still cooking? Yeah, yeah. Sous means under, so it's just an under chef. So you're sort of in charge of the kitchen, still getting dirty. Yeah, you're still getting dirty. And a cook's a cook.

Cook's a cook. You tell him what to do, and he should know. All he needs to know is technique. No, a cook is you tell them what to do, but they always know better. And so they want to do it their way until one day you scream at them enough, and they finally realize that. And then they quit and become a chef. Well, something like that.

So I opened a restaurant a couple months back and, you know, my whole thing is like, I think cooks often, the heat's too high, the pans are too hot and you got to like slow down. You don't need to cook on high heat, but everybody's trained to cook on high heat because they think that's going to cook the food faster and they got to get the food out.

And so after, you know, day after day saying, lower the flames, lower your oven, doesn't need to be on 500 degrees. And I went went i pulled a plate out of the oven and burnt the hell out of my hands i just had a fit started screaming so the next day all of a sudden i noticed the flames were all down the ovens were all down and a couple days later the cook a young woman she came next to me she goes you know you're right you're right thanks it really doesn't make a difference

yeah it does so when do you really start to come into your own as a chef so it's not out in Jersey no it wasn't so I left that restaurant what was it called again it was called 40 Main Street

and that was in Jersey yeah and so I left that restaurant and I was actually a co-chef with a buddy of mine named Jerry Bryan who was from Virginia Beach. And he ended up going back to Virginia Beach to open a restaurant. And he opened a restaurant in Portsmouth. Yeah. Which was near Norfolk. And

I was kind of between jobs. It was right after, you know, the holidays. And he called me up and said, I need help. Can you come down here? So I figured I'd go down there for a couple weeks and help out. Yeah. I ended up staying for seven months really right in virginia beach yeah and just helped him out i had a great place on the beach that one of the one of the guys that own the restaurant you didn't have a family no no no i was 25 yeah one of the guys who owned it had a condo on the beach he gave me that to live in it was a blast that time and so

then there was a guy who i knew in New Jersey, his name was Dennis Foy, and he had a restaurant in Chatham, New Jersey called the Tarragon Tree, and he was opening a restaurant in New York. And I was in New York at a party for a mutual friend, and the guy took Dennis aside and said, this is the guy you should have to run your kitchen in New York. And he pointed at me. And so he called me up, asked me to come,

and at the time I was ready to go to France, and I had six months set up in two different restaurants in France. To learn? Yeah, just to go and stag. We called it stag. You go there and three months in one restaurant, three in the other restaurant. And so I said no. And right after that, my father was diagnosed with lung cancer,

and we knew that he only had about three months to live. And so I decided to stay close to home, not go to France. I took the job. My dad passed away, so I was out of the restaurant for about a month. Yeah. And I came back and started working there, and I didn't care for it at all. I didn't like what he was doing. What was the restaurant?

It was called Mondrian. Yeah. And so- Like, what do you mean? Why didn't he like it? I didn't like what he was doing. He's a good chef. Yeah.

But his style of managing the restaurant wasn't for me. Wasn't the food. Ex-military guy, wasn't my thing. Right. And so I left, and I ended up going to France. Yeah. And I got a call from the owner of the restaurant saying, you know, come back.

We want to talk to you. So long story short, I took over the chef's role in the restaurant and started doing my own thing. And within, I think, three or four months, I got a three-star review from the New York Times. At the Montreal. Yeah, and that put me on the map. And three stars is the highest?

No, four is. But three at the time was tough. It's tough to get three. So that's what you're gunning for as a chef? You know, three, yeah. Four, you've got to be a lot fancier. Like Danielle? Yeah, it wasn't something that I was...

Listen, I was a 26-year-old kid from New Jersey. I didn't know three from four. Three would have been great. Two would have been good, too. I got three stars, and that just put me on the map. But it's interesting because that world, it's an insulated world on some level, the food world, right?

Back then, even more so. Right. Pre-internet. Yeah, so it was like a play opening. Who's this kid? Right. Colicchio. Right. He's got the touch. Right. It's like a play opening. Who's this kid? Right. Colicchio.

Right. He's got the touch. Right. It's like you stand up. There's young guys out there, and you're going to hear about someone next year they'd never heard about before. Yeah, but the funny thing about stand up, and not unlike chefs, is that over time they end up doing the same shit over and over again. Yeah. We do the same thing.

I know. I carry the same recipes around. I've carried around for 30 years. You do have 30-year-old recipes? Yeah. Huh. Okay. All right. So now you're a three-star chef in New York City.

And now, is there a scene? Do you guys know each other? Like, did you know Bourdain? Well, no, I didn't know anything. I knew the restaurant that he was working. I didn't know anything at all. But this was, you know, just going back, this is 1992, I think. Yeah.

And what I noticed is all the chefs that I knew and admired started coming to the restaurant. Your restaurant? Like Daniel Ballou and Jonathan, remember Jonathan Waxman coming in. Just the other chef, Gerard Pango, was a French chef in town. All these chefs started coming in to see what I was doing, which was really cool. What were you doing? I was doing my own thing, which was what? It's hard to explain.

I was using the green market. So it was kind of farm to table before there was even a notion of farm to table. Union Square? Yeah, I was going down there and filling up a truck full of food three times a week. I would hit the fish markets. On your own? You were doing it? On my own, yeah.

So I was doing real sort of produce forward food. So on Sunday, you'd go down to the Union Square Market? No, we'd go Monday, Wednesday, Saturday. Okay. And then I started working with farmers that would bring food to me directly. And you had fish guys down at where? At Fulton Fish Market, yep, yep. That's a lot of shopping.

Yeah, it was, but it was worth it. And so I was doing my own thing. Yeah. And a lot was doing my own thing. Yeah. And a lot of the early reviews were saying just that. It was a new kind of food. I wasn't following anybody. Right now, I think that's the problem with the internet is that you don't have to travel to see someone's food anymore.

You can just kind of make a few clicks and try to understand what someone's doing so trends fly around very quickly. Yeah. And so the restaurant, it wasn't a commercial success. It was a bad business deal restaurant. So we ended up closing the restaurant. Yeah.

And in 1991, I was awarded Best New Chef Food in One Magazine. And Danny Meyer's chef at the time at Union Square Cafe, he was awarded Best New Chef at the same time. There was 10 chefs every year I remember that place it's still there right yeah it's still well he moved recently

yeah so I met Danny and the following year I saw him again in Aspen and said listen I gotta talk to you when I get back home so I called him up he said what's up

I said well and I knew he was a fan of the restaurant yeah and so I said I'm closing the restaurant we should do something together and he's like

nah I don't want to open a second restaurant and a week later he called me back and said yeah let's talk yeah and I asked him why did he call me back and said, yeah, let's talk. Yeah. And I asked him, why did he call back? And he said, we had a mutual friend who was a wine distributor.

He had a wine company. And Danny said, hey, do you know Tom, right? He said, yeah. So he called me. He wants to do something together. And he said, well, I'll put it to you this way. If Sandy Koufax called and said he wanted to play baseball for your team, you'd probably say yes.

So we ended up traveling together before we decided to work together. We took a trip to Italy together. We figured if we could travel together, we could work together. Oh, really? You and this other chef? No, it wasn't a chef. No, he's a restaurateur. Oh, he's a restaurateur. He's a guy who opens restaurants. Yeah, yeah. And he had Union Square Cafe. Yes. So, you know, you go to Italy and what do you do? You walk around and eat?

We just travel around. Yeah, yeah. And he knew Italy really well, spoke Italian, and his father had a travel business. So when he was a kid, he used to go to Italy quite often, Italy and France, and eat around and just loved food. Wanted to be a chef, but decided it was too hard and decided he wanted to work in the front of the house. And he's considered probably the best restaurateur in the country. Is that true still? Yeah, yeah. I mean, he also started Shake Shack and made his million dollars doing that. And that's pretty recent. Yeah, yeah. So we took a trip together and ate around and just really talked about, we didn't really talk about what we wanted to do.

We talked about what we wanted out of our careers, out of our restaurants. Yeah. And that sort of led to Gramercy Tavern. Now, where was that? Because I think I've been there. Gramercy Tavern was on 20th between Park and Broadway. It's still there.

Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay. And when did that open? 94, I think it was. there. Grammar Street Tavern was on 20th between Park and Broadway. It's still there. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay. And when did that open? 94, I think it was. And that was your restaurant. Yeah. He and I did it together. Yeah.

And the approach was you're going to go to the market. Well, the market was there. It was American food. It's close. It was sort of high. Oh, I know this place. It was right down the street. And it was more high concept.

But we had this idea that we wanted to do something that was very comfortable, something that people understood. And this idea of a tavern always kind of you know we talked about i ate there not too long ago yeah yeah and so we talked about this idea of you know a tavern being a place where you can get great food but um you go there for various different reasons whether to have a great meal or whether to just talk about you know the politics of the day or whatever it was so the concept was sort of a watering hole yeah right but with with great great food and great service and is there riffs is that like was that part of this sort of a watering hole. Yeah. Right. But with great food and great service.

And is there riffs? Was that part of this sort of like elevating old standards kind of thing? Yeah, kind of. Yeah. In a way. That became pretty popular, that whole idea. Yeah. Kind of hot, rotting, boring shit.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There was always that. And for me, it was taking the best of this French technique that I learned, taking this Italian sensibility that I had, and this also American sensibility, and fusing it all together and seeing what came out always that. And for me, it was taking the best of this French technique that I learned, taking this Italian sensibility that I had, and this also American sensibility, and fusing it all together and seeing what came out of that. What's an American sensibility?

You know, hot rods, man. Okay, right. I know what you're saying. Guitars. Guitars. Fenders. It's not a chef sensibility. It's just an American cultural sensibility.

Right, right, right. Whereas the Italian and the French were actually chef sensibilities. Yes, yes. So you stayed with that for a while. So that's your first restaurant. That, right, right. Whereas the Italian and the French were actually chef sensibility. Yes, yes. So you stayed with that for a while. So that's your first restaurant. That's a big deal, and it was a big deal, and you did good. Yeah. So you partnered up with that guy.

Yeah. Because I don't understand. I don't know if I talked to Alex or Scott about this specifically. Maybe I did. That's the road that you're on. If you can become a good enough chef to open up several restaurants, that's it, right? That's a new model.

The old model used to be, you know, go back to, you know, the most iconic New York chef growing up when I was coming up through was Andre Saltner, who had Lutece. He lived above the restaurant. He was in the restaurant. If the restaurant was open,

he was in the restaurant. Yeah. And that was the model. And it changed, and it kind of changed, not in America. It changed in France when these three-star Michelin chefs started doing their brasseries and their bistros. They did, you know.

Oh, they got their upscale restaurant. Right. And it's like, for you regular people, they just want a sandwich? No, it wasn't even that. It was a way to capitalize on their notoriety. And they were able to bring in other investors. You didn't want to do another three-star restaurant. It takes too much time and too much effort.

Right. But let's do these other smaller restaurants where you can make the food great, but you don't have to spend millions of dollars creating atmosphere and artwork and shit like that. Yeah. So it was actually, let's bring better food to the masses. Sure. Right. Sure.

So the model changed from living above your restaurant. To doing multiple, to getting on a plane going to your restaurants. There used to be a restaurant I went to. I think it was on Hudson in New York. Some old Italian guy owned it. He brought wine in from Jersey that he made. And it was, I forget the name. Really?

I wish I remembered things. Okay. Because I would have told you. I just want to. I was impressed with the guy, but I was mad at him because I wasn't regular enough for him to treat me. Got it. Got it.

You know, there's that line you got to cross? Right, right. Where you're like, I've been here. Why am I waiting? To, hey, how are you, Mark? Yeah. Yeah, you got to go a few times. Right, right, right.

You got to be regular, man. That's what it's about. It is. Yeah, sure. Are you kidding? That's what people... Like, my mother's boyfriend in florida that's what they live for they don't even care if the restaurant's that good if you can just be the guy that walks in like how are you john hey cheers man you want to go everybody knows your name right it's true right

yeah so you but you guys are aware of that so you when you're in a partnership with that guy the restaurateur what's his name again danny meyer yeah so that's part of it right you in your mind you're like who are who are the guys that are coming in every week who do we you know who's the families that are coming in every week and you do that you make the rounds and you're like oh yeah yeah you're you're there all the time you're you know if you're working on a dish and you know you know a few people that you can try it out on you test drive it on a few people yeah you know you're giving stuff away you're being generous and yeah but i think i think that's that spirit of generosity is is is I think what makes

a restaurant work. I mean you have to create regulars if you wanna have a successful restaurant. Right. So how do you do that? Right, with good food, right? Right, and hospitality. Right, right. Saying hi, being known first names.

Yep, exactly. Right, acting excited to see people. There he is! And I'm always terrible at that. I can't, I'm not that kind of guy to blow smoke up someone's ass. No? Nah, it's just not my style. You're sort of intense. Probably because I

can't stand it when it happens to me. That's why I try to keep a low profile if I go to a restaurant. I'm not that guy to have my assistant call up and make a big deal when I'm coming in. I just want to kind of sneak in. Yeah, right. So, alright, so you're doing, you're sort of ahead of the curve on the farm-to-table idea in a way. But it seemed like a lot of people picked up on that, right?

Yeah, I guess so. Well, no, just because of like, you know, like, because I remember by the time I was in New York, well, I was there for a long time, but, you know, chefs were going there. They were going to the market, but they still were able to find shit that was better than I could find. Maybe they just knew what to do with it. I don't know. We had farmers.

We were regulars for the farmers. Yeah. So you got to be a regular with the farmer too. They got the stuff. They saved you a good shit. Yeah, we get stuff. I would collect seeds and bring them to farmers and say, can you grow this for me? Really?

Yeah, back then, yeah. And back then they would do it. Now I grow my own shit. Where'd you collect the seeds? What do you mean you collect seeds? Back when there were seeds and stuff. Yeah. No, if you go to Italy, you find some kind of-

Tomatoes or something? Tomatoes or something like that. Yeah, a special tomato and seeds and yeah. And they do it for you? Yeah. No, if you go to Italy, you find some kind of- Tomatoes or something? Chubisano or something like that. Yeah, a special tomato and seeds. Yeah. And they do it for you? Yeah. And you had success in that? Yeah, sure.

Growing a special tomato? Yeah. And you grow your own shit now? Now I do, yeah. Where? I'm a gardener. I have a house. Oh, for your house.

Yeah, I live in Brooklyn, but I have a house on North Fork on Long Island. Yeah. And I have a garden. And you do, like big? It's getting big. It's work. But do you can? I do, yeah. Really? Yeah, and I garden. And you do, like big? It's getting big. It's work. But do you can? I do, yeah.

Really? Yeah, yeah. I pickle, I can, yeah. For yourself? My wife calls me a depression-era housewife, you know, at heart, yeah. It's great. So pickling's fun.

Yeah. Like, what do you pickle? Well, there's cucumbers, and then there's, you know, green tomatoes are beets. But that's like, there's a science? Well, there's cucumbers and then there's green tomatoes or beets. That's like, there's a science to it, right? That's almost like chemistry, right? Yeah, I don't care.

There is a chemistry to it and I'm not that focused on the chemistry. I know if it's high enough acid and you put it in the jar and you seal it properly, you're good. And has it worked out? Yeah, I'm still here. Now, why do you think it was gonna blow up? You're gonna die in a pickling accident and poison yourself. No, so far still here. Now, why did you think it was going to blow up? You're going to die in a pickling accident and poison yourself.

Yeah, so far it's been good. I draw my own tomatoes and the whole bit. What do you mean draw your own tomatoes? Well, I- Oh, jar them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I make sauce and jar it. Oh, my God.

So, is this the next wave? The product's coming? No, for me, no. Maybe. Well, not that I'm- Not in my backyard, anyway. But, no, I just, for some reason, and I think my grandparents had,

both sets of grandparents gardened. And it was small. My grandfather used to garden in five-gallon buckets and it worked. Pickle things, you mean? Yeah, yeah. And so I had this property, it's about three acres and houses on it,

and there was one great area to garden in that was kind of in the back of the house. Yeah. And so finally I just bit the bullet and put some boxes together and started gardening. And I just, there's nothing like it for me. It's just so relaxing. I get out there at six o'clock in the morning,

it's relaxing, I can take my time. And what's cool about the garden is it starts to grow. You just start noticing things different every single day. You're like, oh, there's a little zucchini, and two days later, it's, oh, it's grown. Yeah, how did that happen? Yeah, how did that happen? Last night that happened. Yeah, yeah.

It almost looks like something you could have watched happen. Yeah. If I had just gotten it at the right time, I would have just seen this thing blow up. It's just amazing. And so there's something about just getting in the rhythm of having things grow and knowing when it's time to weed and water and when it's time to, you know, when all of a sudden you're looking and go, what is going on with my zucchini? They looked great two days ago and now they're all wilting. What's going on? Yeah.

And you crack open the stalk and there's a worm the size of your pinky sitting there. Oh, you're dealing with the bugs. Yeah, dealing with the bugs. Yeah. Well, then there's those days where it's like, I got too many zucchinis. I got too many tomatoes. Yeah, let's have a restaurant for that.

I can always bring it to the restaurant and go, there you go. That's perfect. But we use most of it ourselves. At home? Yeah,

yeah, we do dinner parties and stuff. Oh, see, that's nice when you're, so you cook for those, I cook at home. I cook at home a lot,

especially in the summer. Yeah. Oh, so you're saying your grandfather actually had a garden in a five gallon bucket. Yes. Out back or whatever. Yes, yes. Like a tomato plant. He would actually grandfather actually had a garden in a five gallon bucket. Yes.

Out back or whatever. Yes, yes. Like a tomato plant. He would actually put the, yeah, in a five gallon bucket. Yeah. And at that point, it's like, cause I always look at people with gardens, I'm like, it looks like you're gonna go through that

in a day. Or your kale came up, so that's one meal. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I have kale that, actually it's another green called spigarello. It's an Italian green related to broccoli. And I just decided to just cut it all down the other day. And I had to blanch it all and then put it in bags and freeze it.

Because there's no way I can eat it all. Yeah, you can blanch and freeze? Blanch and freeze, yeah. That green anyway, it's really hardy, so yeah. Oh, so it's not going to get all mushy? No, not at all. It'll hold up. Oh, so you look at up oh in fact after after

after you take it out of the freezer you probably still have to cook it yeah because i got two bunches of rob the other day and i blanched him and i sauteed him with garlic and red pepper and then the pressure was on i gotta eat that shit but now that also you can blanch that freeze that too it's right well because it's already yeah yeah i like broccoli is it seasonal though it seems yeah there's a season there's a season for everything i know but you think you think that they they get things from all over that those seasons are over yeah but that stuff doesn't grow when it's too hot right oh the rob doesn't that's what the deal is so it's more of a fall it likes to be a little cooler yeah all right so now tell me how like where so

you get done with with the grammar c tavern and how do you how do you leave something like that because like this is a this is the question. There are restaurants that I'd go to, and I'm like, what happened? Well, the chef left. The menu's still there, but the heart of the thing's gone. Yeah, so what happened was Danny and I,

he opened a few other restaurants and created his group. Restaurant. Yeah, and I was keen know continue to work with Danny but I wasn't happy with some of his partners that he brought in and so I opened up a second restaurant called craft and so we decided to work together the best we could um Gramercy was a jointly owned uh restaurant and then he was gonna do his thing I was gonna do my thing and at a certain point it just wasn't working out and I actually worked out a deal where I was buying

the restaurant from him. And then last second, I said, you know what? Here's my number. Gramercy. Yeah, and so I sold my shares. And then you went all craft. I went all craft, yeah. What year was that?

Because I sort of remember that happening. Because then the craft thing as a brand, it was popping up. Yeah. Right? Yeah, we had craft, craft bar, and then witchcraft, and then craft steak in Vegas, and then we did a craft in LA. So yeah, we did. We kind of stumbled into a brand.

Well, what was the angle on that? Like, see, because this is, so this is your big vision. The Gramercy was the collective vision with Danny, right? Is that his name? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So here's the thing. your big vision the Gramercy was the collective vision with Danny right is that his name yeah yeah yeah yeah so here's here's the thing so when I was like when I was at Gramercy I had my food that I was doing it was all plated and and you know somewhat intricate and and during that time do you mean like like fancy liquid and yeah yeah it looked you know you're Bobby flaying it a bit

no I wouldn't go that far but uh it was go that far. But when I say played it, and this is important because of what Kraft was. Yeah. And there was five things on a plate. Yeah, got it. And so then Kraft, it was right around the corner from Gramercy, so I couldn't do the same food I was doing there.

And I didn't have a Thai restaurant in me or something like that. And so I was looking at where I thought the industry was going, and there was so much talk about farmers using farmers. So I said, okay, let's really honor these ingredients. Yeah. And so if you want broccoli rabe, can you get a plate of broccoli rabe? Yeah.

Not broccoli rabe with veal, just broccoli rabe. Yeah. For me, it was peas. Yeah. You know, when peas are in season and they're great and they're sweet and delicious, you may have them on three different menu items. Right. Well, they come in one day and they're starchy.

What do you do? You change all three items. Most likely, you just kind of go with the starchy peas. Yeah. And I was like, you know what? When peas are in season, I want a bowl of peas. Yeah. Or morels.

I want a bowl of morels. Yeah. Just simply roast it and that's it. You can't get that. There are garnishes everywhere. So then I said, okay, how about we do a restaurant where if it's fish, it's simply roasted, olive oil, some fresh herb, done.

Yeah. No garnish. Right. The garnish, so everything is a la carte. So if you want your fish and then you want those peas and morels, you order that way. Right. And that's how, and the idea was that this restaurant was more about the craft of cooking, less about the artistry of cooking.

Oh, okay. And we really wanted to honor those single ingredients and that's how it started. Sort of like you got to do a kind of family style with the, right? Like you're going to get a big thing of mushrooms. Well, that was it too. So that's what I was saying. So instead of plated, it was family style.

Yeah. Right. And you kind of moved the stuff around, and everything seemed like it kind of charred. Yeah. In a good way. In a good way. Okay. Yeah.

No, no, no. It was not that. Who was burning the food that night? No, but it seemed like that that was part of the angle, the roasting business. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like everything just, it's all simple though. Yeah, very simple. Yeah.

And well, I like that. Yeah. And so how many, so where's the empire at now? You know, we're. How do you determine this stuff? So craft, because I'm looking at the list of stuff you have. Are you on a website? No, I'm just on the, I'm just looking at the list of stuff you have. Are you on our website? No, I'm just looking at the list on Wiki.

Oh, on Wiki. Oh, God. That's probably not up to date. Well, no, it's funny. They don't take things off. They just cross them out. It's just closed. Yeah, closed.

Closed. Great. Yeah, we closed a few restaurants recently. You know, the real estate in New York is tight these days, and so the landlords are charging crazy rents, and, you know, when your time is up, and they want to charge $60,000 for a month for a 120-seat restaurant, it's time to leave.

That's crazy. Yeah, it's crazy. It seems like a lot of the restaurants are gone that used to be in New York. So they're all closing because of rent or other stuff. Right. So how do you determine, what do you make of that, though? Like, is it hard to close a restaurant when it's just in the sense that, do food trends change?

Like, do good restaurants survive forever? Yeah, yeah, until the rent knocks you out. But, you know, yeah, it sucks when you have to walk into a restaurant and tell, you know, 60 people that they're losing their job. Right. Of course. Of course. That's what sucks. Right. But it's not usually the food that's doing job. Right, of course. Of course. That's what sucks.

Right. But it's not usually the food that's doing it. No, no, no. Nowadays, it's rent. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the restaurant was busy, but at that point, we would have-

Which one? It was called Craft Bar. Based on the numbers that we were doing, if we had to pay that kind of rent, we would have lost money. Yeah. At that point, it doesn't make sense. So what about some of these other places?

What's Fowler and Wells? Well, Fowler and Wells just changed we changed the name temple court that was a yeah we just changed the name that restaurant opened uh about eight months ago it's in the beekman hotel and uh as it turns out fowler and wells uh they were two publishers that worked in the building was built in 1835 and so these two we named the restaurant for these two guys that you that worked there. We kind of did a little history research. And they were publishers. And they published journals of psychology and a few other things, too. But they were also phrenologists.

Field the head for the problems? Something like that. But phrenology was used for a lot of different things. It was also used to try to prove that the Africans were a separate race. Yeah. And so I knew that, but it was this debunked pseudoscience, and I figured, you know, what the hell.

I knew it was also used by abolitionists to prove the opposite. Yeah. Black writers of the day used it to prove the opposite. But as it turns out, the Fowler of the Fowler and Wells was the guy. Yeah. So we had to change the name of the restaurant.

You got flack. We got, in a review from the New York Times, they kind of- Said it's a little insensitive. A little insensitive and I, you know, the following day decided to change the restaurant. Took about eight months to come up with a new name and get the work changed.

And what's the menu there? It's called Temple Court. Temple Court. Well that's a restaurant where we were, where I went back to, at least when I started cooking, where food was more based on sauces, you know, stocks and sauces versus vinaigrettes and things like that. Got rid of the microgreens, got rid of the swooshes.

And it's a little more basic where it's sauce, garnish, meat, fish, whatever. Yeah. And then also we reworked a lot of the classics. So lobster thermidor we reworked and oysters Rockefeller and things like that. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And then also we reworked a lot of the classics. So lobster Thermidor we reworked and Oysters Rockefeller and things like that. Oh yeah, how do you rework Oysters Rockefeller? You take it out of the shell, number one. We use watercress.

Is that spinach? Well, we use watercress instead of spinach, lightened up the sauce and got rid of the cheese. Huh. So it's just a lighter version. Watercress is good. Yeah, and same thing with the lobster Thermador. We just kind of, you know,

the sauce doesn't have cream in it. We lightened it up. How's it going? It's going great. Yeah? Yeah, it's going really well. Wait, so you've got two restaurants in Vegas? Yeah, there's Heritage Steak and Craft Steak, yeah.

And they're both you? Yeah. What's the difference? Not a whole lot. Yeah? Yeah. A little bit. How do you treat steaks? What's your angle? Not a whole lot. Yeah? Yeah. What is it about, a little bit. How do you treat steaks?

What's your angle on steaks? Simple salt, pepper, just roast them up and that's it. Yeah. Buy good meat, that's it, you gotta buy good meat. Double porterhouse. Double porterhouse is great, you gotta buy good meat. You know who used to have a good double porterhouse? There's another place that closed down the meat packing,

Marcelleria? Uh-huh, sure, is that closed? Yeah. Man. Yeah, that was good. Right? I moved out two years ago, so I don't. Oh, yeah, they did the Rob.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And just a double porterhouse. The best. Yeah, it's good stuff. So just buy good meat, high heat. Buy good meat. High to start and then turn it down. Right.

Yeah, I always say high heat's not your friend. Yeah. Now what do you make of the, what do you think about the classic steak? Do you ever go to Luger's? I haven't been in a while. Yeah.

Yeah. It's very specific, isn't it? Yeah. I mean, I like it, but I haven't been in a long time. Of course not,

but like, do you respect it? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And why not? They've been there for 100 years. You have to.

It's butter, right? Butter plays a big part in that, yeah. They get great meat. Butter plays a big role. Yeah. But I like the fact that they do one thing.

Yeah. Butterhouse, that's it. Yeah. And they get away with that. Yeah, it's good. And what about the nature? Is it like, we'll get to TV in a sec, but like, because you're out here for the Emmys, right?

Yeah. Are you nominated? Yeah, yeah, we're nominated. For what? Best reality show. Oh, for Top Chef? Yeah, it's a primetime nomination. It's been on forever now.

15 seasons. That's a lot. Yeah. 15 seasons of you tasting things and hurting people's feelings. Well, a little bit. Also, you know, we launched a lot of careers, too. I know, I know. But yeah, 15 seasons.

So, but, what about the competitive, you guys got to be competitive. Chefs? Yeah. Come on. Yeah, yes, there is competition, but it to be competitive. Chefs? Yeah. Come on. Yeah. Yes, there is competition, but it's friendly competition. It is? Yeah.

Yeah. But you never sit around and go like, ah, Jeff's a carry-on. It's like, no. No. No. He's wearing his bow ties. Yeah.

No. Yeah. That's his thing. It's fine. He's a good guy. No, he seems's a good guy. No, he seems like a good guy. But I did eat

at his restaurant in Florida when I was on a real chopped craze. So I was, I would go to, you know what I mean?

Okay. No, I was watching it. Yeah, yeah, okay. And he was teaching me how to cook

in a way. In a way. Yeah, but I liked it and I liked the personalities and I went to his restaurant in Florida and I was like, this is not good. I didn't have a good meal. And then I'm personalities, and I went to his restaurant in Florida,

and I was like, this is not good. I didn't have a good meal. And then I'm like, I got to go to the one in New York. I never did. But who is your generation? Is it like Bobby? No, no, I'm a little older than Bobby. My generation was Alfred Portale.

He's a little older than I am. Thomas Keller, Daniel Ballou. Daniel's your generation? Yeah, yeah, he's slightly older than I am. Thomas Keller, Daniel Ballou. Daniel's your generation? Yeah, yeah. He's slightly older than I am, but I was, because I kind of made it, you know, when I was 26, I was pretty young. Yeah. So, yeah. I mean, Bobby's younger than I am.

Jeffrey's my age. Jeffrey's a carrion. Yeah. Yeah. And you guys knew each other coming up? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, working in New York, we kind of all know no you know you sniff around you sure we know everybody is and do you compliment each other yeah

yeah yeah like you know you like he has a good job on that like you taste each other's shit because yeah i mean like that's the one thing that those kind of shows i don't know i'm just top chef do it well you do do it well you're sitting there with chefs and you're tasting shit and you can appreciate things. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's nice, right? Yeah. You know, I think that, I mean, I appreciate everybody.

There's a lot of people doing great stuff that you'd never hear of. Yeah. Chefs like, you know, Jonathan Benno, Marco Canora. These are, you know, chefs doing great food in New York. Yeah. But they're not on TV. Right. So there's a lot of, you know, people are just doing amazing stuff that you just don't, you don't hear of.

And so, yeah, but there's a respect that we all have. You know, I don't, you know, there's not a whole lot of sniping. Some stuff on, you know, sometimes you walk in. The problem right now is with, things have changed. You know, it used to be when we were coming up, there were gatekeepers and certain people, mostly magazine editors and things like that, and writers, who you didn't hang out with.

And if they decided that they liked you and that you were doing some great stuff, they'd write about you. Yeah. And so you got buzz and it was worthwhile. There was a handful of people. Nowadays, buzz is generated for a lot of different reasons. And so a lot of times you go into a restaurant

and you hear this amazing buzz. And it's like, you go there and go, really a restaurant and you hear this amazing buzz and it's like, you go there and go, really, this is it? Right. Not that it's bad but this is what everybody's going crazy about? Yeah.

All right, like I can't, you're going to go there and your mind's going to be blown and you go there and go, now my mind's not blown. It's good, but I'm sorry,

but it's food. It's just food. I think maybe after a while you're so jaded and you go, it's just food. No, I don't know if that's true. I think the point is is that people can generate buzz that is not solely based on the critical palette of somebody you respect.

Yeah, of course. Yeah. Those guys are gone, really. But I think it's just that we need someone. The internet needs someone to talk about and someone that's going to be hot for the next three months. Right. Yeah, right. And that's it.

That's it. But it's true that cultural criticism on all levels, whether it be food or painting, I don't know so much about painting, but just film, it's just diminishing. The standard bearers are kind of gone. Right, right, and this is all user-generated reviews now. Yeah, that's it.

Yeah, I guess it's more democratic, but what do the people know? Wait, you need, what do the people know? Wait, you need a few snobs. You do need a few. Just a few. Not a lot of few. Yeah, just a few respectable snobs to determine the, yeah.

So the TV thing, so that feeds everything else. How many, do you know how many restaurants you have open right now? Yeah, we have eight restaurants. Okay. are ones that you that are your your thing yeah mine are our licensing deals of the hotels and stuff like that yeah yeah so when you have a licensing deal like is that a deal at the mgm is that a licensing deal but you show what what is your responsibility well we design the restaurant yeah we design the kitchen. We put the menu in. It's my food. It's my management style, but they build it and they own it. Yeah.

Yeah. Okay, but you got to check in occasionally? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Make an appearance? Yeah, yeah. More so when we first opened up. Right. When I was there.

When we first opened up, I was there for pretty much three months straight. Are you in contact with the chef? Oh, yeah, sure. Oh, okay. Sure. Does he have problems? Is there a problem sort of like- No you in contact with the chef? Oh yeah, sure. Oh, okay. Sure. Does he have problems? Is he, like,

is there a problem sort of like? No, the guy, the chef there is funny. Michael, he was our first grill cook. I remember the first day

I looked and said, this guy's gonna last about two weeks. Your first grill cook where? At the restaurant when it first opened up. Yeah. So this was 12 years ago.

Yeah. And I really said, this guy's gonna last two weeks. Yeah. He's a chef now. Yeah. He did it. And he's going to last two weeks. Yeah. He's a chef now. Yeah. And he's fantastic. Oh, that's great.

He's just, you know, he's just one of these guys who's kind of quiet, you know, who's did his job. Yeah. You know, I never said much,

but, you know, I couldn't tell whether he was excited about cooking because he was just kind of quiet. Yeah. And he's just fantastic.

And how is Vegas as a market now? It's still good? It's great. Yeah. It holds up. We're back to, you know to pre-recession levels. Oh, yeah?

Yeah, we're finally back there. So the economy's good, despite what we're being told. The economy's good. I mean, the rest of the world's going to shit, but the economy's great. Well, that's the other thing. You were in New York for so many years. You must have dealt with Trump when he was just a character.

Yeah, he wasn't a foodie. I always knew who he was. Oh, he never came to the restaurant? No, he wasn't a foodie. I always knew who he was. Oh, he never came to the restaurant? No, he wasn't a food guy. I would get calls every now and then from his organization saying, we're doing a project and we'd love you to come there. And I would say, you're building a restaurant, right? Oh, no, no, we're the best.

You're going to come. No, no, no, no. We're the best? We're the best. You kidding me? This would be the greatest hotel in the world and you got to come and you should be honored to open a restaurant and spend money on our place.

No. No. No. No. Yeah, it's, I don't know. Relentlessly scary. I see you're engaged with it. Yeah, a little bit.

But it's the righteous thing to do. You got to push back. But like, okay, so the TV show, like, that's been good for you. Yeah. And here's a question. Okay, you've started a lot of careers. You like the people you work with.

Are you a producer on? Yeah. You are at this point. What is it about the cooking an egg? That's kind of open-ended. What about cooking an egg? But I mean, it's like, you know, there's all this talk about the perfect egg.

Yeah, because it's hard to cook. Really? Yes and no. Yes and no. It can be. They did it on one of the perfect egg. Yeah, because it's hard to cook. Really? Yes and no. Yes and no. It can be. They did it on one of the other shows. Iron Chef. What's the guy from Cleveland? Simon. Michael Simon.

He's a good chef. Yeah, yeah, yeah. His sous chef has a great fucking restaurant right next to his. It's called the Green... Oh, what the hell is it called? Greenhouse Tavern. Yeah. There you go, Jonathan Sawyer. Jonathan Sawyer, of course.

Jonathan's a great guy. Jonathan actually, he's really supportive. I have an organization I co-founded called Food Policy Action. Yeah. And we are routinely up in D.C. on the hill, meeting with representatives, trying to push this idea of better food.

Oh, really? So we fight the fight for people that are hungry in this country, for better farming practices, more transparency in the food system. And Jonathan's one of the guys who actually comes and works with me up on the hill. So you spend, I didn't realize that, you spend a lot of time in Washington doing that? More than I want to, yeah. And what does that entail?

We're a C4. I'm an unpaid, unregistered lobbyist, and we don't have clients. Right. So we just go and meet with house members or their staff. And usually around farm bill or school lunch, we're heavily in in labeling um not that i'm anti-gmo but i'm pro-labeling right um and uh you know very active around school lunch trying to get more money for school lunch higher quality food for school lunch um uh working really hard on on my my wife is a filmmaker and she she uh directed co-directed a documentary called A Place at the Table

that came out about four years ago, five years ago, about hunger in this country. And that gave me a real platform to sort of go and talk to representatives about making sure that we have robust nutrition programs in this country. And have you engaged since this president? Yeah, the problem right now is you go there and you'll meet with staff members and stuff, but there's no one. So for instance, I was, you know,

this was confirmed just two days ago, I was with Secretary Vilsack, who was the head of the USDA, and Sonny Perdue, who's now the head of the USDA. There's no one under him. They haven't appointed anybody. So there's no one to talk to. So there's no one writing policy right now.

So it's just bizarre. There's just, the government's just not functioning's no one writing policy right now so it's it's just bizarre there's just the government's just not functioning because no one's there and those are jobs that he needs to fill the president yeah and so what what happens is usually when you're running and you're you know you win the nomination um i'm reading hillary's book right now and you know for months yeah they were saying who's going to fill these positions because they knew how many positions it was like 500 plus positions they're doing it on purpose i don't know if they're doing it on purpose or they just were saying, who's going to fill these positions? Because they knew how many positions, it was like 500 plus positions that he could fill. They're doing it on purpose.

I don't know if they're doing it on purpose or they just didn't think about it because they didn't think they were going to win. Yeah. So there was just, and he doesn't, he's not someone who knows how to govern, he doesn't know how to govern works. And so there was never a thought of, you know, I mean, the one, it was really interesting, Jared Kushner, when he was, you know, taking a walk through, asked, well, how many of these people are staying?

Yeah, right, right. And they said, none of them. Yeah, I know. You didn't just take over a company. Yeah. You know of these people are staying? They said, none of them. You didn't just take over a company. These people are all gone. You've got to fill these roles. I wonder how much of it is on purpose to hobble the government and how much of it isn't. Yeah, I don't think so.

So there's literally no one to go address issues with. There's no one to talk to right now. That's bizarre. So you could talk to the members of Congress and they're involved in writing policy as well, but there's, it's... No policy coming out of these agencies.

Nothing coming out. And that's a good thing, though, because there's nothing happening. They can't get anything done because there's no one to actually write policy. So that's fine. All right.

As long as, yes. Right? It's not getting worse. Right, right. In that one area. It's getting worse. I think there's a lot of stuff going on

with the EPA. I actually think they should start calling the IEPA, the Industrial Environment Protection Agency, because that's the only environment of protection. Or the anti-environment. It's the only environment of protection is industry. Yeah. It certainly isn't the environment.

It's not the Earth's environment. That's for sure. Back to the egg. Back to the egg. I don't remember what show it was on, but why is it so important that there's this idea about the egg? You know, a lot of chefs, especially the old school French chefs, that's like, you know, Andre Saltner, going back to Andre Saltner, if you were cooking one of the job in his kitchen,

he would say, okay, make an omelet. Yeah. And there's a way to make a French omelet. Yeah. And then there's two kinds of omelets. There's a country omelet and a classic omelet. How are you with those? Yeah, I can do them.

I can handle that. But, you know, a classic omelet doesn't have any color on it, but it's all cooked and fluffy. It's all about timing and about knowing how to do it. And a lot of people are just never trained to do it properly. So you tell 15 contestants that come in, like, make an omelet, most of them will screw it up. Basic omelets and weavies, no color.

It's not brown because that toughens the egg. Yeah. And so it's just this beautiful, you know, yellow mass of eggs that are perfectly, you know. Nothing in it? No. Yeah. Typically it's not.

Typically it's just maybe some fresh herbs and that's it. Yeah. It's not. I mean, the American omelet's more of a stuffed omelet. Yeah. And then what's the other kind? There's a French country, there's a classic, and then a country.

What's the country? The country omelet has, there is a little color on it. Yeah. Yeah, so anyway. But that's it. I mean, it's, you know, my son, my eight-year-old the other day, we have chickens out and run around too.

Dad, I gotta learn how to cook an egg. So I taught him how to cook an egg, and he said, I need another one. So four eggs, because he wanted to cook them, which is fine. So he wants, the eight-year-old wants to learn how to cook an egg and he said, I need another one. So four eggs because he wanted to cook them, which is fine. Yeah. So he wants them. Eight-year-old wants to learn how to cook an egg. But was he coming at it in the same way I was or he just wants to learn how to cook an egg?

He wants to learn how to cook an egg. I think it's just like- You didn't bring him through the omelets. No, no. It was fried. He liked them over easy. So he did that. Oh, good, good, good.

You didn't break them? You broke a few. You got to break a few. You got to break a few. So now is the show coming back? Yeah, good. You didn't break them? He broke a few. You got to break a few. You got to break a few, yeah. So now is the show coming back? Yeah, yeah. We shoot usually May through June, and we're in Colorado this season.

Why Colorado? We try to go to different locations every season, and we hadn't been to Colorado. So yeah, we're in Denver, Telluride, and Aspen. Okay. It should be a good season. It's a big foodie culture in Aspen probably, right? And Denver. Denver's actually come a long way.

There's some great restaurants there now. Oh, really? Yeah. I got to go. There's a place called Mercantile I like a lot. Well, by the time I guess we put this up, Mercantile. Okay. By the time we put this up, will have won or will have lost uh

you know i'm practiced just you know just happy to be not we this is our 11th nomination we won one we won one but you're happy that you come out and you see everybody you know it's not my industry so and and you know what i find really interesting is that you know there's a whole group of hollywood type people who love the show yeah And I'm always just shocked at who comes up. Oh my God, I love the show. It's like, really? You watch this? It's great.

Like, Liev Schreiber, you really watch this? It's great. And he's like, yeah, I really watch it. It's great. And so, you know, it's pretty cool. I get that too with this show. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And I'm always sort of like, wow, you're listening to it? Yeah. Like, on your way to work? Yeah. So, no, it's a blast because I don't consider myself part of the industry. Yeah. And yet I am. Sure. And part of the Hollywood industry. no, it's a blast because I don't consider myself part of the industry. Yeah. And yet, I am. Sure.

And part of the Hollywood industry. And so, it's kind of cool. Yeah. And do you drop by the restaurant? Or you did last night. Yeah, I was there last night. Tonight, we're doing a charity event on the beach

and so I'll probably go and hang out with my guys and do that. Well, you're cooking on the beach for charity? Yeah. Yeah. It seems like an ordeal.

It's like one of those walk-around events. No, we have it figured out. Yeah, we have a a station people walk around and we're doing that oh okay yeah well great talking to you man good luck tonight yeah thanks good guy solid dude so i'm gonna gonna plug my gold top directly in to the champ with the wah-wah pedal again. Because I enjoyed it. And you can listen or you can't or don't. It doesn't matter.

I'm going to play. I'm going to fucking play.BGM Thank you. Boomer lives! influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talked to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly.

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