Latest / Chef's PSA Podcast / The Problem With Tipping Culture : Jam Sanichat Ep. 194

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The Problem With Tipping Culture : Jam Sanichat Ep. 194 · Chef's PSA Podcast

• 0:00
  Why are we leaving it to the customers to decide how much
• 0:02
  money we make? Why am I stressed every single
• 0:06
  time I have to come to work? Because I don't know how much
• 0:08
  money I'm going to make, right? Hello chefs, this is Chefs PSA
• 0:12
  and I'm your host Andre Natera. Today my guest on the show is
• 0:15
  Jam Sanichat, chef and owner of Thai Fresh restaurant in Austin,
• 0:19
  TX. In this episode we're going to
• 0:21
  get into Thai cooking, how to write a cookbook from a
• 0:23
  Kickstarter campaign, being a pioneer in the no tipping era,
• 0:27
  and we're going to find out if it's OK to cook with pre made
• 0:29
  Curry paste. Stay tuned.
• 0:44
  What were we talking about? Yeah, my tie is not that good.
• 0:48
  I mean, it used to be pretty good.
• 0:49
  Like I was saying, it's like 25 years ago that I was having to
• 0:51
  speak. That's pretty good.
• 0:52
  You can say hi though. Saladi ka.
• 0:54
  Saladi Ka. Yeah, Saladi.
• 0:56
  Ka. For me, for you.
• 0:57
  For me it's ka. Yes, yeah, Correct.
• 1:00
  Saladi And we we we were talking the other day is like I have a
• 1:05
  special connection with Thai food.
• 1:07
  Maybe people don't know this. This is my story that I've never
• 1:09
  shared with anyone. Well, not that I've never shared
• 1:12
  with anyone. I've never shared on the
• 1:13
  podcast. But early on in my career, a lot
• 1:17
  of the kitchen people that I worked with, a lot of the cooks,
• 1:21
  you know, the prep cooks and everything were, were all from
• 1:23
  Thailand. And so I used to talk to them
• 1:27
  all the time and, you know, they would teach me how to speak
• 1:29
  Thai. And it was just, it was a, it
• 1:31
  was a very beautiful community that I was accepted into.
• 1:33
  You know, I'd always eat with them.
• 1:35
  And then where was this? This was in Colorado when I, I
• 1:38
  worked in Denver, Co. I have no idea why there was
• 1:40
  such a large Thai community there, but there was.
• 1:42
  Right. I would say so.
• 1:44
  Yeah, I would think so. Yeah.
• 1:45
  And, and then later on, I, for people that don't know, I used
• 1:49
  to train in, in Muay Thai kickboxing for a number of
• 1:52
  years. And, and my coach was from
• 1:54
  Thailand. His name was, he would go by the
• 1:57
  name of Saxon Ginger. So he was based out of Dallas,
• 2:00
  TX. He was really, really great
• 2:01
  coach. And so he would, you know, after
• 2:05
  training, we'd go eat his Thai food at his house.
• 2:07
  And I loved it. So when I became a chef running
• 2:10
  my own kitchen later on, and you know, I was doing these French
• 2:14
  tasting menus, I would always incorporate those Thai flavors
• 2:18
  because I love them, you know, whether it's lemongrass or lime,
• 2:20
  things like that. But but one time, my first
• 2:25
  experience, my very, very first experience with Thai food was in
• 2:27
  in Colorado And I sat down for lunch and they said you do you
• 2:32
  want some? I was like, yeah, this is be
• 2:33
  careful because it's spicy. And I said, I'm Mexican.
• 2:38
  I can handle it. Like I ate, I get jalapenos all
• 2:39
  the time. And then I no, no, it's a
• 2:41
  different spicy. And Oh my God, it was, it was
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  like a, it was a moment that it was a moment in time that I was
• 2:47
  like, OK, I can never forget the first time I ate Thai food
• 2:49
  because I was so sick. Because I, I refuse to be like,
• 2:53
  no, no, I'm good. I'm sweating and I'm crying.
• 2:55
  I'm like, no, no, it's not spicy.
• 2:56
  I mean, yeah, even I have to be careful when I say those things.
• 3:00
  I can't tell the Thai cooks just like, oh, just make it spicy
• 3:05
  because I can't handle it. You don't like spicy?
• 3:08
  I do. I love it.
• 3:09
  But if I say it, it seems like they want to make it even
• 3:13
  spicier. Yeah.
• 3:14
  So I just, I can't, I can't challenge the Thai cooks.
• 3:18
  Yeah, it's you. Can challenge me, though I
• 3:20
  wouldn't do it. I I I love Thai food, but by the
• 3:23
  way, I love your book. So thank you let.
• 3:25
  Me, let me hold it up for the camera.
• 3:27
  So for people for people that are looking, you can see look,
• 3:30
  it's a beautiful book and I want to talk to you about how this
• 3:34
  came to be because the I was as I was flipping through it, the
• 3:39
  recipes look delicious. I was hungry.
• 3:41
  Thai food was one of my favorite foods.
• 3:43
  So how, tell us, how did this book come to be?
• 3:45
  Well, I have always wanted to write a book.
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  Why? I wrote a book a long time ago
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  and I remember when that was, I think it was 2000.
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  I'm not even going to name the year.
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  It was a while back when I was a Blogger and they found me
• 4:01
  through the blog and it's like, would you like to write a book?
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  So I did. So it was like almost like all
• 4:07
  recipes, not a lot of photos, almost like a Bible kind of
• 4:10
  style, like 100 recipes. So I've always wanted to do
• 4:14
  something that, you know, with photographs, really like when
• 4:19
  you hold it up, it feels really good and then it tells more
• 4:22
  stories and all that. And then I kind of waited,
• 4:25
  didn't really. And then I opened the
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  restaurant. So it kind of got busy.
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  And then one day, my friend who was an editor at magazines in
• 4:34
  town, Edible Austin, she was no longer with them at the moment.
• 4:38
  And then she came in one day or e-mail is like, hey, you want to
• 4:42
  write a cookbook? This is the restaurants already
• 4:44
  open at this point. Yes, yeah, it was in back in
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  2018. So it was like pretty recent and
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  then so she just like, do you want to write a book?
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  I'll be editor. I was like sure.
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  And then so we met next day, drafted what we want to do and,
• 4:59
  and then we met with the graphic designer and we just decided
• 5:02
  that we're going to do a Kickstarter like.
• 5:05
  So you met someone from and they said let's let's write a book.
• 5:09
  And the very next day, you guys are already strategically
• 5:10
  planning. It in a way like it was almost
• 5:13
  feel like that it might have been a couple of days, but it's
• 5:15
  almost like immediate. So she's my long time friend.
• 5:18
  I've known her since our kids were little, right?
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  So she's just like reached out like, hey, let's write a book.
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  And I was like, sure, let's write a book.
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  And then we sat down and we kind of have the same idea.
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  We want to write it like memoir style, like kind of telling
• 5:34
  stories. And, and I was like, yeah, I
• 5:37
  love that. It's, it's amazing.
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  So because I was a Blogger for a long time before I opened the
• 5:42
  restaurant. And that's the, my style of
• 5:44
  writing, right? I, I always incorporate how I'm
• 5:48
  connected to that story or how I'm connected to that recipe.
• 5:50
  So, so we sat down, we met with graphic designer, we talked
• 5:55
  about it writing down budgets. And then so we decided to do a
• 5:59
  Kickstarter, A crowdfunding and I have had, I've seen a couple
• 6:05
  of successful Kickstarter. So I kind of base my, you know,
• 6:08
  campaign on that. And then we just launched 45
• 6:12
  days project. I think it was too long.
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  I should have done 30 days ago. So I've never done a
• 6:18
  Kickstarter, but maybe I want to write a book and I want to start
• 6:21
  a Kickstarter. Do it.
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  Because the, the books that I've written, so I've, I've written
• 6:25
  and published several books, but minor, you know, they're,
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  they're narrative text heavy. There's not really recipes or
• 6:31
  anything like that. It's more leadership and, and
• 6:32
  things like that. But if I ever said I want to
• 6:34
  write a cookbook, the reason I haven't is because when I was in
• 6:38
  the process of writing one and we started talking to, we
• 6:41
  started doing the formatting and things like that and we started
• 6:43
  talking to people, you know, the graphics.
• 6:45
  It's like, oh, it's, you know, $40,000.
• 6:47
  Like, that's a lot of money, right, to to publish a book.
• 6:51
  And I was like, yeah, I don't know if I feel like I feel like
• 6:54
  doing that, but maybe a Kickstarter is the path.
• 6:57
  Yeah, I mean because it's the thing about Kickstarter is that
• 7:02
  people that you know like plash for the whatever you are
• 7:07
  producing, they want it, right. So they already like that's what
• 7:11
  they want. So they want to support you and
• 7:13
  then they want to have the product in the hands when it's
• 7:15
  done. So it was almost like you pre
• 7:18
  selling it without the product and then you just, you know, let
• 7:22
  them like you just like they just have to trust you that
• 7:24
  you're going to do it. So when, when you when you
• 7:26
  create a Kickstarter for me who has never created Kickstarter
• 7:29
  and never contributed to a Kickstarter either, I don't, I
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  don't even know if I've ever like gone to the website.
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  But how does it work? Do you set up tiers?
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  Like you could donate so much and if you do, what do you get?
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  Yes, exactly, exactly. So you do like you do tiers.
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  So we got, you know, like $40 is a cookbook, which is what the
• 7:46
  price of the cookbook that we had thought about that that
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  time. And then there'll be well, if
• 7:51
  you pledge this much, you get a class, A cooking class of like
• 7:56
  private eight people full on, you know, everybody get a book
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  in that class as well. So eight books, +8 dinner,
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  cooking class kind of thing, or. They have to come to yours.
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  Where you going to? Them I go to the house.
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  So I don't have a lot of that. I have like just like two or
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  three of those like higher tiers like, you know, $2500 or $1500
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  or I would have like a gift card to Thai Fresh because I already
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  have the restaurant. So I figure I can just, you
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  know, if they don't want to book because some people don't want
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  to cook, they just want to eat. So say OK, it's almost like you
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  buying gift card ahead of time and it's not more than what they
• 8:34
  pledge. Just like they pledge $100, they
• 8:37
  get $100.00 gift card just like that.
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  So we take that money and started a Kickstarter as like
• 8:43
  to, you know, make the cookbook. So you were able to raise all
• 8:46
  40,000? Is that what?
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  You it was 60 and then we in 45 we got 65,000 I think Wow.
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  Eventually at the end so it went a little bit over.
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  So for someone like me who says, oh, I could do that, it sounds
• 9:00
  easy, what's the hard part of that?
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  What's the easy part? Well, there's no.
• 9:03
  Advice someone? Yeah, yeah.
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  So, so I think if I have to do it all over again, which I'm
• 9:08
  actually planning to do for another project, the pre
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  campaign is very important, right?
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  And you want to make sure that your campaign looks
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  professional, meaning you have put a lot of work in doing that
• 9:22
  campaign. Because once you go on the
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  Kickstarter page, you're going to see a video, right?
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  So that video would just be you talking about your project, how
• 9:30
  how you know, how it came about, how you're passionate about it
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  and all of that. But you want that to be done,
• 9:37
  you know, professionally looks good so that people would be
• 9:40
  eye-catching, you know, So yeah, don't I would say like, don't
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  skip on it. Just make sure you get it done.
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  And then so it looks really good.
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  Many people want to watch you. People want to see you talk
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  about it. And then later on in the
• 9:53
  campaign, like as you scroll up or Scroll down, you'll see
• 9:57
  photographs, right? Of like like, oh, this is what
• 10:01
  it might look like or all that stuff.
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  Or you do a mock up and you want to make sure that those pictures
• 10:06
  are good quality, right? So like building a beautiful
• 10:09
  campaign is important because like first impression, they open
• 10:12
  it, they see it, they're like, so if they see it and it's not
• 10:15
  as I catch it catching there, which is like go to the next
• 10:19
  one. Right.
• 10:20
  And if I understand correctly, if you don't raise the money in
• 10:22
  time, you don't get the money. You don't get at all 0 and then
• 10:25
  all the money will be refunded. So is there a strategy then
• 10:28
  involved to say, OK, Matt, maybe that's too much, there's no way
• 10:30
  we could raise that much? You just have to go for it.
• 10:34
  You just go for it. And then I guess there's like
• 10:38
  couple strategies. Some people would just put in
• 10:41
  their money first just to kind of get it going and then ask and
• 10:45
  then you can just pull your money out kind of thing, if that
• 10:47
  makes sense. Could you just, I'm just making
• 10:49
  this up because I have no idea. But if I'm thinking like, OK, I
• 10:52
  need a raise, $30,000 and maybe $30,000 might be kind of hard
• 10:58
  for me to raise, but could I say I'm raising $10,000 in three
• 11:02
  different Kickstarter campaigns? So this is phase one, which
• 11:04
  would be the publishing or you know, you know, the, the
• 11:07
  photography, Phase 2 might be the copywriting, whatever.
• 11:11
  And the final edits and kitchens are brutal right now.
• 11:14
  Everyone knows it, fewer people on the line, margins tighter
• 11:18
  than ever, and somehow the expectations keep going up.
• 11:21
  There's just no room to miss anymore.
• 11:23
  I was talking to a chef recently who said the biggest stress
• 11:25
  wasn't the volume, it was the mental load.
• 11:28
  Babysitting, food, timing, everything perfectly, trying to
• 11:31
  be everywhere at once. And that's where equipment
• 11:34
  matters more than people want to admit.
• 11:36
  Rationals. Technology comes up a lot in
• 11:38
  those conversations. The Icon B Pro, the Ivario Pro,
• 11:42
  overnight roast that don't need to be checked, custom programs
• 11:45
  for all your recipes, consistency without hovering
• 11:48
  completely automated cleaning, monitoring everything from your
• 11:51
  phone, The list goes on. And what really buys you the
• 11:54
  headspace? Less standing over pans and more
• 11:57
  time to leave the kitchen instead of constantly putting
• 11:59
  out tiny fires. When you're down to cook, when
• 12:02
  the prep list is rough, when the production ramps up.
• 12:05
  Think rational. I don't see why not.
• 12:08
  You know, you just have to say it in there and then say, OK,
• 12:11
  this is our phase one. We're going to get this going.
• 12:13
  We're going to get the. Yeah.
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  Because if you can't raise enough money for phase one,
• 12:15
  there is no phase two. Phase Three.
• 12:17
  Right, right, right. Yeah, I might do this.
• 12:19
  Yeah. And you just have to like, it's
• 12:21
  almost like it's one of those things.
• 12:23
  I, I, I want to say that it was like, almost like the single
• 12:28
  most stressful thing I've ever had to do because it's just,
• 12:31
  there's a timeline. And if you don't get it, you
• 12:33
  don't get it, right. So around the clock, 24/7, you
• 12:37
  cannot stop thinking about it. It's like, what am I going to do
• 12:40
  tomorrow to put the words out? What can they do differently?
• 12:44
  What were you doing besides what's on Kickstarter?
• 12:46
  So I was constantly posting videos of me cooking or posting
• 12:51
  video of me sitting in front of the restaurant talking about it.
• 12:54
  So every like 4 days, I have a, a little clip saying, OK, so now
• 12:59
  we add 30%. Thank you so much.
• 13:01
  And and if you, and then more of like, I think the, the, the most
• 13:06
  I did was mostly was just say cooking videos.
• 13:11
  It's like, OK, here is, you know, this recipe and then we're
• 13:14
  doing a cookbook. And if you want to own this
• 13:16
  beautiful cookbook of 75 recipes, right?
• 13:19
  So all the time you all your home was always just like having
• 13:22
  to do something because I thought people forget about it,
• 13:25
  especially in the middle of it where it actually plateau,
• 13:28
  right? It would just go up when you
• 13:30
  first start, just like go up and then they come down and then
• 13:32
  it's kind of say and at the end it goes up.
• 13:35
  That's normal for Kickstarter. And that's why I feel like a 45
• 13:39
  day campaigns versus a 30 day campaigns wouldn't make a lot of
• 13:43
  difference because people always wait in the middle.
• 13:46
  So once they come to middle, they're like, oh, I can do it
• 13:48
  later. It's not over yet so I'll wait,
• 13:50
  right. So it's just, I feel like that
• 13:52
  extra 15 days is not really bringing me any more money than
• 13:57
  it would have if it was 30 days. So my next one will be 30 days.
• 14:01
  And I think it's it's a good amount.
• 14:03
  So you just like work hard. You just always kind of and.
• 14:06
  There's a lot of people, I'm assuming on Kickstarter that
• 14:09
  live there. They just like giving away
• 14:11
  money. They're philanthropic.
• 14:12
  They do they are they are they are a lot of people that
• 14:15
  actually like all day browsing Kickstarter.
• 14:17
  What else there is that I can support or what else is
• 14:21
  interesting or like they have a feeling of like, oh, if I put,
• 14:25
  because there's a lot of what is it innovations, right?
• 14:29
  Like things that never done before.
• 14:30
  So a lot of people like to be that person that could say, hey,
• 14:34
  I was the one that supported this company.
• 14:36
  Look how big they've got now or things like that.
• 14:39
  And people raise and Oh my goodness, like some people like
• 14:44
  I want to raise 100,000 for something and then they raise
• 14:47
  like $2,000,000. That happened too.
• 14:49
  And when and when you started writing the book, what what is?
• 14:51
  What is your process? Because I'm assuming it's like
• 14:55
  you said, the very next day you start and then you got you raise
• 14:57
  the funds through Kickstarter. But how long did the process
• 15:00
  take you from start to finish? And then what was your process
• 15:03
  like to get the work done? How did you organize it?
• 15:05
  So we, we started, so we have kickstarted going.
• 15:09
  And while the campaign is going, I'm writing, right?
• 15:12
  So we're not just waiting. It's like, OK, if it doesn't
• 15:15
  come through, that's fine. At least we have some work,
• 15:17
  right? So because I, I did have some
• 15:19
  budget at least, like I know that I can get the, the
• 15:22
  manuscript done, like all the book done.
• 15:24
  So we just hit the ground running.
• 15:26
  We got the photographer all, you know, like set and then the
• 15:32
  graphic designer. So we just pretty much like
• 15:34
  started writing immediately. And my friend was editing as I
• 15:37
  was doing it. And we started doing photos
• 15:42
  because we actually had to start, it had to start doing
• 15:45
  photos even before anything else because that was going in to the
• 15:49
  Kickstarter campaign, right? So it was already kind of, and
• 15:53
  so we just kind of hit the ground running just in hope that
• 15:56
  in the 45 days it will all come together.
• 15:59
  So it took, I don't remember, I think it took about almost a
• 16:05
  year of just like writing, editing, you know, graphic
• 16:08
  design and all that stuff. I remember it was, it was done
• 16:12
  in 2020 in February. That's like right before COVID
• 16:17
  like right? Before, but everyone's cooking
• 16:19
  that time so hopefully it did good.
• 16:20
  For yeah, I, I it was good for like people wanted to buy more
• 16:24
  cookbook, but like it was done. I think we started end of 18 and
• 16:29
  then the book was like in a mock up, like a solid mock up was and
• 16:34
  then ready to send to print. That was February 2020, so like
• 16:38
  a year and a little bit. So I think that was and then it
• 16:40
  came out October of 2020, right on time.
• 16:43
  That was our timeline. I've never seen anything like, I
• 16:45
  was like, whoa, we are on time. This is crazy.
• 16:48
  It was like right on time. Right.
• 16:51
  So for some of this, for some of this thinking, OK, I want to, I
• 16:54
  want to start my own book and I want to, I want to do it all
• 16:56
  myself. Which by the way, in my opinion,
• 17:00
  unless they're offering you $1,000,000 book deal, you should
• 17:02
  sell publish in my opinion, because you know, you get to
• 17:04
  keep it all versus split amongst everyone.
• 17:06
  But with that being said, if you if you had to give advice to
• 17:10
  someone that's planning on writing their first cookbook and
• 17:12
  you know, in a very similar style, what should they budget
• 17:16
  for photography for for for design?
• 17:19
  It's all depends. And it's been, you know, seven
• 17:24
  years that I've done it. So I just kind of not quite
• 17:27
  sure. And I think, I think like I
• 17:29
  would say, you know, 10 grand for like design for, for talk,
• 17:36
  like each of this category will be right around 10 to maybe
• 17:41
  right now it might be a little bit more, you know, for graphic
• 17:44
  design, for editing and then for photography.
• 17:48
  And it could be more expensive. I don't know, right.
• 17:50
  I I wouldn't say it would be less than that like you.
• 17:52
  Don't think so. Maybe with AII?
• 17:54
  Don't know, maybe, yeah. So if you, if you want to do AI
• 17:58
  for editing, that could save you, you know, so like, but when
• 18:04
  I was working with my friend, she just, she just knows me so
• 18:09
  well, right? So she knows my story.
• 18:11
  So it was like a really good experience to work with her
• 18:16
  because when you read what she edited, you like, wow, you know
• 18:19
  me so well. You didn't just like.
• 18:21
  When the book is finally done and ready to be published, who
• 18:23
  do you go to for for independent publishing?
• 18:26
  I well, my graphic designer took care of it.
• 18:30
  She did OK, so she did. She just she didn't like, I
• 18:34
  don't even know the name. I did this.
• 18:35
  I just saw the, you know, the court and then I'm like, OK,
• 18:39
  that looks good. And she did everything.
• 18:40
  She contacted them. She sent the, you know, the the
• 18:45
  file and then it just arrived. Yeah.
• 18:49
  Yeah, I, I, I do think independent publishing is the
• 18:51
  way to go. It's a beautiful book and I love
• 18:53
  Thai food. I, I could talk about all that
• 18:56
  for, for a long time. But something else that I also
• 18:59
  wanted to talk to you about because I think it's very
• 19:01
  interesting is you didn't have a background in culinary when you
• 19:05
  jumped into opening your opening your first restaurant.
• 19:09
  Not really. Well, when I say you didn't have
• 19:11
  a culinary background, I mean working in professional.
• 19:13
  Kitchens, right, Right. Yeah, right.
• 19:15
  And then you open your, you know, leap of faith, one of the,
• 19:19
  I mean, arguably one of the most successful Thai restaurants in
• 19:22
  Austin, TX. Oh, thank you.
• 19:24
  I mean, I'm trying to been around for a minute.
• 19:25
  Yeah, yeah. I mean it it, it is.
• 19:27
  It's one of the first ones I found when I moved here.
• 19:30
  So I guess the question would be for people listening, what was
• 19:35
  that story like when you said, yeah, I'm going to open up a
• 19:37
  restaurant and I don't know anything about working in
• 19:40
  kitchens or what was that process like?
• 19:42
  What were some of the things that you learned that you didn't
• 19:46
  know that were hard lessons? And then maybe also what were
• 19:49
  some of the things that you brought in as an advantage
• 19:51
  because you didn't know that a lot.
• 19:53
  Like sometimes, you know, so sometimes you're afraid to do
• 19:56
  things because you know. Because you know too much.
• 19:57
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 19:59
  Well, for me it was. I was already.
• 20:03
  I never really worked in a kitchen, right?
• 20:06
  So I was a cooking instructor. So I was teaching cooking
• 20:10
  classes before that. And then I was, you know,
• 20:12
  vending at the farmers market. So I know my concept, meaning
• 20:16
  like I want to make sure that the restaurant is sustainable.
• 20:20
  So that's how I've been cooking the food at the farmers market.
• 20:23
  And then, so when I finally opened, it was more on the, I
• 20:27
  wasn't opening a restaurant more so than I was opening a space
• 20:31
  that I could teach, right. So it's restaurant was kind of
• 20:36
  like the secondary. I would say.
• 20:38
  Like I was like, I want a space that I can teach about 12 people
• 20:42
  in the kitchen and maybe I will make some food to sell on the
• 20:46
  side. Like seriously, it was like more
• 20:48
  on the cooking space because I was then like teaching at my
• 20:52
  house and I was determined to get out of the house.
• 20:55
  So I just didn't want to teach at the home, the my house
• 20:57
  anymore. So I, I was looking for a small
• 20:59
  space to be able to teach, but I was like, well, I'm teaching at
• 21:03
  night. So maybe in the day I can just
• 21:05
  make food and then I can sell some food as like a deli.
• 21:08
  That's why we started off as a deli.
• 21:10
  So there was like a daily case with cold Thai food in there.
• 21:13
  People will come and they will say, OK, I want 1 LB of that,
• 21:16
  half a pound of these, right? So we weigh it out.
• 21:18
  And then so at night there was no cooking done because it's
• 21:22
  already been done. People just come in to buy food
• 21:24
  at that point. So I actually had students
• 21:28
  inside the main kitchen that I cook for the restaurant because
• 21:32
  I couldn't do to order, right? Because I, I, I, I want this
• 21:36
  space to be able to teach. So the only way I could do is to
• 21:40
  make it a daily style. And then I'm like, OK, but now
• 21:45
  that I'm teaching, I also kind of want to sell groceries and I
• 21:48
  don't have a big space. It was like started off as like
• 21:51
  a 1300 square feet, right? So there was like a wall that I
• 21:55
  could just put shelf on that wall to store my groceries that
• 22:00
  I use. I was like, well, I'm just
• 22:01
  storing it. I'm storing it there.
• 22:03
  So I'm going to go ahead and sell it, right?
• 22:05
  So it looks really pretty, but that's also where we actually
• 22:08
  store our inventory, right? So it was kind of market slash
• 22:12
  cooking school slash, you know, a deli.
• 22:15
  So at what point do you decide like, OK, we could, we could do
• 22:18
  this. Let's start go it all in with
• 22:21
  the restaurant. Yeah, well, it was kind of it's
• 22:23
  gradual. It's like, so you grow almost
• 22:26
  like organically since the beginning, right as a vendor at
• 22:28
  farmers market then become a deli style.
• 22:32
  And then it was getting a little popular.
• 22:35
  People were coming and then so and then because we were in it's
• 22:39
  like an old strip mall, right. Like was built in the late 60s
• 22:43
  and and we were in the middle unit.
• 22:46
  It was like ABC, right. So like the, the unit C moved
• 22:49
  out and then Elena was like, would you like to expand?
• 22:52
  I was like, sure. And that was one year in.
• 22:54
  And so we expanded, right? And then we still were still the
• 22:58
  same way was doing deli for a little like all that time,
• 23:02
  adding some bakeries, some ice cream, just like, OK, we got a
• 23:06
  double rent now. So we're going to have to sell
• 23:08
  something else. And by the way, for people, I
• 23:11
  tried your ice cream the other day.
• 23:12
  Yeah, and the strawberry one, because like, which one should
• 23:18
  we try? I tried the strawberry one.
• 23:18
  I was like, OK, I've had strawberry before.
• 23:20
  Then I tried. I was like, that's really good.
• 23:23
  Yeah, we use fresh strawberry. Yeah.
• 23:24
  Really good and then coconut because it's all non dairy.
• 23:27
  Correct, Correct. Yeah, it.
• 23:28
  Was really good, really good ice cream for people that like ice.
• 23:31
  Cream. Thank you.
• 23:31
  Thank you. Yeah, Yeah.
• 23:33
  Amazing. And then and then, yeah.
• 23:35
  And then so it's just kind of like, so it was in a way a
• 23:38
  restaurant, right? We have more space to set and
• 23:39
  then and then you need a moved out.
• 23:43
  Yeah. And then I was like, would you
• 23:44
  like to raise my hand? And I was like, sure, right.
• 23:47
  And then so we kind of like a little bit of the time, like by
• 23:50
  the 3rd, going into the 4th year, we took over the whole
• 23:53
  strip. How difficult was it for you
• 23:55
  going from teaching classes, entrepreneurial mindset, you
• 24:00
  know, public speaking background, right, Right.
• 24:03
  To all of a sudden being a chef because now you're leading
• 24:06
  people, you're teaching them how to cook.
• 24:08
  You're have to run service. Yeah.
• 24:11
  How did you go? How was it for you in that
• 24:13
  transition? What was your learning curve
• 24:15
  like? I I think because it's because
• 24:18
  we were growing, you know, slowly.
• 24:21
  So we didn't just like boom, a restaurant with like 40
• 24:24
  employees. We kind of went from, you know,
• 24:26
  2 employees to 5 to 6 to 8 and so like that.
• 24:29
  And then and then we finally like converted to a cook to
• 24:33
  order restaurant, I think in 2012.
• 24:35
  So we opened in 2008, right? 2012 we decided, OK, we're going
• 24:40
  to cook to order now because daily not working, right?
• 24:43
  Because it was just like people really, really want us to make
• 24:46
  food to order. Like this is customers driven
• 24:49
  really they're like, you should cook to order.
• 24:51
  And I was like, but I don't know, I'm not sure.
• 24:54
  And then and then now we had this big 4500 square feet space.
• 24:59
  We're going to need to sell more.
• 25:02
  So the only way at that point in my head that I could sell more
• 25:06
  food is to cook to order because it's going to attract so many
• 25:10
  more people, right? It's like, not many people
• 25:12
  wanted to like bring their friends to a deli and sit down
• 25:15
  and possibly like get their food microwave because it was already
• 25:18
  made. There was no other way to heat
• 25:19
  it up. So so I decided I was like, OK,
• 25:23
  I'm going to go ahead and do it. So we went from Delhi to cook to
• 25:27
  order like pretty much like overnight.
• 25:29
  Was it easy for you to go from from that or was did you have a
• 25:35
  steep learning curve to understand Ala carte cooking?
• 25:39
  Not really. Yeah, it was just kind of it was
• 25:43
  I kind of like try it and and and it kind of I didn't I didn't
• 25:49
  feel that it was any any like for some reason, I'm not sure I
• 25:53
  I can't find the answer why at that point I didn't feel that it
• 25:56
  was just that much different. It was just like the portion was
• 26:00
  different, right. So we had and we, we, we, we
• 26:03
  make all the sauces ahead of time and all that stuff.
• 26:06
  So it was kind of in the planning, right?
• 26:09
  So like, it was just like, instead of making a big pot Thai
• 26:13
  in a Rondo, which is like, OK, we have the same sauce.
• 26:16
  We're going to take that sauce and then make it smaller and
• 26:19
  write a recipe for just one dish.
• 26:22
  And, and then it was and, and plus it was not, it was not like
• 26:28
  we hit the ground running like and got super busy immediately.
• 26:32
  It was just almost like as people find out they were coming
• 26:36
  more. And I mean, but, but seriously,
• 26:39
  this like once we switched, people were waiting for it.
• 26:42
  I'm not kidding. It was just like the, the sales
• 26:44
  triple within like 3 months. It just went from like, and I
• 26:49
  don't know, yeah. And, and I guess one of the
• 26:51
  questions I would have for you and I, and I don't mean this in
• 26:53
  a, in a way that would, that I mean this offensive.
• 26:55
  I'm just very curious about it because because I talked to a
• 26:59
  lot of chefs and they all have strong opinions about, I mean,
• 27:01
  ask them. They have strong opinions about
• 27:02
  salt. I mean everything.
• 27:04
  Chefs have strong opinions about everything really.
• 27:07
  But in in your mind, for you only, not what, not what anyone
• 27:12
  else thinks, but for you. Do you consider yourself a chef?
• 27:15
  Well, for a long time, you know, and for now I, I start to accept
• 27:21
  the title more than anything, but, but in the beginning it, it
• 27:26
  took me forever to just like, Oh well, I'm not really a chef, I'm
• 27:30
  just a cook. I'm a home cook.
• 27:32
  I like to entertain, I like to feed people.
• 27:34
  That is in my nature and in my culture, right?
• 27:37
  So that's what we do. If you go to Thailand, you eat
• 27:40
  like 6 times a day because every time you meet someone they're
• 27:44
  like let's go eat and then you go meet someone else and I was
• 27:47
  like, OK, let's go eat right So for me and that's how that's how
• 27:51
  the restaurant started to it it started as a dinner party, right
• 27:55
  So for me to convert because I didn't go to like school
• 28:00
  professionally, I never worked in a kitchen You.
• 28:02
  Didn't you didn't have formal training and.
• 28:04
  You right, I didn't like climb out from a cooked or sushi.
• 28:07
  Yes, yes, I haven't. I haven't done any of that.
• 28:09
  I just know that I can cook and people, people love, people do
• 28:14
  love the food that I make, right?
• 28:16
  So I know that for sure that my food is good, right?
• 28:18
  So it's, it's just a matter of converting from, you know, like
• 28:22
  I'm making food for 10 people to I'm making food for, you know,
• 28:25
  hundreds and thousands people and, and it's kind of just came
• 28:29
  naturally. I also was, I think lucky that
• 28:33
  all of my cooks and most of the people that I've hired, we're
• 28:38
  not professional cooked either. They just come from like a
• 28:43
  retail like vintage store or I trained them all and it's like
• 28:47
  this is how you cook Thai food. And then other thing, which is
• 28:50
  kind of I think also as a person, I have like my nature is
• 28:55
  to serve. I love serving, I love policing
• 28:57
  people. I love to cook, I love to
• 28:59
  entertain. So that's already in my blood.
• 29:03
  I love doing it. I, I'm happy doing it.
• 29:05
  I love to see people smiling faces.
• 29:08
  It make me happy. It make me want to wake up next
• 29:11
  day and do it again, right. So, so with all that, I think
• 29:13
  like because of my, my national instincts that I like to do
• 29:19
  that. So I'm able to train other
• 29:20
  people to do the same thing. What?
• 29:23
  What's very interesting about your restaurant and about you in
• 29:28
  general is well, I'll start with this one.
• 29:32
  Your restaurant was the first time I'd ever seen in real life
• 29:35
  because I'd heard about it, but I'd never seen it in real life.
• 29:38
  You're and and this was early. You're one of the, the first
• 29:43
  people I've seen in Austin that included gratuity, right, right.
• 29:48
  You included gratuity automatically as part of the
• 29:50
  bill. Yes.
• 29:52
  And I had never, I mean, I know it's more common now, but I
• 29:55
  think when you were, when you were doing it, I, I can't think
• 29:57
  of any other restaurant in Austin that was doing it at the
• 29:59
  time, right. So how did that come to be?
• 30:02
  How did that, how did you form that in your ethos?
• 30:04
  Why did you do it? And then was there initial push
• 30:07
  back? Well, I was always frustrated
• 30:12
  with the tipping system when I was a server.
• 30:16
  Even so, I didn't feel right that I was making more money
• 30:20
  than the back of the house. So I just feel like why is this
• 30:24
  system even here? It doesn't make any sense why,
• 30:28
  you know, like a lot of it doesn't make sense.
• 30:30
  Why are we leaving it to the customers to decide how much
• 30:33
  money we make? Why am I stressed every single
• 30:36
  time I have to come to work because I don't know how much
• 30:39
  money I'm going to make, right. So all of these added so when I
• 30:42
  finally run a restaurant, it was a deli and then counter service
• 30:46
  in the beginning. So I'm like, OK, I'm still, I
• 30:50
  was paying higher than the 213 and a little bit higher than
• 30:54
  minimum wage, but still a lot of people were still depending on
• 30:57
  tips. And I found that tipping create
• 31:01
  conflicts, right? Nobody is happy.
• 31:03
  It's like, oh, I should admit that much.
• 31:05
  I should admit this. And I can tell you from a cook
• 31:06
  standpoint, they all do not like, yeah, they they're all why
• 31:10
  do they make more money than me? Right, right.
• 31:12
  Yeah, sweating back here. And then they will be standing
• 31:15
  next to the cook line and say, oh man, today was such a slow
• 31:19
  day. I only make $120.00 and goes
• 31:21
  like, well, I was sweating in here making $60.00, right, Six
• 31:24
  hours. A lot of cooks were making
• 31:26
  $1012.00 an hour back then and then I was just thinking, how
• 31:31
  could this be fair? I just don't like it.
• 31:33
  This is and for me, not used to that.
• 31:36
  Like in Thailand, we don't do that because.
• 31:38
  What's the typical culture like in Thailand?
• 31:40
  It's just whatever left as a change, it is, there's no
• 31:43
  percentage, nothing. I mean, I'm going back to
• 31:46
  Thailand. I'm doing more than like my mom
• 31:48
  was like, that's too much. And I was like, wow, that's OK.
• 31:50
  I just let me do it. I'm not doing 20% anything, but
• 31:53
  I kind of taking into consideration how big the table
• 31:57
  is, what is the tap right? If it's a lot of work, then I'm
• 31:59
  just like, I'm not going to just leave them like this 10 baht
• 32:03
  change. I'm going to grab more money so
• 32:06
  that I'm going to make somebody's day better by just
• 32:09
  like doing that. But but it's never really
• 32:13
  because we know that they either add service charge on the bill
• 32:18
  or they've already calculated that that what cost them to make
• 32:22
  this food. So the price, right, So this
• 32:26
  price already includes everything.
• 32:28
  I, I, I always use this example like let's say you go buy a pair
• 32:33
  of jeans, right? You got terrible customer
• 32:36
  service. You still have to pay $100 for
• 32:39
  that pair of jeans. They're not going to give you
• 32:40
  discount. So and that person going to
• 32:42
  still make whatever they making per hour, right?
• 32:45
  And then why would like they come into the restaurant and
• 32:48
  there was a mistake made. Doesn't matter which where it
• 32:52
  comes from, doesn't matter what else going on, but the server
• 32:56
  get punished by not getting paid for the work that they already
• 32:59
  performed from like taking order, bringing you water,
• 33:03
  bussing the table right. So it like the work is already
• 33:05
  there. It's just not at the And then if
• 33:08
  you want a tip, then you can you can add OK, I appreciate you.
• 33:11
  How does? That give you prime costs on AP
• 33:15
  and L How does that affect prime costs?
• 33:17
  If you're well, our labor lines runs really high.
• 33:20
  Your labor line runs really high, but does that affect the
• 33:22
  the the top end revenues? Eventually it doesn't.
• 33:26
  In the beginning it was like, so we, we did, we put in number on
• 33:30
  spreadsheet for a year before we went for it.
• 33:34
  We like, OK, we're going to switch to table service like so
• 33:37
  it's like this gradual thing from like deli to counter
• 33:40
  service to cooked order. And then now we're like, OK,
• 33:43
  we're going to go for table service in 16 and we also going
• 33:47
  to change to no tip. We're going to take all of the
• 33:51
  expense, put that on to the price of the food, whatever you
• 33:56
  see, that's what it is. And and we're going to pay the
• 33:59
  server slightly higher than the Austin living wage because it's
• 34:03
  different, right? Like the minimum wage for Texas
• 34:06
  is 7/25, which I'm not sure why is that much because it's, it's
• 34:10
  not enough. You know, it has to be like
• 34:12
  triple that already at this point.
• 34:14
  So we take this, the published city living wage like, and then
• 34:19
  that's what we paid our servers. And then we calculate that and
• 34:23
  reflect that into the price of the food.
• 34:25
  And we were transparent about it.
• 34:27
  We tell people. And at some point we didn't even
• 34:30
  have tipping line. And then we started adding the
• 34:33
  tipping line because people were upset that they could not add
• 34:36
  any more money. Yeah, I, I know part of the
• 34:40
  issue with tipping is I want to feel generous.
• 34:43
  And even though you're giving them and it's included, I still
• 34:46
  want to give them. Some right, right.
• 34:47
  And then we do, yeah, we do get extra whatever 3 to 6% extra.
• 34:52
  But then everybody know that this is what we're doing.
• 34:55
  And we also, we change the style a little bit instead of like
• 35:00
  adding even more to the to the price, which is add a 15%
• 35:06
  service fee like included in that.
• 35:07
  And then we were transmitted every time we bring the, the
• 35:10
  check to the table, we inform the customer that we're like 15%
• 35:14
  already added. You know, we didn't even do 20%
• 35:17
  like a a regular table service amount that a lot of people are
• 35:20
  doing. Did did you get pushed back at
• 35:22
  all from initially from the guests coming in?
• 35:24
  A little bit, yeah. You can't please everyone,
• 35:26
  right? A lot of people were praising us
• 35:28
  like so. So they were happy like because
• 35:30
  people that follow us, they already know that we are doing,
• 35:35
  you know, meaning like we are, we use sustainable ingredients.
• 35:39
  We try our hardest whenever possible, we'll use it.
• 35:42
  All the meats are from within three hour drive from Austin.
• 35:46
  So they already know our our ethos that we.
• 35:49
  I would say your restaurant, the community definitely understands
• 35:55
  that that the decisions that you make in your restaurant are
• 35:59
  definitely aligned with the values of the community.
• 36:01
  Right? That that that you that, that
• 36:03
  that you feed. I think you guys do a great job
• 36:05
  at. That thank you.
• 36:06
  Yeah, we, we got very little pushback, though we did get, I
• 36:09
  mean, you can't please everyone. And then eventually people are
• 36:11
  just like, oh, OK, so it's the same as I'm not paying more, you
• 36:15
  know, I'm not, it's the same like unless they usually don't
• 36:18
  tip at all, which is not even the case.
• 36:21
  But some of them, just some of the people kind of like.
• 36:24
  They're people that don't tip at all.
• 36:25
  They they are, yeah. I think that's I have a family
• 36:28
  member that for everything it's just a dollar under the coffee
• 36:31
  cup. Yes, yes, yes.
• 36:32
  I mean, I mean it's just like so, so they already tipping and
• 36:35
  then they realize that oh OK, I understand why like why the
• 36:41
  change, right? Why, why, why Thai Fresh is
• 36:43
  doing it this way and then eventually it actually is better
• 36:49
  for everyone. We have very low turnover.
• 36:51
  We have like 0 turnover in the kitchen.
• 36:54
  You know how to cook. That's not the problem.
• 36:56
  The problem is getting your team to do what you want when you
• 36:59
  want it. That's leadership.
• 37:00
  My book, Culinary Leadership Fundamentals breaks down exactly
• 37:03
  how to run a kitchen without losing your mind.
• 37:05
  Stop yelling. Start leading.
• 37:07
  Get the book at Chefs psa.com so everyone on the team then makes
• 37:10
  a livable wage. Yes, like and then it is like an
• 37:13
  Austin published livable wage. And as far as ethos goes and
• 37:16
  again, talking about what you do, so you have the vegan ice
• 37:21
  cream, was it gluten free? And, and she brought me some
• 37:24
  stuff. Oh yes, I did.
• 37:25
  We forgot about that, right? Well, I'm looking at it.
• 37:28
  I yeah, I, I came. Baron Gibson.
• 37:30
  I typically I don't think I've ever eaten anything on the
• 37:32
  podcast. I probably shouldn't.
• 37:34
  Yeah, well, why not? It's the best thing.
• 37:36
  So this is coffee cake. So our coffee cake is not vegan.
• 37:39
  It's like sour cream coffee cake.
• 37:41
  And I think this is the best coffee cake period, gluten free
• 37:47
  or not. I think it's like one of the
• 37:49
  best one out there. Yeah, it's it's been it's been
• 37:55
  on our menu for a long time, one of the oldest.
• 37:57
  And that's, that is our sea salt chocolate tart.
• 38:02
  It's a little dark. And that was like that came
• 38:06
  during IS. That like ganache please.
• 38:08
  It's it is, it's just pretty much, it's just chocolate and
• 38:10
  coconut milk really. And so.
• 38:13
  It's really good. Like no extra sugar in the in
• 38:16
  the in the thing and vanilla. Yeah, I was, I was talking, we
• 38:19
  were talking about this the other day.
• 38:21
  I have the biggest sweet tooth. Like people don't know that.
• 38:23
  Like someone messaged me the other day and said, hey, you're
• 38:25
  getting fat, you need to lose weight.
• 38:27
  I was like, people don't know. I have like the biggest sweet
• 38:30
  tooth. Do you like it?
• 38:32
  It's good, Yeah. It's not super sweet, that one.
• 38:34
  It's it's, it came about during COVID that I was trying to find
• 38:40
  something simple to make right. So the restaurant was closed.
• 38:43
  We doing curbside. I didn't have as many employees.
• 38:47
  So I'm like is. It bad that I keep going back.
• 38:49
  No, it's not bad. You're.
• 38:50
  Going to have to take this away, this is so good.
• 38:52
  No, once I brought it, it's it's it's here.
• 38:54
  It's not going away. Yeah.
• 38:59
  But back to the ethos of the restaurant.
• 39:01
  So quality ingredients. You know, we were talking about
• 39:03
  the strawberry ice cream earlier, but you also
• 39:08
  incorporate that in everything. So the chicken that you're
• 39:10
  using, right? And I, and I, and correct me if
• 39:12
  I'm wrong, there was a story about one time you didn't serve
• 39:14
  chicken because you couldn't get chicken that was.
• 39:19
  Yeah. It was, it was.
• 39:20
  It didn't live up to your expectation, right?
• 39:21
  That's. That's that's right.
• 39:23
  I because our chicken farmers suddenly just like, oh, we
• 39:27
  decided to no longer run this, you know, chicken farming.
• 39:33
  And I was like, oh, no, what are we going to do?
• 39:35
  And at that point, I only know one, you know, like farm that
• 39:38
  does it. And then so I was searching and
• 39:41
  searching. It was hard to be, it is too
• 39:44
  hard to believe that it was so hard to find a chicken farmer.
• 39:48
  And it was at that point, not many people.
• 39:50
  You can find pork. You can find beef.
• 39:52
  There's like several of them, right?
• 39:55
  So for chicken. And then we kept looking and
• 39:58
  kept looking. And then.
• 40:00
  Finally, we found one out of Wiggo or near Wiggo that doing,
• 40:04
  you know, pasta raise sustainable.
• 40:06
  We were able to find whole chicken, but not like, you know,
• 40:11
  like what, what did chicken what?
• 40:12
  Did the customers say when you say we're not serving?
• 40:15
  Yeah. So we only had.
• 40:16
  Yeah. Like did you have pushback?
• 40:18
  We did, we did. They were mad.
• 40:20
  So we only had like chicken from whole chicken, meaning like we
• 40:23
  had our chicken rice, which is my family recipe, my most
• 40:28
  favorite food in the whole wide world.
• 40:30
  That's the cover of the book, right?
• 40:32
  So that's chicken, right. So that we were able to serve
• 40:34
  because we were able to find the whole chicken spider.
• 40:37
  We can find the fillet and we're not going to fillet chicken from
• 40:40
  the whole chicken for everything else.
• 40:41
  So we we didn't have it and people were like, you could just
• 40:45
  go to Whole Foods and get it right.
• 40:48
  So they have good chicken. And I was like, but they're from
• 40:50
  Pennsylvania because I did look right.
• 40:53
  So I was like, I don't want to do that.
• 40:55
  That's not my I want to commit to.
• 40:59
  You know, my protein comes from within three hours from Austin.
• 41:03
  So you really put your money where your mouth.
• 41:04
  Is yeah. So I I so I didn't have chicken
• 41:06
  for six months. Yeah, wow.
• 41:08
  And I finally found one. And you and you didn't close.
• 41:11
  I did not. Close.
• 41:12
  You didn't close. They ate something else.
• 41:15
  You know, we could. I love Thai food and I want to
• 41:18
  talk to you a little bit about Thai food in Thailand.
• 41:20
  OK. Why do you think that Thai food
• 41:25
  is? I personally think it's one of
• 41:26
  the strongest cuisines globally. Like flavor wise, I agree.
• 41:31
  But what is it that makes Thai food so unique?
• 41:33
  And by the way, when I was first introduced to Thai food, I think
• 41:37
  a big reason why I loved it is because it was so similar to me
• 41:40
  to Mexican food. In a way, yes, in a, in a way.
• 41:43
  The, the, the lime, Yeah, yeah. The heat, the broths, the sauce
• 41:47
  work, even though, you know, they're worlds apart, right?
• 41:52
  I felt like there was a lot of commonality and in the style.
• 41:56
  And you almost start to wonder like, well, if we go back
• 41:58
  several 100 years, you know, people kind of come to the same
• 42:01
  conclusions. Exactly.
• 42:02
  Yeah. It's like it's, it's, I think
• 42:04
  it's like I have to go back and look at the history, like how
• 42:08
  like, you know, people migrate or like how they end up at one
• 42:13
  part and where they actually coming from.
• 42:15
  So I think people will like travel or migrate with the food,
• 42:18
  right. So Thailand is, I think it's the
• 42:23
  location, geography plays a really important role in, in the
• 42:27
  cuisine itself, Southeast Asia in general, right?
• 42:30
  Like where is situated, it is sandwiched by two oldest cuisine
• 42:33
  in the world, right, Chinese cuisine or China.
• 42:37
  And then to the southwest is India, right?
• 42:39
  So when people start to travel or migrate and go into Thailand
• 42:44
  and so they bring the food with them, right?
• 42:47
  So if you're going to a little north side of Southeast Asia,
• 42:50
  like north of Thailand or even Vietnam, the food is a little
• 42:54
  closer to Chinese food, but a little bit more spice because
• 42:58
  they are so close, Sir, to India, right?
• 43:01
  So, and as a food travel or people travel, right, you're
• 43:05
  going to the middle of Thailand and then you're going to the
• 43:07
  South and Thailand and then you go to Malaysia, food start to
• 43:10
  get closer and closer to Indian food, right?
• 43:13
  So when you mix this two oldest cuisines in the world and make
• 43:18
  it into Thai or Vietnamese or Malaysian food, it is so good
• 43:22
  because it's just like it has all of the flavors, whatever
• 43:27
  Chinese food was lacking. Then the Indian food will kind
• 43:29
  of come in with the spices. So for the Indian part, they're
• 43:34
  mostly like heavy on spice, not as much as fresh herbs.
• 43:37
  Then the Chinese will kind of Chinese cuisine will kind of
• 43:40
  make up for that. So I think like the mixture of
• 43:43
  the two oldest cuisine in the world and then falling, it's
• 43:47
  almost like Southeast Asia is like a melting pot for these two
• 43:51
  big cuisine in the world. And, and I think like the, the,
• 43:55
  the reason, especially Thailand, Thailand, because Thailand's
• 43:57
  smack right in the middle of Southeast Asia, right?
• 44:00
  So like if you go to Malaysia, food's just a little bit more
• 44:03
  like very similar to Indian food, a little lighter, you
• 44:07
  know, not as dry spice forward. But, and I think, I think like
• 44:12
  for Thai food in particular, because of all of these flavours
• 44:15
  and influence when you eat Thai food, there's like so many
• 44:19
  dishes in of, of Thai dishes that has all of the flavors,
• 44:23
  right? Spicy, salty, sour, sweet and
• 44:27
  bitter in how do I say it? Like in, in a, in a higher
• 44:32
  level, Like it's not just subtle.
• 44:35
  It has just like coconut soup, for example, there's a lot of
• 44:38
  lime, there's a lot of chili, there's a lot of cilantro,
• 44:40
  there's a lot of fish sauce. So you get all of it right.
• 44:44
  So most food is that way. We'll have all.
• 44:47
  The if you have the the music and it's like, OK, here's the
• 44:50
  spicy knob and here's the. Right, right, right.
• 44:52
  You turn the volume up on a lot of.
• 44:54
  Them right, so you can taste them all.
• 44:55
  So when you eat it, like the feeling or the sensation you
• 44:59
  get, it's different. And there's so many unique
• 45:02
  flavors in in, I mean, if we're talking lemongrass or we're
• 45:05
  talking if you're lime or if we're talking fish sauce or palm
• 45:09
  sugar, a lot of these we're familiar, but we're not that
• 45:13
  familiar from, you know, in, in the West.
• 45:15
  So it's like you want to add some acidity, but you also want
• 45:20
  to add some lemon flavor and you start to add the other layer.
• 45:24
  And. I was able to recognize that
• 45:26
  early as a chef is like, wow, these flavors are so unique and
• 45:30
  powerful and a little goes a long way.
• 45:32
  Right, Yeah, yeah. And we, I, I think like we put,
• 45:36
  I think Asian cuisine is like tend to be a little sweeter.
• 45:39
  Yeah. So we put sugar in everything.
• 45:41
  Doesn't have to be a lot in everything.
• 45:42
  Some of the thing you don't even taste it.
• 45:44
  Now, why do you put the sugar though?
• 45:45
  Because it. Balance the sour.
• 45:47
  Right. Yeah, it balance the sour, Yeah,
• 45:49
  especially if anything that has like lime juice, definitely
• 45:53
  sugar. And when, when you're typically
• 45:55
  reaching for sugar, are you, are you always reaching for for palm
• 45:58
  sugar typically? Both so palm sugar or white
• 46:01
  sugar, We use a lot of white sugar and I am not, you know,
• 46:04
  like my food is a little less sweet than most Thai chefs.
• 46:09
  I think it's just from my like my preference, right?
• 46:13
  But when I don't add it, it's not the same.
• 46:16
  It doesn't have that like the complexity is not the same.
• 46:20
  So when I teach cooking classes, I what we do is like we we taste
• 46:24
  it and then we add one flavor fish sauce and we taste it
• 46:27
  again. And then we add the sugar and we
• 46:29
  taste it again and then we add the sour and we taste it again.
• 46:32
  And people were like amazed by how each of the flavor make the
• 46:36
  existing thing that they had before more complex.
• 46:41
  So when you. More flavorful.
• 46:42
  When you're teaching someone that is has no frame of
• 46:44
  reference of Thai food and it's like, OK, this is what it tastes
• 46:47
  like and this is how how we get there.
• 46:49
  How do you teach them what what? What are the steps that you get
• 46:53
  them to understand the Thai palette?
• 46:55
  So I like so that, that example that I like that exercise that I
• 47:00
  do. That's one of them, right?
• 47:02
  But then before the class start, I would go into all the flavors
• 47:06
  that are out there, right? So I I laid out into like, OK,
• 47:10
  there's like spicy. It comes from what ingredients,
• 47:14
  right? And the same as like salty,
• 47:15
  sweet, sour, bitter. And then you mix them all and
• 47:19
  then like like I kind of make them visualize it.
• 47:22
  Like for example, I like to use chocolate, for example.
• 47:25
  It's really bitter. 100%. You add a little sugar, one
• 47:29
  ingredients sweet, you eat, you can eat more of it.
• 47:33
  And then sometimes you see sea salt in the chocolate and you're
• 47:35
  like, whoa, this is so good. And all you add is salt, right?
• 47:39
  Or you add fruit in there and it become more complex and then you
• 47:42
  add sometimes people put spice in the chocolate bar and that's
• 47:46
  why it's like and then become so good as like it's the same as.
• 47:49
  Food. Then you had a little heat.
• 47:50
  Too. Yeah, you do the same thing.
• 47:51
  And then like I, I, I make them visualize it.
• 47:54
  I was like, if you receive a plate of food, then you eat it
• 47:58
  and you're like, man, this nisi Racha or hot sauce on it, it
• 48:01
  means your body is craving it because your body or your taste
• 48:04
  buds one that sensation that you have when you have all of these
• 48:08
  five flavors, right? So you grab, you put it on, it's
• 48:11
  like, ah, that's the sensation I'm looking for.
• 48:14
  So it make people just like, Oh, so if I'm missing something,
• 48:17
  they're trying to like visualize like what that flavor that I'm
• 48:20
  missing and I have them taste each of the ingredients
• 48:24
  sometimes. So they just like, Oh, now I
• 48:26
  understand like that. If I'm missing that feeling,
• 48:29
  it's probably is fish jaws. But I always say when in doubt,
• 48:33
  ash fish sauce. Yeah, yeah.
• 48:36
  If you Yeah, it's not there yet, Let's try fish sauce, yeah.
• 48:39
  And there's there's very unique flavors, you know, we're talking
• 48:42
  about, I think the very familiar is our lemongrass cup, your
• 48:45
  lime. But there's also like galangal.
• 48:46
  Yeah, that is very has a very unique flavor.
• 48:49
  And people that don't know when you try it for the first time,
• 48:51
  like, oh, that's you have no, you can say it's kind of like
• 48:54
  ginger, but it's. Not it's not.
• 48:55
  It has its own profile flavor. Yeah, Pandan leaf flavors that
• 49:00
  people are completely unfamiliar with.
• 49:02
  And when you try them for the first time, it's like all your
• 49:06
  your creativity for me was starting to go out was like,
• 49:09
  wow, how can I incorporate this into exactly.
• 49:12
  I remember at the restaurant was chef at the time, we did a foie
• 49:15
  gras torchon and we served it with a a banana salsa that had
• 49:20
  lemongrass and kaffir lime. Yeah.
• 49:22
  I think we did a pandan Jelly with it.
• 49:24
  Like a, you know, a lot of people do like Jelly and, you
• 49:27
  know, we did with pandan and it was like, why was I doing it?
• 49:32
  I don't know. I was young, but I just really
• 49:34
  like. But that sounds good.
• 49:35
  I really like food. I was like, I want to do.
• 49:36
  Yeah. I'm always like when I go eat
• 49:39
  some other cuisines and I can detect some of the Thai flavor.
• 49:44
  Yeah. I'm like, like on top of the
• 49:46
  world. I was like, wow, this is so
• 49:47
  cool. Like I went to like, my
• 49:49
  experience was like, I was at Uchi At that point.
• 49:52
  I was a Blogger, so I was invited to Uchi.
• 49:55
  So they brought out this tuna with, like, watermelon, right?
• 50:03
  And then I took a bite and I turned to the chef.
• 50:08
  I was like, is there any Thai chili and fish sauce in this?
• 50:11
  And he's like, yeah, there's so like you kind of because you
• 50:14
  don't think that it was going to be there and then you taste and
• 50:16
  you're like, whoa, this is like Thai food almost, you know?
• 50:19
  So he was incorporating that because I know that a lot of his
• 50:23
  chefs also from Thailand and all that stuff.
• 50:25
  So it's kind of fun and really cool to see other Christians
• 50:29
  incorporate all these ingredients that you can kind of
• 50:33
  detect it or you eat and you're like, that kind of tastes like a
• 50:36
  longo. I wonder if that was right.
• 50:38
  Yeah. And then if you ask the chef,
• 50:40
  likely that they would say yes. That was goingo.
• 50:43
  Yeah. We used to at the the the last
• 50:45
  place where where I was chef, we used to take the cucumbers and
• 50:49
  compress them with fish sauce, lime juice, a little bit of palm
• 50:54
  sugar, some chilies, garlic, and we'd we'd vacuum them so it'd
• 50:57
  compress them and then we'd grill them.
• 50:59
  Oh, and then we would do like the green papaya, but we'd punch
• 51:03
  them out in, you know, little star garnishes or whatever.
• 51:06
  And we'd serve it with a peanut sauce.
• 51:07
  And it was like the most simple thing.
• 51:09
  It was basically like some Tom or something like.
• 51:11
  That. Yeah, But everyone that would
• 51:12
  come in that would order that said like that's the best thing
• 51:15
  we've ever had is right. Like the flavors of of of Thai
• 51:19
  food. Yeah.
• 51:20
  The the the way that it's able to balance for me, they can't be
• 51:23
  beat. I love it.
• 51:24
  Right. Well, good, because that's what
• 51:27
  I make, yeah. Do you think there's something
• 51:30
  that for the people that are listening, I want to ask you 2
• 51:34
  culinary specific questions. Is there something that is very
• 51:38
  common, ubiquitous, let's call it in, in Thai cooking that
• 51:42
  every kitchen that Western, French, Italian could
• 51:46
  incorporate this because it's so much, it's so much better.
• 51:49
  You get so much flavor or it's so much more efficient.
• 51:51
  If there was one thing that you think every kitchen in the world
• 51:54
  should do that comes from the Thai kitchen, what would you say
• 51:56
  it is? Oh, I don't know.
• 51:59
  There's just so many good ingredients.
• 52:02
  I think fish sauce and soy sauce.
• 52:05
  Yeah, let's say fish sauce. I I feel like it is to me, even
• 52:11
  as a Thai person, I still feel like that is one of the most
• 52:14
  fascinating ingredients to me because like, you add it, if you
• 52:18
  cook it, the fish goes away, leaving you with this umami
• 52:22
  flavor, right? It doesn't go with everything.
• 52:24
  I sometimes put fish sauce in my pasta because I was like, it's
• 52:27
  missing something. And then I'll put it in and then
• 52:30
  people will love it and they have no idea what I put in
• 52:33
  there. Yeah.
• 52:34
  So that that would be 1. But then also I think pandan,
• 52:41
  like if I have to pick one more, right, it's like 1 is like a
• 52:43
  condiment and one would be like something that like leafy or
• 52:48
  like vegetable sort of thing. Pandan, I think it's like, I
• 52:52
  like to see people use it for not just dessert because that's
• 52:55
  what we use in Thailand a lot. But whenever you can incorporate
• 52:59
  pandan into savory food, right, it just gives a different like
• 53:05
  flavor. It's like sweet, but you don't
• 53:07
  have to put in any sugar. You know, it bring in that
• 53:10
  complexity of almost like vanilla.
• 53:13
  It's like imagine putting vanilla in savory food.
• 53:16
  You kind of like, I'm not sure. Now that I think about it, I
• 53:19
  probably should also try to do vanilla in savory food and see
• 53:22
  what happened because Pandan Pandan works really well in in
• 53:26
  some because we have like, I think I only know two things in
• 53:30
  Thai cuisine or one maybe that actually call for pandan that as
• 53:34
  far as Siri goes. So I think it just has like and
• 53:38
  it is one of the like my most favorite food to eat.
• 53:41
  So I feel like if it can do that to one thing, it should be able
• 53:45
  to do that too many other things like, you know, make like a
• 53:48
  Pandan sauce, like a base sauce kind of thing.
• 53:51
  So I think that that might be the two.
• 53:55
  This is my my last question that's culinary related to to
• 53:59
  Thai food. Are we allowed to use the Curry
• 54:02
  paste already made? Oh yes, I do that, Yeah.
• 54:06
  I mean like. Where do we stand?
• 54:07
  Because everyone that we were talking about, you know, this
• 54:11
  Thai community that I used to hang out with, Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 54:13
  We all use the Curry paste already.
• 54:14
  The. In the can, yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 54:16
  yeah. Messy.
• 54:17
  I mean, in Thailand, they don't make their own Curry paste
• 54:21
  either, but because we have Fresh Market, right, 5:00 AM in
• 54:27
  the morning, close at 4:00 PM and we have them every single
• 54:30
  corner of the neighborhood. So you buy them there.
• 54:34
  So even Thai people who don't even make them anymore.
• 54:37
  I mean, my mom used to make, she would like maybe every few times
• 54:43
  she would just like, let's just make our own today.
• 54:45
  So I learned, I grew up learning how to make, so I know how if I
• 54:51
  have to make one. Do you do always mortar and peso
• 54:53
  or use? Blood I I use motor and peso I
• 54:55
  can't use blender. It's it's wrong.
• 54:57
  It's like it's not right. I would rather just buy a canned
• 55:00
  phase and then using a blender, I would do more and peso I
• 55:04
  whenever I I always say whenever I'm homesick, I would grab my
• 55:10
  modem peso and start making Curry paste.
• 55:12
  I just want to hear that sound of Moto and peso hitting each
• 55:16
  other and into the smell of spice that it's like get broken
• 55:20
  down 1 by 1. So it's like, OK, now it's down
• 55:22
  to Kalongo. I can smell it stronger as I you
• 55:26
  know, and as you, you know, power that peso onto the Curry
• 55:32
  paste like the flavor of the the the sense, like the fragrance
• 55:37
  intensified, right, because you break it down more and more and
• 55:40
  more and you can smell it. So it's like a very like that
• 55:44
  feeling is like unmatched. You can't find it.
• 55:46
  What what's your what's your go to brand for Curry paste?
• 55:49
  Which ones you like? Messy.
• 55:50
  Messy. Yeah.
• 55:51
  How do you spell MAS? SMAESRI OK, so a lot of time
• 55:57
  people say mashry but it's actually comes from just messy
• 56:02
  in Thai. And what's your go to fish
• 56:05
  sauce? Fish sauce would be either
• 56:08
  tipurot, which is like a plastic bottle, like square plastic
• 56:12
  bottle, or squid, squid. Squid is my mom's favorite so.
• 56:17
  I like squid too, yeah. Squid.
• 56:19
  I haven't tried the other one. Wow, this has been fun.
• 56:23
  I, I, I, I'll tell you that looking at your book, eating
• 56:26
  this and then talking about Thai food has made me very, very
• 56:29
  hungry. Why you should come or you
• 56:30
  should like start cooking. I I am.
• 56:33
  I'm gonna go home and and make make something tonight in my in
• 56:36
  my pantry. I think I have some.
• 56:37
  I'm sure you have red. Red Curry paste, yes, already
• 56:40
  made, yes. Well, thank you so much.
• 56:42
  Where can people find you if they want to eat at your
• 56:44
  restaurant and then also if they want to follow on social media?
• 56:47
  Well, we are at Thai Fresh, so Nai Oh Nai W Mary's in South
• 56:51
  Austin and then we also have breakfast.
• 56:58
  I must like blanking. We have a on the east side on
• 57:02
  Holly St. It's called Gati Cafe, which we
• 57:05
  serve, you know, travel inspired food.
• 57:08
  So it's like the food that I ate as I travel and those are my
• 57:12
  favorite. So I incorporate that into our
• 57:15
  breakfast and lunch menu and it is the ice cream shop in the
• 57:18
  afternoon and coffee shop. And I also teach cooking
• 57:21
  classes, which you can find the schedule on the Thai Fresh
• 57:27
  website. And the book.
• 57:29
  The book, you can either buy it at the restaurant or you can
• 57:32
  actually order online through our website.
• 57:35
  Excellent. Thank you so much for being.
• 57:36
  Here, Yeah, thank you for the. That was fine.
• 57:38
  Thank. You for the gifts.
• 57:39
  Yeah, you're welcome. Thank you all.
• 57:42
  Right, that's the show. If you liked it, make sure you
• 57:43
  leave five stars. Nothing less than five stars.
• 57:46
  If you want more chefs PSA, go to chefspsa.com.
• 57:49
  Get yourself some books, get yourself some merch including
• 57:51
  Culinary Leadership Fundamentals and the Line Cook Survival
• 57:54
  Manual. If you want early access to
• 57:55
  episodes, you can get them on Spotify and Substack by becoming
• 57:59
  a paid member. The link is in the notes.
• 58:01
  We'll see you next week. Hit the porno music.
• 58:03
  No small Andre in the kitchen, mix it.
• 58:05
  Drop the chef knowledge. No fiction.
• 58:08
  Stirring up the beats. Heat enough the session.
• 58:10
  Listen. Close classes in session.