Latest / Chef's PSA Podcast / Aaron Bludorn & Allie Peña – Mentorship, Leadership & Kitchen Tools

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Aaron Bludorn & Allie Peña – Mentorship, Leadership & Kitchen Tools · Chef's PSA Podcast

• 0:00
  Hello, chefs. This is Chefs QSA.
• 0:01
  I'm your host, Andre Natera. Today, we welcome back chef
• 0:04
  Aaron Bluedorn, who leads the restaurant group behind Blue
• 0:07
  Dorn, Navy Blue Barb, Blue Dorn and Proceed.
• 0:10
  He's joined by Ali Pena, the new executive chef of Blue
• 0:14
  Restaurant in Houston. We taught mentorship, becoming a
• 0:17
  leader, and we get nitpicky about setting up a proper
• 0:20
  workstation. Stay tuned.
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  your first order. I would be the executive chef of
• 1:16
  Blueburn, which is the flagship restaurant.
• 1:19
  Yeah. And how long have you been in
• 1:20
  position now? As that in that position.
• 1:23
  Yeah, yeah. That week, yeah.
• 1:26
  A week? So you guys started working
• 1:28
  together what, like five years ago?
• 1:30
  Yeah, I was, I was going to a job interview.
• 1:34
  I like did the whole thing cuz I was, I was a part of another
• 1:38
  company for a very long time and I just wanted just send a
• 1:43
  refresher and I say the story all the time.
• 1:46
  But I went running, I saw the building, I saw the pass, I saw
• 1:49
  some somebody sitting at the pass ended up being chef Aaron
• 1:52
  and I was like, what is this place?
• 1:54
  And I was like, I got, I mean like I knew what it was before,
• 1:57
  but I'm like, what is this place?
• 1:59
  And I stopped my run, sat there and like just started finding
• 2:03
  out like I quote UN quote stocked to find out what was
• 2:08
  going on in this building. Found it out, applied and I
• 2:11
  think. Which which building was it?
• 2:13
  It was. So currently we're the chef.
• 2:14
  Now. Were you nervous going in?
• 2:19
  Did you, did you know Aaron? Kind of a big deal?
• 2:22
  I mean, I knew of him. Yeah, no, no, Yeah, you are like
• 2:25
  I'll say he's kind of a big deal.
• 2:26
  I knew of him, so this is funny too.
• 2:29
  I knew of him and, and I was like, wow, OK, cool.
• 2:33
  Like this guy's not gonna be here.
• 2:35
  But like the team is great. So I write my, my letter to the
• 2:41
  CDC and now chef, chef Chase. And I was like I whatever what I
• 2:47
  said and I walk in and I'm nervous already cuz I hadn't
• 2:51
  been a cook in a very long time. So you were you were already
• 2:55
  head. Chefs I got, I got, no, I got
• 2:57
  put in a management role. Just kind of how it happened.
• 3:01
  It's not what I wanted. I was trying to find a cooking
• 3:03
  position. I wanted to do the whole thing
• 3:05
  and I got put in a management role.
• 3:07
  I learned a lot from it and I'm incredibly blessed from it now.
• 3:13
  But yeah, so I was nervous walking in and I go up to the
• 3:16
  pass and I see Chef Aaron and I'm like, because my letter was
• 3:21
  written to. Is it handwritten?
• 3:23
  Yeah, No, it was typed. It was typed.
• 3:26
  But I was like, oh, no, like I was not prepared for this.
• 3:29
  And like, we're all in, you know, masks at the time.
• 3:31
  And I'm like, hi. And I'm.
• 3:33
  I don't even know. I remember saying what I wanted
• 3:36
  within five years, what I wanted for 10 years.
• 3:38
  I remember saying what I just wanted in general, walking in
• 3:40
  the building and then I got to see the kitchen and I was just
• 3:45
  like, man, I want this job like I want, I want to do it in this
• 3:48
  kitchen. And I got to.
• 3:50
  So with five years with the company and which did you did
• 3:54
  you do like the circuit of all the restaurants?
• 3:56
  I did. I don't know if it was planned
• 3:59
  that way, but it happened. So yeah, I did.
• 4:02
  I went through the stations as a cook, became a sous chef of Blue
• 4:05
  Dorn, and then I was offered the executive sous chef for Navy
• 4:10
  Blue under Jared, Chef Jared, and for the opening, yeah, for
• 4:13
  opening, which was awesome because I got now 2 restaurants
• 4:17
  that I opened. One is a cook, 1 is a executive
• 4:19
  sue. And then getting to see how Chef
• 4:23
  Sherrod works after Chef Aaron and Chef Chase.
• 4:25
  It was it was just another like tool that I could just have in
• 4:28
  my pocket. And Chef Jared came with with
• 4:31
  you, right? Yeah, yeah, he came from, he was
• 4:33
  with me at Cafe Ballude and then moved down to open up Navy
• 4:35
  Float. Yeah, that's wild.
• 4:37
  I mean, it's interesting how you got such a good following like
• 4:40
  your, your team's been with you for quite some time and you've
• 4:42
  grown up. Yeah, yeah.
• 4:44
  I mean, Ally was is literally what I'm most proud of, and not
• 4:50
  with a lot of other chefs, but the idea of what she's done, you
• 4:54
  know, to open up Ludorne with us, work all the stations, get
• 4:57
  the great foundation, then put on to be a sous chef and move on
• 5:01
  to be an executive sous chef and an opening and then open as a
• 5:04
  chef. You cannot ask for more than
• 5:06
  that as a chef restauranteur. That's insane.
• 5:09
  So I, I think about mentorship, I think about it a lot, but
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  there's also the mentees perspective.
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  Like there's your perspective of how things went and there's your
• 5:18
  perspective of how things are going initially.
• 5:21
  So I want to ask you first, were you quickly able to recognize
• 5:24
  the talent? 100% yeah.
• 5:26
  You know, and that's something I think any chef can can say is
• 5:30
  that within the 1st 5 minutes of seeing someone walk into a
• 5:33
  kitchen, how they hold themselves, you can tell.
• 5:35
  How they set their cutting board up.
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  Everything right and we 0 into that stuff and I can even
• 5:41
  remember, I remember when Ali came to open call, it was
• 5:44
  literally the first day of open call.
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  Here I am sitting on the other side.
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  She says she's nervous. I'm so nervous because it's hard
• 5:52
  to find good cooks. It's hard to find good team.
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  And I had no idea of being new to Houston.
• 5:57
  What what you know, I was going to open those doors to.
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  And we found, you know, some of our almost our entire management
• 6:04
  team two years later in the company was found that first day
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  really, which is wild. Yeah, That is wild.
• 6:10
  Yeah. How how long had you guys worked
• 6:12
  together before? And I know this and you know
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  this, like, behind the scenes conversations are starting to
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  happen. Like, you're like, oh, she's
• 6:18
  good. We should keep an eye on her,
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  like let's start getting her ready for the next position.
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  It was day one. So you're already having
• 6:23
  conversations with your with your CDC or exec sue?
• 6:26
  Absolutely. Yeah, She she was, you know,
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  when we, when Chase and I, you know, took all the resumes and
• 6:31
  talked about it, You know what you do you OK?
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  This person's gonna be good for entre Med.
• 6:34
  This person's pretty good for garmache.
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  You know what I mean? It's like, OK, entry level.
• 6:39
  Entry level. They have some experience.
• 6:40
  Let's try them out there. Meat station, fish station.
• 6:43
  And it's all just a guess, right?
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  And then, you know, you, you start on first day of training.
• 6:48
  All right? How are they doing?
• 6:49
  OK, this one's gonna stay there. We're gonna move this this cook
• 6:53
  over. Playing Tetris.
• 6:54
  Yeah, it's Tetris. Yeah.
• 6:55
  And Ally from day one was, it was so clear that she was ready
• 7:00
  to be on the hotline. She was ready to take a very
• 7:02
  challenging station. And, and unfortunately, every
• 7:07
  entrementier, because that was a station that she ended up on,
• 7:09
  had to deal with an overload for of of, you know, station work
• 7:13
  that that station literally became the odds and ends for
• 7:16
  everyone because she could handle it.
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  You know what? I.
• 7:19
  Mean was it like that initially or it just grew into that
• 7:21
  because you were good? It grew into that because she
• 7:23
  was good and she won't, she won't admit that, but that was
• 7:26
  that was how it was. And then so every entrementier
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  after that, we had to sort of pair that station back down.
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  So when? OK, so now from your
• 7:33
  perspective, did you, I mean, did you know you were good?
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  No, no. OK, so they were, they were
• 7:38
  keeping their eye on you, but you didn't, you weren't aware.
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  That's what makes. Her good, right?
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  Right. OK, humility.
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  Yeah, I, I'm, I'm incredibly insecure of myself, I guess,
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  like in my in my work, not that I don't think I can because I
• 7:55
  have that fight, but it's just like, what do you mean?
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  Like I remember, I do remember on the station and I was begging
• 8:02
  Chef Chase. I was like, chef, please let me
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  come in like an hour and a half, right, Because at the beginning,
• 8:07
  like it's a bit, it's a new restaurant.
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  Like you're prepping your own sauces.
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  You're prepping your all of the all of everything you're using,
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  you're doing. And I was, I was stressed out.
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  And I remember telling him I was like, please let me come in.
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  Like I won't clock in. It's not about that.
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  I was like, I just need to get set up on time.
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  And he was like, Ali, you're fine.
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  And I was like, I'm like crying. I'm like, I'm really not.
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  But yeah, you find you find a way to do it.
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  And it's, it's funny because like that mentor challenging you
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  and pushing you is making you incredibly stronger and faster
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  and whatever. And I remember when they they
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  moved me to fish, I was like, no, I'm not ready.
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  So what's the hard station They're like?
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  What's the one station in in the restaurant that it was like, oh,
• 8:48
  if you work there, you're a gangster.
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  That's hard. Is it fish?
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  Fish is one of them, but meat, I mean meat.
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  Meat is the beat Texas. Yeah, yeah.
• 8:59
  Because you're controlling the line.
• 9:01
  It is Texas. You have all of these steaks,
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  but I think it's more so like leading the line because that
• 9:06
  station leads the team to get everybody.
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  Up on what's your favorite station though?
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  Like if, if, if someone's calling out and you have to
• 9:13
  reshuffle everyone, you're like, I'm working this station.
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  Where you going? You know, surprisingly, I hated
• 9:20
  fish, but I fell in love with fish.
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  I like fish. I like, I like garbage.
• 9:24
  I like fish. I fucking hate the grill.
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  Yeah, I like, I'll like think of every excuse to like, Oh no,
• 9:30
  it's cuz my back or, you know, whatever.
• 9:32
  Like I don't want to work the grill.
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  It's hot and not that I can't, it's just it's not enjoyable for
• 9:37
  me. I don't like.
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  I love the girl. Do you?
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  I love there's. There's a special place for you.
• 9:42
  It's. Well, I think also at the time
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  of like they're like, I'm like, I guess I will brag a little
• 9:48
  like I got to be part of that opening team.
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  You had these like fun things to do.
• 9:51
  Like I remember one time you brought in what did you bring in
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  that that A5 Wagyu I got to eat like I got to cook.
• 9:58
  Have I ever done them before? No, like I was searing flaw and
• 10:01
  I became like pretty good. Like it's just the feeling of
• 10:04
  like, conquering, I think like, oh, I can do this.
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  That made me love girl. Wow, I guess I love girl.
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  I want to go back to one thing that's so important that we were
• 10:13
  just talking about is the, the humility and the fact that every
• 10:17
  chef is insecure and constantly insecure.
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  I am constantly insecure. Every day.
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  I still wake up with anxiety that I'm we're not going to be
• 10:26
  able to perform, you know, and I think that and I've had that
• 10:30
  since I was a cook and just sort of like that, those butterflies,
• 10:35
  you know, on your first day back from a weekend, you know, that
• 10:38
  Monday, not walking, walking into something you don't know.
• 10:40
  And that that unknown creates a little bit of that anxiety.
• 10:44
  But that's what pushes you, right?
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  That's what makes you good because you're constantly
• 10:48
  striving to be that person that you have in your mind you being.
• 10:52
  And, you know, I think Ali was one of those people that had
• 10:56
  that constantly. Every day she heard she would
• 10:59
  come to me and say it's not good enough.
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  I'm not doing a good enough job. And I'm I'll tell you that.
• 11:04
  I'll tell you when you're not doing good enough, but you're
• 11:06
  doing great. Keep going, keep pushing.
• 11:08
  That insecurity, you know, to go back to it is what makes you
• 11:12
  great. And I think that's part of it's,
• 11:15
  you know, yeah, we shouldn't be living in this, like, constant
• 11:18
  ball of anxiety, the chefs. But I think you need to know how
• 11:22
  to harness that. And those who can harness it as
• 11:24
  a young chef and use it as their superpower really become great.
• 11:28
  Well, it's interesting because, yes, we all face doubts.
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  We all think our food's not good enough or it could be better,
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  but there's people that get paralyzed by it and so they
• 11:36
  don't move forward. And there's other people that
• 11:37
  move forward in spite of it. Yeah.
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  And I think when you're able to understand that every single
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  successful chef out there, the, the, the chef that you would put
• 11:45
  on Mount Rushmore of chefs, they've had doubts.
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  They've they've been insecure before.
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  They still do, right? But they still keep going
• 11:52
  forward in spite of the fact that they are insecure.
• 11:56
  And then there's other people that's like, I'm just not good
• 11:58
  enough. I'm going to stay here.
• 12:00
  So I could be the best cook in the worst kitchen and no one's
• 12:03
  ever going to know me. But I'm the king of the rats
• 12:05
  here. And it's sometimes it's, it's
• 12:09
  that limiting belief that you put on yourself.
• 12:11
  You know this, you know this like you could take someone that
• 12:15
  is confident and is willing to go forward even even when it's
• 12:21
  hard and they will be so successful just because they are
• 12:24
  like, hey, you know what, I fall down but I get back up versus
• 12:27
  the other person that says, you know what, I fell down and I'm
• 12:29
  going to quit because today I got today at my station crashed.
• 12:31
  I'm never coming back tomorrow. Well then we all know what
• 12:33
  happens to the people that are overconfident and think they can
• 12:36
  do everything and tell you about their last job.
• 12:38
  And yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly, exactly.
• 12:40
  The other. Swing.
• 12:41
  Yeah, yeah, sometimes. Sometimes it's a double edged
• 12:43
  sword, right? You get too confident and you
• 12:45
  walk in with a bunch of hubris and like, well, my last
• 12:47
  restaurant. That's how we get this
• 12:48
  restaurant. Oh my God, Yeah.
• 12:49
  There needs to be a nickname for that.
• 12:52
  Last restaurantism. Last.
• 12:54
  You know, it's, it's the word. And you know what?
• 12:57
  We've all done that. Like sometimes I catch myself
• 12:59
  doing that still someone like no one wants to hear this shit.
• 13:01
  Yeah, no one wants to hear that. Like, I know I shouldn't do it,
• 13:04
  but sometimes I still do it from a from a mentorship perspective
• 13:10
  because obviously, I mean, you worked under one of the greats
• 13:13
  and and now I, I think that you are becoming one of the greats.
• 13:19
  If if not, you might already be there.
• 13:21
  And thank you. But I but but I think it like
• 13:24
  it's one of those things like we know that person's gonna be, but
• 13:26
  we'll just, we'll just wait until we could officially, you
• 13:29
  know, put the crown on. I would say you're arguably the
• 13:32
  king of Houston. Maybe.
• 13:34
  No, no, no, no. Yeah, I'm gonna, I'll say it.
• 13:36
  Well. Thank you.
• 13:36
  I I appreciate that. I don't consider myself that
• 13:39
  and. Again, El El Rey, El Rey El Rey.
• 13:42
  Yeah, but, but, but, you know, Danielle is also, you know, one
• 13:47
  of the greats and you had a great mentorship with him.
• 13:50
  Gavin, how important is it for you to give back?
• 13:54
  100, that's what I do it for. Yeah.
• 13:56
  And you know, that's why I build the restaurants the way they are
• 14:00
  built is to to create chefs. And that's why I started this
• 14:04
  whole conversation saying Ally is what I'm most proud of the
• 14:09
  like, you know, but the idea of Ally and we have others that
• 14:12
  haven't done the same thing, you know, all of our other
• 14:15
  restaurants. And right now every chef that
• 14:18
  has has a executive chef position started either as a
• 14:21
  cook or a sous chef. And that to me, yeah, it's great
• 14:26
  to bring Jared down, and that's cheating.
• 14:28
  And you know what I mean, bringing someone else to the
• 14:30
  market. But to really do your job well
• 14:32
  and to set up your culture the way it should be is to have
• 14:35
  mentorship and to be able to create the next generation of
• 14:39
  chefs. And that's what I set out to do
• 14:41
  in Houston from day one. Yeah, was not to necessarily
• 14:45
  beat my own chest, but to build a culture and system where I
• 14:51
  could. Basically what Danielle did for
• 14:54
  me, because I was there for 10 years and I started as a cook
• 14:57
  there for what my experience was there over 10 years.
• 15:00
  I would like to create that for Allie, for all of our other
• 15:05
  chefs in our restaurants, give them that ability to create
• 15:08
  their own careers through our kitchens.
• 15:11
  Because at the end of the day, you know, when someone stays, as
• 15:14
  long as Allie that is. I mean, you talk about staff
• 15:17
  retention. Yeah, five years already, and
• 15:19
  now she's becoming a chef. I'm winning, but she's also
• 15:22
  winning at the same time, right? Because when she leaves and
• 15:25
  graduates, she's gonna have the wherewithal that I did when I
• 15:29
  left Danielle and be ready to open up her own restaurant.
• 15:32
  And just like Danielle did for me, I'll be there to mentor her
• 15:36
  to that, you know, and to help her out.
• 15:38
  And that to me is the most important thing that I can do
• 15:42
  for this industry, you know, and not to.
• 15:45
  It's not about me winning or doing any, you know, having
• 15:48
  success. It's about me being able to
• 15:50
  build that and to build that in the city that will that is
• 15:52
  really, really growing. And the culinary scene is
• 15:55
  continuing to burst out of its seams.
• 15:58
  And and. But how do we do that
• 15:59
  sustainably? Yeah.
• 16:01
  And how do we continue to move it forward?
• 16:02
  So the chefs, the next generation of chefs are better
• 16:06
  than us, right. So I had.
• 16:08
  A conversation with two different people the other day,
• 16:10
  it was interesting because one person was working for a chef
• 16:14
  and you know, the, the chef wanted all the shine like they,
• 16:19
  they were like, absolutely you don't, you don't talk to
• 16:21
  customers like it's, it's my show, right?
• 16:24
  Like 0 shine for my team. It's all about me.
• 16:27
  And then I was talking once and that person by the way, you
• 16:30
  know, hated it does not like being in that.
• 16:32
  And I know for a fact, like you don't it's sometimes it's great
• 16:36
  to work under these chefs, but like when they don't want anyone
• 16:40
  else on their team to shine and they get upset with you when you
• 16:43
  do get a little bit of shine, that's not a good environment.
• 16:46
  It's the worst, actually. And so then the other person I'm
• 16:49
  having a conversation with is asking me a completely opposite,
• 16:52
  opposite questions like how do I get my team to shine more?
• 16:56
  Right. And it's, it's interesting
• 16:57
  because I'm like, these are two accomplished chefs that are
• 17:01
  having very different conversations with me.
• 17:03
  And when I was a chef, I firm, I mean, it kind of happened by
• 17:07
  accident. I mean, I always promoted my
• 17:09
  team, but I got to a point where I really promoted my team more.
• 17:13
  So where people wondered like, where's Andre?
• 17:15
  It's like it's always about the team.
• 17:16
  Like, did I disappear too much? And what I found is like when
• 17:21
  you have a successful team and and you know, let's just say you
• 17:24
  have 5 chefs in, in, in the group or five direct reports and
• 17:28
  you're constantly elevating them and making them more successful,
• 17:31
  that eventually also did success for you too.
• 17:34
  Yeah. And that's what that's what a
• 17:35
  lot of these egotistical chefs are missing.
• 17:37
  It's like when your team wins, you also win.
• 17:40
  It's like they win. You win when you only win.
• 17:42
  That's only one. But you have an opportunity to
• 17:44
  become a force multiplier and have, you know, 10 different
• 17:47
  wins depending on how many people are on your team.
• 17:50
  Well, look at look at all the the great chefs, you know the
• 17:53
  Mount Rushmore chefs right now. Yeah, now I think they almost
• 17:57
  more compete over what are their proteges doing and how many
• 18:00
  proteges do they have with restaurants.
• 18:02
  Do they, do they compete about that?
• 18:03
  I think. So absolutely.
• 18:05
  And there's there's a sense of pride there.
• 18:07
  Yeah, there is. You know, I mean, think about it
• 18:08
  like, and, you know, I mean, like, look, Matt Peters and I,
• 18:11
  we both come from two different schools, right?
• 18:13
  You know, and there's, you know, but then think about the schools
• 18:16
  that that TK produced with, you know, Grant and you know, it
• 18:20
  just yeah, I mean, the list goes.
• 18:22
  On and then and then sometimes you have like step parents yes
• 18:25
  you know like they worked under 2 great chefs.
• 18:27
  It's like who gets to claim them?
• 18:28
  Oh yeah yeah that's interesting. So new in position.
• 18:38
  What are some of the things like OK, if you had like like a few
• 18:42
  pieces of advice for someone that's new and and what's unique
• 18:45
  about your about you in particular is you're getting
• 18:47
  promoted from within where you started.
• 18:49
  So there might be some people that worked there that remember
• 18:52
  you from you know we started at the same time and now you're my
• 18:55
  boss. How do you navigate that?
• 19:00
  I I've always whatever position and whatever job, but I always
• 19:07
  put myself next to them. I do it with them.
• 19:11
  I'll show them like, yes, I've done this too.
• 19:14
  Like I can, or we can do this together.
• 19:17
  Look how fast. Like I, I work next to them, not
• 19:20
  above them, and then eventually gain their trust.
• 19:22
  And then because it is about trust at the end of the day,
• 19:25
  sometimes I gain their trust. And then, you know, we move on
• 19:28
  from there to the next one. And then now I can be like, hey,
• 19:32
  I really need this. Can you help me out?
• 19:33
  They'll be like, yeah, absolutely.
• 19:34
  And it's like without a question and they'll just go and do it.
• 19:37
  I'll be like. Do you have advice for new
• 19:40
  leaders when they're new in position?
• 19:41
  Like what were some of the unexpected leadership challenges
• 19:44
  that you faced that you had to overcome?
• 19:46
  Well, I can speak from experience.
• 19:48
  When I first became a leader in general, not on the line, but
• 19:52
  manager leader Sue, I thought the louder I am, the more people
• 19:58
  are going to listen. And then I realized I don't.
• 20:01
  I have to yell. I don't have to be loud.
• 20:03
  I could just talk to you. So don't don't think you have to
• 20:07
  roar. I guess just have a
• 20:10
  conversation. And then after that, I learned,
• 20:14
  yeah, that I guess equaling with them, speaking to them, letting
• 20:20
  them know, yeah, I was once in your shoes.
• 20:22
  Seeing where I am now is the best way to get people to follow
• 20:25
  you. How does the creative process
• 20:28
  work between you 2 now? It's actually one of my
• 20:32
  favorites. Yeah, tell, tell like for people
• 20:34
  listening because the creative process is, it's unique
• 20:38
  everywhere you go. Yeah, and a lot of people have a
• 20:40
  lot of opinions. What's your creative process?
• 20:42
  2 questions. What's your creative process
• 20:44
  before you meet with Chef? And what's your creative process
• 20:47
  when you guys collaborate? I have a journal that I write.
• 20:51
  Any little idea like I get in. I like to pick-n-pull from
• 20:54
  different I guess experiences. I do have a background.
• 21:00
  I'm Mexican, so I'll take a lot of food that like my grandmother
• 21:04
  would make me or on my dad's side, too.
• 21:07
  They're more Gulf coasts. And so they have different kinds
• 21:10
  of like soups and stews. And I think of the flavors I
• 21:13
  think of, I think of like combining it with I guess the
• 21:16
  French technique, the French cuisine, because it's one of my
• 21:18
  favorites. And I'll the way I approach chef
• 21:22
  is, yeah, I'll write it down and I go, so I have this crazy idea
• 21:25
  and he'll be like, OK, yeah, yeah.
• 21:26
  Interesting. And then he'll come to me and be
• 21:29
  like, yeah, but what if you and he'll just add layer it and I'm
• 21:33
  like, oh, OK. And it gets me thinking more and
• 21:38
  I don't know, I think it's I think it's great.
• 21:39
  I know sometimes some like to feel like they can have the the
• 21:43
  total control, I guess over creativity.
• 21:47
  But why if you can have so many Swiss Army knives help build
• 21:51
  something else. So like everything that I've
• 21:55
  ever had an idea, I go straight to, yeah, Chef Aaron.
• 21:57
  And he's just like, oh, but think of it this way.
• 21:59
  And I'm like, oh, OK, yeah. And then think about this way
• 22:01
  and like, oh, OK. Or he'll vice versa.
• 22:04
  He's like, hey, Ally, wouldn't this be kind of cool?
• 22:06
  Wouldn't this be crazy? I'll generally text her randomly
• 22:09
  when they get a random idea. I'm like, Hey, what about this
• 22:11
  product? And it's always, I'm always
• 22:13
  product driven. When I when where my creativity
• 22:15
  goes, I'm like what's in season or like I was, I threw, I said,
• 22:20
  Hey, I saw porcinis on this e-mail.
• 22:21
  What can we do with porcinis right now?
• 22:23
  You know, and like we start bouncing back and forth on the
• 22:25
  line, you know, it's almost like a time killer.
• 22:28
  Some sometimes just to like fill the the conversation.
• 22:32
  And unfortunately the porcinis were not available in Houston.
• 22:35
  And you know, I got the national e-mail from whatever this one
• 22:38
  purveyor and like anyway, so that idea died.
• 22:40
  But then, you know, it's kind of like, all right, well, what else
• 22:43
  can we do now? And, and I that's how I do it.
• 22:45
  Or sometimes I'll just fire, see something randomly, think
• 22:48
  something randomly, and fire off a text.
• 22:50
  And you like frozen Portuguese? Not really like for puree or
• 22:53
  anything like. That I mean you can make puree.
• 22:55
  I'd rather just make it out of like a really good like that was
• 22:58
  cremini and then add porcini powder.
• 23:00
  It's like where I. Random but I remember I had this
• 23:03
  Italian chef, we had this Italian restaurant and I found
• 23:07
  his freezer one day. He was from, he was from Italy,
• 23:09
  he's from Venice. And he loved porcinis.
• 23:11
  And I opened up the freezer. It was a stand up reach in
• 23:14
  freezer and it was filled with frozen porcinis for saying.
• 23:17
  And I was like, why is food cost so high?
• 23:22
  It's all these frozen porgies from Italy.
• 23:24
  Yeah. Anyway, I didn't mean to
• 23:27
  interrupt, but it's just like, it's funny.
• 23:29
  Every now and again, you'll hear something like triggers a
• 23:31
  memory. You've been cooking so long.
• 23:33
  I've been cooking so long. You've been cooking a long time.
• 23:34
  Like every now and again you'll remember something like I forgot
• 23:37
  that that happened. Yeah, I know, I know.
• 23:39
  And that's the most fun. Like when your when your brain
• 23:42
  like goes back to that point or like even like the smells can do
• 23:45
  it or. Yeah.
• 23:45
  Like when I go on the walk in, for some reason the smell of
• 23:48
  fresh strawberries always brings me back to Canlas really good
• 23:52
  because I was I was the intern there, you know, and I was
• 23:54
  always in charge of like rearranging the walk in and they
• 23:57
  always had fresh strawberries when I was there or a lot of the
• 24:00
  time. And it just or maybe it was the
• 24:01
  first time I went in there. Yeah.
• 24:03
  And it just like triggers that memory back to that that walk
• 24:05
  in. It's funny, I have a friend, one
• 24:07
  of my friends. Shout out to Paul.
• 24:09
  He's the chef of The Four Seasons in Houston.
• 24:11
  And he, I was talking to him on the phone the other day and we
• 24:15
  used to work together. He was, he was my he was my exec
• 24:17
  suit and I was a chef. And he's like, do you remember
• 24:20
  one of the cooks fainted on the line?
• 24:23
  I was like, no, he's like, yeah. There was this other older cook,
• 24:26
  Joe, I think his name is Joe Cruise, right?
• 24:29
  He's like, and Joe was like kicking him out of the way.
• 24:31
  He's like, chef, we got orders to move this guy out of the way,
• 24:33
  like cooking over the guy that was passed out.
• 24:36
  And I was like, I don't remember that.
• 24:37
  He's like, you don't remember that?
• 24:38
  Like it's funny how? And then I remembered it and
• 24:40
  then I remembered it. I was like, Oh yeah, how did I
• 24:42
  block that? Well, no, we blocked things out.
• 24:44
  We blocked those traumatic experiences out because people
• 24:46
  will bring that same thing up to me and like, no, I don't
• 24:48
  remember that. Yeah, I don't remember that cook
• 24:50
  walking out. As they say things that you'll
• 24:52
  never remember and they'll never forget.
• 24:54
  Exactly right. And I tell that to, you know,
• 24:57
  when I have a cook that had a tough night and they come and
• 25:00
  they apologize to me, but at the end of the night, Tom, I already
• 25:03
  forgot about it. Just don't do it again tomorrow.
• 25:05
  Then I'll start remembering it. Right, right Oh, it's so funny
• 25:08
  do you, do you, how do you deal with with young cooks that are
• 25:11
  coming into the kitchen right now?
• 25:13
  Because most likely they're working more directly with you
• 25:16
  than than you really 1,000,000% right So how do you, how so you
• 25:21
  had your mentorship. How do you now in turn mentor
• 25:24
  the green cook that's coming in that's right out of culinary
• 25:26
  school to work with you? I.
• 25:28
  Mean I it's probably one of my favorite things to do my kitchen
• 25:33
  or Barb blue Dorne. I opened Barb blue Dorne as the
• 25:36
  executive chef and I had I had a handful of green cooks and I had
• 25:40
  a handful of like cooks from other places that have only ever
• 25:44
  touched maybe Garmo. But I like to show them that
• 25:47
  there's patience. I do like to push them and I
• 25:49
  like to just tell them, I think we mentioned it earlier.
• 25:52
  It's like, whatever you do, just don't quit.
• 25:53
  Like if you don't quit, you're going to be fine.
• 25:55
  You're going to be golden. Ally is the the remember the
• 25:59
  movie Bad News Bears, Walter. Now it's what Billy Bob
• 26:02
  Thornton. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 26:03
  What is it? Was it was that the one?
• 26:04
  I think so, yeah. I mean, Ally, I remember saying
• 26:07
  that about that team. I'm like, oh, wow.
• 26:08
  She's got, you know, a long road ahead.
• 26:11
  And and but she whipped that team up real quick and she now
• 26:14
  they're all looking to be sous chefs around the company or, or
• 26:17
  something or move up. And it it it's really a
• 26:20
  testament to how great she is at this.
• 26:22
  This is like one of her absolute strongest suits is being able to
• 26:26
  build a team, being able to mentor and it's, it's incredible
• 26:29
  to watch. I mean.
• 26:30
  Do do you have a lot of cooks right now that you that are your
• 26:33
  mentees? I would like to think so, yeah.
• 26:36
  Yes, yeah, yeah. Don't be so humble.
• 26:39
  Well, I mean, they've, they've expressed great gratitude that I
• 26:43
  take the time to show them the little things and it goes back
• 26:46
  to it goes back to, yeah, Chef Aaron, Chef Chase, those first
• 26:50
  what, 6 months of Blue door. And it's like just to the you
• 26:55
  mentioned about the way I set up my cutting board.
• 26:58
  I was a mess when I walked into that kitchen.
• 27:00
  They, they completely like sharpened me and the way they
• 27:05
  folded my towels. Like I take those little tiny
• 27:08
  lessons and I tell it to these cooks because the first way to
• 27:11
  be like one professional 2 successful is organization and
• 27:15
  cleanliness. So I'm like, if you're not
• 27:16
  clean, you can't move anywhere and then they'll start cleaning.
• 27:19
  It's like those tiny little things that I think some some
• 27:22
  people ignore. It's like, no, it's all about
• 27:24
  the fish in the pan. It's all about the meat being
• 27:26
  beautiful and medium rare. It's like, no, it's not like
• 27:29
  everything's important. Yeah, everything's important.
• 27:31
  Do you want to be a chef one day?
• 27:32
  Then look, look at everything. Yeah.
• 27:34
  It's like, I guess that's my biggest lesson I give them.
• 27:37
  And so how do you do you have like a method that works for you
• 27:40
  to teach people so that sticks? I don't know if I do, but it's
• 27:48
  been working. So I honestly, I this might
• 27:53
  sound maybe silly, but I think it's all about the environment
• 27:56
  and the energy. And Barb Ludor and I was very
• 28:00
  big on bringing like a very positive like, like, what's the
• 28:04
  like? Yeah, like humiliation free.
• 28:06
  Nobody judges anybody. Like we're all gonna mess up.
• 28:09
  It's fine. And I'm just, I just have that
• 28:12
  conversation and I'm like, you don't look very clean right now.
• 28:15
  Like, what are you gonna do? And I'm like, do you wanna, do
• 28:17
  you wanna move here? What do you want?
• 28:19
  OK, Well, whatever goal it is, you don't think that goal needs
• 28:22
  to start with your organization and like things like that.
• 28:24
  Like, you don't think that goal needs to start with the way you
• 28:26
  organize your prep list? Like they're like, Oh yeah, And
• 28:29
  I take them back to what they want for themselves and want
• 28:32
  them to think about how can they get themselves there and where
• 28:35
  are they at and how can they use it here?
• 28:38
  Well, we have the largest culinary audience in the world
• 28:42
  listening right now. Billions of people.
• 28:44
  I think there's billions at least listening.
• 28:46
  Hopefully for the young cooks that are listening and like
• 28:50
  let's give them someone on one mentorship time with you new
• 28:54
  cook in your kitchen, what are some things that you're going to
• 28:56
  tell them on day one? Like here, This is how we work
• 28:59
  here. Let me guide you.
• 29:02
  I think it would start with their uniform.
• 29:04
  I want them to be like comfortable.
• 29:07
  I want their apron to be clean. I want their towels to be
• 29:09
  folded. I want them to know that this
• 29:11
  prep list is their most important list.
• 29:13
  Let's slow down. Sorry, towels, how are we
• 29:15
  folding them? I have a specific.
• 29:17
  Tell us the specific way, chef. I want the seams facing up.
• 29:21
  I want the two top corners to come down.
• 29:23
  We have a yellow line. Yeah, no, I just down and then I
• 29:26
  fold it in half and then that half I fold in half and all the
• 29:29
  yellow lines half to be on top of another.
• 29:32
  It cannot be out of. How many towels do they get?
• 29:35
  3. Three, what happens if they
• 29:37
  dirty on? So this is what I love about
• 29:39
  Barb Bluedorn is so say all the cooks get 3, right?
• 29:42
  The grill cook obviously is gonna need more.
• 29:44
  The fish cook is probably gonna need more.
• 29:47
  Whenever they need more towels, they will automatically go, I
• 29:49
  need a towel, and everybody in the kitchen will throw a towel.
• 29:53
  They will give up a towel to make sure that that fish cook
• 29:55
  and that meat cook has what they need, and that's cool.
• 29:58
  That's how they get the other towel.
• 29:59
  How do they set up their cutting board?
• 30:02
  Is there like a specific way that you like people to set up?
• 30:05
  You know, I just like it to where.
• 30:07
  Yeah, it's in front of them. It's funny because I will tell
• 30:10
  them like horizontal, have your space, but think about the
• 30:12
  person next to you. Like don't you know there's some
• 30:14
  cooks go in and they just take up so much?
• 30:16
  Yeah, which was me. They used to call me Tornado
• 30:18
  Alley because I would make such a mess.
• 30:20
  But it's like, how can you limit yourself to here?
• 30:23
  How can you limit yourself to these like this 90° square and
• 30:27
  how can you think about your your teammate next to you and
• 30:30
  giving them that space? So everything needs to fit here
• 30:32
  and in front of you. You have a hotel pan and
• 30:35
  whatever you're working on those three projects needs to fit in
• 30:37
  that pan and then you need to put it away.
• 30:42
  Great restaurants don't always bring customers in.
• 30:45
  Great stories do, because in food, beverage and hospitality,
• 30:48
  what you sell is only part of the story.
• 30:52
  It's the why behind it, the authority you create and the
• 30:55
  experience that you built. Market scale turns expertise
• 31:01
  into content that connects podcasts, video series and
• 31:05
  industry education, not ads assets.
• 31:11
  Market scale has brought run the past and how to manage like an
• 31:14
  executive chef to life real world examples of how great
• 31:17
  content leads the conversation. Because attention is earned and
• 31:21
  the industry doesn't need more noise.
• 31:23
  It needs more leaders. Do you have like a specific way
• 31:32
  that you tell them to label? I do use tape.
• 31:36
  We use blue tape and we cut it. With scissors or tape cutters.
• 31:40
  Scissors. So scissors, we use scissors.
• 31:43
  I will say recently I have learned about this tape
• 31:47
  dispenser cutter. I used to have my thoughts on
• 31:50
  it, but at the end of the day, as long as they're straight
• 31:55
  edges it's fine. Is there 1 so?
• 31:58
  Is it OK use tape cutters or is it not OK?
• 32:00
  What the chef? What do we?
• 32:03
  Do we don't have one in our kitchen?
• 32:06
  What color of tape is it Blue? Or blue-green.
• 32:08
  We use blue. There's gonna be a lot of angry
• 32:12
  chefs listening right now. No, it's the Danielle versus
• 32:15
  Thomas Keller. Is it?
• 32:17
  I used to be a team blue tape. Yeah.
• 32:19
  And now I'm Team Green Tape. OK, whatever is cheaper.
• 32:22
  Do you know why? Have I ever?
• 32:23
  Have I ever told you? No, I'm curious.
• 32:25
  Because I was helping a chef out in Puerto Rico and actually one
• 32:29
  of the chefs knows you. He worked with you anyway, I
• 32:32
  won't say who, but anyway, I'll tell you off camera, but I was
• 32:37
  helping out a chef in Puerto Rico and they had no light bulbs
• 32:40
  in the kitchen in the walk in. I'm sorry.
• 32:44
  And so why not went in to look for stuff like you can't read on
• 32:46
  blue tape in the dark, but you could read on green tape in the
• 32:49
  dark. So as at that moment that I
• 32:51
  decided OK, green tape moving forward.
• 32:52
  What's more expensive? That's how I'm thinking.
• 32:54
  About this it's the same price. It's the Scotch brand, right?
• 32:57
  Yep, Yep, Yep. Is it?
• 32:59
  Yeah. I mean I buy it on Amazon.
• 33:01
  That stuff, that's all. It's not as good now we're
• 33:03
  getting into. What?
• 33:04
  We'll explain, explain, explain. Explain.
• 33:06
  What do you mean it's not as good?
• 33:07
  It falls off. No, but you're talking about the
• 33:09
  frog tape. What I'm talking about, what is
• 33:13
  it? Scotch.
• 33:14
  Scotch brand. Scotch brand green tape and
• 33:16
  Scotch brand blue tape I feel stick exactly the same.
• 33:19
  Exactly the same. No, you're you're right.
• 33:21
  But if you go to an off brand, Oh yes generic yes I agree,
• 33:25
  never work. No.
• 33:26
  But if you're, you're right, either yes, I'm like, you're
• 33:28
  right. What's going on here?
• 33:29
  Yeah. I agree they fall right off the
• 33:31
  deli container the. Honestly, that's a, that's a
• 33:33
  cost that I will cost. Plus I will always take.
• 33:37
  I will always pay more for good tape.
• 33:40
  Yeah, yeah, I agree. I agree.
• 33:42
  OK, so back to the label. Sorry.
• 33:43
  We got way on track. We got into a tape debate.
• 33:47
  We use scissors, but I will say I have seen a dispenser
• 33:51
  recently, so yeah, I'm curious to know if that's gonna work.
• 33:54
  But I will say all the cooks still use their scissors.
• 33:57
  Do you use sharpies? Yes.
• 33:59
  Click Sharpies? No.
• 34:00
  Why not click Sharpies? Well, when they dry out and two,
• 34:03
  you can stay in your chef coat. That's what I've been saying for
• 34:05
  years. It's like people put them in
• 34:06
  there, especially if you're paying for their uniforms and
• 34:08
  they come back. Chef, can I get a new chef coat?
• 34:10
  I hate that. And there's nothing worse than
• 34:13
  when you're holding a median and someone's like click, click,
• 34:15
  click, click, and you're trying to have a conversation.
• 34:17
  So that's why I banned click Sharpies when I was a chef.
• 34:19
  I came out of California using click Sharpies, Yeah.
• 34:23
  And then came to New York and. And I was like, I'm going to
• 34:26
  show everyone something. I started doing it.
• 34:28
  I ruined in one chef coat. Yeah, kind of like 00.
• 34:32
  And then I realized I'm like, wait a minute.
• 34:33
  No, I want the, I want the, I want the cap on it.
• 34:36
  Yeah, I want the cap on it. And it's like you hate click.
• 34:39
  I I well that was 10 years of OK the cafe balloon making me hate
• 34:44
  click sharpies. Yeah, I I don't like click
• 34:46
  sharpies either, for the record, but every now and again I'll get
• 34:49
  chefs like no, you got for Expo. It's the only one allowed to use
• 34:52
  a click sharp because it's faster and he's like dies.
• 34:53
  So quickly. Yeah, I'm not a fan.
• 34:56
  But I also have to have like a smooth tip.
• 34:57
  I'm I'm one of those guys. If I'm using you know what we've
• 34:59
  recently. This is crazy.
• 35:01
  This I never thought I get I get here but we have switched all to
• 35:04
  KDS kitchen display systems. Oh yeah?
• 35:07
  How's that? I actually really like it.
• 35:09
  I I. It confuses the shit out of me.
• 35:11
  Gavin Cason Yeah, like sold me on it really, because, you know,
• 35:15
  for years I love tickets. You know what I mean?
• 35:17
  I'm like, I'm the guy with got the ticket, the, you know, the
• 35:21
  cap in my mouth and I'm like writing a ticket or like, you
• 35:23
  know, I like pop it back in, go and and I like to play around
• 35:27
  with tickets on the board. I have like this custom made,
• 35:29
  you know, ticket board that I do for every one of our
• 35:31
  restaurants. And then KDS comes around and
• 35:35
  it's. Let's see you're shaking your
• 35:36
  head over there by. The way, sorry.
• 35:40
  I didn't mean to. I didn't mean to notice that,
• 35:41
  no. That's fine, That's fine.
• 35:43
  But I mean for communication and like, you know, the meat cook he
• 35:47
  can have, he can have a running count on all of his meats and
• 35:49
  everything else. Yeah, no, it's kind of like.
• 35:51
  So. So at the beginning of the
• 35:52
  shift, they're plugging into KDS.
• 35:53
  How many? They're starting with 25 steaks
• 35:55
  and 25 fish or. Whatever, there's that.
• 35:57
  But as service goes on on the bottom, he starts deducting.
• 36:02
  No, it keeps track of how many he has on the board.
• 36:05
  So I mean, how do you how do? You so no more.
• 36:09
  How many all day, chef? Yeah.
• 36:11
  Yeah, it's all right there. And.
• 36:13
  And then also ticket times. Yeah, every ticket has a time on
• 36:17
  it. So.
• 36:18
  And this is kind of selfish for me, as someone who's bouncing
• 36:20
  around to restaurants. I can walk up to the pass and
• 36:23
  see where the kitchen's at if I need to, you know, I want my
• 36:28
  Superman cave and jump in. Yeah.
• 36:29
  Yeah. Right.
• 36:30
  No, no, I need to. It's more like these days, like
• 36:33
  if I need to really screw up service.
• 36:35
  Right, right. Or, or if you need to say, hey,
• 36:36
  this one's been 25 minutes, should have been out five
• 36:38
  minutes ago. Absolutely.
• 36:40
  And it but I think that it gives that power to the chefs to be
• 36:43
  able to really see where they're at.
• 36:45
  Also the communication between stations, you know, what they're
• 36:48
  coming up on at the same time. Look, I I am an analogue guy
• 36:52
  until I die, but this was one of those situations where I.
• 36:55
  Was like I've never used AKDS system do you still and I've
• 36:59
  never worked in a kitchen that's used it either do you call still
• 37:03
  or do you not call you still call yeah.
• 37:05
  So you still have to call. So there's some things that
• 37:07
  don't change, but there's. Some things that don't change,
• 37:08
  it's more of like a, hey guys, are we all listening here?
• 37:11
  Yeah, you know, and much less for the actual Do you see it?
• 37:16
  But then cuz cooks miss calls all the time and don't get
• 37:19
  tickets or tickets gets lost. Now it's on a screen right in
• 37:23
  front of them. It's so clear, so easy.
• 37:25
  So when something goes out, you have to hit out done or
• 37:27
  something like that, yeah. Just double tap.
• 37:29
  Yeah, OK. Double tap and.
• 37:30
  Then when the server comes back and says hey you never gave me
• 37:33
  my fish recall. OK, so.
• 37:36
  That's easy. I mean, man, it's like, look, I
• 37:38
  am like I said analog all day. I don't wanna I'm not really
• 37:44
  excited for these self driving cars and all this other stuff.
• 37:46
  But I see this and I'm like there's a lot of efficiencies
• 37:49
  here and there's a. Lot What about robot chefs?
• 37:53
  You know what, They can't figure that out.
• 37:56
  Seen those like tumblers? Yeah, yeah, like the actual
• 37:58
  like, you know, arm that's doing it, man.
• 38:00
  They are way. Do do you use AI at all with
• 38:03
  with what you do and and not obviously not in the kitchen,
• 38:06
  but do you use it at all in your operation?
• 38:08
  We're starting to, yeah, we're starting to, I think there's a
• 38:11
  huge opportunity for, you know, having a pricing and comp sets.
• 38:17
  Yeah. And, you know, using AI to see
• 38:19
  where we're at with, with our offerings.
• 38:22
  Like how does how do we stack up against the competition or how
• 38:26
  does our menu read what things like that?
• 38:30
  I think it's interesting. I mean, we'll see more and more
• 38:32
  as time goes on. I think also reservation systems
• 38:35
  are going to be heavily influenced by AI.
• 38:38
  And I want to know what does that look?
• 38:41
  Google and Google ratings and everything that that does with
• 38:45
  AI and where it pushes your restaurants to certain eyeballs.
• 38:49
  There's so much there and it's part of it's scary, but it's
• 38:53
  just like the advent of social media.
• 38:55
  We need to know how to harness it right, you know?
• 38:57
  A lot of the places that like if I get hired to consult for a
• 39:00
  restaurant, usually the first thing I do is like, I, I put AI
• 39:03
  in there, like get a ChatGPT or something and I build a chat box
• 39:07
  for them. But one of the things that I
• 39:09
  found recently with AI that it's really good at this is it's
• 39:12
  great at scanning a lot of information and finding a needle
• 39:16
  in a haystack. So I'll give you an example of I
• 39:21
  was working on tax, something with tax and I couldn't find a
• 39:25
  certain sales tax that I needed. And it was like a 200 page
• 39:29
  document. I was like, I can't find this.
• 39:31
  I just plug it into the AI and it says it's online.
• 39:34
  This, this, this, there you go. And then do you want me to
• 39:37
  calculate it for you? It's like, yeah, great.
• 39:38
  So, so finding things like that that'll save you 30 minutes of
• 39:43
  like scrolling and then you get computerized like that's good.
• 39:47
  And then for recipes, like I just did a, a guest chef dinner
• 39:52
  and I need to to write recipes and order guides and prep lists
• 39:55
  and I was like, fuck, I don't have time to to do all this.
• 39:57
  Like I type like that still or I talk type which by the way you
• 40:02
  could type FN twice on your Mac and it.
• 40:05
  You could, I just discovered this the other day that you type
• 40:08
  FN twice and then you just talk and then populates.
• 40:11
  Great. Yeah, right.
• 40:16
  So anyway, I, I, I go to the, the ChatGPT and I was like,
• 40:19
  write my prep list, write my recipes and write an order list
• 40:24
  based on these three dishes and boom.
• 40:26
  And then I just emailed it to my friend, like, OK, this is what
• 40:28
  you need to order. This is what you need to prep.
• 40:31
  And and then I'm like very specific, like write the prep
• 40:33
  list with the proteins first and what you deem to be the hardest
• 40:37
  work. And I just have to correct a
• 40:39
  little bit tossing. Out recipes.
• 40:40
  Yeah, it's great. Wow, it's great.
• 40:42
  That's right. That's right.
• 40:43
  So I do use it a lot for that. Or like if I need to mock up a
• 40:47
  dish, I'm like, OK, I'm thinking of this, I'll type it up and
• 40:52
  then I'll say kind of like this. Yeah, that's exactly what At
• 40:55
  least I have an idea of how I want it to plate.
• 40:58
  Look, I think our industry, you know, there's a lot of
• 41:00
  industries that are at risk of a lot of like data entry, data
• 41:04
  analysis that are gonna go away. Yeah.
• 41:06
  It's kind of scary. You know, this, this, I mean, I
• 41:09
  don't know, they're talking about lawyers and doctors and
• 41:12
  all that stuff. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa.
• 41:13
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's wild. That's gonna be cute.
• 41:15
  But it's. And we're close.
• 41:16
  And the thing that I'm hopeful for with the hospitality
• 41:21
  industry is it's still hospitality great.
• 41:24
  You know, like they're never going to get that human
• 41:26
  connection, which is what people look for in going to a
• 41:29
  restaurant is the idea that we're all, you know, the
• 41:31
  interconnectivity and why do you go to a restaurant?
• 41:33
  It's to see other people around. Why do you like going to a busy
• 41:36
  restaurant as opposed to going to a slow restaurant, right?
• 41:39
  You want to you want to hear the roar of the crowd.
• 41:40
  You want to see other people enjoying along with you.
• 41:42
  There's something there. We learned that drink, you know,
• 41:45
  you know, the pandemic, right? And that we needed restaurants
• 41:49
  and it and it wasn't for necessarily to be fed because we
• 41:52
  could feed ourselves, right. It was for that human
• 41:55
  connection, the hospitality, someone taking care of you,
• 41:57
  enjoying someone's creativity, enjoying someone's vision of
• 42:01
  creation of a space in in which humans can enjoy.
• 42:05
  And I think, I mean, I could be totally wrong here.
• 42:08
  So like Fast forward 10 years, like, hey, I figured that one
• 42:12
  out. No, but I think that that that
• 42:16
  human touch, that human commonality is so important for
• 42:20
  for what we do and why will. I agree with you and and what's
• 42:24
  interesting is like what I do because I, I use AIA lot because
• 42:28
  it helps me with everything that I need to work on.
• 42:30
  It just makes me 10 times faster.
• 42:32
  If I didn't have an AI, you know, I have like 10 AI
• 42:35
  assistants, but if I didn't have those, I'd probably need 10
• 42:38
  employees. Well.
• 42:39
  Hopefully it makes your business more efficient.
• 42:41
  It does, but what I what I was going to say is I noticed a lot
• 42:43
  of people use it and I'm starting to wonder like am I
• 42:46
  dealing with a real person on the other end?
• 42:49
  AT&T, Hello, are you? Listening Well yeah well it's
• 42:52
  not just that but like specifically for the podcast I
• 42:54
  get pitched I mean I won't tell you how much I get pitched but I
• 42:57
  get pitched a lot for hey would you like to talk to so and so
• 43:00
  and so and so and so and I read it as like this is AI like I
• 43:03
  know this is not a real PR company emailing me this is this
• 43:08
  is a this is a bot and so I have to filter out a lot of like I
• 43:12
  have an autoresponder now that just.
• 43:14
  You have a bot to filter out bots.
• 43:16
  No, no, just like a, like an e-mail reply, like an auto.
• 43:18
  No one. Right, right.
• 43:21
  But it's funny because like a lot of these, a lot of the
• 43:23
  pitches that I guess, like I know that's not a real person.
• 43:26
  And what's funny is because I because I use AI and AI like it
• 43:29
  leaves a thumbprint, like you could recognize it if you've
• 43:32
  used a lot. And I know it's like a lot on
• 43:33
  social media, like people aren't writing their own shit anymore.
• 43:37
  Like it's, it's wild. And like if you, if you see
• 43:41
  where it's going, like with the videos, like pretty soon you're
• 43:45
  not going to be able to tell because now they could talk.
• 43:48
  I don't know if you saw that. Yeah, I've seen that.
• 43:50
  Yeah. Weird.
• 43:51
  It's it's getting so, so here's my prediction with AI is I do
• 43:55
  think at a certain point it's going to hit where the the
• 43:58
  robots do get good enough to cook in kitchens.
• 44:00
  I do think that's coming. But I do think what's going to
• 44:03
  end up happening is you're going to have consumers that say, I
• 44:05
  don't support robo kitchens, I only support human kitchens.
• 44:09
  Yeah. And I think that's gonna be like
• 44:10
  a big thing soon in the future. I think people are gonna say
• 44:13
  Nope, I only eat in restaurants with real chefs that are that
• 44:15
  are with real. Cooks.
• 44:16
  And that's gonna be a luxury. Yes, yes.
• 44:19
  And it's gonna, and it's gonna be like, you know, you're elite
• 44:22
  because you have to humans cook for you versus Yeah.
• 44:25
  Yeah. Versus robots, I'd say that
• 44:27
  we're about 10 years away from that.
• 44:28
  I think it's coming. OK, all right, all right.
• 44:30
  Yeah, let's do this again in 10. Years.
• 44:32
  Yeah. We'll see the same conversation.
• 44:33
  We'll see who's right. I want to ask sorry I got I got
• 44:38
  distracted. I can talk about AIA lot.
• 44:40
  That was a fun little. That's all this is now.
• 44:43
  Rabbit hole. Yeah.
• 44:44
  So I'm thinking about the the new cooks that are coming into
• 44:51
  the into the industry. And I think the path is
• 44:52
  different now than it was probably when when we were
• 44:54
  coming up. When we were coming up, it was
• 44:56
  like you had to cook in what was called continental back then.
• 44:59
  It was like European, French, Italian or, you know, just find
• 45:04
  out like if you want to be good, that's, that's where you worked.
• 45:06
  Where the culinary schools, pretty much.
• 45:08
  They were pushing you. They were, they were definitely
• 45:10
  pushing you. And it was like, OK, if you're
• 45:11
  going to go into a hotel, it needs to be a luxury hotel.
• 45:15
  You're going to go into a Country Club with a certified
• 45:17
  master chef or you're going to go work in a French restaurant.
• 45:19
  Or, you know, it was like there was certain paths where now I
• 45:22
  don't think that path is, is exactly the same way it was.
• 45:27
  I think now, you know, some chefs are coming out and say I
• 45:29
  want to cook Mexican food, I want to cook BBQ, I want to cook
• 45:32
  Thai food. Where I think it's opened up the
• 45:36
  possibilities now where the the path to being a successful chef
• 45:40
  is not as linear and and it's not as it's not as black and
• 45:46
  white as it used to be. Sure, sure.
• 45:49
  Yeah, absolutely. I mean, Ally, you want to talk
• 45:51
  about that? I don't.
• 45:54
  Know yeah, I will say I have noticed that I probably not the
• 46:00
  exact same subject, which I will go back to that, but I feel like
• 46:03
  cooks come in and they just want to like beeline to get to that
• 46:07
  goal that they want so they'll just move through it fast.
• 46:11
  But I don't know I guess call me old school.
• 46:16
  I love like learning that French background or the Italian
• 46:20
  background or those linear things are such a great baseline
• 46:24
  because then because I'm also I, I'm I'm obsessed with Mexican
• 46:28
  cuisine like I think it's beautiful.
• 46:30
  The flavors are great they're unique.
• 46:31
  They're they're very, very bold. Not like French food.
• 46:35
  I don't know, but in my head, I guess to marry the two because
• 46:38
  think about it like each if you're thinking about the
• 46:41
  different countries, they only knew what they knew because
• 46:43
  that's how they did it always. So what happens if you just
• 46:46
  start like shifting it, like what if, what if the Italians or
• 46:50
  what if, you know, Mexico found techniques from Italy or or
• 46:54
  France or Germany, even with some of their vegetables.
• 46:58
  It's just, I don't know, I hope, I hope the young cooks will not
• 47:05
  ignore the old school French technique or the Italian
• 47:08
  technique, those that that linear line you're talking
• 47:11
  about. I think it's coming back.
• 47:13
  I, I, I, I do think it's coming back.
• 47:14
  I see it now only because I think we had maybe a 10 year
• 47:20
  period where that kind of food, like it, it wasn't the most
• 47:25
  popular cuisine, right. And I think a lot of people have
• 47:28
  never had it. And all of a sudden they're
• 47:30
  trying it for the first time and it's like, I've never had, you
• 47:33
  know, lobster bisque before Pike Canal or, you know, like they've
• 47:37
  never had it. I was just talking with Jacob,
• 47:39
  You know Jacob, right? Yeah, yeah.
• 47:41
  He was just on, he had just gone to Publicus and he had the the
• 47:46
  canals with the white sauce and the caviar on top, my favorite.
• 47:49
  And he was saying this like, the best thing he's ever had.
• 47:53
  Yeah. And.
• 47:54
  And it's so simple. And you look at the plate and
• 47:55
  it's like white on white with a little bit of caviar.
• 47:58
  But it's like he's like, yeah, but it's executed perfectly.
• 48:01
  Perfectly. Yeah.
• 48:02
  Right. And I think that's what's
• 48:03
  missing is like it doesn't have to have.
• 48:06
  Flare. Like sometimes just good food is
• 48:09
  good. Simple, yeah.
• 48:11
  Look, I, I, I wanna say this, you know, wherever you come up,
• 48:15
  you, you have to understand what cuisines in history had the most
• 48:19
  influence, right? Right.
• 48:20
  And, and it's good to have a knowledge of everything.
• 48:24
  It's good to have an expertise somewhere.
• 48:27
  And it's good to have a curious mind, right.
• 48:31
  So just, yeah, just like you, we came up learning French cuisine
• 48:36
  and, you know, the five mother sauces and the Picard system
• 48:40
  and, you know, every, you know, the the geek Culinaire, you
• 48:43
  know, like all those. And I love that.
• 48:46
  And that when I was a young chef, that's what I wanted.
• 48:49
  That's what I wanted to learn. That's what I wanted to.
• 48:50
  But as where I am now, I'm more exploring the crossovers and the
• 48:57
  areas where, you know, certain cuisines crossover.
• 49:01
  And I've just done it by virtue of where, where the diaspora has
• 49:05
  been, where colonization fell and how those cuisines came in
• 49:11
  to interact with each other. Right.
• 49:12
  And I'll, I'll, I'll talk about this in, in regards to me
• 49:16
  discovering Gulf Coast cuisine, you know, relatively recently,
• 49:20
  you know, in the last six years. And, and you know, if you look
• 49:24
  at the trade routes, of course, you know from that all the
• 49:28
  places that France colonized, you know, Vietnam, Senegal, West
• 49:33
  Africa, you know, any of those, you know, Louisiana.
• 49:38
  And you take all those things and you put them together in a
• 49:42
  modern day context. You have a large Vietnamese
• 49:44
  population living in Houston, and Cajun cuisine that is
• 49:48
  heavily influenced by French cuisine is in Houston.
• 49:52
  And you have this crossover today, really via Cajun, Right.
• 49:56
  So what where is it all rooted French cuisine?
• 50:00
  Right. Then.
• 50:01
  Then take one more layer. Where's Cajun cuisine?
• 50:03
  It's the intersection of West African, French and Choctaw and
• 50:08
  everything else that was in Louisiana.
• 50:10
  Yeah. And so you literally have, you
• 50:13
  know, this cuisine of Gulf Coast today, which is West African, a
• 50:16
  little bit of Vietnamese, a little bit of French.
• 50:20
  And it put it. Yeah.
• 50:21
  But again, at the at the end of the day, it was all rooted by
• 50:23
  the colonizers cuisine which was French, you know that no
• 50:27
  ionization. I'm not saying that was a good
• 50:28
  thing, but there are these crossovers and, and getting to
• 50:32
  explore it. I've only been able to do
• 50:34
  because I have a background in French cuisine.
• 50:35
  And when I have traveled to Senegal or eaten Vietnamese
• 50:39
  food, I've never actually been, which is a huge blind spot of
• 50:42
  mine and I'm very ashamed of it. I will go one day, but you eat
• 50:46
  these foods and you see these, these cross sections of
• 50:48
  technique and then you're able to take them and put them on a
• 50:50
  plate and call it Texas Gulf Coast or Houston cuisine.
• 50:54
  That's really exciting to me. And, and then you add in the,
• 50:58
  the Mexican influence and you really have something that is so
• 51:01
  unique and so amazing. And I'm so excited to be able to
• 51:06
  shine a light on it and just call it, you know, Gulf Coast,
• 51:09
  American or contemporary Gulf Coast.
• 51:11
  And that to me is where I see my French background has really
• 51:18
  helped me out a lot is to connect these dots and, and
• 51:22
  really become a part of that. So if you want to specialize in
• 51:25
  one cuisine, that's awesome. But open your mind up to the
• 51:29
  world of cuisines in order to make yourself a better chef,
• 51:32
  because you might get bored. Yeah, if you're pigeonholing
• 51:35
  yourself in one type of cuisine. However, you know, I mean, look
• 51:38
  at sushi chefs. They can spend their entire
• 51:41
  lives, Yeah, chasing the perfection of that craft.
• 51:44
  There's always exceptions. There's always exceptions, but
• 51:46
  I, I think, you know, you talk to a great sushi chef, you know,
• 51:51
  Morimoto wants to know about every cuisine around the world,
• 51:54
  you know, and it has been influenced by it as well.
• 51:57
  John George, right. It's influenced by.
• 52:00
  Anyway, all of that to be said, I think it's, it's so important
• 52:04
  to have an open mind and to be because that'll just at the end
• 52:08
  of the day, it's going to make you better and better and
• 52:09
  better. And when you become a restaurant
• 52:11
  tour and you want to open another restaurant, it's good to
• 52:13
  know about more than one cuisine that defines you.
• 52:17
  It's interesting, I had AI hope I'm not ruining this
• 52:20
  conversation that I had with this other guy because I might
• 52:23
  be giving away his secret. But we were talking, he wants to
• 52:26
  open up a a a a Cajun restaurant.
• 52:29
  And we were talking. I was like, he's like, but how
• 52:31
  do I stand out? I was like, well, when was Cajun
• 52:34
  food founded? I don't know, but a couple 100
• 52:37
  years ago maybe. I don't know.
• 52:38
  I honestly, I don't know. But anyway, that's not the
• 52:40
  point. The point is is like French food
• 52:42
  back then did not look like French food now.
• 52:45
  And so if you were starting Cajun food today, what would it
• 52:48
  look like? Like if you took the what's
• 52:51
  popular in France right now and blended it with what's popular
• 52:55
  in New Orleans? You end up with something
• 52:56
  completely different. Yeah.
• 52:58
  I mean, look at what Serene's doing at the Carnola, right?
• 53:01
  That's a great example, right? You know, he's brought West
• 53:04
  Africa, he's brought Senghalese cuisine to New Orleans.
• 53:06
  He's got a French background. He's, you know, worked for
• 53:09
  Dominique Kran. Yeah, worked in New York.
• 53:11
  He's there's a guy that's really pushing Gulf Coast cuisine to
• 53:15
  the next next generation, right? There's other ones too, but I
• 53:19
  think it's, I think that really gets me excited about our part
• 53:23
  of the world. One of, you know, I have close
• 53:26
  friends, Rico and Rico Torres from Michelin San Antonio and
• 53:30
  Gabe Auralis. You you know, these guys, of
• 53:34
  course, but we've been kicking around the ideas like I don't
• 53:37
  want to go back to being a chef, but we we often joke around like
• 53:40
  let's open up a Mexican steakhouse and I and I'm like,
• 53:43
  there's a huge opportunity for this.
• 53:45
  Like, and I and I'm beating this subject up a lot on the on the
• 53:49
  show, but it's like, think about like do it instead of instead of
• 53:52
  Bernays, you get molay instead of bread, you get tortillas.
• 53:55
  And it's like, it would be so good.
• 53:57
  Do it take take the idea and run with it.
• 53:59
  Like, yeah, so we we like for the The thing is like, I don't
• 54:04
  want to be the chef. Neither does Gabe does recall.
• 54:06
  It's like we don't want to. Run it La Nacional in Monterey.
• 54:12
  Yeah, one of my. Favorite restaurants of all
• 54:15
  time? And it's a Mexican steakhouse.
• 54:17
  And and that's the point is like I saw someone posted and there
• 54:20
  was a restaurant that I wasn't aware of in Chicago, but it's a
• 54:23
  Basque style steakhouse. I can't remember the name of it.
• 54:27
  I had just discovered it and I thought, I want to go eat there
• 54:29
  because the food looks so good. And it's just reinventing the
• 54:32
  steakhouse in a new way because I feel like steakhouse is great.
• 54:35
  I love steakhouse, but I think you could do it different now.
• 54:39
  You could do the Mexican, you could do the Basque version, you
• 54:41
  could do the French, whatever. It's, it's interesting that we
• 54:44
  call it steak houses because I know it's, it's, it's centered
• 54:46
  around beef, but could it be centered around meat?
• 54:49
  Can we call it a chop house? Can we?
• 54:51
  Well, because I think that's where a lot of dining is going
• 54:54
  these days. People want a table that is just
• 54:57
  full of you have meats, you have sauces, you have sides and you
• 55:02
  just pick your own adventure. And there's something really,
• 55:05
  it's also like extremely hedonistic, right?
• 55:09
  Yeah, just to. I also think people are eating
• 55:11
  that way more today. You know, a lot of people that
• 55:14
  carnivore diet are, you know, very, very protein centric.
• 55:19
  So I also think like it's, it's also kind of fashionable to eat
• 55:22
  this way too. So it's not only is it good, I
• 55:24
  enjoy that kind of food, but it's also like it's time has
• 55:26
  come. We're turning into another
• 55:28
  podcast that is also taped here in the city talking about
• 55:33
  carnivore diets. And yeah, it actually might be
• 55:35
  taped in the studio. Anyway, no names, no names.
• 55:42
  I want to, I want to wrap up just with a couple of questions.
• 55:45
  So we're going to ask you, you're working, you're working
• 55:48
  the line. You're do you normally finish at
• 55:51
  the pass during service? What's on your station?
• 55:55
  What does your station look like?
• 55:56
  Walk people through that. I have my ramekins and
• 56:02
  garnishes. I have my bottles.
• 56:04
  What's new bottles? An olive oil.
• 56:08
  Good olive oil. Yeah, we've actually switched it
• 56:13
  up. We were using a Spanish one.
• 56:15
  What was it like Oja from Trap you remember from?
• 56:18
  I remember the name but I went back to Blue Dorn and they're
• 56:21
  using a different one. Now it's your choice.
• 56:25
  I know you got. Finishing Oil Chef That's.
• 56:28
  Not but yeah, it's oil, it's Malden salt, it's garnishes and.
• 56:33
  Do you have a peppermill? Actually, yeah, Bluedorn, they
• 56:36
  do, and I loved it and I don't know why I never thought about
• 56:39
  that for a bar, but yeah, they use it to garnish a couple of
• 56:42
  things. Specific peppercorn in there or
• 56:45
  does it? Does it not matter?
• 56:46
  No, it just has to be toasted. This has to be and you said your
• 56:49
  finishing salt is Maldon. Maldon salt.
• 56:51
  What's the kosher salt or what's the salt in your kitchen?
• 56:54
  Diamond. Diamond OK, Yeah, I just want to
• 56:57
  make sure we're not. We're not heathens here.
• 56:59
  Well, we were we were blue tape earlier.
• 57:01
  I just. Want to make?
• 57:02
  Yeah, I'm just kidding. I used to use Danielle, used the
• 57:04
  baleen, the blue box. Yeah, yeah.
• 57:07
  And I'll tell you what, the switching from seasoning with
• 57:09
  diamond to baleen is is hard. Yeah.
• 57:13
  I I get really salty. Yes, I get really salty.
• 57:16
  So I have the baleen sea salt at home because kosher salt for
• 57:21
  some reason is really hard to find at grocery stores.
• 57:22
  It is and so short there was right?
• 57:26
  And so I had the baleen and every time I'd cook it, I was
• 57:29
  like, everything was so salty or not salty enough.
• 57:31
  It's like I had a hard time figuring out the way to season
• 57:34
  with this. Spend our careers like it's
• 57:36
  almost like a it's like a it's like a second appendage.
• 57:39
  It's like diamond salt like knowing you know exactly how
• 57:42
  much yeah, the feeling of it. Oh anyway, don't get me started.
• 57:45
  That could be a whole. Podcast So back to the station
• 57:49
  for acid. Do you have lemon cheeks?
• 57:51
  Do you have vinegars? What what are you?
• 57:52
  What are you using? Normally lemon, lemon cheeks on
• 57:56
  our station, although I personally like to season with
• 57:59
  vinegar. Do you?
• 58:00
  Yeah, I find that. Vinegar.
• 58:04
  Well, honestly, I've kind of gone more towards cherry
• 58:07
  vinegar. That's probably because of
• 58:08
  Cherry. Danielle, hello.
• 58:11
  I'm always like putting cherry in it.
• 58:13
  Yeah, maybe some cherry vinegar. But another favorite of mine is
• 58:18
  white balsamic vinegar. Yeah, I use it a lot because
• 58:20
  it's a little sweeter, but yeah, so I guess it's a mix of lemon
• 58:25
  and vinegars. And then do you have plate
• 58:28
  wipers on your station? Yes.
• 58:29
  What do you how do you make them?
• 58:31
  With seafolds, you take the whole seafel.
• 58:32
  I learned this as well through my mentorship.
• 58:35
  You take the whole seafel, fold it in half and then in half
• 58:37
  again. And then it gets with the little
• 58:40
  bit of vinegar and water. And I will say I at one point
• 58:45
  when we opened Barbara door and I cut them in half, I took half
• 58:48
  a seafold and did it. And yeah, it's just, it doesn't
• 58:51
  work the same. It's not the same.
• 58:53
  It's not the. Same.
• 58:54
  So I had. Again, that's not a line item
• 58:57
  that I will accept. Yeah, we had Barclay Dodge on a
• 59:00
  couple weeks ago and he was saying that, you know, in his
• 59:03
  kitchen they have the alcohol for the plate wipes.
• 59:06
  And he says everyone knows it's like an Al Bully thing from when
• 59:09
  he worked at Al Bully. It's like the the bottle with
• 59:11
  the red tape on it is always alcohol.
• 59:13
  I was like, oh, that's kind of cool.
• 59:14
  I never, I never knew that, but I thought that's a good thing
• 59:17
  that people listening could catch on.
• 59:18
  Like add that to your kitchen if you're listening, if you don't,
• 59:20
  if there's no alcohol bottle, standard red tape's a good
• 59:23
  standard on a on a bottle of alcohol.
• 59:25
  I thought that was kind of close.
• 59:26
  Like if I ever. I like that.
• 59:27
  Yeah. I was like, I like that.
• 59:30
  And then is there something that you could tell a cook or a chef
• 59:35
  listening, like something that you know that you do in your
• 59:38
  kitchen that really enhances flavor or a technique that you
• 59:43
  do that was like, everyone should be doing this but no one
• 59:46
  knows about it? Honestly I think I've kind of
• 59:50
  already said it and I think a lot of my cooks got weird I
• 59:55
  guess when I would tell them. But I actually do like a lot of
• 59:57
  my if I ever use spices or Peppers, don't.
• 1:00:01
  Like over toast them. But if you do, vinegar is a
• 1:00:05
  great way to pull all the flavors out.
• 1:00:08
  It's like it's brighter than lemon cheeks.
• 1:00:10
  So it's brighter. What do you mean?
• 1:00:11
  So like I, I make a lot of, I guess salsas, different kinds,
• 1:00:15
  but even not just salsa, say there's another puree or sauce
• 1:00:19
  that has it's very peppery forward, whether it's like chili
• 1:00:22
  flake or something or there's bitter flavors, whether it's
• 1:00:25
  nuts, if it's too bitter, if you pour a little bit of vinegar, it
• 1:00:28
  brightens it and it pops it and then you add a little bit of
• 1:00:31
  salt, but always add the vinegar 1st.
• 1:00:32
  And it just makes it like in my head, I guess more like round
• 1:00:36
  and you know what I mean? Like you taste something and
• 1:00:38
  it's just like, Oh yeah, it's there.
• 1:00:39
  But then if you add the vinegar, it's like.
• 1:00:42
  I don't know. And you Chef, that's what I
• 1:00:43
  like. You have like a tip for cooks
• 1:00:45
  that like everyone should know this, but they don't.
• 1:00:48
  Oh wow, that's that's a really loaded question there.
• 1:00:52
  Everyone should know this, but they don't.
• 1:00:54
  I'm sure some people do, but you know what I mean?
• 1:00:56
  Like. You know, I'm gonna throw one
• 1:00:57
  out there and it's your uniform is a direct response of how good
• 1:01:02
  your your food's gonna taste. The direct it, it directly
• 1:01:05
  effects how good you know, if you walk in, you know, very
• 1:01:08
  clean if you shaved. I have a beard, but I still
• 1:01:11
  shave every morning and I take the time to put myself together.
• 1:01:16
  My head is also put together and ready to walk into that day to
• 1:01:21
  cook my the best food I can. Yeah, how clean you look is how
• 1:01:23
  clean you cook, right? Absolutely.
• 1:01:25
  If you had a Mount Rushmore of chefs, like so that's 4 chefs
• 1:01:28
  that you had to put on Mount Rushmore.
• 1:01:29
  I'm going to ask you both like who are the four chefs?
• 1:01:31
  We'll start with you and then I'll let I'll let you finish.
• 1:01:34
  Like who are the four chefs that deserve to be on Mount Rushmore?
• 1:01:36
  Oh my God, Without pissing anyone off.
• 1:01:38
  Yeah, I know, right? Alan Passard, Roger Verger,
• 1:01:46
  Daniel Ballude. Yeah.
• 1:01:50
  Yeah, I'm real heavy on the French.
• 1:01:52
  And then this is going to be a while on Tracy Desjardins.
• 1:01:56
  Yeah. No one's ever said her before on
• 1:02:00
  this show. Why her?
• 1:02:02
  Because not a lot of people know her.
• 1:02:03
  And I know who she is and she's great.
• 1:02:05
  But a lot of people who who may not know her, like why?
• 1:02:07
  Why her? To you I think what she did for
• 1:02:11
  seasonality yeah with with chefs and and I she was a mentor to
• 1:02:17
  Douglas Keane the chef that I work for and one of my mentors
• 1:02:20
  and I just think about someone who had impacted cuisine so much
• 1:02:27
  or my cuisine indirectly and she's a.
• 1:02:30
  She's a legend. Yeah, she's a legend.
• 1:02:32
  Great. I'm glad you threw her on there.
• 1:02:34
  Yeah. How about you, Chef?
• 1:02:36
  To me. Yeah, to you.
• 1:02:38
  OK, I happen to have to say Thomas Keller.
• 1:02:41
  I have all of his books. It's one of my go to's.
• 1:02:45
  I love Enrique Alvera. Yeah, I also have all of his
• 1:02:50
  books. That's what I go to his books.
• 1:02:52
  Are worth a ton of money these days.
• 1:02:54
  I don't care. No, no, I'm just saying like
• 1:02:56
  they are like, like his. What is it?
• 1:03:00
  The TAN book? I don't know what it's called.
• 1:03:02
  It's like 1000 bucks. Are you kidding me?
• 1:03:04
  No, I'm not. I've got two of them.
• 1:03:05
  Yeah. Cool.
• 1:03:06
  Yeah. It's like a it's like a Bitcoin
• 1:03:09
  these days. One of those books.
• 1:03:10
  Yeah. Thomas Kerr, Thomas.
• 1:03:13
  Keller Enrique I also, and I'm not just saying this, but I also
• 1:03:18
  love Alan Facade because he is one of the few that I think
• 1:03:22
  would always he he's traditional, but he also is like
• 1:03:28
  no rules and we'll just throw it and let's just do this.
• 1:03:31
  And then my last 10 of course yes Chef Daniel balloon cuz I do
• 1:03:36
  also have all of his and I I'm gonna fan girl a little bit but
• 1:03:42
  I met him for the first time and I was so scared so I barely
• 1:03:45
  talked but like the energy, the happiness, all of it like.
• 1:03:50
  The life of the party you. I can see that he is a great
• 1:03:54
  mentor. It's funny because I don't know,
• 1:03:57
  I don't know if this was said on the podcast or if it was just a
• 1:04:00
  conversation with someone that I had, but they were saying how
• 1:04:02
  Daniel Blue's everywhere. He's like, you see him here,
• 1:04:05
  then you see him there and he's like, he's all over the world
• 1:04:08
  all the time. Yeah, but that reminds me of you
• 1:04:11
  because I feel like, Aaron, every time I see you, like
• 1:04:13
  you're in a new city. You're in New York.
• 1:04:15
  You're, you know, you're at Pebble Beach.
• 1:04:17
  Yeah, you're in Austin today. You're in Houston.
• 1:04:19
  Like how do you how do you do that?
• 1:04:21
  You learn from the master, Yeah, you know, but you also have a
• 1:04:25
  good team. Yeah, you have to have a good
• 1:04:26
  team to be able to do it. And it's fun to be able to
• 1:04:29
  connect with so many chefs and. And now being in Houston, I
• 1:04:32
  love, you know, getting out and sort of preaching the gospel.
• 1:04:36
  Yeah, yeah. Showing everyone what we're
• 1:04:38
  doing because it's, it's worth a, it's worth a look.
• 1:04:41
  Well, for the people that are listening, where can people find
• 1:04:43
  you? We'll start with you.
• 1:04:45
  So if we're talking Instagram, at Aaron Bluedorn, at Bluedorn
• 1:04:49
  HTX, at Barb, Bluedorn HTX, so on and so forth, the restaurant
• 1:04:54
  is Bluedorn, Barb, Bluedorn, Navy Blue, and Perseid.
• 1:05:00
  And and you chef. I do not have all of that, but
• 1:05:04
  my. Yeah.
• 1:05:07
  My Instagram is just zella under score Pena 93 or XELLA under
• 1:05:13
  score Pena 93. This was fun.
• 1:05:15
  We'll have we'll have you back again soon.
• 1:05:17
  Thank you so much. So last hot luck you were here.
• 1:05:19
  This every hot luck you should be here.
• 1:05:21
  I love it. Yeah, I love it.
• 1:05:21
  Let's make this this thing. Awesome.
• 1:05:23
  Well, thank you so much. Yeah, Yeah.
• 1:05:25
  Thanks, Jeff. Well, I hope you enjoyed the
• 1:05:26
  show. You know what to do and make
• 1:05:28
  sure you leave five stars if you're listening on Spotify or
• 1:05:30
  anywhere really. If you're watching on YouTube,
• 1:05:32
  hit the like and subscribe button.
• 1:05:33
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• 1:05:36
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• 1:05:40
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• 1:05:42
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• 1:05:45
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  Go to chefspsa.com. You get books, obviously, the
• 1:05:50
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• 1:05:56
  Hit the porn music.