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Chefs Akin & Lindsay on the Melding of Unlikely Cuisines · The Restaurant Guys

• 0:42
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Hello everybody, and welcome.
• 0:43
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: You are listening to the Restaurant Guys.
• 0:46
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I'm Mark Pascal and I'm here with Francis Shot.
• 0:48
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Together we own stage left and Catherine Lombardi restaurants in New Brunswick, New Jersey.
• 0:52
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We are here to bring you the inside track on food, wine, and the finer things in life.
• 0:56
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Hello, mark.
• 0:57
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Hey Francis.
• 0:58
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: How are you today?
• 0:59
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I'm great, thanks.
• 1:00
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: How you doing With the finer things in life?
• 1:01
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Uh, finer things are, are treating me pretty well.
• 1:04
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Well, we have one finer thing to sample in just a moment, but we, we should let people know that we have a little bit of an interesting show today, a little bit of a divergence.
• 1:11
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mm-hmm.
• 1:11
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We have a couple of short se one segment each with, Two different chefs and what brings them together is they're both chefs in the United States who are presenting a mashup of two different cuisines in unlikely places.
• 1:24
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So we have Tyler Aiken who owns Bastia in Philadelphia.
• 1:27
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: He is bringing, Sardinian and Corsican cuisine to Philly.
• 1:30
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We went down there, had a lovely meal there.
• 1:32
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: He's terrific.
• 1:33
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And we've got Chaz Lindsay, who's bringing Italian food with a southern bent to Jackson, Mississippi I am really curious about that because I see Sardinia and Corsica coming together before I see southern cuisine and, Italian cuisine.
• 1:49
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Well, we just make assumptions about, um, San Francisco and Italian cuisine, the Northeastern Italian cuisine, because there was such Italian immigration there, but I, mm-hmm.
• 1:58
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Uh, collard greens and, uh, Italian cuisine.
• 2:00
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We're gonna have to figure out how that works.
• 2:02
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We're gonna have to see that.
• 2:03
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Let's see, let's see.
• 2:03
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But in the meantime, this isn't a product endorsement, but I think it's a really interesting product.
• 2:08
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: and it it bears some, uh, conversation.
• 2:10
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Well, well, I think one of the things that reasons it bears conversations,'cause I think a lot of people are curious as to how do we come upon new products?
• 2:19
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And it's different all the time.
• 2:22
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Sometimes it's.
• 2:24
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: You know, you're in a farmer's market and you find some cool new produce, or sometimes you're at another restaurant and you see something that's intriguing and sometimes they find you.
• 2:34
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Yeah.
• 2:34
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: It's, so, this is a crazy story.
• 2:35
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So when we did the live show, when we recorded the live show with Andrew Zimmer mm-hmm.
• 2:40
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Uh, it was very well attended and there's a long line of people wanna take pictures afterwards with the restaurant guys and whoever our guest is, and these two lovely ladies, uh, cashew and tan, mother and daughter, Came up and obviously they knew Andrew and they were super grateful for him.
• 2:55
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And they were, they had a history.
• 2:56
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And the history was that he had included their bottled chutney elephant green chili chutney.
• 3:02
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: mm-hmm.
• 3:03
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: In a list of must-haves for your kitchen.
• 3:06
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And, uh, he said, what we have always found is that all these bottled and canned chutneys that.
• 3:10
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Suck.
• 3:10
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Okay.
• 3:11
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: They just, it's just as a category.
• 3:12
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: They're never great.
• 3:13
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I will tell you, I have never had one that I liked.
• 3:16
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So the ladies were kind enough to leave a couple of sample bottles for me and Mark as well.
• 3:20
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And Holy Kim, it's really good.
• 3:24
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And Andrew, we talked about afterwards.
• 3:25
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mm-hmm.
• 3:25
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: He said, yeah, Francis, they're, they're all terrible, but these, this are really great stuff.
• 3:29
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: mm-hmm.
• 3:30
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And so we opened those, those bottles, we opened one of those bottles they left for us.
• 3:33
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: mm-hmm.
• 3:34
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Uh, and then we went to the Fancy Food Show, they final week, and they were.
• 3:37
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Yeah, and they're super nice people.
• 3:40
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: It's a mother and daughter, small company.
• 3:42
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Well, they did something.
• 3:43
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I did.
• 3:43
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: They did something that really got our attention at the Fancy Food Show.
• 3:47
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: They screamed our names across the, across the Fancy Food show.
• 3:50
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: That's, that's it's the restaurant guys, which is great.
• 3:54
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And they're, they're really lovely people.
• 3:55
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And, and it's, it's great when lovely people do something that's really great.
• 3:59
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But here we opened one of those jars and now we're opening a second one.
• 4:04
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: whoa, it's, it's, it's very strong, very aromatic and very real, though, Mm-hmm.
• 4:10
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Not flat at all.
• 4:10
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mark and I are sampling a little bit of it right now.
• 4:12
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Don't mind me.
• 4:14
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: You know, it's funny, Friends of ours, of Mexican descent who work in the kitchen, uh, when they make hot food, they're like, do you want it hot or do you want it like Irish hot?
• 4:23
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Which is, which is, well, they call it like, what they call say to me is that, do you want a gringo, spicy?
• 4:28
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Yeah.
• 4:28
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Yeah.
• 4:29
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: That gringo spicy is probably about where I am.
• 4:31
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So we're gonna try this for your benefit completely selflessly.
• 4:34
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We're gonna have a little of this on a roll here.
• 4:38
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I, it really does bear talking about.
• 4:40
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mm-hmm.
• 4:41
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: It is shocking as hell to me that this is a shelf stay product at hr.
• 4:45
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Yep.
• 4:46
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: By the way, we're not getting paid by these people.
• 4:49
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: No.
• 4:49
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Not sponsored.
• 4:50
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Not at, not at all.
• 4:50
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I, I don't think they have the, the money to be sponsored.
• 4:52
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I think they make, I.
• 4:53
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: The one product, and it is extraordinary.
• 4:57
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: It's delicious.
• 4:58
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I mean, it is absolutely delicious and you, and you get, you know, a, a ton of different flavors and it's hot.
• 5:04
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Okay?
• 5:05
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But it's not stupid hot, right?
• 5:06
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: It, it's, it's not just heat eat, it's not very complex.
• 5:09
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: It's not gonna burn up my palate, so I can't, it.
• 5:11
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Enjoy other flavors.
• 5:12
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Right.
• 5:13
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Again, I'm not, I'm not one of those guys who's, who's looking for, you know, ghost chili peppers and looking, looking to, to torch up the room.
• 5:21
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But it's warm.
• 5:21
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I mean, it's just, this has definitely got some spice to it.
• 5:23
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So it's, it's elephant green chili chutney.
• 5:27
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mm-hmm.
• 5:27
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And we'll put the link to where to buy it on our website, and frankly, I think we're gonna bring it into our store.
• 5:31
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mm-hmm.
• 5:31
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So if you wanna buy it from us, if we don't get it in time, you can find it from them, but maybe you can buy it from us as well.
• 5:36
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We're also gonna get it.
• 5:38
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: In restaurant size.
• 5:38
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: They sell like commercial size.
• 5:41
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And we're gonna use this.
• 5:42
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We had it in, we, we have it in butter.
• 5:43
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We had it in, uh, a couple different things that It's delicious.
• 5:46
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Yeah.
• 5:47
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Delicious.
• 5:47
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But, uh, honestly, I'm just right here by itself on a piece of bread.
• 5:50
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I'm enjoying the heck out of it.
• 5:52
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So I have to tell you, I went to the Fancy Food Show.
• 5:53
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mm-hmm.
• 5:55
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Well, you know, you know I was gonna, you were there.
• 5:57
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I know.
• 5:57
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I stood next to you have to tell you, meaning you out there listening.
• 6:01
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We went to the Fancy Food Show in New York, which is a huge, huge operation in the Javits Center.
• 6:06
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: and I think it gets harder as time goes on to find those truly unique ingredients.
• 6:11
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And one of the reasons is because we are pretty sophisticated as a country.
• 6:15
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I, I'm gonna say something else, and it, and this comes from, from.
• 6:19
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: You know, our perspective, I think it gets harder and harder for, for us, for you to make us say, wow.
• 6:26
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Yeah.
• 6:26
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Okay.
• 6:27
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: From our life experiences, from our restaurant experiences, from our food experiences, we, we've tasted a lot of things, we love it.
• 6:33
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: There's nothing we love more than when we find that cool new thing that makes us say wow.
• 6:38
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Right.
• 6:38
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: I mean, I had a, a salami that was made with Asher Blue Cheese yesterday that I went Wow.
• 6:43
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Yeah.
• 6:43
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Right.
• 6:44
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: there's plenty of cool stuff out there, but one of the things the fancy food shows you is.
• 6:50
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: For every cool thing out there.
• 6:52
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: There's also some a thousand things that are fine.
• 6:55
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Some, some things that are, that are, that are not as great.
• 6:58
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But I al I also think it's just, it's not just us, it's that because of the, uh, internet, because of YouTube mm-hmm.
• 7:04
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Because of, of Instagram.
• 7:06
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: There, there are.
• 7:07
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: When we started going to the Fancy Food Show 30 years ago, there was a lot of food that just wasn't in New Jersey.
• 7:13
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mm-hmm.
• 7:13
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: There was a lot of food that wasn't in the country, and, and we were the first to bring a lot of things to market.
• 7:18
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Austrian roasted pumpkin, seeded oil, um, really great balsamic vinegars, uh, elephant green chili chutney.
• 7:25
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Well, that was not years ago.
• 7:26
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: That's just now.
• 7:27
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But I, uh, so it, I think it was easier to differentiate yourself back then.
• 7:32
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mm-hmm.
• 7:32
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Because there was so much stuff we didn't have.
• 7:33
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: We're a very sophisticated food country right now, and everybody knows a lot of stuff.
• 7:37
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So not to say there wasn't a lot of good food there.
• 7:39
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And one of the things that was really great was there was a New Jersey Pavilion where there were.
• 7:43
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: All these great New Jersey farmers that were represented and, and producers of food that were represented that we got to see, including some people we knew, which was fun.
• 7:50
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But there was also from Pennsylvania and other places.
• 7:53
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: You know, not, not just Pennsylvania, New York.
• 7:55
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: I mean there was Vermont and North Dakota.
• 7:58
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: Uh, there was a whole Chinese pavilion.
• 8:00
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: There was a Japanese food pavilion there.
• 8:02
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: I mean, literally from every corner of the earth there were, food purveyors.
• 8:07
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: And, and to be fair, France and I only spent a few hours there.
• 8:11
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: I'm sure there were nuggets to be found everywhere.
• 8:14
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: Yeah.
• 8:14
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: That's huge.
• 8:15
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: It because it, there was some cool stuff and there was some interesting stuff.
• 8:18
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: My goodness though, what I'll tell you is caviar and hooni baro everywhere are living their life right now.
• 8:26
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: They are.
• 8:27
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: They are everywhere and I.
• 8:29
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: If you're not, if you're not on the boat, you're sinking.
• 8:32
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: What?
• 8:33
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: We were the first restaurant in New York or New Jersey to bring in Harmoni Baro when it first became legal.
• 8:38
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: Yeah.
• 8:38
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: And now like Mark said, it's everywhere and there's a huge differential in quality.
• 8:45
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: Oh yeah.
• 8:45
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: Among the Harmon Kos, again, very fun for us, right?
• 8:48
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: We've always said theta.
• 8:51
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: The best way to establish, grape from good and to learn about a product is to taste it side by side, by side by side.
• 8:59
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: So being at the Fancy Food and being able to taste seven different, how many Baro Deta from seven different producers.
• 9:07
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: Was amazing.
• 9:08
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: It was absolutely amazing to see because there is huge differences in quality, even in that very, very specific product.
• 9:16
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: Yeah.
• 9:16
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: There are huge variations in quality.
• 9:18
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: Yeah.
• 9:18
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: And Cinco Hots is the winner, Cinco.
• 9:20
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: It's still our favorite winner.
• 9:21
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_141012: It's still a winner.
• 9:22
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But I, I do say the only thing that I took out of the Fancy Food Show that.
• 9:30
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Was really something totally new under the sun, totally new.
• 9:34
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: This was, this was a totally new thing for us.
• 9:36
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: This is, you know, this is not our, our traditional style of cuisine.
• 9:40
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: This is not a, an area that Francis and I frankly, have a lot of experience with.
• 9:45
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But this is really cool.
• 9:46
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: But, and we've had a lot of bottled chutneys, but, and, and everyone we've talked to is like, oh, bottled chutney sucks.
• 9:50
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Mm-hmm.
• 9:50
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And even Andrew Zuman was like, yeah, bottled chutney sucks except for this one.
• 9:53
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: Yep.
• 9:54
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: And it's really good.
• 9:54
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So, We're gonna go to here, two chefs, two different places, and you're gonna have a great time.
• 9:59
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: So stick with us.
• 10:00
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_140020: You're listening to the Restaurant guys@restaurantguyspodcast.com.
• 10:04
  Francis: Hey there everybody.
• 10:05
  Francis: Welcome back.
• 10:05
  Francis: Our guest today is Tyler Aiken.
• 10:08
  Francis: He is chef owner of the Cavalier at the Green Room in Wilmington, Delaware.
• 10:13
  Francis: He's also chef owner of Bastia, a Corsican and Sardinian restaurant at the hotel.
• 10:18
  Francis: Anna and Bell in the Fishtown neighborhood of Philadelphia, which is fast becoming one of mark of my favorite restaurant neighborhoods in the country.
• 10:25
  Francis: Bon App, Petit says it's a must visit, new restaurant.
• 10:28
  Francis: Esquire says it's the best new restaurant in America, the Wall Street Journal.
• 10:31
  Francis: Recognizes its pivotal role in redefining hotel dining, and most importantly, mark and I ate there and had a great time.
• 10:37
  Francis: So Tyler Kin.
• 10:38
  Francis: Tyler Kin, welcome to the show.
• 10:40
  Tyler: Thanks me.
• 10:41
  Tyler: It's an honor to be here, man.
• 10:43
  Tyler: It was great.
• 10:43
  Tyler: I, I will tell you that, um, now Philadelphia is, we're kind of closer to New York, oriented New Jersey, and for those of you who aren't from around here, new Jersey's kind of split.
• 10:52
  Tyler: North Jersey looks at New York and South Jersey looks at Philly.
• 10:56
  Tyler: but we're going to Fishtown more and more and it was a pleasure to come down, so your restaurant and have dinner and you were there and it was a lovely time.
• 11:02
  Tyler: And uh, it's a cool, it's a cool new thing.
• 11:05
  Tyler: Thank you.
• 11:06
  Tyler: Yeah.
• 11:06
  Tyler: So what's the affinity with the hotel restaurant?
• 11:08
  Tyler: You've, you've done this a couple of times now.
• 11:10
  Tyler: Why, why in hotels?
• 11:11
  Tyler: Why is that, uh, something that seems to be attractive to you?
• 11:15
  Tyler: You know, it, it, it's, it's partly coincidence, I would say, you know, like I was not hunting for a hotel restaurant opportunity.
• 11:22
  Tyler: When LA CVS materialize, I was approached.
• 11:26
  Tyler: When the pandemic hit and I was kind of left holding the bag on, you know, like vendor tabs within, I had terms and trying to wrap my head around how continue, you know, paying rent in a timely and full way.
• 11:43
  Tyler: The partnership that helped me open this, the few small restaurants that I had going into the pandemic here in Philly was like a modest one.
• 11:49
  Tyler: You know, we were not sitting on a big war chest and these were not partners who.
• 11:54
  Tyler: We're going to be particularly excited about, like recapitalizing the business to any great extent.
• 11:59
  Tyler: So, yes.
• 12:00
  Tyler: Um, you know, when you, when you engage with larger entities who have a real, like capital base, um, to absorb crises like, like COVID for instance, or, you know, even month to month kind of.
• 12:15
  Tyler: Performance and maybe up and down.
• 12:17
  Tyler: To me that was appealing because the, the beginning of the pandemic really was traumatic for me and made me rethink, um, how I was approaching opening restaurants.
• 12:26
  Tyler: Um, I think like on a day-to-day basis, there are great benefits to having a hotel restaurant.
• 12:33
  Tyler: there are also complications, but you know, the, the support.
• 12:37
  Tyler: The, these synergies that exist within a larger context, uh, you know, like a hotel operation.
• 12:44
  Tyler: in many instances there's also a corporate team that may be remote, but having that team overseeing operations and, and not kind of trying to take it on all yourself Yep.
• 12:54
  Tyler: Can be really nice.
• 12:56
  Tyler: And you might think, well, you know, you must be there 120 hours a week.
• 13:01
  Tyler: In reality, I, I find the paradox is like, it actually gives you more liberty to have a family life, to have a home life because, you know, all of, all of these arrows pointing in all these various meal periods are producing revenue, which allows you to build a team.
• 13:17
  Tyler: Instead of maybe having one or two.
• 13:18
  Tyler: So chefs, you might have four.
• 13:20
  Mark: Having layers certainly can help.
• 13:22
  Mark: Just so you know, Tyler, a war chest in the restaurant business is like three pieces of gold.
• 13:27
  Mark: That's that's what's, yeah.
• 13:29
  Mark: I think he knows in the restaurant.
• 13:30
  Mark: I think he knows.
• 13:30
  Francis: But the hotel's got the money.
• 13:32
  Francis: That's the thing.
• 13:32
  Francis: Well, you know, you bring up a very interesting thing'cause that has fallen in and outta fashion.
• 13:37
  Francis: So we've been doing this for.
• 13:39
  Francis: 32 years for ourselves.
• 13:40
  Francis: And I was doing it for six years and Mark was doing it for three years prior to that.
• 13:43
  Francis: But I remember even in our local town here, we had the Hyatt Hotel.
• 13:48
  Francis: Now the Hyatt Hotel at one point had this fancy restaurant in it, and that was kind of an anchor.
• 13:53
  Francis: And a lot of hotels, they had anchor restaurants that were fancy, and then that went way out of fashion.
• 13:58
  Francis: They're like, we're losing money on all this.
• 13:59
  Francis: Get rid of'em all.
• 14:00
  Francis: Mm-hmm.
• 14:00
  Francis: Yes.
• 14:00
  Francis: And it'll come in and go out.
• 14:02
  Francis: And I think what you see now is if you have a name and you have a reputation like you do.
• 14:06
  Francis: You can forge a partnership with a hotel, and this is good advice.
• 14:10
  Francis: We have a lot of people who like are thinking about going into the restaurant business or small operators in the restaurant business.
• 14:15
  Francis: We were able to buy the building three or four years into having the restaurant and that became our.
• 14:21
  Francis: War chest.
• 14:22
  Francis: We could, we could go there for credit if we needed credit.
• 14:25
  Francis: 'cause no one's loaning the mm-hmm.
• 14:26
  Francis: Mm-hmm.
• 14:26
  Francis: No one's loaning the restaurant.
• 14:28
  Francis: I couldn't refinance my house when COVID started.
• 14:30
  Francis: 'cause they said if the name restaurant is tied in your CV anywhere we want, we will not lend you any money.
• 14:36
  Francis: Yes.
• 14:36
  Francis: But if the, if the name landlord is tied in, they're like, let me see the spreadsheet, right?
• 14:40
  Francis: Mm-hmm.
• 14:40
  Francis: I remember being that 50 seat restaurant and four terrible weeks.
• 14:45
  Francis: Would've cost us the mm-hmm.
• 14:46
  Francis: Would've cost us everything.
• 14:47
  Francis: It would've closed us down.
• 14:48
  Francis: And you know, if you can have that partnership with the hotel, which like you said, has a bookkeeping department and it has finance people and all that stuff, it can let you do what you do.
• 14:58
  Francis: How much freedom do you have working in a hotel like that?
• 15:00
  Francis: I think that's in, I think the business arrangement is kind of interesting.
• 15:03
  Tyler: The opening period is critical.
• 15:05
  Tyler: You're really like setting the tone for the life span of the restaurant.
• 15:09
  Tyler: I think during those first few months, um.
• 15:11
  Tyler: So, of course, like, you know, effectively living outta the restaurant during, during that time.
• 15:17
  Tyler: when you engage with a hotel or a developer, or even now I see like my friend Gregory Corde, just open some.
• 15:25
  Tyler: FB outlets in a French department store that opened in Manhattan.
• 15:29
  Tyler: Oh, yeah.
• 15:29
  Tyler: Um, the print top, like, you know, it's not just hotels.
• 15:33
  Tyler: There are other analogous kind of like institutional environments that people are finding themselves in for restaurant opportunities.
• 15:40
  Tyler: Yeah.
• 15:40
  Francis: so let me ask you a question.
• 15:41
  Francis: Yeah.
• 15:41
  Francis: Does the, as far as like creative freedom though in the restaurant, did the hotel management ever come in and say, we need to change that menu, or we need to change the way the dining room works?
• 15:49
  Francis: How much freedom is there and how much collaboration is there?
• 15:52
  Francis: As far as the operation of the restaurant goes?
• 15:54
  Tyler: So in the instances where there is like creative direction that might be unsolicited, but offered nonetheless, I think of that input as as collaboration as opposed to dictation.
• 16:07
  Tyler: I cannot think of a single circumstance and, and this, you know, speaks to the health of the partnerships that I've found.
• 16:16
  Tyler: Not a single time has anybody like, you know, forced a dish down my throat.
• 16:21
  Mark: If it's working, no one's gonna say Change this.
• 16:23
  Tyler: Yeah, if you're hitting like healthy revenue numbers, cost numbers, then you know, it's kind of like, if it's not broken, don't, don't fix it.
• 16:31
  Tyler: Fix it.
• 16:31
  Mark: Yep.
• 16:31
  Mark: Francis and I had a, a business partner for almost 30 years, and I, I used to love to say about Lou.
• 16:37
  Mark: Lou was always there when you needed him and never there when you didn't.
• 16:41
  Francis: Yeah.
• 16:41
  Francis: Yeah.
• 16:41
  Mark: It was great.
• 16:42
  Mark: And that was, that was, that was the highest compliment I could pay to Lou as, as our, as our non-working
• 16:46
  Francis: partner.
• 16:46
  Francis: Non-operating partner.
• 16:48
  Francis: Yeah.
• 16:48
  Francis: Hey, listen, I, I'm gonna turn attention to the food because I'm excited by your food.
• 16:51
  Francis: We had a lovely meal when we were there, and it's different than.
• 16:54
  Francis: Other food we've had.
• 16:55
  Francis: So Cor Corsica and Sardinia?
• 16:58
  Francis: Not exactly.
• 16:58
  Francis: Mm-hmm.
• 16:59
  Francis: Looking for the, Hey honey, let's go for Corsica food tonight.
• 17:01
  Francis: So those are like
• 17:02
  Mark: two islands that France and Italy didn't want.
• 17:04
  Mark: And you know, they kind of almost kicked them out.
• 17:08
  Francis: You're bringing their food back.
• 17:09
  Francis: I wanna start, I wanna start with just for our, our listeners and I endorsed this.
• 17:13
  Francis: This is from the Esquire magazine article about your restaurant.
• 17:17
  Francis: The single best bite I've had this year was a fried squash blossom stuffed with ricotta, spiced with Corgan herbs on a tranche of toast, topped with uni butter, which ran down my chin and onto my jeans.
• 17:29
  Francis: I had it at Bastia, a restaurant to which I was not predisposed.
• 17:33
  Francis: Another sleek and well-funded Mediterranean place in a new boutique hotel Fuey.
• 17:38
  Francis: But the chef Tyler Aiken is a man on fire.
• 17:40
  Francis: Aiken turned the weird island of Corsica and its cousin Sardinia.
• 17:44
  Francis: Apologies to our Corsica and Sardinian listeners to to a Craft A Surprising Mediterranean menu.
• 17:50
  Francis: Surrender to the Squash Blossom baby.
• 17:53
  Francis: That's a pretty damn good review.
• 17:55
  Francis: Yeah,
• 17:55
  Tyler: and that was awesome.
• 17:56
  Tyler: And you know, the Man On Fire quote in particular, there were some Denzel Washington memes going around with my head superimposed.
• 18:03
  Tyler: But that was incredibly flattering because Joshua, one of my favorite food writers, I think, well, he is now.
• 18:08
  Tyler: To receive praise like that from somebody like Joshua is pretty amazing.
• 18:12
  Tyler: He identifies a dynamic that can be a difficult one, which is, you know, there is this kind of inherent stigma, and you mentioned it too, you know, around hotel restaurants, and they've become.
• 18:24
  Tyler: Kind of cool again or have the opportunity to eat.
• 18:27
  Tyler: But I, I think our food media and especially the, the segment of food media that does criticism like there, there's a predisposition to dislike hotel restaurants.
• 18:40
  Mark: To be fair, Tyler, a lot of hotel restaurants suck.
• 18:42
  Mark: Yeah,
• 18:42
  Tyler: okay.
• 18:43
  Tyler: They
• 18:43
  Mark: do.
• 18:43
  Mark: There's a lot of hotel restaurants out there that aren't, that aren't good.
• 18:47
  Mark: Yes.
• 18:48
  Mark: So it's, it's a pleasure and I think a real draw for a hotel.
• 18:53
  Mark: To have a restaurant that's really special, that's a jewel box.
• 18:56
  Mark: That's going to be one of the places that the people who stay in that hotel have to go.
• 19:00
  Mark: Yeah.
• 19:01
  Francis: It is a huge it.
• 19:02
  Francis: It's huge and it, I think it close in both directions.
• 19:05
  Francis: Your restaurant has a street presence, like very much like it is part of the neighborhood.
• 19:08
  Francis: It doesn't feel like you walk through a big hotel lobby to get to the back of it.
• 19:11
  Francis: No.
• 19:12
  Francis: Yeah.
• 19:13
  Francis: Will you talk to us about Corsican and Sardinian cuisine though?
• 19:16
  Francis: What drew you to it?
• 19:16
  Francis: What is it?
• 19:17
  Francis: What makes Corsica and Sardinian cuisine?
• 19:19
  Francis: 'cause there aren't a lot of restaurants doing that.
• 19:21
  Mark: I'm not sure I knew what it was until I walked into your restaurant.
• 19:26
  Tyler: So, you know, I have these two, I have a few threads, I think in my like cooking biography, one of which is French food.
• 19:36
  Tyler: I went to a classical French culinary school.
• 19:40
  Tyler: I've been operating a Brosy denim in Wilmington for four and a half years now.
• 19:44
  Tyler: And.
• 19:46
  Tyler: Also deep history, like a deep experience doing Mediterranean and, and Italian food.
• 19:53
  Tyler: I was interested in bringing those threads together on this project, but finding some novel lens.
• 19:59
  Tyler: You know, I think a lot of hotel restaurants like Joshua identifies our, you know, kind of generically quote unquote Mediterranean.
• 20:08
  Tyler: Um, and don't have a strong sense of mooring with any cuisine, and you find items next to each other that don't especially make sense.
• 20:16
  Tyler: I don't think that resonates with sophisticated diners in 2025.
• 20:21
  Tyler: You know,
• 20:21
  Mark: there are restaurants that are trying to please all the people all the time.
• 20:24
  Tyler: Yeah.
• 20:24
  Tyler: And
• 20:25
  Mark: yeah.
• 20:25
  Mark: You know, especially if you're in a hotel.
• 20:27
  Mark: I think that's a common practice.
• 20:29
  Mark: And, and when we talk about the hotel restaurants, like we were talking about before, that aren't very interesting.
• 20:35
  Mark: I think they're restaurants that are trying to accommodate all the people all the time and, but to me that's not super interesting.
• 20:41
  Francis: So tell, tell us about Yeah.
• 20:42
  Francis: Corsica and cuisine and Sardinian cuisine specifically.
• 20:45
  Francis: Mm-hmm.
• 20:45
  Francis: What is Corgan and Sardinian cuisine?
• 20:48
  Tyler: Yeah.
• 20:48
  Tyler: So, um, you know, the thing that they both have in common is they both have a big chip on their shoulder about their mother, father countries, right?
• 20:55
  Tyler: Like, uh, the, the corsicans identify first and foremost as Corgans, likewise for Sardinians, right?
• 21:02
  Tyler: Like they would just assume not be part of France or Italy respectively.
• 21:06
  Tyler: So there is like a, a, there's a, a self-conscious attempt to be, I think, unique from the mother country, but that influence.
• 21:17
  Tyler: Permeates the cuisine.
• 21:18
  Tyler: Nevertheless, um, the, there's a common thread between the two, uh, both having been at various points ruled by the genoese.
• 21:27
  Tyler: So you see this Italian stamp on Corkin food.
• 21:31
  Tyler: Uh, you see the mainland Italian stamp on Sardinian food in the form of these, especially Gena, they ditches.
• 21:38
  Tyler: For me, it's been a really fun puzzle to fit together because.
• 21:42
  Tyler: You know, it's, it's a tight sandbox.
• 21:45
  Tyler: Like neither of these cuisines, I would say are like extensive in their traditions, you know?
• 21:51
  Tyler: Mm-hmm.
• 21:51
  Tyler: Um, there's plenty of fun stuff to play with for sure, if you're like, pulling your ideas from, from traditional dishes, but.
• 22:00
  Tyler: You know, it's not all encompassing.
• 22:04
  Tyler: It feels like you're in a cozy sandbox where there's enough sand, but not too much.
• 22:08
  Tyler: And um, for me it was a really fun way, or it has been, and it continues to be a really fun way to, you know, kind of like merge these two cuisines at times.
• 22:18
  Tyler: There are dishes that I think represent elements of both.
• 22:23
  Tyler: Cuisines in a single dish.
• 22:24
  Tyler: Like I'm not trying to compartmentalize them entirely.
• 22:27
  Tyler: And then they, we have dishes that are really just celebrating like a unique, tradition from, from one of the two.
• 22:33
  Francis: What would be a traditional Corsican dish and what would be a traditional Sardinian dish?
• 22:38
  Tyler: I think the most traditional corsican dish that we have on the menu is, you know, veal and olives.
• 22:45
  Tyler: It's like a classic, classic.
• 22:48
  Tyler: Of course skin combination.
• 22:49
  Tyler: We kind of lean into the French identity by.
• 22:53
  Tyler: Plating it up on lapu, uh, lentils.
• 22:56
  Tyler: Mm-hmm.
• 22:56
  Tyler: Um, but we're, you know, we're serving a really beautiful imported French, um, buco.
• 23:03
  Tyler: The sauce is simply, you know, a reduction of brazing liquids and we're studying it with, you know, ola olive cheeks.
• 23:12
  Tyler: Um, that is just ubiquitous in corsicas, the, the VOL of combo.
• 23:17
  Tyler: And it might be a roast.
• 23:19
  Tyler: With, uh, some zas it might be chops with some other type of olives, but the, the combination is like a holy one.
• 23:28
  Tyler: Love it.
• 23:28
  Tyler: Um, you know, so the thing I love about Corkin food that's really interesting is like, even though you're sitting on an island in the middle of the Mediterranean, you know, it's really, it was like a very, very much not a coastal culture cuisine for a very long time because of, uh, the presence of malaria along the coastline and also the prevalence of piracy.
• 23:48
  Tyler: These people lived in the interior, which very quickly climbs to altitudes that exceed like the highest peaks in North America.
• 23:56
  Tyler: So on this, this very small island, he's got, um, you know, essentially like an extension of the Alps.
• 24:03
  Tyler: And as a result you see a lot of alpine traditions and the cheeses.
• 24:06
  Tyler: You see a lot of charcuterie and mushrooms and chestnuts and a lot of these kind of like hardier.
• 24:14
  Tyler: Flavors, uhhuh and ingredients.
• 24:16
  Tyler: Um, whereas in Sardinia, you know, that that dynamic of like escaping the coastline has, uh, historically not been, you know, something they've had to deal with.
• 24:26
  Tyler: And in turn, you know, it's informed their food in the direction of being more seafood oriented.
• 24:31
  Tyler: So it gives us a nice arsenal of hardier things to lean into during the fall and winter and, you know, these kind of lighter, brighter.
• 24:39
  Tyler: More overtly sardinian, uh, dishes and flavors during the spring and summer.
• 24:44
  Mark: Oh, that's great.
• 24:45
  Mark: I, I will tell you, not mentioning the pasta, I think sells you short because, uh, I, those dishes I thought were really incredible and, and frankly, some of my favorite parts of your menu.
• 24:56
  Mark: Thank you.
• 24:57
  Mark: Also, I, I found a lot of nuts in your cuisine.
• 25:01
  Mark: Is that, is that indigenous to, to either of these areas?
• 25:05
  Tyler: Yeah, both for sure.
• 25:06
  Tyler: As a chef I would say I'm always looking for, you know, plate components that bring texture.
• 25:14
  Tyler: Mm-hmm.
• 25:14
  Tyler: When you think about pasta and seafood and, you know, braised meats, like it's soft, soft sauce, you know, so you need a counter point to that.
• 25:24
  Tyler: Yes, you find nuts all over menus in, in these two places, but you know, for me it's like.
• 25:31
  Tyler: That's just how I think about a dish.
• 25:32
  Tyler: Paris, you could
• 25:33
  Mark: feel the textural counterpoint.
• 25:34
  Mark: Right.
• 25:35
  Mark: That was, that was clearly what a lot of the point of, of the roasted nuts were in some of your dishes.
• 25:40
  Mark: You felt it, it was great.
• 25:41
  Mark: It, like I said, you really shined in the pasta dishes.
• 25:44
  Mark: I was, I was really impressed by them especially.
• 25:46
  Tyler: Cool.
• 25:47
  Tyler: Thank you.
• 25:47
  Tyler: And, and, and that's one of the great things about Sardinia is it has this, you know, these kind of obscure pasta shapes mm-hmm.
• 25:56
  Tyler: That, um, have been really fun to experiment with and
• 25:58
  Mark: that
• 25:58
  Tyler: was
• 25:58
  Mark: fun.
• 25:59
  Mark: Right.
• 25:59
  Mark: Pasta shapes I've never seen seen.
• 26:00
  Mark: Yeah.
• 26:00
  Tyler: So tell us about some of those pasta shapes.
• 26:03
  Tyler: First one that comes to mind, uh, like mal radius.
• 26:06
  Tyler: So there's, there's a tradition of like, um, Yoki s broadly is a gnocchi that is based on a dough that's made only with selina and water.
• 26:17
  Tyler: So there's no potato.
• 26:18
  Tyler: It's not the nichi that we're familiar with, it's twosome.
• 26:21
  Tyler: I'm not sure I mentioned to you this fact, but that dish on our menu has.
• 26:27
  Tyler: About 110 hand shaped pieces of pasta.
• 26:30
  Tyler: We're not using an extruder, we're not using a, a roller of any kind.
• 26:35
  Tyler: Well,
• 26:36
  Mark: there's a roller, but, but the guy's name is Joe.
• 26:38
  Mark: Yeah, right.
• 26:39
  Tyler: Her name's Elizabeth.
• 26:40
  Tyler: Yeah.
• 26:41
  Tyler: And she's wonderful.
• 26:42
  Tyler: Um, and couldn't be doing this without her.
• 26:45
  Tyler: So, you know, we kind of dive into these things and then make'em our own where we can.
• 28:17
  Tyler: I think that's amazing.
• 28:18
  Tyler: That's
• 28:18
  Francis: great.
• 28:19
  Francis: So, um, Tyler, we enjoyed the visit to the restaurant.
• 28:21
  Francis: We learned a whole bunch of new things and thanks for coming on the show to talk with us about them.
• 28:25
  Tyler: Thank you so much.
• 28:26
  the-restaurant-guys_1_03-25-2025_133132: You can find out more about Tyler at our website or on the show notes.
• 28:30
  the-restaurant-guys_1_03-25-2025_133132: His restaurant in Philadelphia is Bastia, his restaurant.
• 28:33
  the-restaurant-guys_1_03-25-2025_133132: If you are in Wilmington, Delaware is La Cavalier and we suggest you go there to try some great pasta.
• 28:38
  the-restaurant-guys_1_03-25-2025_133132: We'll be back in just a moment.
• 28:39
  the-restaurant-guys_1_03-25-2025_133132: You're listening to the restaurant guys.
• 28:41
  the-restaurant-guys_1_03-25-2025_133132: Find out more@restaurantguyspodcast.com.
• 28:45
  Francis: Hey there everybody.
• 28:46
  Francis: Welcome back.
• 28:46
  Francis: You're listening to the Restaurant Guys, and our guest is Chaz Lindsay.
• 28:49
  Francis: Chaz has Polito Austria in the a Jackson, Mississippi, kind of an unlikely address for an unlikely restaurant, and we were kind of intrigued by it, so we thought we'd give him a call and bring him on the show.
• 29:01
  Francis: Chaz brings Italian American influences to Jackson, Mississippi to an Italian American vibe, and as that sounds familiar to you, that's what we do in Katherine Lombardi.
• 29:10
  Francis: So we couldn't be more pleased to have him on the show today.
• 29:12
  Francis: Chaz, welcome to the show.
• 29:13
  Francis: Hey, thanks
• 29:14
  Chaz: for having me.
• 29:15
  Mark: Uh, so, uh, the first question, and frankly, the, the whole, the, the reason we were like, this guy needs to be on our show.
• 29:22
  Mark: How does one combine southern Italian cooking with southern cooking?
• 29:26
  Mark: How does, how do those two things marry in the same building?
• 29:29
  Chaz: Well, I like to say that we're more Italian and mindset.
• 29:32
  Chaz: So Uhhuh, yeah, so like, Mississippi focused, but Italian in mindset.
• 29:37
  Chaz: So like the, the whole idea is that we cook with the seasons here.
• 29:40
  Chaz: Um, you know, we print, we print menus in-house based on weekly availability, which is, it's actually shocking how many restaurants don't print menus in-house anymore.
• 29:49
  Chaz: Mm.
• 29:50
  Chaz: and so, there's been times where I've reprinted menus during the middle of service because we had the 86 something.
• 29:55
  Chaz: I just Absolutely, I don't, I don't like providing someone with an option of something they can't have.
• 30:01
  Chaz: You know?
• 30:01
  Chaz: Mm-hmm.
• 30:02
  Chaz: Um, and so I lived in Italy for a year.
• 30:05
  Chaz: Um, spent six weeks there initially in 2011, harvesting olives and maintained that relationship with the farm.
• 30:12
  Chaz: And then they opened A, b and b, um, on the farm, an agri chomo, as they like to call it.
• 30:17
  Chaz: Yep.
• 30:18
  Chaz: They said, you know, we're, we're doing this, we're gonna have a small restaurant.
• 30:21
  Chaz: And I was burned out on New York City life, and I was looking for a change and.
• 30:25
  Chaz: So moving to a horse stable in Italy was the perfect and like complete opposite of living in New York City and having to get on the train every morning.
• 30:34
  Chaz: Um, and so I learned a lot about cooking with seasons, preserving food, working with what's available and not just, you know, having asparagus on the menu 365 days a year.
• 30:46
  Francis: But didn't you find that in New York you had had a lot of that, uh, cooking with the seasons?
• 30:50
  Chaz: I did.
• 30:51
  Chaz: Um, and that was.
• 30:53
  Chaz: That was what intrigued me on, you know, wanting to go to Italy and work on a farm and learn more about it.
• 30:59
  Chaz: You know, I had the pleasure of working for Tom cio.
• 31:01
  Chaz: Before that I was in, uh, Hyde Park, New York at the Culinary Institute, which is, that was really the first time that I had been exposed to, like, farm to table cuisine, you know, small producer, small organic farms, and I really just kind of fell in love with it.
• 31:15
  Chaz: Like I remember, I, I would volunteer for a local CSA to help them.
• 31:20
  Chaz: To butcher chickens.
• 31:21
  Chaz: So we would go and slaughter chickens on a Saturday afternoon and um, you know, or I'd go and help with some type of harvest.
• 31:29
  Chaz: One of the ways I made my beer money was forging ramps.
• 31:32
  Chaz: Um, so I just like fell in love with that style of cuisine, but I really, really fell in love with it when I worked for Cchi, specifically when I got moved to Kraft as, uh, the am sous chef.
• 31:43
  Chaz: Because I had to be at the Union Square Green Market at 7:00 AM with a wheelbarrow Monday, Wednesday, Friday.
• 31:48
  Chaz: That's me.
• 31:49
  Mark: What a, what a great place to learn about fruits and vegetables and what nature can bring you.
• 31:56
  Mark: That that market is one of the great markets in the world.
• 31:59
  Francis: It's the foundational green market of the New York City Green market system.
• 32:02
  Francis: It's, it's incredible.
• 32:04
  Francis: Absolutely.
• 32:05
  Francis: So what would you get for Collicchio at the, at the Green market?
• 32:08
  Francis: What would you be tasked to go find there?
• 32:12
  Chaz: Basically anything and everything.
• 32:13
  Chaz: That was great.
• 32:14
  Chaz: Whatever was coming out.
• 32:15
  Chaz: I mean, it was really kind of a, like a dog eat dog.
• 32:17
  Chaz: Like I knew some of the other sous chefs from working with them as line cooks.
• 32:21
  Chaz: Um, throughout my time in New York.
• 32:23
  Chaz: It was always like, who could be there?
• 32:25
  Chaz: Be there first and get there the quickest.
• 32:27
  Chaz: Um, so when strawberries would hit like Mountain Sweet Berry Farms, um, you know, they had the best strawberries, so you wanted to be there first or like campo for Castle Vi Toronto or Radicchio Treviso or stuff like that.
• 32:40
  Chaz: Like limited quantity, things that you would want to get.
• 32:43
  Chaz: Norwich had really great romanesco, so you'd want to be the first one there to buy all the romanesco for the menu.
• 32:49
  Chaz: Um, and I just, I had that two wheel Rubbermaid.
• 32:54
  Chaz: Barrel and then like, I've got a picture of like young me somewhere.
• 32:56
  Chaz: I'll have to dig it up and send it to you in front of Kraft with that wheelbarrow just like piled high, probably 300 stuff.
• 33:04
  Chaz: Um, there was one day during, it was P season, so in the spring I, uh, it tipped over in the middle of 20th Oh, oh no, at the park and I just had like a hundred pounds of English peas all over the place.
• 33:17
  Chaz: Like it, oh no.
• 33:18
  Chaz: Kind of embarrassing, but you know,
• 33:20
  Mark: funny story now.
• 33:22
  Mark: Well, hopefully they were still in the pod so you, they were still Yeah, still usable and, and that, and that saves the cleanup by like four times, right?
• 33:30
  Mark: Right.
• 33:30
  Mark: If they're still in the pods.
• 33:31
  Francis: Alright, so you, you have your time, uh, at CIA for your education.
• 33:35
  Francis: You work in New York for one of the great chefs of New York, who's also a Jersey guy.
• 33:38
  Francis: I've been on our show and, uh, then you go to Italy.
• 33:42
  Francis: And it had to be a bold move to think I can bring this back to Jackson, Mississippi,
• 33:46
  Mark: in talking about Jackson, Mississippi, I wanna talk about how different it is to be in Jackson, Mississippi seasonally than it is to be in New York City seasonally where.
• 34:00
  Mark: Our, our, our produce is basically a may through, you know, early October thing here in, in this part of the world, or most of our produce, most of our, our most interesting stuff happens may through early October.
• 34:14
  Mark: What does Jackson Mississippi give you that New York couldn't give you?
• 34:17
  Mark: So I've,
• 34:18
  Chaz: I've gotten really lucky because the farm that I do most of my work with.
• 34:22
  Chaz: It's called Two Dog Farms.
• 34:23
  Chaz: They're about 25 minutes north of me in Florida, Mississippi.
• 34:27
  Chaz: Mm-hmm.
• 34:27
  Chaz: And their big market that they sell to is New Orleans, um, which is about two and a half hours south of here.
• 34:33
  Chaz: And they've linked up with a company called JV Foods, which sources from local producers in northern Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi.
• 34:43
  Chaz: So.
• 34:44
  Chaz: Now, like, um, starting in late November, I've got access to like, really good citrus from Plaquemine Parish, Louisiana.
• 34:51
  Chaz: So like bergamot Meyer lemons, ruby red grapefruits, you know, stuff like that that we couldn't really get when we were in New York.
• 34:59
  Chaz: You know, that climate's not conducive to citrus, really.
• 35:02
  Chaz: Um, we get, we ha I have a guy in Collins, Mississippi that's an hour south of here.
• 35:07
  Chaz: He was a chicken farmer who lost his contract with Sanderson Farms.
• 35:11
  Chaz: Converted all of his chicken houses to a mushroom grow operation.
• 35:14
  Chaz: So I've got like beautiful shiitakes and blue oysters and lions mains coming from him.
• 35:20
  Chaz: right now our tomatoes, like people always ask you what your death row meal is.
• 35:24
  Chaz: Well, uh, a Mississippi beef steak tomatoes sandwich on white bread with mayonnaise is on my list.
• 35:30
  Chaz: You know, Uhhuh nice, like, I mean, and they grow great tomatoes in the Hudson Valley and, and jersey and stuff like that.
• 35:36
  Chaz: But.
• 35:36
  Chaz: I, you know, we've got bi, bi colored corn right now.
• 35:40
  Chaz: I think it's a little bit later for y'all.
• 35:42
  Chaz: Uh mm-hmm.
• 35:43
  Chaz: Yeah.
• 35:43
  Francis: Everything's later for us.
• 35:44
  Francis: Yeah.
• 35:44
  Chaz: I, I, uh, always remember everyone would talk about Jersey corn and blueberries, you know?
• 35:49
  Chaz: Yep.
• 35:49
  Chaz: They were delicious.
• 35:50
  Chaz: and CREs, we've had a lot of rain.
• 35:52
  Chaz: Right now.
• 35:52
  Chaz: We have a ton of chant trails popping up.
• 35:54
  Chaz: I've got, you know.
• 35:55
  Chaz: Every college kid that listens to fish, you know, hanging, hanging out at the back door, trying to sell'em to me.
• 36:00
  Chaz: Um, nice.
• 36:02
  Chaz: But we grow, we grow a lot of the same stuff that I was able to get in New York, but, um, it just comes at, at a different time of the year.
• 36:09
  Chaz: We, we can't really do asparagus or peas down here.
• 36:12
  Chaz: It's just too hot.
• 36:13
  Chaz: Mm-hmm.
• 36:14
  Chaz: Um.
• 36:14
  Chaz: I have other sources to bring those in for a couple weeks at a time just'cause I love them.
• 36:19
  Francis: tell me about your restaurant.
• 36:20
  Francis: So you come into Jackson, Mississippi, what was the restaurant landscape like in Jackson, Mississippi before you got there and what did you bring that hadn't been there before?
• 36:30
  Chaz: Well, so.
• 36:32
  Chaz: I started, I started cooking in Jackson when I was 15.
• 36:34
  Chaz: And the, and Polito is, is located in the neighborhood that I was born and raised in.
• 36:38
  Chaz: My parents still live here.
• 36:39
  Chaz: I still live here.
• 36:40
  Chaz: I live four blocks from the restaurant.
• 36:42
  Chaz: Um, but here, you know, Jackson's always been like very meat and potatoes or like gulf seafood, and it's always gotta be a protein, a starch, a vegetable, and a sauce.
• 36:53
  Chaz: And that sauce is usually, some variation of a bur blanc.
• 36:56
  Chaz: Um.
• 36:57
  Chaz: the stakes are always generally like broiled and the drippings are expanded and that, that becomes a sauce.
• 37:04
  Chaz: And seasonal cuisine was, I mean, we had some of it, but it wasn't like at the forefront.
• 37:11
  Chaz: another thing that I learned in New York, and you know, people always say, oh, well you lived in Italy, so that's where you learned how to make pasta.
• 37:18
  Chaz: I learned how to make pasta working for Tom Collicchio.
• 37:20
  Chaz: That's, oh, yeah.
• 37:21
  Chaz: I really learned how to make pasta.
• 37:24
  Chaz: So we make all of our pasta here inhouse at Polito.
• 37:27
  Chaz: before I moved to El Paso, Texas.
• 37:29
  Chaz: I was executive chef of a restaurant downtown.
• 37:31
  Chaz: It's now shuttered, called Parlor Market.
• 37:34
  Chaz: I was starting to do more seasonal cuisine and pasta there.
• 37:38
  Chaz: but then my wife, matched for her medical residency in El Paso.
• 37:41
  Chaz: So I went and spent three and a half years out there.
• 37:44
  Chaz: Um, and when I came back I knew, I knew I didn't wanna work for anybody else here because I wanted to do my own thing, and I didn't want to be like having rules or have to, you know, do like a certain dish that I always have to do.
• 37:58
  Chaz: Because somebody else owned the restaurant.
• 38:00
  Chaz: Um, I mean, we now
• 38:01
  Mark: have Did you, did you figure out that there's probably more rules now than, than, yeah.
• 38:05
  Mark: Than there was when you were working for somebody
• 38:07
  Chaz: else?
• 38:07
  Chaz: Absolutely.
• 38:08
  Chaz: Definitely.
• 38:08
  Chaz: I, um, you know, I have things on my menu now that I can never take off.
• 38:13
  Chaz: and I'm okay with that.
• 38:14
  Francis: what are those things?
• 38:15
  Francis: Yeah, tell us, tell us.
• 38:16
  Chaz: First and foremost, it's our Caesar salad, which is crazy.
• 38:18
  Chaz: And it's like we're sitting here talking about local produce, but I, I have to buy romaine hearts.
• 38:23
  Chaz: I go through about six to seven cases of remain hearts a week.
• 38:26
  Chaz: Right now, we're only open, uh, we're dinner only Tuesday through Saturday, but that's Caesar salad pays my rent.
• 38:33
  Chaz: Um, another one's our pork and ricotta meatballs.
• 38:36
  Chaz: Hold on a second.
• 38:36
  Chaz: What, what makes your Caesar salad different than other people's Caesar salads, at least in Mississippi?
• 38:42
  Chaz: Well, so we don't use croutons.
• 38:44
  Chaz: All right.
• 38:44
  Chaz: And it's, it's served very cold, cold plate, cold lettuce, cold dressing, which a lot of people don't pay attention to.
• 38:51
  Chaz: and it's like minor fine details like that that make it really pop, you know, so it's like cold, crispy.
• 38:57
  Chaz: and then we do a blend of Pecorino and Parmesan, and then instead of croutons, we do brown butter, panko.
• 39:04
  Chaz: Uh, and so it's like a crouton, so you get like a little crunch in every single bite.
• 39:08
  Chaz: It's amazing how something so small, like a small detail like that just blows people's minds.
• 39:13
  Francis: do you go heavy on the anchovy or light on the anchovy or there's a fair
• 39:16
  Chaz: amount of anchovy in the dressing?
• 39:18
  Chaz: Yes.
• 39:18
  Chaz: Yeah.
• 39:19
  Chaz: Legit.
• 39:20
  Chaz: we don't put'em over the top, but we do have'em available on the side, either the salted or the poker own.
• 39:25
  Mark: yeah, I found that, most people want more anchovy in their Caesar salad than they want you to tell them how much anchovy is in their Caesar salad.
• 39:34
  Francis: Yeah.
• 39:35
  Francis: Well, I'm Do you mash it into the garlic and the, and the like make mash it into the dressing or no?
• 39:39
  Chaz: Yes.
• 39:40
  Chaz: So yeah.
• 39:41
  Chaz: Yeah.
• 39:41
  Chaz: We actually throw it all in the vi prep, um, with garlic, comfy.
• 39:44
  Chaz: And then we put a couple of raw cloves in there too, just to give it a little zing.
• 39:48
  Chaz: Rock cloves,
• 39:49
  Francis: Caesar salad.
• 39:50
  Francis: Cloves of garlic.
• 39:51
  Chaz: Yeah.
• 39:51
  Chaz: Oh, I'm sorry.
• 39:53
  Francis: Rock
• 39:53
  Chaz: cloves.
• 39:54
  Chaz: Yeah, that, that's the uh, Thanksgiving edition of our Caesar salad.
• 39:58
  Francis: Yeah.
• 39:59
  Francis: No, I, my opinion, so we make a, I make a Caesar salad at home that we don't serve in the restaurant.
• 40:03
  Francis: 'cause it's just too much.
• 40:04
  Francis: I think Caesar salad should hurt just a little bit.
• 40:06
  Francis: Garlic franchisees, France just wants a little
• 40:08
  Mark: tear in the corner of your eye while you're eating the Caesar salad.
• 40:11
  Mark: It should
• 40:11
  Francis: hurts a little bit.
• 40:11
  Francis: It's a little over the top.
• 40:12
  Francis: Agree.
• 40:12
  Francis: I'm right there with you.
• 40:14
  Francis: So, how.
• 40:15
  Francis: So how were you received?
• 40:16
  Francis: How has, has Jackson received you, uh, and, and your restaurant?
• 40:21
  Chaz: It's been killer.
• 40:22
  Chaz: Um, I, I mean, honestly, it's like exceeded expectations.
• 40:26
  Chaz: We just, we've been open two and a half years now.
• 40:29
  Chaz: I mean, it definitely helps, like my parents are very, very involved in the community.
• 40:33
  Chaz: Um, tonight actually, I have to go to the mayoral inauguration because my mom's last day on the city council was yesterday.
• 40:40
  Chaz: She's retiring and I'm thrilled that she is no longer gonna be in public service, although she did an amazing job while she was there.
• 40:47
  Chaz: Um, and so my, my parents were very well connected, so when people heard that, you know, Chuck and Burgy, Lindsey's son were opening a restaurant, they wanted to check it out.
• 40:55
  Chaz: So I was lucky in that regard.
• 40:57
  Chaz: But then I had a really good staff, um, really good people, you know, supporting me.
• 41:03
  Chaz: Some, some good cooks that were able to help me out, get it open.
• 41:06
  Chaz: And so we also delivered on quality.
• 41:08
  Chaz: and we've just been building and building and building.
• 41:11
  Francis: are you finding any people pushing back, like, I don't eat that food.
• 41:13
  Francis: Like, you know, that it's, don't, not accepting of it.
• 41:17
  Chaz: It's not, it's not so much more that like, you know, initially we had people who had an issue with being able to read the menu because, you know, we, we do all the pastas by shape, not by sauce.
• 41:29
  Chaz: Um, so like, the Orke or the Parel or stuff like that, that's actually still kind of foreign down here in Mississippi.
• 41:36
  Chaz: And so there has been like an education process that we've had to do with our guests.
• 41:40
  Chaz: and then Jackson has also had its own turmoil.
• 41:44
  Chaz: the neighboring city, uh, in the North Madison, there's a lot of people who are like, oh, you're in Jackson.
• 41:49
  Chaz: I'm not gonna come eat there.
• 41:50
  Chaz: So mm-hmm.
• 41:51
  Chaz: If they get swindled by some friends or whatever to come, and then they discover that it's like local fresh food.
• 41:57
  Chaz: The menu changes almost weekly.
• 41:59
  Chaz: They're like, wow, this is a unique experience and it's right here in Jackson.
• 42:03
  Chaz: they want to come back.
• 42:04
  Chaz: And I have people that thank me for changing the menus because so many people down here become complacent.
• 42:09
  Chaz: They want the same thing.
• 42:11
  Chaz: Mm-hmm.
• 42:11
  Chaz: Um, and, and it's something like my menu right now is, is beautiful and it's one of my favorite times of year to cook here because you really don't have to put heat to anything.
• 42:21
  Chaz: Like our tomato salad is just a beautiful sliced tomato.
• 42:24
  Chaz: Mm-hmm.
• 42:24
  Chaz: With.
• 42:25
  Chaz: Olive oil from the farm in Italy that I worked at.
• 42:28
  Chaz: A really nice white balsamic and then beautiful basil, salt, pepper, and that's it, you know, and it's just delicious.
• 42:35
  Chaz: Keeping it simple.
• 42:36
  Chaz: Yeah, keep it simple.
• 42:37
  Mark: you mentioned that you, your menu.
• 42:40
  Mark: Serves pasta by the cut of the pasta rather than its its preparation, uh, necessarily.
• 42:47
  Mark: When we opened Kaha Lombardi, our, our thoughts were, we're gonna put the best cut of pasta, we think, with each preparation.
• 42:56
  Mark: So the macaroni would be on the each dish, but we would allow you to switch macaronis if you wanted.
• 43:05
  Mark: So, if you wanted, orti with, with marinara or with the meat gravy or, or with one of the other preparations you could do that.
• 43:13
  Mark: what we found is, I would say it's once a month.
• 43:18
  Mark: Somebody says, can I switch?
• 43:20
  Mark: Pasta from the pasta you've chosen.
• 43:22
  Mark: I'm very surprised by how receptive people are to, Hey, we chose this, this macaroni to go with this preparation to go with the broccoli, rob and and sausage, because this is it's the right shape, it's the right shape.
• 43:36
  Mark: For that dish.
• 43:38
  Mark: people are much more receptive to that than I thought they would be.
• 43:40
  Mark: Oh, a hundred percent.
• 43:41
  Chaz: Yeah, for sure.
• 43:42
  Chaz: I've got, I've got one bar regular who wants everything on Parel, and you know what, that's totally fine.
• 43:48
  Chaz: You know, and he is also the only reason that we keep Chardonnay by the glass on the menu, so, you know, it's.
• 43:53
  Chaz: You know, but he comes in, he's in two, three times a week and we wanna make sure that he is happy, so Yep.
• 43:58
  Chaz: You know if, yeah, if you want that set up with the parel, then.
• 44:01
  Chaz: I'll do it for you, bill.
• 44:03
  Chaz: No problem.
• 44:04
  Francis: Let's, let's talk about, um, some of the dishes I did, we did a little research ourselves.
• 44:10
  Francis: I'm sorry we weren't able to come to the restaurant.
• 44:12
  Francis: Jackson's a little far.
• 44:13
  Francis: We'll make it one of these days, but I saw that you have, I just looked at a couple of dishes that you have had in the past that kind of mixed the Italian with the southern, cuisine.
• 44:21
  Francis: And I saw Gulf oysters with the butter made from Nya, uh, which is the.
• 44:26
  Francis: Southern Italian influence on that.
• 44:29
  Francis: Of course, collard green, slow cooked with prosciutto tiramisu, with nilla wafers.
• 44:34
  Francis: How, how often do you kind of play lean into that mixing ingredients from two different traditions?
• 44:40
  Chaz: Well, that's, I mean, that's kind of the whole deal.
• 44:42
  Chaz: You know, the collard greens, they've been on the menu since day one, so is the tiramisu.
• 44:47
  Chaz: so collard greens, that's like one of the most traditional southern dishes you can think of.
• 44:51
  Chaz: Um, you know, like my grandmother almost always had'em around the house, but instead of the smoked ham hawk or the bacon, you know, we use Panchetta.
• 45:01
  Chaz: And instead of Tabasco, which is Avery Island, Louisiana, right around the corner.
• 45:05
  Chaz: We use Calabrian chili.
• 45:07
  Chaz: but the collard greens come from the farm 25 minutes north.
• 45:10
  Chaz: So it's, you know, Italian in mindset, but Mississippi tradition, it.
• 45:15
  Mark: you know, you mentioned this before, but I, I, I wanna retouch on it.
• 45:19
  Mark: Do you think that a New Yorker, coming to Mississippi would be welcomed to open a restaurant the same way you were as a person who was originally from Mississippi, Mississippi, moved away and then home?
• 45:33
  Mark: Well, first and foremost,
• 45:34
  Chaz: Mississippi is the hospitality state.
• 45:36
  Chaz: So, you know, and we, uh, we, we kind of joke that our greatest export is talent.
• 45:42
  Chaz: Um, yeah.
• 45:43
  Chaz: And so anyone who's willing to come here and try something new and bring, you know, added value to our state is more than welcome.
• 45:51
  Chaz: there are a lot of people who are still kind of set in their ways and, and I worked for a guy here for a while who.
• 45:56
  Chaz: Who I really learned from that when, especially when I first moved back from New York, I, there were things that I just didn't understand why people didn't order'em or didn't like'em.
• 46:06
  Chaz: You've gotta, you've gotta ease people into things around here.
• 46:10
  Chaz: Um, and you know, new Yorkers are known to be a little abrasive, so they might need to take, uh, cotillion or something before they try that.
• 46:17
  Mark: It doesn't get better when you come to New Jersey.
• 46:19
  Mark: Just so you know.
• 46:19
  Mark: We, we, trust me,
• 46:21
  Chaz: I'm aware I got some good friends from my time up in New York from there, so.
• 46:24
  Chaz: Yeah,
• 46:25
  Francis: well, I could see how a lot of folks in a lot of different places that I've lived, and I know people in if, if.
• 46:32
  Francis: When, when you come and you bring, a real New York restaurant to someplace that hasn't had that before, there's a little bit of like, yeah, you're coming here to teach us how to eat.
• 46:41
  Francis: You know, that's kind of different than say you're an Italian person, bringing Italian restaurant somewhere.
• 46:46
  Francis: So I think you as a native son.
• 46:48
  Francis: I think that probably opened a lot of people's minds to say, let's, let's see what you have to bring us.
• 46:54
  Francis: 'cause they trust you,
• 46:55
  Chaz: right?
• 46:55
  Francis: Absolutely.
• 46:56
  Francis: not a carpet bagger is what comes to mind.
• 46:58
  Francis: Exactly.
• 46:58
  Chaz: Yeah.
• 46:59
  Chaz: We, uh, you know, we're starting, we're starting to get some of those outta Austin, all the Californians who moved to Austin that can't afford that or moving, moving east to us now, you know, so we're starting to see a little bit of it, but I think with, with the.
• 47:12
  Chaz: The way Jackson is right now.
• 47:14
  Chaz: I mean, our downtown is, is, is desolate.
• 47:16
  Chaz: I think anyone who's willing to come here and make an investment, you know, we will welcome them with open arms.
• 47:22
  Francis: So you opened a bar as well across the street.
• 47:25
  Francis: What's the story behind that?
• 47:26
  Chaz: Yeah, it's, it's called Rowans.
• 47:28
  Chaz: Um, and our tagline is Good food, cold beer.
• 47:31
  Chaz: I also like to say family friendly during the day, a little loose at night.
• 47:35
  Chaz: we opened it as a dive ish bar.
• 47:37
  Chaz: So we do a, a cast iron burger.
• 47:40
  Chaz: we do a fried bologna sandwich, you know, which is a big deal down here in the south.
• 47:45
  Chaz: Hold on.
• 47:45
  Chaz: Do you make it a Mortadella sandwich?
• 47:47
  Mark: cause that would
• 47:47
  Chaz: Okay.
• 47:48
  Chaz: In total.
• 47:48
  Chaz: Hilarious.
• 47:49
  Chaz: In total.
• 47:49
  Chaz: Uh, I was gonna do that initially, but I, but I was like, I don't know.
• 47:53
  Chaz: Probably some more della's a little bit up there.
• 47:55
  Chaz: Yeah.
• 47:56
  Chaz: And then we're, then we're back to the whole education process.
• 48:00
  Chaz: Um, I've got, I'm getting really good baloney from a place in Atlanta called Flippers.
• 48:05
  Chaz: They also do a quarter pound, uh, all beef hotdog and we call it the ripper's ripper.
• 48:10
  Chaz: do you fry it?
• 48:10
  Chaz: Oh yeah, yeah.
• 48:11
  Chaz: There you go.
• 48:12
  Chaz: Oh,
• 48:12
  Francis: flipper's ripper.
• 48:13
  Francis: I like it.
• 48:13
  Francis: The one influence I have from
• 48:15
  Chaz: my time up there is, uh, we do everything on Martin's potato buns.
• 48:20
  Chaz: Oh yeah.
• 48:20
  Chaz: Great.
• 48:20
  Chaz: So we're the only people around here who do that.
• 48:23
  Chaz: you know, it's blue plates during the week for lunch.
• 48:26
  Chaz: And then, kind of as a nod to my time in El Paso, our brunch menu is pretty.
• 48:31
  Chaz: Pretty Mexican heavy.
• 48:32
  Chaz: So we do pozole, vos, rancheros, chili chiles.
• 48:35
  Chaz: We do tos with everything.
• 48:37
  Chaz: Um, I'm actually doing carnitas for.
• 48:40
  Chaz: The mayoral, uh, inauguration tonight.
• 48:43
  Francis: Nice.
• 48:43
  Francis: That's great.
• 48:44
  Francis: I found, I found one more thing that I, I need to address.
• 48:47
  Francis: I found in, in reading about your place, that you have things like a Negroni on your menu there, but you also have a, a NASCAR spritz.
• 48:53
  Francis: Yes, sir.
• 48:54
  Francis: You need to explain a nascar, you need to explain yourself with that nascar.
• 48:57
  Francis: Okay.
• 48:58
  Chaz: So, um, I guess it's like traditionally a spaghetti.
• 49:01
  Chaz: you know, we have a Fiero Pizza oven in Polito that we nicknamed the nascar because you can do everything really quickly in it.
• 49:09
  Chaz: You know, it burns at about 700 degrees and I, I can't remember who came up with that nickname, but I think it was my fir opening sous chef nicknamed it the nascar.
• 49:18
  Chaz: And so we do family meal every day.
• 49:22
  Chaz: And, um, if we were really in the weeds, I would keep like curly fries and jalapeno poppers and mozzarella sticks in the freezer.
• 49:29
  Chaz: We'd throw'em all in the fryer, throw'em onto a sheet tray, cover'em in cherry peppers and shredded mozzarella, and then throw'em in the NASCAR for a minute, just to get all that melted and then cover it in ranch dressing.
• 49:39
  Chaz: And so that we call those disco fries up here.
• 49:42
  Chaz: So yeah, so we, we call that NASCAR family meal, which is now on the menu at the dive bar across the street.
• 49:48
  Chaz: Um, and my buddy Will, who's the head brewer at the, the brewery in the building that we're located in, he was like, you should call it a NASCAR spritz.
• 49:57
  Chaz: I don't know why, but it's just stuck and we sell a bunch of'em.
• 50:01
  Chaz: It's, uh, Miller High Life.
• 50:02
  Chaz: You dump two ounces out, you fill it with half an ounce of lemon juice and an ounce and a half Aperol.
• 50:08
  Chaz: And, uh, that's the NASCAR spritz.
• 50:10
  Francis: Well, I love the idea in principle.
• 50:12
  Francis: I'm not gonna try it, and until, until I can tell you try until, come you until now, until I come visit you and can have it done by the expert.
• 50:19
  Francis: I'm not trying that on my own.
• 50:20
  Francis: So
• 50:20
  Mark: I, I have to tell you one of the things I, I, and again, that intrigued us and, and why one of the reasons we wanted to this show is Francis and I really enjoy people tying together a, a global perspective with local cuisine.
• 50:36
  Mark: Mm-hmm.
• 50:37
  Mark: It, it's just a, it.
• 50:38
  Mark: It is a great evolution in the culinary world, where we're getting to see these things happen in places like Jackson, Mississippi and, and we're really enjoying it as well.
• 50:50
  Mark: And, and I promise you, if I'm within 75 miles of you, you will see me.
• 50:55
  Mark: You gotta make the trip.
• 50:56
  Mark: Yeah.
• 50:57
  Chaz: Well, I mean, speaking of that, I was, I was super fortunate.
• 51:00
  Chaz: you know, my parents, they, they travel, they don't vacation.
• 51:03
  Chaz: Um, and so.
• 51:06
  Chaz: we grew up going all over the place and all over the world and it was always, it was always food focused.
• 51:10
  Chaz: When we traveled, it was like, where are we gonna eat?
• 51:13
  Chaz: You know, I remember before like Eater or Yelp or, you know, you could just get on your phone and find a place.
• 51:18
  Chaz: They had this book, it was like, I think it was called Eat Your Way Across the USA, um, I don't know.
• 51:23
  Chaz: And mom and dad that was always in the center console for road trips.
• 51:27
  Chaz: you know, in high school I was part of a French exchange program in southwestern France, So I was super lucky that my parents just like encouraged me to travel and go do these things, and I, and I picked up a lot and learned a lot from that.
• 51:40
  Chaz: And, you know, there's a lot of people who don't have that opportunity here in Jackson or are just, complacent with, doing what they are, are used to.
• 51:50
  Chaz: And so, you know, I thought it was important to bring, fresh perspective in a more worldly perspective on how to, how to dine and, and eat.
• 51:59
  Mark: Well, I, I like that you kept your hometown perspective though at the same time, kind of the amalgam of those two things is, is making food exciting again, across the country.
• 52:08
  Mark: I'd be out of business if I didn't.
• 52:12
  Francis: We are happy you're not Chaz, Lindsay, everybody.
• 52:14
  Francis: His, restaurant is called pto Austria in Jackson, Mississippi.
• 52:17
  Francis: He's also got Rowans, and if you're within striking distance, you should definitely hit it.
• 52:20
  Francis: Thanks for, thanks for joining us today,
• 52:23
  Chaz: gentlemen.
• 52:23
  Chaz: It was a pleasure.
• 52:24
  Chaz: Thank you
• 52:25
  Francis: Pleasures all.
• 52:25
  Francis: Thanks very much Chas.
• 52:49
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Well, it's a pretty interesting story.
• 52:51
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: I don't know much about Jackson, Mississippi.
• 52:53
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: I don't know much about Mississippi.
• 52:55
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: I've only been once, so I've never been.
• 52:57
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: You know, that's part of what restaurant guys are supposed to do, right?
• 52:59
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: We're supposed to bring you stuff from places that, that you haven't necessarily been, We talked about his Caesar salad and how he does it a little differently.
• 53:07
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Do you remember the first stage left menu?
• 53:11
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: 1992 Had a Caesar salad on it.
• 53:15
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: That is still my favorite way to eat Caesar salad in the world.
• 53:19
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: I don't remember what that iteration of the Caesar salad was.
• 53:21
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Okay.
• 53:22
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: And I, and I still do it to this day, Kalari, the fried calamari salad calamari instead of croutons.
• 53:26
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: And what you do is you do fried calamari in there instead of croutons.
• 53:31
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: And the flavor of the anchovy and the flavor in the calamari, and you get all that crisp that you get from a crouton, but instead of just being a piece of bread, it's this flavor burst in the middle of your Caesar salad.
• 53:44
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Still my favorite way to have a Caesar salad.
• 53:46
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Not crazy about it.
• 53:47
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: You're nuts.
• 53:48
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Oh, I'm not crazy about it.
• 53:49
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: I'm, you're nuts.
• 53:49
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: A big, I'm a fan of a tra, as you know, and you are a fan of my Caesar salad as well.
• 53:53
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: I love your Caesar salad.
• 53:54
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: I, I would love your Caesar salad more.
• 53:56
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: If I had fried calamari with it, cretin.
• 53:58
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Um, if you would like my Caesar salad recipe, you can email us at the guys@restaurantguyspodcast.com and I will send you my Caesar salad recipe.
• 54:09
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: The key is it's a ton of garlic, it's a ton of anchovies, which doesn't taste fishy as long as you put enough garlic and mustard in there.
• 54:14
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Wor shirts.
• 54:15
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: It's classic, but it's, it's like turned up to an 11.
• 54:18
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: And if you wanna ruin it with some fried calamari, go right ahead.
• 54:21
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: It's your salad.
• 54:22
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: If you would like my recipe for fried calamari Caesar salad.
• 54:25
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Just come into the restaurants, order fried calamari, order Caesar salad and mix'em, and it's spectacular.
• 54:30
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Or I'm having it for lunch today.
• 54:31
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: All right.
• 54:32
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: I'm having that for lunch today.
• 54:33
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: All right, well, I'm gonna go and have something other than Caesar salad for lunch.
• 54:36
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: Hope you have enjoyed the time with us.
• 54:39
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: I'm Francis Shot.
• 54:39
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: And I'm Mark Pascal.
• 54:40
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: We're the restaurant guys.
• 54:41
  the-restaurant-guys_2_07-01-2025_133443: You can always find out more@restaurantguyspodcast.com.