Latest / Chef's PSA Podcast / Rogelio Garcia’s Culinary Journey—Guest Chef Tips, Napa Valley & Pebble Beach Ep. 150

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Rogelio Garcia’s Culinary Journey—Guest Chef Tips, Napa Valley & Pebble Beach Ep. 150 · Chef's PSA Podcast

• 0:00
  Hello chefs, this is Chefs PSA. I'm your host Andre Natera.
• 0:02
  Today's episode I have my friend and one of my favorite chefs,
• 0:06
  Rogelio Garcia from the Michelin starred restaurant Oro in the
• 0:09
  Napa Valley. He was recently in Austin, TX to
• 0:12
  do a dinner and we got to catch up.
• 0:14
  We're going to talk about everything from guest chef
• 0:16
  dinners to his cookbook, how to create your own identity as a
• 0:20
  chef, which is something I think that's very important right now.
• 0:23
  How he works in his kitchen and what he would do if he wasn't a
• 0:27
  chef. I think you'll enjoy this one.
• 0:28
  Stay tuned. This episode of Chefs PSA is
• 0:43
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  mention Chef's PSA to get free shipping plus a sample box on
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  your first order. Chef, good to have you back,
• 1:23
  man. It's good to see you.
• 1:25
  Thanks for having me. You're doing the whirlwind tour.
• 1:27
  So you were at Pebble Beach last weekend.
• 1:29
  I was, yeah. Pebble Beach, 2025, Yeah.
• 1:31
  Who's there? Everybody, man, a lot of
• 1:33
  friends, a lot of colleagues, a lot of support.
• 1:36
  It was super, super amazing to be part of it, and the weather
• 1:39
  was incredible. Yeah.
• 1:40
  I actually went golfing for the second time in my life.
• 1:44
  Really. Yeah.
• 1:45
  Yeah. How did you do?
• 1:47
  I did. All right.
• 1:48
  You know I did. I did all right.
• 1:50
  Yeah, you don't play golf ball every weekend.
• 1:51
  No, we, I go to that event, I've probably been going to that
• 1:58
  event for close to 20 years now. Really.
• 2:00
  I mean, I'm sorry, 10 years, 10 years.
• 2:02
  Wow. I think my first list was 2015.
• 2:04
  Yeah. And then obviously, you know,
• 2:06
  three years of 3-4 years that they, because of the pandemic,
• 2:10
  that, you know, they didn't host it.
• 2:12
  And I've never golfed there. And I've, you know, heard how
• 2:15
  amazing the golf courses are there.
• 2:18
  And we did it and it was incredible.
• 2:21
  Yeah. It's pretty cool.
• 2:22
  No, it's, it's, it's, I mean, it's, it's, it's a sport, man.
• 2:26
  You know, the people that, you know, think it's not it.
• 2:29
  It truly is. Yeah.
• 2:30
  You got to know what you do. There's a skill.
• 2:31
  There's a skill to it. And, you know, we met this cute
• 2:36
  couple from Atlanta who were kind of showing us the ropes,
• 2:40
  and then we invited them back to one of the events we were doing.
• 2:44
  Yeah. But amazing, amazing people out
• 2:47
  there. Good, great friends.
• 2:49
  And you know what's the? Setup.
• 2:51
  How many days is it and what are the different events that you're
• 2:53
  you're participating? In so week, we went in on
• 2:55
  Thursday, which is opening night and they do little bites.
• 2:59
  I wasn't part of that, but you're able to go as a chef and,
• 3:02
  and just, you know, kind of walk, walk through the, the
• 3:04
  venue. Just a food grazer.
• 3:06
  Chef's little booths. Right, so opening a nice quite
• 3:09
  kind of a big deal. Friday we did our event.
• 3:12
  So it was kind of the same thing Canape kind of walk around and
• 3:19
  then and then we did a dinner the next day called Buen
• 3:22
  Provecho. So kind of celebrating Latin
• 3:24
  America flavors. And it was, it was amazing, man.
• 3:29
  It was, it was Gilberto Setina from LA.
• 3:34
  He got a star last year, a whole box.
• 3:37
  Diego Lamar. So he does all of Gaston's
• 3:42
  restaurants kind of open, you know, all the way through the
• 3:46
  years. And he lives in Miami.
• 3:48
  And then Mario, he's come from Panama City.
• 3:53
  So incredible dinner, amazing, amazing chefs in their, you
• 3:57
  know, in their own craft. Yeah, what'd you?
• 3:59
  Do I did? I did squab and moling.
• 4:03
  Yeah, OK. And then I did a small canape
• 4:06
  bite with Mexican chocolate and caviar.
• 4:08
  Nice. So what was was the food that
• 4:12
  you were preparing based off the book or was it more based off
• 4:14
  the restaurant? You know, I think it's a little
• 4:16
  bit of both. So the moling I was from the
• 4:18
  book, chocolate from the book Squab a little bit more of a
• 4:21
  kind of fine dining, obviously from, you know, California.
• 4:25
  But we I think right now it's kind of blends both.
• 4:29
  But everybody got a copy of the cookbook, which is super
• 4:32
  exciting and it was so cool to cook with them.
• 4:37
  Obviously you know you're going to a kitchen and you feel that
• 4:41
  excitement. That rush and be able to connect
• 4:44
  with these guys was pretty cool. I'm a huge fan of them so.
• 4:48
  Me too. I was looking at, I was looking
• 4:50
  at all the photos like these are like my friends and people that
• 4:52
  I'd like to be friends with. But the food looked great.
• 4:56
  What is what are you doing in Austin?
• 4:59
  So you're doing at dinner, which I'm going to be at.
• 5:00
  I know what you're doing in Austin with like, so you're
• 5:03
  doing this tour, right? So you're, you're, you got the
• 5:05
  books. You're, you're cooking across
• 5:07
  the country. What are you doing?
• 5:08
  Yeah, so tomorrow night we're doing a dinner at Garrison at
• 5:11
  the Fairmont in Austin with Chef Gill and Chef John.
• 5:18
  Stomping grounds, yeah. Yeah, man, that's an amazing
• 5:21
  kitchen. Yeah.
• 5:23
  I'm telling people like that is probably people can often ask me
• 5:27
  like, why'd you retire? It's like I had a hard time
• 5:28
  going to another kitchen after that one.
• 5:31
  That kitchen had everything is like it's a once in a lifetime
• 5:34
  build. Everything's new.
• 5:35
  Well, I don't know about now, but perfect equipment, beautiful
• 5:40
  setup. It's like a ton of staff.
• 5:42
  Perfect equipment, The amount of equipment, the amount of China
• 5:45
  the staff did. You see their China room?
• 5:47
  I saw the China. I mean, I don't know how many
• 5:50
  floors I walked through and and saw the China.
• 5:52
  So it was pretty cool to see that staff was incredible.
• 5:55
  You know, the team, they have a they have a strong team and was
• 5:59
  just super excited to cook tomorrow night.
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  So be there and and you know, be in Austin, great weather here.
• 6:06
  And, you know, the dinner is, again, out of the cookbook.
• 6:10
  I mean, it's a collaboration dinner with, you know, Chef John
• 6:13
  and myself. You know, he spent a bit of time
• 6:15
  in San Francisco. Did.
• 6:17
  You guys cross paths there? We did not, No, no, no.
• 6:19
  He was in San Francisco. I think I was in Napa at the
• 6:22
  time. And then when I eventually went
• 6:24
  to San Francisco, he had already came to, I think he was in
• 6:27
  Austin already. And so, yeah.
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  So it's a collaboration dinner. Super excited for all the
• 6:33
  guests. I'm excited.
• 6:34
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm excited to to try the food.
• 6:37
  Where else have you? Where else have you gone and
• 6:38
  where else are you going to? So I'll do something to tell it
• 6:42
  right the end of the year, a couple, you know, we have like
• 6:46
  10 libraries that I'm going to be doing a small bite talking
• 6:48
  to, you know, kids, schools thing like that man back back
• 6:54
  home. And then just kind of things
• 6:56
  come out, come up. And so I'll either take them or,
• 6:59
  you know, try to push them back a little bit, but I kind of
• 7:02
  never say no. So I want to I want to take
• 7:04
  advantage of of everything that comes so.
• 7:06
  Yeah, no, the the I'm, I'm really looking forward to it.
• 7:09
  I'm, I'm really happy that you're back, man.
• 7:11
  I tell everyone when they go to Napa's like you got to meet
• 7:13
  Rogelio the greatest, so I'm I could.
• 7:16
  And your book's awesome. Thank you man.
• 7:18
  Thank you. Yeah.
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  I mean, when you were here last time, I really had time to
• 7:22
  digest the book. Yeah.
• 7:24
  Yeah. Yeah.
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  I was like, that's great. Yeah.
• 7:26
  Yeah. The food is beautiful.
• 7:27
  The photos are beautiful. People should go get it.
• 7:30
  Yeah. Where can they get it by the
• 7:31
  way? Chevro Helio garcia.com so
• 7:34
  there's a link there to buy the book and you know, order there
• 7:38
  and you know, ship so. Yeah.
• 7:40
  Awesome. Yeah.
• 7:41
  No, it's a, it's a beautiful book.
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  Everyone should have one. Are you doing are you doing a
• 7:43
  book signing at at dinner tomorrow?
• 7:46
  Yeah. Well, yeah, I have.
• 7:47
  Everybody's going to get a book tomorrow night, OK, So sign book
• 7:50
  there. And so, yeah.
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  And it's going to be fun. It's going to be a.
• 7:53
  Lot of fun this episode will come out after the dinner, but
• 7:55
  yeah, go go meet Chef Rogelio. Yeah, unfortunately it comes out
• 7:59
  after, after the dinner is going to be done.
• 8:02
  I also saw that you maybe with the most recent Michelin, you
• 8:05
  guys had dinner up in Napa, up at the French Laundry.
• 8:08
  We did all the all the big dogs at the table.
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  Who did I see? I saw, I saw like Phil Tessier
• 8:14
  there, right in Bradley yourself.
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  Yeah, Yeah. Thomas.
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  Yeah. Who is there?
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  Yeah, So William, William Bradley, Phil.
• 8:22
  Phil Tessier Valcontu. Yeah, he's he's a good friend,
• 8:26
  man. Yeah.
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  I love Val. You know, I remember a store
• 8:30
  about vow is that I was, I had just moved to San Francisco.
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  And at the restaurant I was working at the time, we were
• 8:36
  hosting dinners, you know, like chef dinners.
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  And so I would host everyone dinner every day of the month.
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  And we would have a theme of an ingredient.
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  So we'd do peas, caviar, truffles, stuff like that.
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  And he came, I think we did, I think we did beans and he was,
• 8:53
  he's so super nice. He's just, I didn't know him and
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  I just said, hey, I'm going to, I'm going to see if he can come.
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  And he came and we did a dinner and I was super excited to meet
• 8:59
  him. And I'll never forget that he
• 9:01
  did me, he did me good man. And ever since then we we got
• 9:04
  along and he's invited me to dinners and things.
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  Like that, he got two stars. He's got two stars.
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  Yeah. Californios amazing.
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  And yeah. So we we had dinner and what?
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  Can you say what's sat at that table?
• 9:17
  It's like the Illuminati. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 9:19
  Well, I mean, yeah, no, I mean, it was, it was conversation,
• 9:23
  actually, it was about cookbooks.
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  Yeah, most, most of it, yeah, cookbooks.
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  And you know, what was your your favorite cookbooks?
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  I think mostly everybody had a cookbook and you know what it
• 9:32
  takes to get one and you know the amount of time.
• 9:35
  I mean, Thomas's books are incredible.
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  Like the whole set. Like the French Laundry changed
• 9:40
  the game. The new, the new one, per SE.
• 9:42
  French Laundry also great, right?
• 9:45
  It's a Bouchon book. I mean, all all his books were
• 9:47
  great. Your books great but Phil has
• 9:49
  the chasing book Coos book which is also people don't know about
• 9:52
  that but that's a great book. It's incredible.
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  Yeah, I'm trying. To think, who else had a book
• 9:55
  there? You know, I think anybody,
• 9:57
  anybody that that has a book, I mean, they say there's three,
• 10:00
  three things you got to do for, for you leave, right.
• 10:02
  It's like write a book, have a sun and plant a tree.
• 10:07
  OK. Because those those three things
• 10:09
  will outlive you, right? So and so I have a son, have a
• 10:14
  book and I, I had to plant a tree, but you know, yeah.
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  I planted. I planted a tree.
• 10:19
  I I have. I have books.
• 10:20
  You have books too. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 10:22
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like writing.
• 10:24
  I was writing a cookbook. I was writing a cookbook and we
• 10:28
  had all the photography done. I had all the recipes done and
• 10:31
  then I left the job. So like that project was
• 10:33
  shelved. It's, it's one of those that
• 10:35
  it's like one of the regrets I have cause the cookbook would
• 10:38
  have been nice. Yeah, yeah, the cookbook would
• 10:40
  have and and you know everyone, every chef wants.
• 10:42
  Oh, I, I can relate, man. I mean, there were so many times
• 10:44
  that I want to call it quits, you know, because you do spend a
• 10:48
  lot of time and you don't really know if it's going to come to
• 10:51
  fruition, to be honest. You know, a lot of time, money
• 10:54
  and effort. And but yeah, it, it was, it,
• 10:59
  it's I, I wanted, we wanted to scratch it.
• 11:02
  You know, we couldn't find either an agent, we couldn't
• 11:04
  find a publisher. And, you know, trying to put all
• 11:09
  those, you know, all the information together was, was,
• 11:11
  was a lot of work. But the minute we did sign with
• 11:15
  the publisher and they inserted all the photography, what's
• 11:17
  incredible, I was it, it, it, it came more real in that moment.
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  And I'm so happy. I, I, I stuck with it.
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  Super, super happy man. I want to go back to Pebble
• 11:30
  Beach, you know, doing the dinner tomorrow and kind of the
• 11:33
  circuit. Yeah, a lot of chefs are on the
• 11:35
  circuit right now. You're you're heavy on the on
• 11:37
  the chef's circuit, right. Doing the guest chef dinners.
• 11:42
  What is what are some things that like make you say damn it.
• 11:46
  And it's like this, this one's not going to be fun.
• 11:48
  And other ones like these guys set me up like what are some of
• 11:51
  the do's and don'ts for chefs that are listening that are
• 11:53
  thinking about inviting you to dinner?
• 11:55
  Like like what? What makes it What makes a guest
• 11:59
  chef dinner smooth and what makes it not smooth?
• 12:02
  Well, I think, I think they're all been pretty smooth.
• 12:06
  I think it's the, the prep, right?
• 12:07
  I mean, that's, that's the one thing for me is that.
• 12:10
  You prep there and ship it? Or do you prep on property?
• 12:12
  No, I'd prep it on property. I try to ship some stuff if it's
• 12:15
  going to be a big dinner, but for the most part I just send
• 12:18
  recipes and they either get all the mies and plots or start some
• 12:22
  of the easy recipes. But there's always questions,
• 12:24
  right? But I think, you know, sending
• 12:28
  recipes has help prep list just as much detail as possible.
• 12:32
  I mean, remember, you know, you're working with a new team
• 12:34
  and and they've never met you until you get there.
• 12:37
  So they get this kind of, you know, list ahead of time, but.
• 12:42
  Do you have a formula like certain dishes?
• 12:47
  You know, like this one always works.
• 12:49
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm starting to.
• 12:51
  I'm starting to, I think at the beginning, you know, when I was
• 12:55
  doing the dinners, I was like, ah, that was too complicated.
• 12:57
  Maybe I should, you know, keep it more simple.
• 12:58
  Maybe, you know, and at the end it's, it's kind of giving an
• 13:01
  experience to the guest and, and they're there to, you know,
• 13:05
  either have a book, you know, get a book, meet me, you know,
• 13:08
  support the restaurant that I'm cooking that.
• 13:10
  And so yes, it's about the obviously the food and, and have
• 13:14
  a good time, but we still have to execute it, right.
• 13:16
  So it has to be thought out and and you know, has.
• 13:19
  It ever gone bad? No, never, not even once.
• 13:23
  No, no, I mean, I mean there's the mistakes that, you know,
• 13:25
  that that happened in in the back that, you know, we don't
• 13:28
  even want to talk about. But no, I think for the most
• 13:31
  part, it's been, it's been great, you know, and, and to be
• 13:33
  honest, the guests are very supportive, very, very nice.
• 13:38
  And and the staff. I, I think as a cook for me, I,
• 13:41
  I, I remember I did this when I was working at Cyrus.
• 13:44
  We did when, when the, you know, the tsunami in Japan happened.
• 13:51
  So, you know, chef Doug, you know, he owns, he owns Cyrus.
• 13:55
  He, he brought, we did a collaboration dinner and brought
• 13:58
  Douglas King and he brought chefs from, I think he brought
• 14:02
  Corey Lee, David Kinch from Andreese at the time and
• 14:06
  somebody else. But that was the first
• 14:08
  collaboration dinner that I, you know, that I was part of and I
• 14:13
  was super excited as a cook, right, to, to meet other chefs
• 14:17
  that I wanted to work 4/2. And so I can imagine, you know,
• 14:22
  this is, you know, everybody's like, oh, I want to, I, I get to
• 14:25
  see a different type of cuisine. You know, I get to meet somebody
• 14:28
  new. It's not your normal day-to-day.
• 14:32
  We're prepping, we're talking, we're having a great time.
• 14:36
  They're asking me questions, I'm asking them.
• 14:38
  So it's, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's that camaraderie and,
• 14:40
  and, and, and then we go into service and, and they're excited
• 14:44
  that, you know, play some different and things like that.
• 14:47
  So for me, it was exciting to do that as a, as a, as a young
• 14:49
  cook. And I'm sure it's exciting for
• 14:51
  them. So I'm, I'm, I'm just glad that
• 14:53
  every kitchen I stepped into, everybody's excited.
• 14:56
  You know, Gabe, Gabe and I were talking about these dinners
• 15:00
  because sometimes, like, the chaos is like people doing shit
• 15:06
  for the first time. Like, like, you know, chefs.
• 15:08
  I was like, I want to impress the other.
• 15:10
  Chefs under there. Yeah, yeah.
• 15:11
  Yeah, they're, they're, they're showing up having never done the
• 15:13
  dish. Before Oh my God.
• 15:14
  And it's like you don't even know if it works.
• 15:16
  That was that was. I'm not gonna be honest, man.
• 15:18
  That was me when I first started as a chef.
• 15:21
  Yeah, My first chef job. I wanted to just.
• 15:24
  Yeah. I mean, and and you know, you're
• 15:25
  young. You.
• 15:26
  Yeah. You wanna?
• 15:27
  You wanna you wanna? The S on, yeah, yeah, you know.
• 15:29
  Yeah, and everybody's looking at you like, you know.
• 15:31
  Do you deserve to be here? Yeah, exactly.
• 15:33
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, yeah, that was definitely me
• 15:36
  and and I want to do that. You know, at the end of the day,
• 15:39
  it just comes with confidence. You're like, you know, not, not
• 15:42
  that you don't care or you're not going to try it, but I think
• 15:46
  it's, I think it's about networking, meeting people and,
• 15:49
  and having a great time. And but also, you know, if you
• 15:52
  can, you know, do do an amazing dish, it's obviously you know.
• 15:56
  So there's two types of guest chefs when you're doing the
• 15:58
  dinner, right? And then when you're doing a
• 16:01
  food grazer where everyone's just getting a little bite
• 16:03
  right, big, big festival and everyone's just just taking a
• 16:06
  little, a little canopy or whatever.
• 16:09
  Do you have a a different strategy when you're doing?
• 16:12
  The bites, yeah, when, when I'm doing the bites, I usually do
• 16:16
  something out of the cookbook. And so it's usually two to
• 16:20
  three, you know, bites. And it depends on the setup.
• 16:25
  You know, sometimes you can't really cook outside, can't have
• 16:28
  a anything hot, things like that.
• 16:31
  And then we're actually doing the dinner.
• 16:33
  You kind of want, you know, you want to, you want to kind of
• 16:35
  show off a little bit, you know, specifically like if you're
• 16:37
  doing a tasting menu depends on the city.
• 16:41
  Like every time I come to Austin, you know, we did, we did
• 16:43
  a dinner, I'm sorry, it's Texas, but we did a dinner last month
• 16:46
  in Houston with Aaron and we're using some of the BBQ grills
• 16:50
  there. So maybe take something from the
• 16:52
  city that that you're at. So a little bit of inspiration.
• 16:54
  It's it's always good. Yeah, it's funny, I do.
• 16:58
  I haven't done a food grazer event in like 2 1/2 years.
• 17:01
  I think the last one I did, I was, I was in the booth next to
• 17:05
  Aaron, all right, So Aaron's next to me and I was in the VIP
• 17:10
  section where people, so they're saying like you're not going to
• 17:12
  do more than 250. You know, there's 800 out there,
• 17:14
  but you guys are VIP, you do 250.
• 17:17
  And I don't remember what I was doing.
• 17:18
  I was doing a like a grilled cucumber with something right?
• 17:25
  And I ran out of cucumber and there was more people like I had
• 17:29
  I had counted my cucumbers and you always want to run out
• 17:31
  anyway, like you don't want to take anything back.
• 17:35
  But I had run out and my assistant was like I had two
• 17:40
  assistants that they give you, you know, sometimes you go to
• 17:42
  these events, they're like, here's a student and here's
• 17:43
  someone else volunteer, right? And I had run out and I'm like,
• 17:47
  what am I going to do? And the one of my one of my
• 17:51
  friends that's a chef, he's like, have some of my, I had
• 17:54
  some meat. He's just slicing.
• 17:56
  Like I had so much like just take some meat, just serve the
• 17:58
  same sauce, whatever. And so in the middle of running
• 18:01
  out, I switched. I was like, what would you like
• 18:03
  to, you know, the cucumber? Would you like some meat?
• 18:05
  And they're like, what are you, you know, the guests?
• 18:07
  Like, what should we get? I was like, get the meat.
• 18:08
  I'm like, yeah, yeah. And the people that were next to
• 18:11
  me and, and, and Aaron was watching too.
• 18:14
  And, and the, the, the guys were like, that was so slick.
• 18:17
  Yeah, like you made it look like.
• 18:18
  I was like, I've, I just sometimes you just got to like
• 18:22
  lean into it. Right.
• 18:23
  Yeah, yeah. I mean, I mean, that's always,
• 18:25
  that's always scary, man, Like running out of food.
• 18:28
  Yeah. And it was early.
• 18:29
  Yeah, it was like an hour and a half and I'm already out.
• 18:32
  Well, you don't know. I mean, if you do a good dish,
• 18:34
  it's almost, Yeah, it's almost, it's almost not that good
• 18:38
  because you start running out because there's no, there's no
• 18:40
  limit, right? So somebody can come back four
• 18:41
  or five times. And I mean, we served brisket
• 18:44
  tacos at Pebble Beach and you know, it was supposed to be I
• 18:47
  think three 350 and we probably did 450 to 500 tortillas and
• 18:52
  did. You run out.
• 18:54
  Pretty much, yeah. Yeah.
• 18:55
  So we were just doing brisket. I mean nobody, nobody, everyone
• 18:58
  said it. Happened.
• 18:59
  And then you say, sorry, yeah, I used to position myself next to,
• 19:03
  like, the most popular booth. Yeah.
• 19:05
  So yeah, like if they allowed me to pick where I was going to be,
• 19:07
  like, put me next to like, Aaron Franklin or something.
• 19:10
  So I know he's going to have a long line now.
• 19:11
  Yeah. I mean, it's, it's it's it's
• 19:13
  it's those events are are pretty cool.
• 19:18
  Yeah. I always, always love doing
• 19:20
  them. You, you always finish a little
• 19:21
  bit. You leave the students and I'm
• 19:22
  gonna go walk around. Walk.
• 19:24
  Around. You guys clean up?
• 19:26
  Yeah. I would say, you know, you guys
• 19:29
  are gonna work and I'm gonna network.
• 19:30
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I always, I used to have to do a
• 19:33
  chef's PSA. It was like the the, the price
• 19:36
  you paid to get to go to the food event.
• 19:37
  Yeah, you got to clean up. Yeah, you got to clean.
• 19:39
  Up for the chef I know like. Sorry, I you get to go, you get
• 19:42
  to hang out with, you get to network, you get to become like
• 19:45
  you're in the inner circle now. You get to network, meet all
• 19:47
  these chefs that you never do, but you got to clear.
• 19:49
  And you got, you should come. You should come one year, man.
• 19:52
  So Pebble Beach, if you're listening, invite me.
• 19:54
  Yes, please. You should.
• 19:58
  The amount of chefs that are there that I think you would
• 20:03
  enjoy, I mean, I'm sure you know most of them, but the other side
• 20:07
  that you don't, Oh, man, it would be pretty cool, yeah.
• 20:09
  It would be. Fun.
• 20:10
  I, I went to last month, I was at Tucson, I did an event in, in
• 20:15
  Tucson for the cookbook. So this was not, you know, it
• 20:19
  wasn't chef related per SE. You know, there was the booth
• 20:23
  that I was at that I did a demo was all cookbooks, so it was
• 20:29
  probably 6. I think Kevin's from Tucson.
• 20:33
  Is he really? Yeah, you were.
• 20:34
  You were just saying earlier. I did.
• 20:36
  Yeah. You met him out there?
• 20:37
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Kevin Fink, I think, I know he's
• 20:39
  from Arizona. I think he's from Tucson.
• 20:41
  Oh cool. Yeah, he's got some of that.
• 20:42
  Like you see some of that Sonoran influence food.
• 20:45
  That's where he gets from. I'm, I'm, I'm thinking I might
• 20:47
  be wrong. Kevin, if I'm wrong, sorry.
• 20:49
  Yeah, sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt.
• 20:50
  No, no, no, we. So we, we did an event out of
• 20:53
  the cookbook. So it was an author event.
• 20:54
  So that was the second one that I've done.
• 20:57
  And there was a booth of somebody doing a podcast.
• 21:02
  Oh really? Yeah.
• 21:02
  So there was, there was, there was a booth and, you know, he
• 21:05
  just kept going. So every time I pass by, he had
• 21:07
  somebody else doing, you know, somebody different doing a
• 21:10
  podcast. There was, you know, a band
• 21:12
  singing and then there was a culinary stage.
• 21:14
  So there was I I did it, it was a 2 day event.
• 21:18
  And so I did one of the demos for about an hour and a half.
• 21:21
  So, but I got to tell you, man, like doing those author events,
• 21:26
  it's a different demographic than what I'm used to.
• 21:28
  You know, usually you go, well, you usually go to Pebble Beach
• 21:31
  and dinners and stuff. And it's all chefs, foodie stuff
• 21:33
  like that. And this is more of an author,
• 21:37
  writer, journalist kind of take on it.
• 21:41
  And so I'm, I'm at the tables, you know, with the marine
• 21:44
  biologist, you know, medical doctor, there's this, you know,
• 21:50
  a gentleman that was awarded for 30 years in jail and he's got a
• 21:53
  cookbook about jail and you know what, what he went kind of went
• 21:57
  through. So all these.
• 22:00
  Different. Walks, different walks that I
• 22:01
  wouldn't be in the same room unless I would have had a book,
• 22:06
  right. So I think it's pretty cool.
• 22:08
  I think it's, yeah, it's it's, you know, because you started to
• 22:11
  have a conversation and now you have something to connect with.
• 22:15
  Otherwise I, you know, I, how would I met a warden unless I,
• 22:19
  you know, I wouldn't met a warden.
• 22:21
  So I. Mean.
• 22:22
  Yeah, right. Like who knows?
• 22:24
  A warden. Yeah, So it was, it was this,
• 22:28
  it's, it's been, it's been an amazing ride with the book, you
• 22:33
  know. It's introduced you to a lot of
• 22:35
  people. A.
• 22:35
  Lot of different, yeah, yeah. New cities travel, right?
• 22:39
  Would you say that before you wrote the book and after you
• 22:46
  wrote the book, it's like you have a different perspective on
• 22:52
  the business? Of like writing the books or
• 22:55
  just the industry? I could rephrase this a little
• 22:58
  bit. Like before you wrote the book,
• 23:01
  you were Chef Rogelio. After you wrote the book, you
• 23:04
  are still Chef Rogelio, but now there's a public persona
• 23:07
  attached. How much of that had to change
• 23:11
  or has it changed at all? Or have you felt any pressures
• 23:14
  of that of now being a public facing figure?
• 23:19
  No, I mean, I don't, I didn't even think about that, to be
• 23:22
  honest. I think, I think just, I guess
• 23:25
  all caught up in the book and the writing, the photography and
• 23:29
  what kind of meant to me to put it out.
• 23:31
  I've never actually like it's sometimes it's very hard to look
• 23:34
  at it from the outside in And but I do have to remind myself
• 23:39
  about, you know, what it means obviously to me, but for what it
• 23:44
  means to a lot of people. I mean, I get so many messages
• 23:46
  out of, you know, young Hispanic cooks for the most part, very,
• 23:51
  very excited, proud and, and such an inspiration, man, You
• 23:54
  know that for them, you know, that there's, there's an open
• 23:57
  door for them to do the same. And so I think it's, you know, I
• 24:03
  didn't realize what it would mean.
• 24:05
  I was just kind of going and, and, and saying, I want to write
• 24:08
  this book and, and, you know, the industry, you know, we kind
• 24:12
  of went through a lot in the pandemic.
• 24:14
  And I want to, I want to, you know, kind of showcase my
• 24:17
  recipes, you know, things that I grew up cooking, the
• 24:20
  photography, stuff like that. And all of a sudden, like this
• 24:22
  project became kind of a big deal for a lot of people.
• 24:25
  So I mean, I remember being a young cook and and looking at
• 24:33
  Enrique Alberta Pujo for the first time.
• 24:35
  If I ran that type of restaurant and I saw your book and
• 24:39
  Enrique's book, they, they would both be on my brainstorming book
• 24:44
  pile with tabs and markers and, you know, notes.
• 24:47
  I'd be stealing your your dish. Like what?
• 24:50
  How many ingredients in his mind?
• 24:51
  OK, take one out now. It's mine.
• 24:53
  Yeah. That's what we need.
• 24:57
  To do. But yeah, it's, it's a beautiful
• 24:59
  book and it I think it's, I think it's, it's, it's every
• 25:05
  chef should be having that book on the bookshelf.
• 25:08
  It's along with all those other great books in my.
• 25:10
  Thank you, man. Yeah.
• 25:11
  Appreciate it. It's on my, you know, I got my
• 25:13
  in my office, I have a lot of cookbooks, like a lot of chefs.
• 25:16
  But in my office I have a. Few cookbooks.
• 25:18
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 25:19
  So I got yours and then it's like cellar de con roca muga
• 25:24
  reitz like it, bokus like it's right there.
• 25:27
  So it. Takes.
• 25:28
  It takes a spot on the. Thank you, man.
• 25:30
  Appreciate it. Thank you The big dog shelf.
• 25:32
  Thank you, man. Thank you.
• 25:33
  Well, you know what it takes man, what you know, to to get a
• 25:35
  book and. It's different though, because
• 25:38
  I'm the, I'm the publisher, yeah, I'm the, I'm the one stop
• 25:41
  shop. So it's just different.
• 25:43
  But I would love to do a cookbook like yours that's like
• 25:51
  a beautiful coffee table book, right?
• 25:53
  It's just when I hear about the process like no, I don't know if
• 25:56
  I. Want to?
• 25:57
  Yeah. And you know, we, they they've
• 25:58
  always asked me that. Would you do another one?
• 26:01
  Yeah. Would you?
• 26:02
  I I think so, yeah. When I What would you do though?
• 26:05
  I don't know, I mean, there's so many ideas, you know, you know,
• 26:10
  maybe maybe something more fine dining or maybe more, more
• 26:13
  traditional, you know, I think, I think one of those.
• 26:17
  But yeah, I think I think I'll definitely do another one, but I
• 26:20
  don't know yet. I don't know.
• 26:21
  It is a it is a it takes a lot and you have to be in the mental
• 26:24
  state to do it right. And, and so, but, but I've met a
• 26:29
  lot of people and I'm thinking, wow, there's a lot more that I
• 26:34
  wish I would have known back then that I know now to be able
• 26:37
  to do it. Are there any cookbooks in
• 26:39
  particular that you have? You know, I talked about a
• 26:41
  couple that are on my shelf book.
• 26:42
  Like what are some of those books that you have on your
• 26:46
  shelf that's like your go to? Like, you know, I just need to
• 26:48
  pull a book and just look at food or tap some recipes.
• 26:51
  Well, I mean, I got to say, I mean, I've, I've always, and
• 26:54
  it's because I'm, I grew up in that region.
• 26:56
  But the French Laundry cookbook, I mean, obviously that's a
• 26:58
  that's a huge game changer. Other Julia Childs cookbooks, I
• 27:05
  remember Alan du Casas, the big fat one.
• 27:08
  The big one. Yeah.
• 27:09
  That that that was the yeah, that that was one that I think
• 27:14
  that was one of my first ones that I was looking at because I
• 27:16
  was working at a French restaurant at the time.
• 27:18
  And so I was I would go through that.
• 27:19
  I haven't. It's amazing.
• 27:20
  Yeah, it's incredible. I mean, there's just so many,
• 27:23
  man. I mean, so many now that come up
• 27:25
  and I'm thinking, wow, that looks pretty cool.
• 27:27
  And even different countries have.
• 27:29
  You seen Andre Chang's book Octave Philosophy.
• 27:32
  I don't think so, no. That's great.
• 27:33
  Is it? Yeah.
• 27:34
  When I when I read cookbooks, I read them page to page.
• 27:37
  Like I read the recipe, I read the story.
• 27:39
  I like, I read it like a book. And you know, this like a lot of
• 27:43
  cookbooks are kind of predictable.
• 27:44
  Like the photo, you could look at me like, I think I know how
• 27:46
  to make it. And then you read it.
• 27:47
  It's like, yeah, just what I thought.
• 27:49
  Right? Yeah.
• 27:50
  Octo Philosophy is probably one of the first books that I've
• 27:52
  ever read. It's like you look at the photo
• 27:53
  and then you read the recipes. Like I did not expect that in
• 27:56
  there. Wow.
• 27:57
  Yeah, it's so cool. Yeah, it's a good book.
• 27:59
  You should check it out. I'm going to check it out.
• 28:00
  Yeah. Shout out to Andre.
• 28:02
  I don't know him, but he's got he's got a great name.
• 28:04
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 28:06
  So it's a it's a great process, man, you know, and and you know,
• 28:11
  the photographer me was a highlight.
• 28:13
  I'd be able to have photos visual and and be part of that.
• 28:18
  It was pretty. It was pretty nice.
• 28:20
  Let me ask you this because I I think about this a lot, so I'll
• 28:23
  tell you a story first. I used to work with this girl
• 28:27
  and she was young. She was 18 years old when we
• 28:28
  worked together. I was her chef and I sent her
• 28:32
  off to go work at the French Laundry.
• 28:34
  So she worked at the French Laundry just when Corey Lee was
• 28:36
  the chef, right. And then she had come back and
• 28:39
  then she went to go, I sent her to go work at another
• 28:41
  restaurant. The chef, Anthony Bambachi at
• 28:43
  the time in Dallas, he was like the king of Dallas had he was
• 28:47
  the first one doing like Spanish food, like the molecular stuff.
• 28:51
  And then she went to Brazil and and she worked this great
• 28:55
  restaurant in Brazil. Maybe it was Alex Atala's.
• 28:58
  Anyway, then she went to Europe and like she, she was 18 and she
• 29:02
  was out hustling everybody. She was she's the best chef that
• 29:07
  no one's ever heard of, you know what I mean?
• 29:10
  And I think about like, because we've we've talked about this
• 29:13
  before, like MMA, sometimes when you're in the MMA gym and you're
• 29:19
  like, there's guys in there that never wanted to turn pro.
• 29:21
  They were, they never even fought in front of a crowd, but
• 29:25
  they they fucked everyone up in the gym.
• 29:27
  Like they were the guy that knocked out the pro fighter.
• 29:29
  And it was like, oh, it got knocked.
• 29:30
  I was like, man, if you only turned pro, you'd be the UFC
• 29:33
  champion. Like I don't want the limelight.
• 29:35
  There's a lot of chefs like that too.
• 29:36
  No one's ever heard of. And they could cook circles
• 29:39
  around people. They're better than the
• 29:41
  executive chef that has the, the, the name on the door,
• 29:45
  right. And everyone knows in that
• 29:46
  kitchen like, no, no, that that's the one.
• 29:48
  Yeah. He just doesn't want that.
• 29:49
  Or she, he or she don't want the the.
• 29:51
  Line. Yeah, yeah.
• 29:52
  They're the one everyone learns from them.
• 29:54
  Are there people like that that that you've worked with in your?
• 29:56
  So many man. So many When I mean when I
• 29:59
  started. People you could give a shout
• 30:00
  out to. Yeah, This guy, he's got to be,
• 30:04
  man. He's got to be in the 60s now.
• 30:06
  He's still cooking. Oscar Garcia.
• 30:07
  Yeah. Goes by the name of Todo Mix.
• 30:09
  Todo Mix. Yeah.
• 30:10
  So he, I know him started cooking in Napa at 15.
• 30:15
  He was, you know, he was one of those kind of senior cooks and,
• 30:19
  and, and he would, he would worked up at the meat station,
• 30:23
  you know, and it was like 250 covers and by himself and I ran
• 30:28
  into him. Maybe when the book was.
• 30:32
  Out maybe a month out and then I gave him 1.
• 30:36
  He was, I went to eat at this at the restaurant that he was
• 30:38
  working at and he came and I was with a friend of mine and he
• 30:42
  came out and I gave him a book and super exciting, but
• 30:45
  definitely an amazing cook, amazing cook.
• 30:50
  And but yeah, he can, he can cook anything, multitask, just
• 30:56
  just a beast in the kitchen. And but, but I remember that all
• 31:01
  through my career growing up, like so many of these guys can
• 31:03
  just cook so good and they know like the chefs.
• 31:06
  Do better than the chefs. They do they do they?
• 31:07
  Can they? Can they?
• 31:09
  They know everything like covers how to get out.
• 31:13
  They're never in the weeds. I mean, it's almost like second
• 31:16
  nature to them, you know, and they've been doing it for a long
• 31:18
  time. But yeah, I mean, so many of
• 31:21
  them, so many, so many of them that I, that I can kind of shout
• 31:24
  out and, and still doing it today, still still doing it,
• 31:28
  which, yeah, it's wild. I I look at like.
• 31:30
  Someone's like I've, I've worked with some of these people and I
• 31:33
  remember there was this one chef that I worked under and he or
• 31:37
  worked with, he worked under me. He was so good.
• 31:39
  He knew my food better than me. He actually liked the sauces.
• 31:42
  Yeah. Like I'm thinking this he like
• 31:43
  chef like this. Yeah, that's it.
• 31:45
  That's my sauce. But you made it right.
• 31:46
  And and sometimes. You, you know, you being a good
• 31:48
  cook doesn't mean you're going to be a good manager.
• 31:50
  No, that's true too. That's tough, man.
• 31:51
  Managing people, it's tough. I mean, I, I, I would say this,
• 31:55
  I'm forever a student of, of being a leader.
• 31:58
  You know, it's, it's not easy. What's the hardest part you
• 32:01
  think? I think.
• 32:03
  I think people believing in you, you know, and believing in the
• 32:07
  vision and, and you mean the, the, the people that.
• 32:09
  Report you or the people about I just everybody, right?
• 32:12
  Because at the end of the day, you know, you have to lead the
• 32:15
  team as the chef, right? Like you're the one that has to
• 32:20
  above, below, sideways, like you have to make it happen.
• 32:23
  And so I think get getting everybody from the beginning to
• 32:26
  believe in it. And then, you know, one year
• 32:29
  goes by SEC 2-3 and then just make sure that everything still
• 32:32
  consistent. And that's, that's the, the
• 32:34
  challenge. But, you know, getting people
• 32:38
  that think like you and want the same things that you want.
• 32:43
  It's crucial when, when, when you're hiring.
• 32:45
  I think it's important, you know, because, you know, they,
• 32:49
  they, it just, it's, it makes it easier on communication and
• 32:52
  everything else, right? But yeah, I mean, I mean, but
• 32:56
  they also, you know, they have lives themselves, right?
• 32:58
  So they're going through their life and, and, you know, you
• 33:02
  have to be aware of that. So how do you structure?
• 33:06
  The vision for your team currently, well, I mean.
• 33:10
  It's, I think they, they, they already, I think they already
• 33:14
  come in with the vision themselves and with who they
• 33:16
  want to be in the future, what they're going to get out of the
• 33:18
  restaurant. So I think it's, it's, it's,
• 33:21
  it's better that way too, right? So they know that they're going
• 33:27
  to come in, they're going to work hard, they're going to
• 33:29
  learn as much as they can. You know, sometimes we
• 33:32
  collaborate on the menus. They have ideas and it's, it's,
• 33:35
  it's, it's that kind of food talk and that kind of culinary
• 33:39
  artistry. And then, but they already know
• 33:43
  that from the beginning, from the minute they walk in the
• 33:45
  door. So and it's just about, I guess,
• 33:50
  keeping them focused and and but they but most of them already
• 33:54
  have, if not all of them already have that in them to become
• 33:57
  great. Do you?
• 33:59
  Think when you're when you're building a team, like what's
• 34:02
  your strategy? Do you do you mix it up with?
• 34:09
  People that want to be. Chefs.
• 34:12
  People that don't want to be chefs, meaning like they, they
• 34:15
  just want to cook. They don't, they don't care
• 34:17
  about the leadership. They're like, they just want,
• 34:19
  like we were talking earlier, how do you mix your team up or
• 34:22
  do you look for people specifically that want to be in
• 34:26
  your shoes one day? Well.
• 34:28
  I mean, they, they, they all want to be chefs to an extent,
• 34:35
  or at least they have some sort of a purpose.
• 34:38
  You know, if they don't want to become chefs, they want to, they
• 34:40
  want to do a good job, you know, whether it be just, you know,
• 34:43
  just being whatever they want to do, you know, So, but I think
• 34:50
  setting the expectation of like, hey, this is going to be, it's
• 34:52
  going to be a long road and the hours are long.
• 34:54
  It's, you know, the expectation is, is pretty high.
• 34:57
  And you know, you're not, you're not, maybe we're able to, you
• 35:02
  know, take your birthday off and Christmas and all that kind of
• 35:04
  stuff. So just setting that expectation
• 35:07
  from the beginning, but also me being there with them, you know,
• 35:11
  present and and and I think means a lot to them too.
• 35:14
  What is something about the? Industry that you think, people
• 35:19
  that you know and especially at your level that maybe people
• 35:24
  need to know now before you put your whole life into this.
• 35:29
  Well, it's a, it's a long road, right?
• 35:31
  And you know that, right? It's, it's a long, long road of
• 35:34
  sacrifice and you miss a lot out of this industry.
• 35:41
  So, you know, I think that's the, the biggest thing and, and
• 35:48
  being disciplined is another, you know, like take care of
• 35:51
  yourself outside of that work, you know, eating well or working
• 35:55
  out 'cause it's a, it's, it's going to, it's a, it's a, it's
• 35:58
  a, it's a long time. And I think a lot of emotions
• 36:03
  are being more aware of that. But if you're, you know, if you
• 36:05
  have that, if you're able to be disciplined and from the
• 36:08
  beginning have that and then understand that it's going to be
• 36:13
  a long road to the top and you're persistent, you'll get
• 36:17
  there. You know, you'll definitely,
• 36:18
  definitely get there and be at your own pace.
• 36:20
  You know, I think that's the the, the, the biggest one and,
• 36:24
  and not comparing yourself to everybody else.
• 36:26
  You know, we all learn different and some people get it quicker,
• 36:30
  some take a little bit longer, but it's, it's really at your
• 36:34
  own pace that that you should be, you should be getting at it.
• 36:38
  And for people that. Want to move up very fast
• 36:42
  because I think that's something in today's world that we don't
• 36:44
  see. We didn't see when, when.
• 36:48
  You and I were coming up as cooks like you were on the
• 36:50
  station for. Like you better give me at least
• 36:52
  a year on that station before you think you're leaving.
• 36:54
  Or nowadays, you know, someone's going to come in and two months
• 36:57
  or like. I think I mastered my station.
• 36:59
  Chef. Can I move?
• 37:00
  Can I move? Yeah.
• 37:01
  I'm ready to go to somewhere else.
• 37:05
  Where do you stand on that, do you think?
• 37:07
  Do you think times have changed and people are getting better on
• 37:10
  their stations faster? Or do you think that maybe
• 37:13
  people just don't know what they don't know?
• 37:16
  Well, maybe a. Little bit of both, you know, I
• 37:18
  definitely work with a lot of talented cooks.
• 37:20
  I mean, the talent pool for me, when you do find it, it's a lot
• 37:25
  more right. There's a lot more information
• 37:26
  and resources and when I started cooking, so you might be able to
• 37:30
  get more, more things quicker now, right.
• 37:34
  I mean, I used to go back home and, and, you know, if I didn't
• 37:38
  know how to cut chives, I would buy chives at Safeway and go
• 37:42
  and, and try to get better at them or buy a potato and try to,
• 37:45
  you know, Tornay. And like I, I would do that
• 37:49
  'cause I, I, I was terrible at it, man.
• 37:51
  And I didn't have the time to practice at work.
• 37:53
  You know, I was, I was, I wasn't, I wasn't that good, you
• 37:57
  know, trying to learn all these, all these skills.
• 37:59
  So I would buy that and, and do it there.
• 38:02
  But I'm sure there are cooks today doing that too right now.
• 38:05
  So, but where I stand on that, I mean, if you're good and, and,
• 38:10
  and you think you, you have it, then, then, then you deserve it.
• 38:13
  You know, I think, I think that's what it is.
• 38:15
  You know, I, I mean, you're on a station.
• 38:17
  I mean, you, yeah, you definitely want to perfect it.
• 38:19
  But at the end of the days, it's, it's your, it's your loss
• 38:21
  as a, as a chef, right? If you move too quickly and then
• 38:24
  you end up at a road where, oh, shit, like I should have paid
• 38:28
  more attention, you know, on that station a year ago or two
• 38:31
  years ago, stuff like that. You're eventually going to run
• 38:34
  out of that information. So, but if you're moving with
• 38:38
  purpose and you're always evolving, getting better, even
• 38:45
  if you're slower, there's going to be no wall you hit because
• 38:49
  you're always going to. You're going to have so many
• 38:50
  tools in your pocket to go through it.
• 38:54
  And everyone's time is. Different meaning some people
• 38:58
  get their shine in two years, right?
• 39:00
  And then they they kind of fade off really quick Some people
• 39:03
  take 15 years and then they shine bright.
• 39:05
  You know, everyone, everyone, everyone's time.
• 39:08
  Yeah, sometimes it's just their timeline's just a little bit
• 39:10
  different. Some people get.
• 39:11
  There faster. Some people get there slower,
• 39:14
  but also you know my. Son, my son, he he wants he's he
• 39:17
  wants to be a Barber, right? Yeah.
• 39:18
  So I tell him all the time, you know, you have, I mean,
• 39:23
  competition is is heavy. Everything right now.
• 39:26
  I mean, being a Barber, being a chef, whatever, but but.
• 39:29
  Him being a Barber. Today he's got to realize that
• 39:32
  the competition of his peers just in that age bracket, it's a
• 39:36
  lot, right? Like he he's got guys have been
• 39:38
  doing it since he was 10 and now they're 19, he's going to be 20.
• 39:42
  So they got him maybe on six years already.
• 39:45
  And then you have the guys that are a little bit older, right,
• 39:48
  And then the guys that are older than that.
• 39:49
  And then you have the new guys that are in school.
• 39:52
  Same thing with cooking, you know, like the competition, you
• 39:56
  know, if you want to be the elite and you want to be better,
• 39:59
  like you have guys that are just neck and neck, they're they're
• 40:03
  ready, ready to, to, to get at it.
• 40:06
  You know, whether it be taking, you know, I tell him like, you
• 40:10
  know, taking you, you guess or you know, charging more, I mean,
• 40:15
  whatever it may be. You have that those young guys
• 40:19
  ready, ready to go. So it's the same thing with
• 40:21
  cooking, you know, you know, it's everyday trying to learn
• 40:24
  something. It's a.
• 40:25
  It's a combination. Though like of of talent and and
• 40:29
  work ethic because. If you're extremely.
• 40:33
  Talented. The more time that you.
• 40:37
  Have to work on that talent the better you'll you'll be right.
• 40:39
  So if, if I'm naturally gifted and I also have, you know, a, a
• 40:44
  longer time preference, So if I could be in the kitchen for, you
• 40:47
  know, 10 plus hours versus the person who is naturally talented
• 40:53
  but burns out after about four hours and then they get
• 40:55
  frustrated. It's like, I want to like the
• 40:57
  person that can go longer will get better over the course of
• 40:59
  time because we all know like the more time you're doing it,
• 41:02
  the better you're going to get, right.
• 41:04
  But then there's also the. The people that.
• 41:07
  Maybe don't have the talent, but also have that work ethic and
• 41:11
  they're like, they will show up every day when it's hard, when
• 41:14
  it's raining, when it's snowing, when everyone wants to call out
• 41:17
  sick. They're they don't care.
• 41:19
  They're they're going to be there every day.
• 41:20
  And sometimes that person also beats the person that's
• 41:24
  talented, because sometimes talent doesn't mean mental
• 41:29
  fortitude. And I and I think that's
• 41:31
  something that people miss in this industry.
• 41:33
  It is hard and there's going to be hard days and there's going
• 41:37
  to be days that two people call off and you're working, you're
• 41:40
  working harder. And there's going to be days
• 41:42
  when it's like the restaurant is full and you didn't plan for it
• 41:45
  and you had a bad service, right?
• 41:47
  And and the tickets filled up and you want to cry, right?
• 41:51
  Those days happen to all of us, but there.
• 41:54
  But how you take it, those like can you get through it or does
• 41:59
  that break you? Because those bad services are
• 42:03
  inevitable for anyone that cooks professionally.
• 42:07
  And I think the the talent will get you so far.
• 42:10
  But the mental fortitude to get through some of those difficult
• 42:13
  days and say, hey, you know what bad day, learn from it.
• 42:16
  What did I do wrong? What can I do better?
• 42:17
  How can I plan for it next time versus the that was a hard day.
• 42:21
  I never want to do this again because sometimes the talented
• 42:24
  people break on the hard days. Do you think?
• 42:27
  Being that committed and consistent is the time itself
• 42:32
  too. Yes, right.
• 42:34
  Yeah, you could almost categorize.
• 42:35
  It as like, you know how like in video games, they have like
• 42:37
  different, different attributes like their skill is very high,
• 42:41
  but their heart is yeah, yeah, yeah, right, yeah, yeah, like
• 42:44
  the heart yeah, yeah, yeah, But their skill might be whatever,
• 42:48
  but their overall right, right. The the gestalt, as they say is,
• 42:51
  is is at a higher level. So just yeah, talent is just one
• 42:57
  of the one of the things that you're looking for.
• 42:59
  It's also, you know, discipline. It's also how do you work clean?
• 43:02
  How do you get along with others?
• 43:04
  Right, right. Yeah.
• 43:05
  Man, so so much goes into. Making a good cook, it's not
• 43:08
  just one thing, right? Yeah.
• 43:10
  I want to. Ask you about this because this
• 43:12
  has been on my mind a lot and we talked about it offline too, but
• 43:19
  I like to call it the Instagrammification of food.
• 43:23
  And I'm not trying. To pick on any chef.
• 43:26
  Because I do this. Too, And I did it a lot when I
• 43:29
  was a chef. It's like you look at you look
• 43:32
  at Instagram and I was on Instagram the other day and I
• 43:34
  was like crudo, crudo, crudo, crudo, crudo.
• 43:38
  And you know, the, the, the broken white sauce with the
• 43:41
  green oil. And it's like everyone's kind of
• 43:43
  the mini tart, the something sphere with some shaved
• 43:46
  truffles. And I'm not saying it's not
• 43:47
  delicious and I'm not saying it's not beautiful.
• 43:49
  I'm just saying it looks like all the other pretty food and it
• 43:52
  almost feels like we've lost a little bit of, of, of, of why
• 43:59
  we're in it. Because I think when you're
• 44:00
  playing at a certain level, you got to check certain boxes.
• 44:03
  Like do I have a mini tart? Do I have bites?
• 44:05
  Do I have a mini R DS at the end?
• 44:07
  Do I have, you know, how many mini R DS am I doing right?
• 44:10
  How many snacks am I doing at the beginning?
• 44:12
  And where I think it, it becomes a little bit of a slippery
• 44:14
  slope. Is that what ends up happening
• 44:18
  is that there's no difference. Like there's nothing unique
• 44:20
  about it. It's just like, OK, if you got a
• 44:22
  high end restaurant, that's what it's going to look like.
• 44:24
  This is a little bit of a rant, so I'm giving you a lot of
• 44:26
  context to to why I'm ranting like this.
• 44:30
  But this is all gotten fast with social media.
• 44:34
  But then there's restaurants like Echebari in Spain that does
• 44:37
  something completely different. They got their prawns or they
• 44:40
  got, you know, the fish. And it's really simple.
• 44:43
  It's you look at what they're doing.
• 44:45
  It's like, when did they get #1 like last year?
• 44:50
  Number one is like their food. Doesn't look like anyone else,
• 44:53
  right? Or you look at like when Renee
• 44:55
  was on top and you could argue that, you know, he's still up at
• 44:58
  the top, but his food look like his food.
• 45:01
  You could say Enriquez food look like his food, right?
• 45:04
  Thomas's food look like Thomas's.
• 45:06
  You know, Ferran or Grant, like they all came in with the new
• 45:09
  style that everyone's like. It doesn't look like everyone
• 45:11
  else's. It was like derivatives of them.
• 45:16
  And so. My question is.
• 45:20
  How do we as. As as chefs.
• 45:24
  Find a unique way to. Cook that doesn't feel like
• 45:27
  everyone else's. I don't know for the.
• 45:29
  The other chefs, but I think the more, at least for me, you know,
• 45:33
  being in industry for such a long time now, you go in phases,
• 45:38
  right? And I want to say maybe this is
• 45:42
  maybe I don't know because I haven't gone through that phase,
• 45:45
  but maybe a little bit of like Daniel Hum going from, you know,
• 45:50
  the, the savory tasting, I mean, the, I'm sorry, the tasting
• 45:53
  minute to vegan now fewer courses, fewer.
• 45:55
  Courses. Vegan until around that, you
• 45:58
  know, I think mastering yourself, you know, and getting
• 46:02
  to know who you are and, and, and I don't know, maybe putting
• 46:07
  all accolades aside and just saying, look, if it works, I'm
• 46:10
  just, I'm going to do it because this is what I want to do,
• 46:12
  right? And I think when you get to that
• 46:14
  point, like it's, it's, it's, it's, it's a game changer for
• 46:20
  you and, and for everything else.
• 46:23
  But I think for me in, in, in, in the last couple years has
• 46:26
  been, and I think part of it was the book, you know, all all
• 46:31
  through my career, you know, growing up in Napa, cooking out
• 46:35
  of European style restaurants, not really knowing Mexico
• 46:38
  because of the borders, right. And, and missing like felt like
• 46:44
  I was missing something inside made me want to learn more about
• 46:49
  myself. And so that changed my my way of
• 46:51
  cooking. And it still continues to do so
• 46:53
  the more that I connect with my roots.
• 46:57
  And so, but I'm yet to master fully master myself in that.
• 47:02
  And whatever comes out at the end as far as like dishes, I'm
• 47:06
  just excited for that, for that to come in the in the next
• 47:09
  couple of years. You know, I think you hit the
• 47:11
  nail on the. Head I I I truly think that you
• 47:13
  do, you know, with that Daniel Homer analogy, because all these
• 47:17
  other chefs that we mentioned earlier, the Thomases and so on,
• 47:20
  like they were already excellent at what they did.
• 47:23
  And they just said, you know what I'm going to do me.
• 47:27
  Yeah, right. Then like I, I don't need to
• 47:29
  prove this to anyone because I don't you know, I'm good, right,
• 47:33
  Right. And I think when they've when a
• 47:36
  chef finally gets to that point and they say I could cook
• 47:39
  whatever, I don't need to look like this restaurant or that
• 47:42
  restaurant. I could just do me.
• 47:44
  And I think that's when that's when they have those breaks.
• 47:47
  So I'm I'm just as guilty, but. I also think there's an
• 47:52
  incentive. Structure around it meaning OK,
• 47:54
  if the awards are if that restaurant that cooks that food
• 47:57
  is getting awards I want awards so I'll cook more of that right
• 48:00
  there so so chefs also are incentivized by by the award
• 48:04
  system, whether whatever award system that is and then there's
• 48:08
  the the fear of getting eaten by our own right because if you
• 48:13
  serve something. Super simple and I'm just.
• 48:17
  Making this up, you know, some some, some beautiful
• 48:22
  strawberries with something. Yeah, yeah.
• 48:27
  People are just like. This dude's serving
• 48:28
  strawberries. Well, I mean, but, but that's,
• 48:31
  that's part of the, you know, the last conversation we had,
• 48:33
  man. I mean, it's, it's, it's being
• 48:34
  patient now. I've done it, man.
• 48:36
  Like when I, when I became a chef for the first time, man,
• 48:39
  I'd done it. I'd, I'd put stuff out that now
• 48:41
  I think of, of, of what I did and I was like, I can't believe
• 48:44
  I did that, you know, right. But you have to go through it.
• 48:47
  You have to, you have to, if you have a solid team next to you
• 48:50
  and they're calling you out and like, all you really going to do
• 48:52
  is strawberries, you have a good team.
• 48:55
  Yeah, because because they're, they're, they're saying, you
• 48:57
  know, they, they, they, they want you to succeed.
• 49:00
  The the, the worst thing would be that you have a team that
• 49:02
  just, you know, all they say is like.
• 49:06
  Yeah, it's fine, It's fine. It's.
• 49:07
  Fine. And then and then you think that
• 49:09
  you know, you know, whether Starburst or whatever, but if
• 49:12
  you have a team, you know, and because the guests will tell you
• 49:14
  at the end of the day or they stop showing up, you know,
• 49:16
  right, right. So and it's it's.
• 49:19
  It's an interesting thing because it's like, you know, I'm
• 49:21
  just going to use the strawberries and cream analogy.
• 49:22
  It's delicious, right? And if you do it right as a
• 49:25
  chef, it could be amazing. But also all the other chefs,
• 49:29
  because a lot of chefs, not only were you trying to impress the
• 49:32
  guests, we're also trying to keep our social status in the
• 49:36
  chef community. So if we see other chefs like
• 49:38
  this dude serving strawberries and cream, but I'll, I'll tell
• 49:43
  you this. If I serve strawberries and
• 49:46
  cream, all my chef friends are going to be like this dude,
• 49:49
  which by the way, I'm thinking about doing it.
• 49:51
  That's why I keep bringing it up.
• 49:52
  All all my chef friends would be like this dude.
• 49:54
  Stick to podcast. Yeah, yeah, stop serving
• 49:56
  strawberries. And but if Marco pure white did
• 50:00
  it, yeah, yeah. Or Thomas Keller or Renee's
• 50:03
  doing a a video saying I have these perfect strawberries and
• 50:05
  this. Cream.
• 50:06
  From the farm and it's perfect. I would be like 3 days.
• 50:09
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know.
• 50:10
  Everybody. I do it.
• 50:11
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, yeah, I.
• 50:12
  Mean, I mean, again, it's, it's, it's him mastering what, what he
• 50:18
  wants to do, you know, and not really, I would say caring, but
• 50:23
  maybe there's a purpose to it too.
• 50:24
  You know, like you say, there's the, the you know, the, the
• 50:27
  cream comes from this farm, the strawberries he grew or whatever
• 50:29
  it may be, but it is it is about that man.
• 50:32
  I mean, and knowing where they come from, like where the food
• 50:35
  comes from, it's important, Michelin.
• 50:39
  Has kind of. Changed James Beard has changed
• 50:42
  the, the, the way that they award restaurants in terms of
• 50:45
  like excellence, right? It's, it's great food.
• 50:49
  It, it's, it's kind of breaking the bolt a little bit.
• 50:52
  And Michelin has done the same thing.
• 50:53
  And I'm not sure if everyone's picked up on, on Michelin's
• 50:56
  move. You know, now that they've added
• 50:57
  Texas, they're adding, I think they just announced they're
• 50:59
  adding S they're really expanding.
• 51:02
  Texas to me was like the first sticking their toe in the water.
• 51:07
  Mexico also in Singapore, you know, the Taco place in Mexico,
• 51:11
  the, the BBQ places in Texas. And what you're starting to
• 51:16
  realize is what Michelin is saying.
• 51:18
  They might not be saying this loud, but I'm this is what I'm
• 51:20
  hearing is they're saying it's about doing the type of food
• 51:26
  that you do and being the best at that type of food.
• 51:29
  So whether it's BBQ or whether it's tacos, is this the most
• 51:33
  exceptional version of that? So what that means, and this is
• 51:38
  just my thought, what that means is that frees up chefs to kind
• 51:41
  of break the mold now, because now we don't have to have a this
• 51:45
  and a that and a snack and a tart and a yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 51:47
  whatever. We can now do whatever we want
• 51:49
  as long as it's exceptional, because that's what Michelin's
• 51:51
  saying. That's like the food has to be
• 51:53
  exceptional. So that that frees the handcuffs
• 51:56
  a little bit to say. And James Beard has already done
• 51:58
  that, right. And World's Fifty, I mean, they
• 52:02
  they do award very, very, very high end.
• 52:05
  But with Ichibari winning, they're also saying like the
• 52:07
  food has to be exceptional, right?
• 52:09
  Right. It doesn't have to have all the
• 52:11
  stuff on it. It could be just some prawns
• 52:13
  that are perfect caught from over here.
• 52:14
  It's the store. And so I, I think for chefs,
• 52:18
  this is just don't listen to me. Don't build your business model
• 52:21
  off what I'm saying because I don't want to hear shit.
• 52:23
  So I'm not going to bail you out if it if I'm wrong because I
• 52:25
  could, you know, I always reserve the right to be wrong.
• 52:28
  But I do think that this opens up an opportunity for chefs like
• 52:31
  we were talking about. It's like, like, like you said
• 52:33
  with Daniel Hume, this opens up the door for chefs to be
• 52:37
  themselves and make exceptional food.
• 52:42
  And the incentive will come if it's exceptional, but if you
• 52:45
  make it look like everyone else, I think.
• 52:48
  And I and I'll tell you I. Have this conversation a lot
• 52:50
  behind the scenes people are noticing, you know what I mean?
• 52:53
  Like like it's, it's, I'm talking about it cuz I have a
• 52:55
  podcast, but a lot of chefs are talking about it and they're
• 52:59
  just not talking about it publicly.
• 53:01
  So I do think that right now is the right time for chefs that
• 53:04
  are listening. You have the opportunity to make
• 53:07
  what you're doing exceptional, stand on your own, too.
• 53:10
  Be original and you will get recognized.
• 53:12
  Yeah, yeah. I mean.
• 53:13
  When I was here last man, we we talked about Michelin.
• 53:15
  I don't think you called it. Yeah, right.
• 53:17
  Barbecue you. Called it BBQ.
• 53:18
  You were 100. Percent right.
• 53:19
  I was so excited. Yeah, I was.
• 53:20
  So, And I actually went to Ole Mae.
• 53:22
  Yeah, last night. Did you?
• 53:24
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 53:25
  It was my first mission to start a restaurant in Texas.
• 53:27
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 53:28
  Which is pretty cool, man. It was.
• 53:30
  It was so hard to see it from a different perspective.
• 53:32
  Right. Yeah.
• 53:34
  And it and it's to the point that I.
• 53:35
  Was saying it is yeah. They they smoked the mold a
• 53:37
  little bit. It did, yeah.
• 53:39
  Yeah, I mean service, food, everything was exceptional.
• 53:41
  It was so good. So I was excited that I'm yet to
• 53:44
  go to like a BBQ actual, you know, BBQ Mission Star
• 53:48
  restaurant, but. Yeah, I think you're you're.
• 53:51
  Absolutely right. You know, it's and and and for
• 53:54
  me that again, growing up in Napa and Michelin being so
• 53:59
  present from from a young cooks and me, as soon as I heard about
• 54:03
  it, you know, I remember my eyes just.
• 54:06
  Being like Oh my God, this is. What I want to do now this is I
• 54:08
  want to pursue this, this route. And I love how they, I mean,
• 54:14
  they're going in the South now, right?
• 54:15
  And so, Chris, what that's going to look like?
• 54:17
  Yeah. I mean but but.
• 54:18
  You know, you get a lot of chefs, they get, are going to
• 54:20
  get recognized for that may may not have been recognized in the
• 54:25
  past, at least by by Michelin that people do do look at these
• 54:32
  guides and and do go to these restaurants to to see and to
• 54:36
  check it out. And and so, I mean, I do it, I
• 54:38
  use it all the time. I mean, I'm here and I'm
• 54:40
  thinking what's open? What, what can I check out?
• 54:42
  And but, but to be able to do it from that region, it's, it's
• 54:46
  kind of it's, it's, it's nice, man.
• 54:48
  Yeah, it is nice. It's pretty cool.
• 54:49
  So let me ask you this. When you cook.
• 54:54
  And I'm not talking about in the restaurant, yeah, but.
• 54:56
  Maybe you're like. Someone that you haven't you're
• 54:58
  having a dinner party, you're inviting a couple of chefs over,
• 55:01
  but you guys are going to have wine.
• 55:03
  You're going to have what are you cooking?
• 55:05
  Classic stuff. What are you?
• 55:06
  What are? You making what's on the menu?
• 55:08
  On the menu, Fish. I love fish, so either, I mean,
• 55:13
  people probably give me a hard time, but salmon, you know, You
• 55:19
  know, So I love prawns. Are you doing, like, sauces with
• 55:23
  it? Simple sauce.
• 55:24
  Yeah, simple. Like vinaigrettes?
• 55:26
  Like I love like chimichurri and you know, kind of stuff like
• 55:28
  that. Nothing too heavy, man.
• 55:31
  A lot of vegetables roasted. Maybe there's a little bit of,
• 55:35
  you know, either Japanese or Asian kind of twist to them soy
• 55:39
  mirror and things like that. And so and that's it man.
• 55:44
  But I'm AI love breakfast though, So if I'm if I'm I love
• 55:48
  eggs. I don't I don't eat a lot of
• 55:50
  meat. I taste it throughout the, you
• 55:53
  know, the restaurant and and as I'm going, you know, tasting all
• 55:58
  the stations, things like that. But I I it's usually more
• 56:01
  vegetables, meat and I'm trying to stay away from bread.
• 56:05
  I realize that I'm an addict of bread.
• 56:06
  Like I love bread and I love bread all all my life.
• 56:09
  Yeah, bread and butter. That's Oh my God, it's so.
• 56:11
  Good. But but yeah, it's, it's, it's,
• 56:16
  it's, I think healthy eating, man, I, I love that, you know,
• 56:18
  and you feel light after you feel light.
• 56:20
  It's not, it's not heavy. Delicious the fish and all that,
• 56:23
  right so. You know, in in my case, if I
• 56:26
  invited you over tonight for dinner, yeah, I'd cook some
• 56:28
  artichokes, maybe, you know, maybe with some chicken fat over
• 56:32
  the top of them, nice bread. So you could dip in the olive
• 56:34
  oil or whatever on the artichokes.
• 56:37
  Maybe some cured tomatoes on there.
• 56:38
  Maybe some strawberries with a Yeah, with my vanilla ice cream.
• 56:42
  Right. Maybe.
• 56:43
  I'll have a piece of fish. With just, like a lobster sauce
• 56:48
  on. Yeah.
• 56:48
  You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah.
• 56:49
  Just a poached fish with lobster sauce.
• 56:50
  Yeah, Yeah. And you know what?
• 56:52
  We'd sit around and we'd be like, man, I haven't.
• 56:54
  That's simple. Yeah, right.
• 56:55
  Simple. So this is.
• 56:57
  Kind of where my thought. Is is like, could you not take
• 57:02
  that style of food and serve it excellent with excellent service
• 57:06
  in an in a beautiful setting and still get a Michelin star even
• 57:10
  though it's not bells and whistles?
• 57:11
  I don't know. Well, I mean, I I do got to say.
• 57:14
  Because I, I say this because of fish, I think the restaurant
• 57:17
  that, you know, at oral we, it's, it's, it's mostly fish, to
• 57:21
  be honest. So there it is a take on that
• 57:22
  what I what we just said, but more a little bit more
• 57:26
  technique, but you know, nicer China, right, Right.
• 57:31
  Then you add the the wine. Aspects, so it is.
• 57:33
  A long I do I do the food that we do at Oro.
• 57:36
  It is how I love to eat, to be honest.
• 57:38
  So there's not a little bit more finesse, more more refinement,
• 57:42
  but it's, you know, it's good, good vegetables and good cooking
• 57:48
  and and that's that's the menu, you know, if.
• 57:52
  Just pick pick a random big name chef.
• 57:54
  Yeah, right. They they invite you to their
• 57:56
  house and they say they're serving what you just said.
• 58:00
  Some fish, some vegetables. Everything's going to be
• 58:02
  delicious, you know, beautiful dessert.
• 58:04
  Simple. Would you pay just as much?
• 58:07
  As that as you would. At their restaurant, I would.
• 58:10
  I would maybe. More for the conversation, maybe
• 58:14
  more right. Yeah, yeah.
• 58:15
  So it's. It's interesting because it's
• 58:17
  like, OK, when you change the company and you change the
• 58:19
  setting and you know there's not going to be any phones because
• 58:22
  no one's going to be snapping photos, right.
• 58:26
  Going back to our earlier conversation, the dinner that
• 58:28
  you had at French Laundry and the company that's around the
• 58:31
  table, Phil, Tessia and all these guys, that is more
• 58:35
  memorable. Yeah.
• 58:36
  Well, yeah. I mean, when?
• 58:37
  When? When, when I get, you know, when
• 58:39
  I get the invite. I'm not, I'm not thinking of
• 58:42
  what are we going to eat? You know, I know I'm going.
• 58:45
  To the. 3 mission to start restaurant The French Laundry.
• 58:48
  I'm thinking of what are we going to talk about?
• 58:50
  Yeah, it's so it's the experience that I'm, I'm looking
• 58:53
  forward to it. I I'm not, you know, the food is
• 58:55
  secondary at that point. And I think when when people are
• 58:59
  looking for an experience, you know, and so not that the food,
• 59:03
  obviously, you know, it has to be excellent, but like you said,
• 59:07
  man, like, I mean, who doesn't you say crude or crude or all
• 59:09
  this stuff, but I think it's about the experience when you
• 59:12
  nail that too. It's it's those are the the top
• 59:15
  tier guys man that those three stars this number one in the
• 59:19
  world like when you crack that code wow, it's it's unstoppable
• 59:24
  and what you find like if you. Looked at like, what do they all
• 59:27
  have in common? Yeah, the the top, the the tip
• 59:30
  of the spear guys. What they all have in common is
• 59:34
  that they're unique. Yeah, you know that that that's
• 59:37
  the biggest thing. Like it's there.
• 59:39
  I I guarantee you if you took ten of the best chefs in the
• 59:42
  world, what was the guy that you called out earlier that?
• 59:48
  We used to work with you was really good and you gave.
• 59:50
  Him a book. Oh, Oscar.
• 59:53
  Garcia. Oscar Garcia Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 59:55
  Can probably cook cook. Better than those guys, he could
• 59:57
  cook. Man.
• 59:58
  He could cook. He This guy had a.
• 1:00:00
  He had a side job, man. I think he did.
• 1:00:02
  He did tacos. He did like catering on the side
• 1:00:04
  too. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:00:06
  I mean, yeah, for sure. I mean, so you take someone like
• 1:00:08
  Oscar, he could probably like. Technically cook better than all
• 1:00:11
  those guys, but those guys can put it together in a way that
• 1:00:15
  feels like they know how to put it together better than Oscar.
• 1:00:19
  You know what I mean? Like like those guys could say
• 1:00:21
  no, no, it's this is this is perfect.
• 1:00:23
  I mean you, you take it a step further and and.
• 1:00:25
  I think about my mother, man. I think about my mom cooking.
• 1:00:28
  Yeah, right. Who's going to beat her?
• 1:00:29
  Yeah. No one.
• 1:00:30
  Yeah, yeah. It's like or you.
• 1:00:32
  Know, you know, everybody's mom like that's, that's, you know,
• 1:00:35
  those memories, those holiday memories, birthdays, the
• 1:00:39
  cooking. It was, it was about that, it
• 1:00:41
  was about that, that, that experience, that ambience of a
• 1:00:44
  family enjoy. And so I didn't have a much
• 1:00:47
  growing up, but yeah, man, I, I remember.
• 1:00:50
  So then then going back to cooking.
• 1:00:55
  Another way to look at it would be.
• 1:00:59
  You could. Cook for someone.
• 1:01:01
  Like you're trying to impress them and you're also trying to
• 1:01:04
  demonstrate the culmination of your knowledge of all the career
• 1:01:09
  that you've had, all the techniques that you've learned,
• 1:01:11
  all the experiences that you had so you could cook for them.
• 1:01:13
  Like I'm going to impress you and I'm going to, I'm going to
• 1:01:16
  show you what I could do, right, Right.
• 1:01:18
  Another way to cook. For someone would be I'm.
• 1:01:20
  Going to cook for you because I love you.
• 1:01:22
  Yeah, right, Right. And they're not going to be the
• 1:01:25
  same thing, yeah. Right, 100%.
• 1:01:27
  And this one actually might taste better.
• 1:01:29
  Yeah. Oh yeah.
• 1:01:30
  Well, every time, somebody. I go to a house or somebody
• 1:01:32
  invited me. It's like, I don't know if
• 1:01:34
  you're going to like it. You're probably picky, you know,
• 1:01:36
  your chef. And I'm, I'm just thinking, man,
• 1:01:38
  I eat out of a deli most of the time at the restaurant and I'm
• 1:01:43
  just happy to be here and, and, and having a hot meal, you know?
• 1:01:47
  So, but yeah, it's interesting. I mean, I could talk about this
• 1:01:50
  subject all day. And I'm having my own my own
• 1:01:54
  moment and and I hope I don't, you know, I know a lot of chefs
• 1:01:57
  like this dude needs to shut the fuck up.
• 1:01:59
  This already, I get it. Yeah, yeah, you can, you can
• 1:02:02
  skip this part, but it is on my mind.
• 1:02:04
  It is on my mind because what I'm trying to do is plant the
• 1:02:08
  seed because look, I'm not going to do it like I'm, I'm well into
• 1:02:14
  my podcasting and and chef's PSA career.
• 1:02:16
  I'm not going to I'm not trying to do this.
• 1:02:18
  What I'm trying to do is just give people a voice and give
• 1:02:22
  people something to think about. That's all that's all I'm trying
• 1:02:24
  to do is. I might be wrong, but I just
• 1:02:26
  want people to think about it like if, if you want to be
• 1:02:30
  exceptional, are you being exceptional because this is who
• 1:02:34
  you are you being exceptional because you're doing someone
• 1:02:36
  else's food? But anyway, that's rant over
• 1:02:39
  because I know people are probably already tired of me
• 1:02:41
  talking about this, but I do want to ask you a couple more
• 1:02:43
  questions. Chef, let's talk about.
• 1:02:47
  The Chef Rogelio way that to. Cook Yeah, when when you're in
• 1:02:52
  your. Kitchen and you're setting up
• 1:02:54
  your. Your your station, what's on
• 1:02:56
  your station when you're working, when you're during
• 1:02:58
  service, yeah, you're calling the board or where where do you
• 1:03:01
  work? So I usually well we prep
• 1:03:03
  through. I prep with with the team
• 1:03:06
  through the day when we get the butchery, vegetables, I mean
• 1:03:09
  whatever, whatever needs to get done and and when the restaurant
• 1:03:13
  opens, where do you position yourself?
• 1:03:14
  I. Expedite you actually, yeah,
• 1:03:15
  Yeah, so. So just so you can get, you
• 1:03:18
  know, you can see the guests coming in sitting down, you can
• 1:03:21
  coordinate the dining room with with the managers, what's on
• 1:03:24
  your, what's on your workstation.
• 1:03:26
  I have sharpie highlighters. Plate wipers How do you make
• 1:03:32
  plate wipers just a? Little bit of alcohol.
• 1:03:35
  And pretty simple. I mean, it's just do you use a
• 1:03:37
  sponge or do you use a towel? No, it's a towel.
• 1:03:38
  The towel. Paper towel.
• 1:03:40
  And and then we preset the tickets, right?
• 1:03:44
  So because it's a it's a long menu, the tickets are preset.
• 1:03:48
  So with the, you know, you just kind of take the menu and then
• 1:03:50
  you do these, these tickets and it's just scratch it off.
• 1:03:53
  Yeah. How do you how do you call it
• 1:03:56
  order? In order in two tasting and then
• 1:03:59
  the. Kitchen says 2 tasting and then
• 1:04:02
  we begin. So then then it goes do they say
• 1:04:04
  2 tasting chef, 2 tasting we? 2 tasting, 2 tasting.
• 1:04:07
  So it's just. It's more of because they can't
• 1:04:09
  see the tickets, right? So they have to almost make that
• 1:04:12
  mental memory of like, OK, they have a have two squad and then
• 1:04:16
  two this, you know, whatever it may be.
• 1:04:19
  And that's just kind of like how it becomes a sport at that at
• 1:04:22
  that moment, right? You have to be in it and, and
• 1:04:25
  focus and being on top of it. So you can imagine like all
• 1:04:28
  these courses kind of going out throughout, throughout the you
• 1:04:31
  know, the the restaurant and you don't want to miss a course,
• 1:04:35
  right? You want to skip a course.
• 1:04:36
  So it's do you time it or yeah, we time it.
• 1:04:39
  No. So once it begins.
• 1:04:40
  You pretty much as the expeditor, you're, you're able
• 1:04:43
  to see the time, right? Like every 7 minutes, of course
• 1:04:46
  you'll be going out to 10 unless you know, they want to wait or
• 1:04:50
  there's wine or they get up, things like that.
• 1:04:52
  So you're, you're, you're just going, there's no, there's no
• 1:04:57
  stopping it, right? Because because we, we want to
• 1:04:59
  get it out in like 2 1/2 three hours and so, and then it
• 1:05:03
  begins. So, and then, so that's my
• 1:05:06
  station. But, and everybody's kind of
• 1:05:09
  tasting throughout the, throughout the day, right?
• 1:05:11
  Make sure the sauces are, are hot or warm.
• 1:05:14
  Make sure that, you know, we do, you know, cook the fish on that
• 1:05:17
  menu. So everyone's got to be
• 1:05:18
  seasoned. Sometimes they fire an extra 1.
• 1:05:19
  So I'll say, hey, you know, you have two fired fire one extra.
• 1:05:22
  So what we'll taste it throughout, throughout the, the
• 1:05:24
  service to make sure that everything's up to par.
• 1:05:27
  I think that's the biggest thing, man.
• 1:05:28
  It's like tasting everything. What do you have?
• 1:05:30
  Any finishing salts or anything? Like that on yourself for the
• 1:05:33
  cell I do. A mix of combo salt, like a
• 1:05:36
  dehydrated combo and then salt. And then I also do mushroom
• 1:05:40
  salt. So we, we season pretty much all
• 1:05:43
  the stuff with either mushroom salts and I love the mushroom
• 1:05:45
  because we, we, we do a lot of mushrooms at the restaurant.
• 1:05:48
  So we'll do you know, centrazo and season morals, porcinis,
• 1:05:52
  blue foots. I mean, sometimes it's all of
• 1:05:54
  them. You just dehydrate, dehydrate
• 1:05:56
  them and then mix them with with with the salt.
• 1:05:59
  And we'll season vegetables, we'll season fish, meats, all
• 1:06:05
  that stuff. So that's finishing oils,
• 1:06:08
  finishing oils, just. Olive oil.
• 1:06:10
  Specific 1 You like Tin Brink? They're in Suzhoune.
• 1:06:13
  Just a good friend of mine. So we'll use that.
• 1:06:17
  Vinegars. Vinegars.
• 1:06:18
  Yeah. Lemon.
• 1:06:20
  I love vinegars, but I do a lot more just citrus.
• 1:06:25
  Yeah. So right now it's, it's, I mean,
• 1:06:29
  orange, cacao, oranges, navel limes, lemons, you zoos like as
• 1:06:36
  right now, you get so much. So the minute we can get, get
• 1:06:39
  anything like that, we'll use it and and we'll season in with
• 1:06:43
  that. Not too much on spices and
• 1:06:46
  things like that. We'll use some sauces that
• 1:06:47
  we'll, we'll kind of get creative with.
• 1:06:49
  But but it's like I said, man, I mean, it's, it's really about
• 1:06:53
  the the product and the ingredients.
• 1:06:55
  I mean, it's so hard not to use those things in, in the Napa
• 1:06:58
  Valley. I mean, strawberries are coming
• 1:07:00
  to season now. Asparagus, Morales, I mean, so
• 1:07:04
  much good stuff and I'm just excited.
• 1:07:06
  Every season I kind of geek out. What?
• 1:07:10
  What? Color tape?
• 1:07:11
  Are you guys using blue tape? Green tape.
• 1:07:13
  Green tape, man. Green tape.
• 1:07:14
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We have to Yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 1:07:17
  yeah, yeah. Or, or scissors.
• 1:07:19
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Green tape guy.
• 1:07:21
  Yeah. I used to be a blue tape guy.
• 1:07:23
  Really. I switched to.
• 1:07:24
  Green. Yeah, I was in.
• 1:07:24
  It doesn't. It doesn't.
• 1:07:25
  It doesn't. I don't know, maybe.
• 1:07:26
  The one we were using, but it doesn't stick the same.
• 1:07:28
  Yeah, I was important to see it and I was in the.
• 1:07:31
  Walk in and it was. Kind of messed up kitchen.
• 1:07:32
  I was helping out and and the the light bulb was out.
• 1:07:36
  Like no, their walkins had light bulbs and I couldn't see.
• 1:07:40
  So I was like where's my stuff? But I realized you could read in
• 1:07:42
  the dark on green tape. Oh, yeah.
• 1:07:45
  Yeah. Can't on blue tape.
• 1:07:46
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:07:46
  So it's like it was. That moment.
• 1:07:47
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Green tape.
• 1:07:49
  Green tape. From this point, folks, I'm all
• 1:07:51
  green tape. We used like the Scotch brand.
• 1:07:53
  Yeah, yeah. Because when you were cooking,
• 1:07:56
  green tape was. A thing too, right?
• 1:07:57
  It was, but I was a blue tape guy.
• 1:07:59
  OK, so. For, for for a long time, I was
• 1:08:01
  like, no blue tape, blue tape. And then I was like, Nah, green
• 1:08:03
  tape. Yeah, I was catching some shit
• 1:08:05
  from some shows, like, yeah, why are you?
• 1:08:06
  Why are you using this tape? Yeah, but.
• 1:08:09
  Do you do you guys fold your towels A.
• 1:08:10
  Certain way, yeah. How do you fold?
• 1:08:12
  I mean not a certain way. But we do fold them.
• 1:08:14
  Just fold. Yeah.
• 1:08:14
  We just fold them. Yeah, They got to be folded,
• 1:08:16
  Yeah. What's?
• 1:08:19
  Something that. You do that has either improved
• 1:08:25
  your food or improved the efficiency of how you cook that
• 1:08:29
  a lot of people don't do. But you do it.
• 1:08:30
  And it's like more people should know how to do this, I think
• 1:08:34
  well. I think improving the food is
• 1:08:37
  not necessarily the cooking part.
• 1:08:38
  I think communication, I think that's I've been through the
• 1:08:41
  years, I really try to get better at it on all aspects with
• 1:08:46
  the sous Chez, with the front of the house, with the gas, like
• 1:08:51
  just reading better, you know, the, the room, and then you kind
• 1:08:57
  of make the tweaks on the food on that.
• 1:08:59
  So for me, that's been a huge game changer.
• 1:09:01
  You know, like back in the day, I, it's just not that I didn't
• 1:09:04
  care, but I wasn't that aware of of those things.
• 1:09:07
  And now it's, it's, it's, you know, I've been, I've been
• 1:09:11
  trying to get way, way better on the communication part.
• 1:09:14
  Like so either through text, through emails, through, I mean,
• 1:09:17
  just being better at on on all the the micro things that you
• 1:09:23
  can do, you know, whether when the guests come in, when they
• 1:09:25
  leave ordering things like that. So it's just it's important,
• 1:09:28
  man. It's really, really important.
• 1:09:30
  Yeah, all the all the little detailed.
• 1:09:32
  Touch points that they don't even think about they don't even
• 1:09:34
  you're thinking about the shit that they don't even yeah no and
• 1:09:37
  doing it in the. Moment, you know what you think
• 1:09:39
  of something just sending that and and and and because some
• 1:09:44
  people you know, don't don't want to either they're shy or
• 1:09:47
  don't want to say hey, I don't really understand or, you know,
• 1:09:50
  and then something when something happens then I blame
• 1:09:52
  myself. I'm thinking, man, I should have
• 1:09:54
  been AI should have communicated that better, right.
• 1:09:56
  So yeah, I think that's that's that's one thing.
• 1:10:00
  What about something specific like a culinary technique?
• 1:10:02
  And I'll give you an example of of of 1 is like prehydrating
• 1:10:07
  xanthan gum is better than just yeah, throwing it in or another
• 1:10:12
  one that I I've told people that I that I like to do is like
• 1:10:15
  sometimes you compress herbs in the cry back machine so that
• 1:10:17
  last year. Is there something specific in
• 1:10:19
  your kitchen that you guys do that's like OK, that that's
• 1:10:23
  cool. Like when people leave, they're
• 1:10:24
  like, oh, I've never seen that. Yeah, I think, I think it's a
• 1:10:26
  mushroom. So for.
• 1:10:27
  Me that was a game changer yeah, because it's they got so much
• 1:10:30
  umami and when we when we get all the mushrooms and dehydrate
• 1:10:33
  it and make it Oh my God, like you can you can season some of
• 1:10:36
  the most a a carrot and it'll taste completely different.
• 1:10:39
  What ratio do you use? Like 3 to 1?
• 1:10:41
  Three to one. Yeah, Yeah.
• 1:10:42
  And. Specific salt?
• 1:10:44
  Or do you just use? I I do the.
• 1:10:45
  Kosher Diamond. Crystal or diamond?
• 1:10:47
  Crystal. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:10:50
  But but man, it's it's it's. A game changer, man.
• 1:10:53
  Like it's just it's so much flavour.
• 1:10:55
  Yeah, that comes out. We'll try that.
• 1:10:57
  Yeah, you should try it, man Yeah, You know, because, because
• 1:10:59
  sport, you know, I remember cooking and everybody in the in
• 1:11:02
  in my I mean, I was working at this massive hotel when I first
• 1:11:05
  started cooking. Then they would do porcini
• 1:11:07
  powder right was a thing and it's just like store bought and
• 1:11:12
  and then doing this is kind of a.
• 1:11:16
  Kind of a take. On that but with salt and it's
• 1:11:21
  just incredible so so you might see this today when well.
• 1:11:24
  When you're in Garrison, I don't know if they still do it, but
• 1:11:26
  when I was there, what we had them do was we, we do our salt
• 1:11:30
  with a combination of dried wakame and mushroom pellets like
• 1:11:33
  the ones you get at the Chinese bar.
• 1:11:35
  So we dry little comedy blitz it mushroom pellets and salt.
• 1:11:39
  And that was oh, cool. So people listening.
• 1:11:41
  That was the the the steak season.
• 1:11:43
  Yes, similar to your idea, but we didn't use real mushroom.
• 1:11:46
  Yeah, I like the the idea of using you do you.
• 1:11:49
  I'm going to tell you, man, you're a legend.
• 1:11:50
  In that place, man. Yeah, They, they, they remember
• 1:11:53
  you, man. They do.
• 1:11:54
  Yeah, they do. Man, they they.
• 1:11:56
  Talk super highly of you. Yeah, that's very good.
• 1:11:59
  I I joke around. With them is like they got their
• 1:12:02
  Michelin recommend on the restaurant.
• 1:12:03
  Yeah, side joke is like if I was there.
• 1:12:05
  They would have got. If I was still there, they would
• 1:12:08
  they would have got three stars. Just kidding.
• 1:12:11
  But yeah, those it was. It's a it's a beautiful kitchen.
• 1:12:14
  It's nice, man. It's nice.
• 1:12:16
  Yeah, and I was still a chef then you.
• 1:12:18
  Know what I mean? Like the like people tell me now
• 1:12:22
  it's like when I see people now that used to work for me like,
• 1:12:24
  oh, you're so different now. It's like, yeah, well, I'm not a
• 1:12:26
  chef anymore. I mean, they say once a chef I
• 1:12:28
  was, but I'm not active. Like I'm not running kitchens.
• 1:12:31
  And I've I, I have, I will admit this since I've started.
• 1:12:36
  Doing this I'm much. Softer than I was that.
• 1:12:39
  Yeah, like, you know what I mean?
• 1:12:41
  Like, I just. I just see it different.
• 1:12:42
  Like I'm. I'm not trying to.
• 1:12:44
  Yeah, you know what I mean? Do you miss it?
• 1:12:47
  Yeah. Really.
• 1:12:49
  Not enough to go back. Yeah.
• 1:12:51
  But I miss it. Here's the hardest thing that
• 1:12:53
  people don't understand is when you're in a kitchen.
• 1:12:57
  I'm introverted naturally. Are you really?
• 1:12:59
  Yeah. Like, naturally.
• 1:13:00
  Like outside of work, I'm to myself quiet, you know, I'm.
• 1:13:04
  I'm introverted. I'm, I'm really shy and like
• 1:13:07
  when the camera's off, right? But at work, I always played the
• 1:13:13
  part talking to people, directing traffic.
• 1:13:16
  And so I couldn't wait to get home.
• 1:13:18
  So I could like, no people right now.
• 1:13:22
  It's no people all day. And that's weird.
• 1:13:27
  Like when you're in the kitchen, you're around people, you're
• 1:13:29
  cracking a joke. You're, you're.
• 1:13:31
  And So what I miss more than anything is the camaraderie.
• 1:13:35
  I also missed the daily mental challenges.
• 1:13:37
  Like there was always something right, working on There was
• 1:13:40
  always like, OK, how we can make the food better, how we can be.
• 1:13:43
  We got a big event. We got a right.
• 1:13:44
  You know, there was always like a a new new, a new daily dragon
• 1:13:49
  to slay. Yeah.
• 1:13:50
  And now it's like, what? What's some funny shit I'm gonna
• 1:13:52
  post today. Yeah.
• 1:13:53
  Might make people laugh or might get people to talk.
• 1:13:56
  So it's just different. Yeah.
• 1:13:57
  I mean, you deal with chefs all the time and like.
• 1:13:59
  Do you do you think most chefs are introverted?
• 1:14:02
  Yeah, really you? Just tend to go to.
• 1:14:05
  That without even knowing it. Like the back of the house,
• 1:14:07
  like. Yeah, I think so.
• 1:14:08
  Not, not even and. When you're.
• 1:14:10
  Extroverted, you tend to go to the front and the show and right
• 1:14:14
  here's what I do notice. Because I do, I do.
• 1:14:16
  The podcast is a lot of chefs, not only they they introverted,
• 1:14:23
  but they're also, they're different when the camera's on,
• 1:14:26
  when the camera's off, you know what I mean?
• 1:14:29
  I I mean, I won't say who, but I've had people on that have
• 1:14:32
  like frozen up during the podcast and, and, and they won't
• 1:14:37
  like people listening won't know that they froze up.
• 1:14:39
  But I know because I know them often.
• 1:14:40
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, yeah. And I've had people tell me on
• 1:14:43
  the podcast, like, I don't remember any of the interview.
• 1:14:46
  I was so nervous. I'm like, really like that.
• 1:14:48
  Like they don't remember any of the conversations.
• 1:14:50
  They hear the episode because they were nervous.
• 1:14:52
  I'm like, wow, that blows my mind.
• 1:14:55
  Chefs are introverts in general. And I think that's I, I think
• 1:15:02
  that actually. Is is kind of probably.
• 1:15:04
  Why they went into the kitchen versus the service side, You
• 1:15:06
  know that they, they just want a little bit more control.
• 1:15:08
  They don't want to deal with people at the table.
• 1:15:11
  Yeah, yeah. It's, it's it's.
• 1:15:14
  Wild. I'll tell you I have a.
• 1:15:15
  A completely different perspective over the last three
• 1:15:18
  years of the industry than I did when I was in it.
• 1:15:21
  And one of the things with chef's PSA is because when I was
• 1:15:27
  a chef, I'd only interact with chefs at a certain level daily,
• 1:15:30
  right? You got the food and wine or you
• 1:15:31
  got this? Like these are my friends that
• 1:15:33
  just people I see all the time. But once I left that and I
• 1:15:36
  started doing only chefs PSA, it's like I I opened myself up
• 1:15:39
  to interact with chefs that I didn't interact with before, You
• 1:15:43
  know, people that work in all aspects of culinary, whether
• 1:15:45
  it's, you know, at the diner or the hospital or, you know, a
• 1:15:50
  corporate setting. Like I talked to all of them now
• 1:15:53
  and what I realize is that. We have a lot more in common
• 1:15:59
  than. What makes us different?
• 1:16:02
  The food is different. And maybe the.
• 1:16:04
  Structure of the kitchen is different, but the, the
• 1:16:06
  challenges are the same in every kitchen.
• 1:16:08
  And just because it works here doesn't mean it works there.
• 1:16:13
  And I, and I think a lot of times as chefs, we look at other
• 1:16:18
  people like, oh, that, you know, they're, they're this type of
• 1:16:20
  chef or they're that type of chef.
• 1:16:21
  And I don't respect them. And I'll, I'll tell you that
• 1:16:26
  what I do now I realize like, no, like we're all facing the
• 1:16:29
  same struggle. Doesn't matter what we're
• 1:16:31
  cooking. Like we're all facing the same
• 1:16:32
  struggles in the kitchen. It's just different.
• 1:16:35
  It's just different. And we have way more in common
• 1:16:39
  than what makes us different. So it's been, it's, it's been
• 1:16:41
  eye opening for me to, to, to appreciate all aspects of the,
• 1:16:47
  of the culinary world. It's, it's, it's really a
• 1:16:49
  beautiful industry. Yeah, even at the higher levels.
• 1:16:52
  Man, like you know, I mean, you know when they.
• 1:16:56
  When they speak about their. Struggles and some of these
• 1:16:58
  chefs have three stars and I'm thinking wow you 2 like you you
• 1:17:01
  go through that I mean you you would think that they have it
• 1:17:05
  all perfect right right and it's not the case you know we're all
• 1:17:08
  human and we're all trying to figure it out you know and the
• 1:17:12
  industry is is evolving right and it's and it's sometimes
• 1:17:16
  you're you're trying to catch up and I think that's the that's
• 1:17:20
  the tricky part what is the pressure of of the.
• 1:17:23
  Michelin, how does that affect you?
• 1:17:27
  Well, I. Mean pressure has always.
• 1:17:30
  Been there in the industry. Right.
• 1:17:32
  I mean, from, from the beginning, I think the pressure
• 1:17:35
  is, is the pressure, the stress and all that.
• 1:17:39
  I, I'm a believer that whatever you do, it's always going to be
• 1:17:43
  there and it kind of makes it a little easier to deal with,
• 1:17:47
  right? But it's not I, I don't.
• 1:17:52
  I don't want to say just. Michelin I just think overall,
• 1:17:55
  any, anybody right, just the guest, just just like you say,
• 1:18:00
  all these like little, little things throughout throughout the
• 1:18:03
  day of of improving and, and whether it be on the financial
• 1:18:07
  side or, you know, on the guest side, the staff, the food, I
• 1:18:14
  mean there's just so many aspects that I think it's the
• 1:18:18
  way you deal. With it and for me.
• 1:18:20
  As always been being a runner, it was just going out running
• 1:18:23
  right like if I'm, if I'm feeling it and and I'm able to
• 1:18:27
  do it, I, I go, I do I try to run at least four to five times
• 1:18:31
  a week, but when I get the chance to.
• 1:18:34
  Run. For a long time, I'll do a 12 to
• 1:18:38
  15 mile run and it's just, it makes me feel so good inside,
• 1:18:42
  Like, but I feel like I did a cleanse from the inside out,
• 1:18:45
  right. And, and, and I love it.
• 1:18:48
  I, I truly, truly love it. I'll do, I'll do, you know,
• 1:18:51
  three to five and, and you know, that's, that's pretty standard
• 1:18:55
  for me. But when you, when I get those
• 1:18:59
  long runs, I, I'm able to reset think and all through the run,
• 1:19:03
  I'm thinking of my week. I'm thinking of the future, the
• 1:19:07
  past and everything in between. And so it just helps me out.
• 1:19:14
  I've, I've had a, you know, maybe have a conversation or
• 1:19:17
  maybe improve this and things like that.
• 1:19:20
  You know, I'm going to ask you a really tough question.
• 1:19:23
  I want to ask you this. At a certain point, chefs
• 1:19:27
  eventually move on to something else.
• 1:19:29
  Yeah. If there was something when you
• 1:19:31
  think about like, OK, if I were to ever move on to something
• 1:19:35
  else, what would you move on to? If I would ever move on to
• 1:19:39
  something. Else it's funny to ask that
• 1:19:44
  because when I before I wanted to be a chef, I I took acting
• 1:19:49
  classes. I remember you saying that last
• 1:19:51
  time. Yeah.
• 1:19:52
  And. I really want to pursue that.
• 1:19:54
  I really. Did I, I, I, I remember telling
• 1:19:56
  my brother when I was a junior and, and I had just talked to my
• 1:19:59
  teacher at the time and she was, she was like, yeah, you know, if
• 1:20:02
  you want to do this. You have to get an agent and
• 1:20:04
  that they're presenting you and then you'll go to casting and
• 1:20:06
  just, you just try out, right? And it's hard because, but
• 1:20:11
  depends who, you know what they're looking for.
• 1:20:14
  They're, you know, anybody can get a role.
• 1:20:18
  It doesn't really matter, right? It just depends on what they're
• 1:20:20
  looking for. And I was super excited to tell
• 1:20:22
  my brother I'm going to get an agent.
• 1:20:23
  So after high school, I'm going to, I'm going to pursue this.
• 1:20:25
  And then obviously, you know, cooking happened and all that.
• 1:20:28
  I think something in film or, or something like that, you know,
• 1:20:33
  something in, in, in being, but it also connected to food at
• 1:20:39
  some something, you know, and, and I've been, you know,
• 1:20:41
  thinking about ideas and, you know, it's always on the back
• 1:20:45
  burner, right. So.
• 1:20:46
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:20:47
  So, you know, it's it's. Could you do both?
• 1:20:51
  I might. I might do both, I don't know.
• 1:20:53
  But I, I would love to do that. And you know, you know my
• 1:20:59
  girlfriend. 'S like she's saying you.
• 1:21:00
  Know you should do you should go to just go to Community College
• 1:21:03
  and just do just take acting classes just do it for fun, you
• 1:21:06
  know as a hobby. Any producers listening?
• 1:21:09
  Hey, guys. You guys out there what?
• 1:21:10
  Kind of movie would you want to be at?
• 1:21:13
  I don't know. I don't know.
• 1:21:15
  I don't. I don't even know if it would be
• 1:21:16
  a movie, you know, I don't. I don't even know what it would
• 1:21:18
  be. Netflix original series?
• 1:21:19
  Yeah, I don't. Yeah.
• 1:21:20
  What do you want? Maybe.
• 1:21:21
  Maybe. Hosting I don't know.
• 1:21:22
  Would you watch any shows like or movies that you?
• 1:21:24
  Like I would like to be in that one.
• 1:21:27
  I think something. With food, you know, if I can,
• 1:21:29
  if I can go to Mexico and you know, either travel and, and,
• 1:21:35
  and go back to my roots and feel like, like a, like a Bourdain
• 1:21:38
  style show. Not necessarily.
• 1:21:40
  I don't even know. I don't even.
• 1:21:41
  Know I don't even know, but I think something connected to
• 1:21:44
  food, you know and also opening the opening the the opportunity
• 1:21:49
  for people that may not want to you know that their story is not
• 1:21:53
  being told either. Like you said, they might go on
• 1:21:57
  camera or, but they do an amazing product that that, that
• 1:22:04
  when they, when they would tell the story or they have a cool
• 1:22:06
  story that's connected to food, then you'd be like, wow, I
• 1:22:09
  didn't even realize that that's how it worked right?
• 1:22:12
  Or something like that. So I I I have.
• 1:22:16
  An itch to make a movie. Really.
• 1:22:18
  Yeah. Yeah, I do.
• 1:22:19
  I truly do. I would.
• 1:22:20
  I would want to make a movie. So if anyone's listening, you
• 1:22:23
  want to make. There you go.
• 1:22:23
  You're the executive producer, man.
• 1:22:25
  Yeah, I wouldn't. Want to be in it.
• 1:22:25
  I would want to make it so my my.
• 1:22:27
  Idea for a movie would be this. So anyone's listening, here's my
• 1:22:29
  pitch. Think like a Scorsese style
• 1:22:32
  movie right? Set in the disco era, late 70s
• 1:22:37
  early 80s. Toxic chef.
• 1:22:40
  You know, cocaine era New York City.
• 1:22:44
  Throw in plates doing lines just like, the most toxic chef you
• 1:22:50
  can imagine. Yeah, Yeah.
• 1:22:52
  And then there's like a younger chef watching all this go down.
• 1:22:56
  So of course there'd be like climax, yeah, the chef has a
• 1:22:59
  downfall and all that. But like showing, you know,
• 1:23:03
  like, think like 80s disco music like Blonde.
• 1:23:07
  Do you think Carlito's way and fellas about chef nice like.
• 1:23:12
  Christian Bale or. Or someone like that toxic chef.
• 1:23:15
  I think it would be it would be like entertaining, like I wanted
• 1:23:17
  to be dark and, you know, tragic at the end.
• 1:23:21
  Like of course the guy probably has to die or something like
• 1:23:23
  that or or, you know, fail or like.
• 1:23:26
  But this ties into why I. Want to do it OK?
• 1:23:31
  In the old days, a lot of those kitchens, you know, when we, we
• 1:23:34
  throw the term toxic kitchens and all that, it's like they
• 1:23:37
  would do shit in those in those days that you would never forget
• 1:23:40
  and you wouldn't, you would never do that again because it
• 1:23:43
  was such a traumatic experience of when you made the mistake.
• 1:23:45
  Like I, I, I, I talked about this on a, on an interview I did
• 1:23:48
  recently that this chef used to carry a rock salt in his pocket.
• 1:23:53
  So if you didn't season the food, he would take the rock
• 1:23:55
  salt out and be like, your taste buds are not seasoned, lick the
• 1:23:58
  salt. And so like everyone in the
• 1:23:59
  kitchen at some point had had looked at the salt.
• 1:24:02
  But you never forgot after that, right?
• 1:24:05
  And what's interesting? About that is.
• 1:24:08
  Just by telling that story, there's going to be people that
• 1:24:11
  listen to this and they're going to remember that and they're
• 1:24:13
  going to be like, that's terrible.
• 1:24:14
  I'll never forget just by hearing it, right.
• 1:24:16
  So sometimes making a movie like that, you could put all those
• 1:24:19
  extreme examples in the movie. People don't have to experience
• 1:24:23
  it, right? To know to never do it again,
• 1:24:26
  right? You know what I mean?
• 1:24:26
  Like, like you could watch a movie and someone, you know,
• 1:24:30
  falls down this or like Final Destination, yeah where the the,
• 1:24:33
  the they're driving behind the truck with the yeah yeah.
• 1:24:35
  Poles. And it's like they you never
• 1:24:37
  want to drive by that that that got me, man, right.
• 1:24:39
  You. Never want to drive by every
• 1:24:41
  time I see that. I'd never want to do that.
• 1:24:43
  Right. Yeah, but you only had to watch
• 1:24:44
  that, so I think you could. Put some things like that in a
• 1:24:46
  movie, make them extreme. And I think a lot of chefs would
• 1:24:49
  be like, OK, I'll never for not forget the season or I'll yeah,
• 1:24:52
  right. Just so you could, you could
• 1:24:54
  learn the lesson by seeing it sometimes versus actually
• 1:24:58
  experiencing it. And I'm not, but I would have to
• 1:25:01
  be very careful because I wouldn't want to glorify that.
• 1:25:03
  That's why I would have to make it a period piece in the 70s or,
• 1:25:07
  you know, it's not today. And I and I, and I want to make
• 1:25:10
  sure that I put that out there as a disclaimer for anyone
• 1:25:13
  listening like that's not today. And I wouldn't I, I think today
• 1:25:16
  we have, we have different methods.
• 1:25:17
  We're smarter, we know better. We know how to get more out of
• 1:25:20
  people using different tactics from from the kitchens that were
• 1:25:26
  were from before. Yeah.
• 1:25:29
  Well, Chef. I always love.
• 1:25:31
  Talking to you, I do want to say this while you're on the podcast
• 1:25:34
  is I tell this to people all the time when I talk about you, I
• 1:25:38
  say I've never. Wanted a chef?
• 1:25:43
  That I've met to win more than I want Rogelia to win.
• 1:25:45
  Thank you man. Appreciate it Like I'm I'm I.
• 1:25:48
  Mean that with. With, with 100% honesty is that
• 1:25:51
  you are one of the most genuine people, humble, talented, a
• 1:25:56
  complete package. And you deserve all the
• 1:25:59
  accolades that you've you've earned and you've received and
• 1:26:04
  many more. And I and I, I promise you that
• 1:26:07
  what you're doing is amazing and you're impacting people and your
• 1:26:10
  books amazing. And yeah, I, I, I am your
• 1:26:14
  biggest cheerleader when, when the cameras are off, also when
• 1:26:17
  the cameras are on. But you know, when I when I'm
• 1:26:19
  having conversations of like, who's the next, I have a certain
• 1:26:22
  group of chefs that I think these are the next ones.
• 1:26:24
  Thank you. I put you in that group.
• 1:26:26
  Thank you, man. Appreciate it means a lot.
• 1:26:27
  Much love. Man, where can people find you,
• 1:26:30
  Oro? In Calistoga.
• 1:26:31
  In Napa Valley, my hometown so and on social media, chef
• 1:26:35
  Rogelio Garcia and the book you might on my.
• 1:26:38
  Website at. Chefrogelio garcia.com.
• 1:26:41
  Awesome. There's a link there.
• 1:26:42
  Thanks for coming back, bro. Thank you, man.
• 1:26:43
  Appreciate it, brother. Thank you man.
• 1:26:45
  Well, I hope you enjoyed the show.
• 1:26:47
  You know what to do and. Make sure you leave five stars
• 1:26:49
  if you're listening on Spotify or anywhere really.
• 1:26:51
  If you're watching on YouTube, hit the like and subscribe
• 1:26:53
  button. I'd completely revamped the
• 1:26:55
  Chefs PSA store, shop.chefspsa.com.
• 1:26:58
  My team added a ton of new items.
• 1:27:01
  I advise you to go check it out. Just peruse, look around, maybe
• 1:27:04
  you see something nice that you like.
• 1:27:05
  Keep supporting the show. Go to chefspsa.com.
• 1:27:08
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• 1:27:11
  to episodes on Substack and Spotify for Premium members.