July 23, 2025 • 40 mins
We're back with another classic Bombing episode! Eric and chef extraordinaire/pal Roy Choi talk about setting kitchens on fire accidentally and walking in on people having sex in a restaurant after hours. Never a dull moment when you are a professional chef. Eric talks about lying his way through a restaurant gig and immediately being fired after 3 days. Roy shares his tales of cooking stoned, his time of cooking in Japan, an infamous bombing moment with an Iron Chef, getting ripped by The New York Times, and asking the age old question: how does a tire mascot dictate "good food?" And last but not least, how witnessing people peeing into the tomato sauce will make you think twice about ordering pizza.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
What have y'all.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
It's me Eric and we are back with another edition
of Bombing, where I talked with friends, comedians, musicians and
chefs about their worst moments on stage and also there
were worst moments in the kitchen. Today we have an
esteam chef on the pod, roy Choi, the prolific restaurant
tour and one of the pioneers of the food truck
movement with the revolutionary Kogi food truck in La serving
up Korean taco deliciousness. He's a dear friend of mine
(00:23):
and he shares his bombing moments in the kitchen and
trying to cook while blaze out of his mind. Let's
get into it.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Bombing. Bombing with Eric Andre called bombing.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
I just want to know the trials and tribulations of
roy Choi. I want to know the worst gig you
ever had, the worst restaurant review you ever had, the
worst meal you ever made, the worst gig you ever had.
I want to know, just like the word I mean,
you've You've lived in and worked in some gnarly kitchens.
(01:01):
I'm assuming with some gnarly motherfuckers. Yeah, and you came
up under some gnarly motherfuckers. Some hot heads and shit.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
So yeah, for sure, I came up. I came up
before PC and before like you know, I'm from the nineties.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
So we were saying racist shit to you in the kitchen.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Oh yeah, racial time. Yeah, you know, Like I mean,
I held my own, you know, luckily, luckily enough, I
had a background to be able to hold my own.
But if if I didn't hold my own, yeah, I mean,
it's not just racist shit. It's sexist shit. It's racist shit,
is aggressive, competitive, toxic, toxic environments. But there's also like
a good side to it. There's a chill side. It's
like it's like any industry. You look at football in
(01:41):
the seventies, porn in the eighties, you know, cooking in
the nineties. You know, like it's like it's give and take. Yeah,
you know, it's what we It's what we got because
we don't have that much information. Now there's too much
information that everything is like you're walking on needles. But
back then, outrageougonomy, people are just going for it. Back then,
you know, you're just going for or like I'm not
I'm not condoning, I'm just saying like no one knew
(02:03):
any fucking better, right, you know, so it's just what's
coming up? You know, there's I kind of missed that,
Like I don't know if the right worst transparency, but
just that that like that that primalism of just like
saying whatever the fuck was on your.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Mind, right, no filter, no filter, raw, no vasoline. Yes,
we had songs. We had songs. They had no filter. Wait,
so what was like the worst gig? Like what did
you before you had you know, your own restaurants, where
were you where'd you cut your teeth or what was
like the worst gigs you had?
Speaker 3 (02:33):
I mean I cut my teeth in New York. I
went to culinary school out there. I cooked in New
York restaurants in nineties in the nineties.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Yeah, well year do you remember, like ninety.
Speaker 3 (02:44):
Six, ninety seven, ninety eight, So this.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
Is back in the day when I remember I went
to dinner with Bobby Flan, Michael Voltagia one time, Tony
Hawking by mete to the dinner and Fultajia told me that,
like he goes literally, chefs would have cookbooks that looked
like they were like written by an old Italian grandmother.
There was no internet. I mean, there was like the
earliest stages of the Internet, but like there was actually
(03:07):
like the secret recipe because you couldn't just like go
online and watch fifty five thousand YouTube videos about every
single recipe. You really had to like work under some
psycho chef and really get in their good graces and
figure out each one of these recipes. Like it was
like it was medieval compared to now, which you have
all this information at your fingertips.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
It's very medieval. I guess it could be the same
as like stand up comedy in a sense where you
had to go out on the road and stay in
motels and like pay your dues and all that. You know,
the whole thing of paying dues like in our generations,
like it's real stuff because there was no Internet, and
so yeah, you had Like right now, people think working
at a job for like or doing something for one
(03:50):
year is a long time, right, you know, I mean
that's almost too long for people, like they want instant success.
Back then, you like it was understood that you would
work for seven years over someone in obscurity, you know,
and just learning and absorbing. It is very like kung fu,
you know, it's like kills like you're putting your hands
in like broken Fire. It was very Yeah, it was
(04:12):
very Saturday morning Kung Fu movie, like going to the
top of the bamboo forest and yeah, balancing and hitting
tree trunks, you know, that's that's what it was, and
that's the only way you could learn. And and then yes,
there were books, but these books were written like decades ago, right,
and and they were all European, right, And so yeah,
(04:34):
if you ever needed like something or vinaigrette or anything
like just something, if you're like kind of freestyling, you
would have to go back to the office, look up
the book and kind of like it was a very
dewey decimal system.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Well did you see people get rocked ever in kitchens
like fucking spilled hot boiling water in themselves or just
burn themselves with hot hot mops.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
No, I've seen it. I I was the one that
was spilling stuff and causing fires. And because I got
into cooking late and then I had I had a
I don't have real like horror stories. But the one
thing I did have in that time of my life
in the late nineties was I had this unique intersection
and ability where I would always walk in on people
having sex in the kitchen yeah, I don't know if
(05:26):
you have. I mean, it's just something that's following me.
I've been walked in on like five times in my life.
And then I just there was just this period of
time in the nineties where I would always either be
walked in on or I'd walk in on something, and
it would just be like I would be completely were
just going down to get like flour, you know, or
bread curubs.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Yeah, just too like cooks.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
Were so happening all the time in New York. It
was happening all the time.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
People just drunk and coked up or just like the
pressure of work just led to these primal urges. It's
the pressure. It's like sleep. It's just it was like
just what it was back.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
Then, you know. And then in New York, the kitchens
have levels, right, so in your mind you think that
there are these like hidden chambers. So there's the kitchen level,
and then there's like a storage level. There's the office
on the third floor, and then there's the basement. You
know how New York streets are, and so it was
always in the kegs are in the bottom, the fifty
(06:24):
pound sacks of flour, and those are perfect spots to
get it, get it on. But it was like, but
the weird thing is fucking down by the flower man,
because there's six stacks of flower, fifty pound sacks of
flower bins. So you could do it either way. You
could do a doggy style, you could be on bottom,
(06:45):
it doesn't matter. You could lay down, you could do
missionary whatever you want. Kegs kegs. You have handles to
hold on to, you know. So it's just it was
happening all the time, and it was just like quick shit,
you know, like.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
A yeah, I don't know why I know all that stuff?
Well I know it. I know why, Yeah, I know
it because I here's walking in on it.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Man.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
Unfortunately I wasn't the one being walked in on in
those situations, but I was the one always walked I
was always like this dumb mister Magoo, like walking in
with like an empty hotel pan trying to pick up
panko flower and then yeah, so that's the type of
stuff that was happening to me.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
But I was in New York. Rats, how many rats
did you see?
Speaker 3 (07:26):
I didn't see that many rats. I worked in really
good restaurants, so I didn't really see that many rats
in New York. I would see I was living actually
up just below Spanish Harlem, up in like east upper
East Side, so i'd see something like on the way
home to work, but or on the subway but not
at work, but like the bombing stuff for in the
kitchens in New York was me I was. I got
(07:49):
into professional cooking a little bit later, like in my
later twenties, so I was like trying to make up
for lost time. So I kind of I kind of
went for kitchens I wasn't ready for yet, you know.
So I tried to let you be, like you're getting
on stages you're not You're not even prepared for, you know,
like you haven't even put in the work yet, right,
And so I get in there and I was just
with all these like assassins and pros, and I was
(08:10):
just trying to keep up. And then I have this
really crazy problem when I get nervous. It doesn't happen
as much anymore because I'm not that as much as
nervous anymore. But when I was younger, I was really
nervous and shy. I fucking bleed from the nose, like
fucking like you have a fire hydrant. Really, Yeah, So you.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Get so nervous that your nose.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Yeah. So yeah, and I think maybe part of well,
part of it is definitely like my anxiety and my
my shyness, but part of it is I was like
born with like a cleft, so my whole like nose
palette and bone bone is a little bit different. My
whole nasal passages and everything is really weird. So all that,
and then so I'd be in the middle of the
service and then my nose just start losing it, and
(08:53):
so I'd stuff one up and then I stuffed the
other up, and then and then one night I was
a chicken stock off the thing and it started, uh,
the fat fell off the top, and then it like
the fire just took over the whole island. And then
once it took over the whole island, and my nose
wouldn't stop bleeding, so it looked like too big, like
(09:14):
MAXI pads in my in my nostrils. And then they
had to stop service for a second and clean up.
And then the chef just looks at me. It's just
shaking his head. But it was like, I it was
a pretty comedic moment because he's looking at me.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
There's this huge fire.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
They have to stop service. Everyone's pissed off. But how
can you get mad at me? I'm like a little
I'm like the little kid, and stand by me, you know,
like I'm just like you trying. I'm trying so hard.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
You really mean to do well.
Speaker 3 (09:41):
I really met to do well, and I'm sitting there
with two bloody noses and yeah, so they just like
everyone jumped in to help me out. That's a great
thing about kitchens is you know, like when they know
you're trying, they'll jump in and help you out.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
So it's not.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
All like the worst parts. It's not all people trying
to cut each other's heads.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
Often it's not that, but it is a lot of competitiveness. Yeah, yeah,
I mean there are horses, you know, like I didn't
really experience them too much, but there are a lot
of horstors where people bump in you with hot shit,
you know that's yeah, or leave a knife out, you know,
leave a knife out that points outward or but those
are those are bad kitchen. Just like in anything in
(10:19):
life are there are bad people in bad situations and
people with malicious intent. In most case, people are just
trying to like see what you're made of. I would
say the good is better than that. But that doesn't
mean like they're like nice. It means like they're just
pushing you, so like can you keep up?
Speaker 2 (10:35):
They're testing your metal?
Speaker 3 (10:36):
Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
I worked in a kitchen for three days. I waited tables. Okay,
there's a restaurant called Burritoville in the West Village. This
is probably twenty years ago. I just graduated college, I
want to say early two thousands, and I was the
worst server in the history of restaurants. I burned myself
every five seconds. I forgot you got to tell the
customer when the plate is hot they give And it
(11:00):
was like very rowdy, loud gay guys in the in
the neighborhood at the time. So like I would like
put a plate down and be scalding hot, and the
guy would go to touch the plate. I forgot to
tell nothing. I'd be like, it's fucking hot, and I'm like,
oh shit, I'm supposed to tell you that. And I
(11:20):
lied on my job interview and I told the guy
I was waiting tables since I was fourteen years old
from my parents. Never worked in a restaurant once in
New York. I was fucking horrible dropping plates. I would
like scoop when the when the customer would be like
can I take this home and to go back, I
would just scoop it out with my hands, and the
waiter the other waiters were like, dude, don't if you're
(11:41):
gonna do that, don't let the customers see you doing that.
And I was like, shit, I didn't want the best
chefs in the world use their hands. And the person
training me was like, you're not the best chef in
the world. You're horrible. You're fucking horrible.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
Like, we don't serve like hot plates anymore like that.
It sounds like a restaurant that would serve like like
plate that was like scalding. Yes, yeah, yeah. Other than
Peter Lueger, is no one that really does that.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Sometimes you get the sizzling fahida play like a chili
this kind of thing. But that's that's telling you it's
fucking cooking. But my friend Derek Beckele's I hope he
doesn't mind me tell you a story. He worked at
a restaurant in Manhattan. I gotta ask him which restaurant
this is not to put it on blast, just out
of curiosity. He was like, this was not like a
cheap restaurant. He goes, this was a fancy this is
(12:29):
a fans I don't know if it was Mission Star,
but like whatever, but like it was you know, fine dining,
white tablecloth chip and he tells the story. I wish
he was here to tell it. He tells it better
than me. But there was a tomato soup tomato bisk
or something they were serving and everybody's wolfing it down.
It's like the special soup of the day. So soup
(12:50):
djure people. Everybody wolven it down. People ask for seconds
and ship and then he goes back into the kitchen
and he's like, I got more soup. I need more soup.
I got supporters. And the chef was like no, no, no,
And he's like what And he said, like the cauldron
of soup was like dumped out and going down the
drain or something, and there was like a gigantic, dead
(13:12):
bloated rat at the bottom. So he said, like people
were wolfing it down because I had this like gamy rat, Brian,
I was giving it like the perfect flavor.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
It makes me think of this time in high school
where I knew a bunch of kids that were working
at a pizza spot. Again, I just had this thing
in life where I walk in on ship. Yeah back
then I walk in and they're all peeing in the
fucking tomato sauce.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
What why?
Speaker 3 (13:43):
Because they're fucking sixteen years old.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
That's a crime against humanity. People were eating, Yes, that
was the pizza. Come on, Jesus, but Christ.
Speaker 3 (13:57):
It must be something with tomatoes and rats.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
It's because it's.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
I think they were busier and never than.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
That with Aeric Codre.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
With aeric Codre, what's the worst like restaurant review you
ever had? Have you gotten like ripped by I don't
read reviews. I tell my publicist, like, unless it's good,
don't send it to me. I don't care, like I
you know.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
I did get ripped apart by The New York Times.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
I got ripped apart by the Nature.
Speaker 3 (14:35):
By Pete Wells. The he's like he's like the theater critic,
you know, like like the food, you know, like the
type of thing where people are waiting on pins and
needles for his his his review, and then it's a
make or break situation, you know.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
But we opened.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Well luckily, like career wise, I wasn't at a point
where I really gave a funk about it. But the
project we were working on mattered, you know. And I
don't know if you know about this project called Local
I did out in Watts and Oakland. But you know,
it was a project for you know, for the people
I grew up with, you know, like it was like
going back to the neighborhood building a restaurant, employing everyone,
(15:14):
you know, providing Wi Fi internet jobs, nutrition training, and
we were just building, like trying to build a great
restaurant in the hood, you know what I'm saying. Yeah,
And so we started Watts, Oakland, you know, we went
to San Jose, San Francisco, all that, and uh, he
came in and just ripped us apart.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
Man. Just wait, so there's stuffy white New York Times
because I'm asuming they're they're they're they're.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
They were disguises. So I don't know what.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
Food reviewers were disguises when they come in they do
they do, yeah, because they want to be incognitia. They
want to be treated as if they're Yeah, they don't
want special treatment, so they know what the real deal is.
Speaker 3 (15:56):
Yeah, that industry now is kind of fleeting because of
the way the world is and the way the internet is. Right,
but when they were at when they were at in
their prime, you know, there's only five of those fake reservations,
burner phones, whoa you know, disguises like horrible disguise like
this guys you would wear the guys is like you
(16:17):
would wear yeah, like fucking sabotage beastie boys ship and
they would go in restaurants like that.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
So that that guy missed the point of that project.
That project you were trying to bring. You trying to
uplift marginalized communities and bring vitality to the hood. Just
bring bring culture. Yeah, jobs create jobs. So that guy
like that's like a completely missing the point.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
But the thing is we were too high profile chefs
opening a restaurant in watts There was a lot of attention.
You know, everyone was writing about this opening and so
you know, it was a big for them to actually
cover it. And and you know Pete he's a tremendous writer.
He's like, you know, he's the writer of the New
(17:07):
York Times. But he has a shtick where he goes
to a restaurant, like in the beginning of each year
he did Guy Fieri's restaurant, he did. He did a
few others where he just fucking leans in. Hennihilates, He
annihilates you, he gets I think. So I don't know,
but I think he does. And and you know we
got I got zero stars. I got zero stars from
the New York Times. So I would say that's bombings.
(17:31):
It has to hurt, right, It hurts, right, It hurts
on every level. Yeah, even though I say it doesn't hurt,
it hurts, you know, because we're not opening. You know,
we're not the ones peeing in the fucking pizza sauce.
You know, we're trying, you know, like we really care
about this thing, and you know, for us to get
a zero, to do all that work and get it,
you know, even if you know, like your your mission
(17:52):
is higher than that and it's not about the ego,
it's still it still hurts.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Like, you know, has he ever said anything nice? Has
he've always been on yours? Always been after you?
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Do? You feel like I didn't even know I was
on his radar until that? Yeah, So New Yorkers don't
really give a shit about us in l A. I
don't even think we exist you know, so.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Was there like but that's no longer? Is that's still
true maybe back in the day? Is that still like that?
Is there still like an East Coast West Coast Biggie
Tupac chef beef.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
I don't know if there's a chef, but but I
do think that New York's New Yorkers still. I think
that New York is the center of the world, you know,
in many ways, you know. And uh, but they love
to live in l A.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
What about Parisian chefs? Are they even even more cool?
Speaker 1 (18:41):
Man?
Speaker 3 (18:42):
Really like French new wave cinema man, the new, the new,
the new guns.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
I'm talking about the old school cats with the chef
boyarded fucking hats, the rough as hell in the kitchen.
But they're cool.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
They're cool as being something. Really, the French are cool, man,
They fucking smoked cigarette.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Oh no, I'm not.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
I'm not talking about all French people. Chef. French chefs
were the toughest in the their fucking the like brick
ship house fucking I thought they were like the teacher
in that movie Whiplash, like throwing fucking drum symbols at
your fucking head.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
Uh yes, yes, But that's inside the kitchen.
Speaker 2 (19:17):
Outside there outside, so outside the New York chefs are
not their dicks inside and out of the kitchen.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
I wouldn't say it's the chefs. I would say it's
the more the patrons and the diners, you know that,
you know, just like New York and l A in general,
Like a lot of times we get overlooked, you know, like, yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
I think LA is the capital of I mean, I'm
not an expert, but I thought like LA is the
capital of Yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
Yeah, but but you got to remember our casual attitude
and our lifestyle. A lot of people don't think that
we're trying, or it doesn't get computed that we actually
give a ship sometimes. So what I mean by that
is Micheline guide came here years ago. Like I don't
have too much beef with many in life. I'm pretty zen, right,
but fuck the Michelin guy, you.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
Know, straight up and then and everyone Michelin.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
It comes from an era where you fucking you know,
you remember ship and you hold the line. I come
from that era here.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
What does that mean?
Speaker 3 (20:18):
Like, you know, like your word means something like you know,
you got people's back, You fucking like you represent you know,
like and you and you hold down your ship, you
hold down your hood, you know, like the Michelin guy
came to La and told us that we were uncivilized. Yeah,
and that there was no place in this city that
could have great food to their to their measurements because
(20:41):
it wasn't European based, you know. And you know, because
you could go to a restaurant with shorts on or
whatever the case may be.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
You know, and the guys living in like the eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
Exactly, and then they came back years later, seven eight
years later and then reintroduced themselves California, and everyone acted.
Everyone just got back on their dick like they didn't
say that ship. And for me, I just remember.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
You know, so.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
No no, no, no, no, no no no.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
So a lot of people look at us like we
don't we're not trying hard, you know, whereas like in
other other cities, like because it's you know, very European
core base, it looks like it's more intelligent or whatever
the case may be.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
You know, like there's like stuffy blue blood like yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
You know, Miami gets that a lot too. There can't
be great cuisine down in regions where people are just
chilling and having a great time, you know, because it's crazy.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
I didn't know that LA that's so fun that that's
all news to me. That's all news to me because
I thought like LA is the high water mark, and
everybody's trying to catch up to l A. But I
guess it's like this new.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
I would say, like amongst the amongst the people, yes,
you know, but uh but still amongst the guard that
old guard the gates. Yeah, the gatekeepers that control media
or control the industry in the sense that get kickbacks
from giving reviews or things like that. I would say, So.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
It's a corrupt too, there's some corruption there.
Speaker 3 (22:07):
I bet fucking the Michelin guys corrupt ship.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
I've done. I've been to some Michelin Star restaurants that
fucking sucked, that were like dog food. I went to
one in in Prague and I like left and I
was like that was mediocre. And my sister goes, this
place is a Michelin Star, and I was like, dude,
this is I heard that. It's been bullshit from the beginning.
Though it's a tire company, right, isn't a company that
(22:31):
makes tires, it's Michelin it's the same.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
It's the same same company.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
Company is a tire company because they tell me what
the best fucking fog raw is.
Speaker 3 (22:42):
Well, the history of it is, they built the guide
because they want people to buy tires. They want people
to travel throughout Europe. Instead of taking the eurail on
the train. They wanted people to get in their cars
and travel to these remote regions and you know, go
and you know, go into the deep part to France
or you know, Hungary or Czechoslovakia or Prague or whatever.
(23:06):
They wanted them to drive these you know places, and
so the guide was there, you know, to tie it
all in.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So it's almost it's almost kind of been a scam
from the beginning. It's almost like they're in their own
self interest. I think that of the younger generations, nobody's
paying attention to that shit. Maybe I mean, I don't know,
but but I think you said, but I didn't know
that La was the underdog, And that's what I'm saying.
And I wanted to I wanted to apologize to your
(23:33):
business partner, who I think hates my guts because when
we ate together, she was like, why are you leaving?
Speaker 1 (23:38):
La?
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Do you remember this I don't remember this in Chicago. Yeah,
can I tell this story and we can lift it
out if you know, because you were just about to
move to New York so we eat eating in Chicago.
I didn't know your business partners from LA or I
didn't know LA had such underdog status and you spent
your life defending it. I still hate where I'm from.
So anybody that loves where I'm from, I'm like, why
(23:59):
do you love where you're from? I fucking hate where
I'm from Bokwards On, Florida. I don't have any nationalism
or for fucking I'm not like swinging the flash, singing
the national anthem for where I'm from. So I'm like,
your business goes, why are you leaving in LA and
I go? I've been here fifteen years. I'm kind of
(24:19):
bored with it. I'm either in my car, in my office,
or there's no spontaneity. I want to be in New
York against I'm walking around, I run into a friend,
I run into a I went into a restaurant or
a little shop I never saw before. I want that
spontaneity to inform my creativity. I missed, I miss walking,
I missed the diversity.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
Of the area.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
I'm like gushing about New York and I've never met
anybody else that hated me more. During dinner, the entire
time she was like, uh huh like. I was like,
it was reminded me of like if I said that
to Tupac like sugar night, like and she was so
excited to meet you that. Oh yeah, She's just like
(25:00):
did she really think I was talking about La? She
doesn't hate me. I really felt like she turned. She
she was very warm at the top and there was
a sharp one age. It might have been it might
have been I might have been in my own mind,
but I was like, shit, I really shouldn't have some
people actually like where they're from. I should She can
talk shit about book arts on Florida.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
I'm proud of her though, because us in LA, we
don't like to we don't like, we don't like to
back down, you know, from people talk about our city.
Because people talk about our city all the time, they
make fun of it all the time. People make fun
of Elk because people come to LA. It's usually people
that come to LA and don't get everything they wanted
out of the city. You know, whether that's for a job,
(25:43):
for acting, for creative endeavors, for entrepreneurial ships, but whatever
it is. You know, like they'll come to LA because
we're the land of opportunity, and then they'll come and
then they'll they'll leave and say LA is fucking horrible.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
Oh they'll be bitter. They'll be bitter. We get a
lot of that.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
See, I don't think we get a lot of stereotypes,
you know, about who we are. And but then again,
those are things that people think of us as if
like if people only want to Times Square, you know,
and said New York sucks.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
Right, exactly. The stereotype of LA is people are like
I went to LA once, I hated it, and I go, well,
what neighborhood did you go to. I went to Beverly
Hills for twenty four hours, and there was a bunch
of plastic surgery. I go, that is not the Los
Angeles experience. Los Angeles is a massive city with no nexus,
and every single neighborhood has its own identity. It's a
patchwork of various neighborhoods, each with their own very specific identity.
(26:36):
So you really, you really cannot make a broad generalization
about it. I lived there for fifteen years and I
still am figuring out what it's about. So I would
agree with you on that. However, when I traveled the world,
LAS held in high esteem, I thought, yeah, we are
in because I'm from Florida, and I'll tell you the
butt of every joke ever. But I relish in that.
(26:58):
So it's funny that your defensive of LA to me,
because when people make front of Florida, it just gives
me more and more power. I'm like, yeah, because I
grew up hating it. I grew up in these suburbs
is filled with elderly people on death's door, which is fine,
but it just was like not a place for a
kid or a mixed kid that was like full of
energy and creativity. I resented it. So now everybody hating
(27:20):
on Florida and all these Florida man memes, I finally
feel so validated and vindicated and just I'm like, I
knew it, and I knew I got out as soon
as I turned eighteen. For a reason, I feel like
I relish in people's hatred of mine where I'm from.
Not only do I not defend it, I'm like high
five motherfuckers, Like, yeah, I keep a porn gasoline. Yeah,
(27:44):
on the flames.
Speaker 3 (27:44):
Florida is good at being yeah, being the worst of
the worst always.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
I saw a meme it said, America is the Florida
of the world. It's like America compared to other countries,
it's the America. America is the world's Florida. That's what
I said. I was like, yes, but I love Miami.
I will say Miami is the exception because I Miami
was rough. I was born in Miami, and it was
(28:12):
very rough for a while. And then it was like
douchey house music for a while, like euro trash, douchey
club like like mikon Nos fucked Las Vegas, and it
just made this like it was like that kind of
culture which was like vapid and whack. And then and
then all of a sudden, in the past ten fifteen years,
it's had this like renaissance and it's like all the
(28:34):
things awesome about it got more awesome and louder, and
now it's like one of my favorite cities in America.
Speaker 3 (28:39):
Orlando outside of the tour stuff is cool too, man,
there's a lot of great food in them.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Really.
Speaker 3 (28:42):
Oh yeah, yeah, you got it.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
You got only went to Disney World when I was
a little kid, and I haven't been there since.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
I heard Pensa Cola is though too. It's you know,
it's it's rough.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
But Pensicola. People out there that can't be I resent
n besides Roy Jones, it's go out there, all right,
you know.
Speaker 1 (29:13):
With Aerdre, with Aerdre.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
Have you ever been two waisted at work? Has there
ever been a time where you got fucking trash and
you were like ship, I did too much?
Speaker 3 (29:33):
Yeah, I've tried, you know, I'm I'm a celebrated stoner.
I love being you know, I love getting high.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (29:39):
And uh, I thought it would be cool to cook stones,
but it's not. No, Yeah, it's like I thought it was.
You know, I thought it was like rock and roll.
Speaker 2 (29:49):
What happened? There's too much ship going.
Speaker 3 (29:52):
On and so yeah, it's just everything fell apart. I
can't and then and then there are people relying on
you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Did you smoke a blood? Did you do an edible?
Did you smoke a joint?
Speaker 3 (30:03):
Above? Yeah, edible and smoke and just completely stone like
fucking the kid where you kind of got to hold
the edge of the table once in a while, and uh,
but you know, you think everything's cool, but like you know,
like the difference of like maybe going up on stage
or even doing an act or whatever. Stones or the
thing about a kitchen is there are like thirty people
(30:25):
relying on you, right, you know, and then and then
things are coming at a pace that your mind is
not ready for. And then you're dealing with fire and
knives and and you got to remember shit. You can't
just like freestyle and ramble. So that that didn't go well.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
It was recent.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
I try. I always try, Like it's almost like a
seasonal thing. I try every year to get on the
line Stone to see if it to see if you
could hack it, see if I could hack it. And
I can't.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
Edibles too, yeah, edibles will not.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
Yeah, and so yeah, don't. Yeah, I've tried to cook Stone.
We at the Kogi Truck one time made edibles. We
made our cakes into into an edible like trestleg chie cake,
but we didn't know how to measure the butter. So
each cake ended up having probably like an ounce of
weed in it.
Speaker 2 (31:20):
So we were like we ate it.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
So the team, like five of us ate them. And
this was early coke and went out on the street
and we couldn't.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
We couldn't function.
Speaker 3 (31:29):
We couldn't function. We had to leave the truck there
overnight because we couldn't drive it back and we couldn't
count the change. So we would just we just do
like a like trigger like Halloween candy. We just dumped
all our change and our dollar bills like on the thing,
and we just told people just take the fucking money
or leave the fucking money, and then we would just
be making food. We didn't even like follow the tickets.
(31:50):
We would just be making food. Whatever was in that
burrito was in that burrito. It didn't matter any But
that was a great day. Somebody, somebody was Aaron Dennis
on that Saturday. Somebody suited Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
This is this in and now many.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
We were like a Madrid later. Yeah, there's a restaurant
in Japan where the servers are elderly and they have dementia. Yeah,
you just get what you get.
Speaker 3 (32:22):
That's a dream restaurant, man, that's wild. I love that ship.
Speaker 2 (32:25):
You would you would go.
Speaker 3 (32:26):
I would make a restaurant like that. I've tried. I
tried to make a restaurant like that. Kogie was trying you.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Try to hire people with dementia.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
No, I've tried to make a restaurant where nobody could
say or knew what they were getting. Oh he was
that freestyle you just get what you get.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (32:41):
Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2 (32:42):
Like it's like it's like you're the ship, you're the
expert fucking hook it up.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
Yes, I like that, but.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
The dementia has different.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
It's a little different.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
That's that's like Russian Roulette. That's fucking wild.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
But in Japan, because they're so polite to each other,
so everyone is there and they just endure it, which
is amazing.
Speaker 2 (33:07):
Yeah, have you gone to Japan?
Speaker 3 (33:09):
I have I worked in Japan?
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Really?
Speaker 2 (33:12):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (33:12):
I worked in Japan in Tokyo and Yokohama as a
cook back in the day. Oh, that was another time
I bombed in Japan.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
What what? What after New York?
Speaker 3 (33:21):
No? This is yeah after New York. This was two
thousand and three. I worked in the summer of two
thousand and three in Japan to just be better, you know,
like and uh so I was working in Iron Chef
Michiba's kitchen. He was the original Iron Chef. And then
I worked in a hotel in Yokohama, and I thought
I did. I thought I fucking I thought I brought it.
(33:41):
I thought I represented for the US of A. Yeah,
you were like gang Gang Gang Gang. I was dream Team.
I was like at Johnson, I thought I brought it.
And at the end they gave me my my report
card or my analysis, and the only thing the Japanese
could say about me was that was a good eater.
(34:04):
I was.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
It was why, why why you could have fucked up
that bad? Like what?
Speaker 3 (34:09):
What?
Speaker 2 (34:09):
What was that about?
Speaker 3 (34:10):
I've been, I've been. There was a period in my
life where I just I got by because of effort.
And that was for a long period, probably up until
probably up until about two thousand and five. It wasn't
that long ago. And then something kicked in, you know,
later on and then with Kogie, but uh yeah, I
(34:32):
tried my best, and I just couldn't keep up with
these cooks. They're so good in Japan. They're so fucking good.
They're so precise, brutal, Yeah, and they they're just everything
is perfect, the cuts are perfect, and I was just
all thumbs and I was getting through it. But I
was like I was, I was like a guy sweating bullets,
you know, like everything, And they were supposed to make
(34:56):
these comments on like how my aptitude was and all
these things, and the only thing they wrote was that he
was a great.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
Oh that's a kick of the fucking crotch.
Speaker 3 (35:03):
But that's a bomb. But it's great, you know.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
Don't you think that all those failures and trials and
tribulations is what has made you so successful?
Speaker 3 (35:12):
I think, not only just me, but it helps. I
think it's what helps me relate to a lot of
others because a lot of you know, we all fuck up, man,
we all bomb, you know, and that's what your podcast
is about. It's just we're not in a society where
we can share those things a lot or admit to
those things, because we're judged on those things. But I
think it would be better if we're able to express
them more, because then we can like all like laugh
(35:34):
about them and then like analyze them and then use
them as a part of like our own kind of identity,
you know, because without that then we're all just trying
to be kind of the same model of things. But
but yeah, I you know, I just hope that we
can talk about them more, because yeah, I think that's
what helps me relate because you know, I feed people
(35:55):
on the streets all day every day, right, And I
think it's just the way that we express ourselves, the
way our food taste. They can taste, you know, like
mistakes and failures and speed bumps in our food, you know,
as far as like when you eat it and it
just doesn't feel like fully put together, you know, it
feels like there. There have been a lot of you know,
things that got that to that point. And I think
(36:17):
that's what it makes Kogie relate to so many people. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
because they're going they might be going through it right now.
They might have fucked up at their job and they
come and eat at Kogie and they're like, oh shit,
really fucked up too.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
You know.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
It makes it human. We're not human, Yeah, it makes
it human. Wow, it's fucking fascinating. Wait, I had fucking
one another. Oh has there any ever been like a
robbery or like some fucking crazy ass customer going fucking nuts,
or like a meltdowns or anything at any of your
restaurants somebody coming in but naked and taking a ship
on the wall, any of that kind of fucking crazy shit.
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Oh man, I'm sure, there are plenty of chefs that
have gone through that we have been lucky we haven't.
But early in the Kogie days, I was the fucking
train wreck because I would take food out of people's
hands because when I went, what happened was when they
were yes, really yes. When what happened was when we
(37:10):
started kogi. We were all out of a job, and
it was our freedom, like it was like truly like
our ability to just do whatever the hell we wanted.
And so for me it was like finally my chance
to be just like this is what I serve and
that's what you get, you know, like just like no substitutions,
no sauce on the side, no nothing. And so it
(37:31):
was sushi bar style, almost class style in my mind.
And so when people would start to ask for things,
instead of getting mad, I would get so mad, but
instead of like getting violent or anything like that, I
would just walk out of the truck. I would take
their food out of their hand midpipe. I would replace
it with a crumpled out bill and then we would
(37:52):
close the doors and take off. So that was that
was kind of the koge style, and I kind of.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
They asked for a substitute oh yeah, yeah, God forbid,
they asked for sauce on the side. Were you like
hot tempered in those days? Was it like hot like
hot blooded? No, it was frustrated.
Speaker 3 (38:12):
It was earnest. I'm kind of actually proud of it
at the time. Man. Yeah, it was very earnest. You know,
it was very earnest. There was there's a famous sushi
bar chef here called uh Nozawa that his family now
runs Sugarfish and we do the same. He was, you know,
if you asked him for a California rolely kick you out,
you know.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
So it was kind of like sho Dreams of Sushi
meets like the soup Nazi from Seinfeld. Yeah, no soup
for you.
Speaker 3 (38:39):
Yeah, except on the streets. Yeah, that you know. But
it was all out of love and that eventually evolved
into a deeper love where we took care of people.
But I think Kogi's and everything that we do has
been lucky in the sense that you know, people relate,
you know, people feel like we're a part of them.
So you know, like we can't go anywhere, you know.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, so fuck.
Speaker 3 (39:03):
But no one's coming naked. I take a shit.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
Maybe I'll do it tonight. Yeah, you would have to.
They tried to stop us, and we can't be stopped.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
Can't be stopped, man, Roy Chai, thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (39:16):
All right, thank you, shr with a redre all right,
listen up, we got something special for you. Got a
burning story that you're itching to tell about when you
bombed or absolutely failed in life. Now's your chance to
tell me all about it, Babel. I want to hear
your worst, most cringe worthy what the fuck was I thinking?
(39:38):
What just happened moment? So pick up your phone and
dial seven one six Bombing. That's seven one six two
six six twenty four sixty four and leave me a
voicemail and we might just play it on a future episode.
Bombing with Eric Andre is brought to you by Will
Ferrell's Big Money Players Network and iHeart Podcast. Our executive
producer is Olivia Aguilar, Our producer is Bei Wang, Our
(40:00):
research assistant is David Carliner. Our editor and sound designers
Andy Harris, and our art is by Dylan Vanderbergh. Go
rate us five stars and drop a review on your
podcast app a choice
What have y'all.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
It's me Eric and we are back with another edition
of Bombing, where I talked with friends, comedians, musicians and
chefs about their worst moments on stage and also there
were worst moments in the kitchen. Today we have an
esteam chef on the pod, roy Choi, the prolific restaurant
tour and one of the pioneers of the food truck
movement with the revolutionary Kogi food truck in La serving
up Korean taco deliciousness. He's a dear friend of mine
(00:23):
and he shares his bombing moments in the kitchen and
trying to cook while blaze out of his mind. Let's
get into it.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Bombing. Bombing with Eric Andre called bombing.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
I just want to know the trials and tribulations of
roy Choi. I want to know the worst gig you
ever had, the worst restaurant review you ever had, the
worst meal you ever made, the worst gig you ever had.
I want to know, just like the word I mean,
you've You've lived in and worked in some gnarly kitchens.
(01:01):
I'm assuming with some gnarly motherfuckers. Yeah, and you came
up under some gnarly motherfuckers. Some hot heads and shit.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
So yeah, for sure, I came up. I came up
before PC and before like you know, I'm from the nineties.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
So we were saying racist shit to you in the kitchen.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Oh yeah, racial time. Yeah, you know, Like I mean,
I held my own, you know, luckily, luckily enough, I
had a background to be able to hold my own.
But if if I didn't hold my own, yeah, I mean,
it's not just racist shit. It's sexist shit. It's racist shit,
is aggressive, competitive, toxic, toxic environments. But there's also like
a good side to it. There's a chill side. It's
like it's like any industry. You look at football in
(01:41):
the seventies, porn in the eighties, you know, cooking in
the nineties. You know, like it's like it's give and take. Yeah,
you know, it's what we It's what we got because
we don't have that much information. Now there's too much
information that everything is like you're walking on needles. But
back then, outrageougonomy, people are just going for it. Back then,
you know, you're just going for or like I'm not
I'm not condoning, I'm just saying like no one knew
(02:03):
any fucking better, right, you know, so it's just what's
coming up? You know, there's I kind of missed that,
Like I don't know if the right worst transparency, but
just that that like that that primalism of just like
saying whatever the fuck was on your.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Mind, right, no filter, no filter, raw, no vasoline. Yes,
we had songs. We had songs. They had no filter. Wait,
so what was like the worst gig? Like what did
you before you had you know, your own restaurants, where
were you where'd you cut your teeth or what was
like the worst gigs you had?
Speaker 3 (02:33):
I mean I cut my teeth in New York. I
went to culinary school out there. I cooked in New
York restaurants in nineties in the nineties.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Yeah, well year do you remember, like ninety.
Speaker 3 (02:44):
Six, ninety seven, ninety eight, So this.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
Is back in the day when I remember I went
to dinner with Bobby Flan, Michael Voltagia one time, Tony
Hawking by mete to the dinner and Fultajia told me that,
like he goes literally, chefs would have cookbooks that looked
like they were like written by an old Italian grandmother.
There was no internet. I mean, there was like the
earliest stages of the Internet, but like there was actually
(03:07):
like the secret recipe because you couldn't just like go
online and watch fifty five thousand YouTube videos about every
single recipe. You really had to like work under some
psycho chef and really get in their good graces and
figure out each one of these recipes. Like it was
like it was medieval compared to now, which you have
all this information at your fingertips.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
It's very medieval. I guess it could be the same
as like stand up comedy in a sense where you
had to go out on the road and stay in
motels and like pay your dues and all that. You know,
the whole thing of paying dues like in our generations,
like it's real stuff because there was no Internet, and
so yeah, you had Like right now, people think working
at a job for like or doing something for one
(03:50):
year is a long time, right, you know, I mean
that's almost too long for people, like they want instant success.
Back then, you like it was understood that you would
work for seven years over someone in obscurity, you know,
and just learning and absorbing. It is very like kung fu,
you know, it's like kills like you're putting your hands
in like broken Fire. It was very Yeah, it was
(04:12):
very Saturday morning Kung Fu movie, like going to the
top of the bamboo forest and yeah, balancing and hitting
tree trunks, you know, that's that's what it was, and
that's the only way you could learn. And and then yes,
there were books, but these books were written like decades ago, right,
and and they were all European, right, And so yeah,
(04:34):
if you ever needed like something or vinaigrette or anything
like just something, if you're like kind of freestyling, you
would have to go back to the office, look up
the book and kind of like it was a very
dewey decimal system.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Well did you see people get rocked ever in kitchens
like fucking spilled hot boiling water in themselves or just
burn themselves with hot hot mops.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
No, I've seen it. I I was the one that
was spilling stuff and causing fires. And because I got
into cooking late and then I had I had a
I don't have real like horror stories. But the one
thing I did have in that time of my life
in the late nineties was I had this unique intersection
and ability where I would always walk in on people
having sex in the kitchen yeah, I don't know if
(05:26):
you have. I mean, it's just something that's following me.
I've been walked in on like five times in my life.
And then I just there was just this period of
time in the nineties where I would always either be
walked in on or I'd walk in on something, and
it would just be like I would be completely were
just going down to get like flour, you know, or
bread curubs.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Yeah, just too like cooks.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
Were so happening all the time in New York. It
was happening all the time.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
People just drunk and coked up or just like the
pressure of work just led to these primal urges. It's
the pressure. It's like sleep. It's just it was like
just what it was back.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
Then, you know. And then in New York, the kitchens
have levels, right, so in your mind you think that
there are these like hidden chambers. So there's the kitchen level,
and then there's like a storage level. There's the office
on the third floor, and then there's the basement. You
know how New York streets are, and so it was
always in the kegs are in the bottom, the fifty
(06:24):
pound sacks of flour, and those are perfect spots to
get it, get it on. But it was like, but
the weird thing is fucking down by the flower man,
because there's six stacks of flower, fifty pound sacks of
flower bins. So you could do it either way. You
could do a doggy style, you could be on bottom,
(06:45):
it doesn't matter. You could lay down, you could do
missionary whatever you want. Kegs kegs. You have handles to
hold on to, you know. So it's just it was
happening all the time, and it was just like quick shit,
you know, like.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
A yeah, I don't know why I know all that stuff?
Well I know it. I know why, Yeah, I know
it because I here's walking in on it.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Man.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
Unfortunately I wasn't the one being walked in on in
those situations, but I was the one always walked I
was always like this dumb mister Magoo, like walking in
with like an empty hotel pan trying to pick up
panko flower and then yeah, so that's the type of
stuff that was happening to me.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
But I was in New York. Rats, how many rats
did you see?
Speaker 3 (07:26):
I didn't see that many rats. I worked in really
good restaurants, so I didn't really see that many rats
in New York. I would see I was living actually
up just below Spanish Harlem, up in like east upper
East Side, so i'd see something like on the way
home to work, but or on the subway but not
at work, but like the bombing stuff for in the
kitchens in New York was me I was. I got
(07:49):
into professional cooking a little bit later, like in my
later twenties, so I was like trying to make up
for lost time. So I kind of I kind of
went for kitchens I wasn't ready for yet, you know.
So I tried to let you be, like you're getting
on stages you're not You're not even prepared for, you know,
like you haven't even put in the work yet, right,
And so I get in there and I was just
with all these like assassins and pros, and I was
(08:10):
just trying to keep up. And then I have this
really crazy problem when I get nervous. It doesn't happen
as much anymore because I'm not that as much as
nervous anymore. But when I was younger, I was really
nervous and shy. I fucking bleed from the nose, like
fucking like you have a fire hydrant. Really, Yeah, So you.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Get so nervous that your nose.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Yeah. So yeah, and I think maybe part of well,
part of it is definitely like my anxiety and my
my shyness, but part of it is I was like
born with like a cleft, so my whole like nose
palette and bone bone is a little bit different. My
whole nasal passages and everything is really weird. So all that,
and then so I'd be in the middle of the
service and then my nose just start losing it, and
(08:53):
so I'd stuff one up and then I stuffed the
other up, and then and then one night I was
a chicken stock off the thing and it started, uh,
the fat fell off the top, and then it like
the fire just took over the whole island. And then
once it took over the whole island, and my nose
wouldn't stop bleeding, so it looked like too big, like
(09:14):
MAXI pads in my in my nostrils. And then they
had to stop service for a second and clean up.
And then the chef just looks at me. It's just
shaking his head. But it was like, I it was
a pretty comedic moment because he's looking at me.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
There's this huge fire.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
They have to stop service. Everyone's pissed off. But how
can you get mad at me? I'm like a little
I'm like the little kid, and stand by me, you know,
like I'm just like you trying. I'm trying so hard.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
You really mean to do well.
Speaker 3 (09:41):
I really met to do well, and I'm sitting there
with two bloody noses and yeah, so they just like
everyone jumped in to help me out. That's a great
thing about kitchens is you know, like when they know
you're trying, they'll jump in and help you out.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
So it's not.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
All like the worst parts. It's not all people trying
to cut each other's heads.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
Often it's not that, but it is a lot of competitiveness. Yeah, yeah,
I mean there are horses, you know, like I didn't
really experience them too much, but there are a lot
of horstors where people bump in you with hot shit,
you know that's yeah, or leave a knife out, you know,
leave a knife out that points outward or but those
are those are bad kitchen. Just like in anything in
(10:19):
life are there are bad people in bad situations and
people with malicious intent. In most case, people are just
trying to like see what you're made of. I would
say the good is better than that. But that doesn't
mean like they're like nice. It means like they're just
pushing you, so like can you keep up?
Speaker 2 (10:35):
They're testing your metal?
Speaker 3 (10:36):
Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
I worked in a kitchen for three days. I waited tables. Okay,
there's a restaurant called Burritoville in the West Village. This
is probably twenty years ago. I just graduated college, I
want to say early two thousands, and I was the
worst server in the history of restaurants. I burned myself
every five seconds. I forgot you got to tell the
customer when the plate is hot they give And it
(11:00):
was like very rowdy, loud gay guys in the in
the neighborhood at the time. So like I would like
put a plate down and be scalding hot, and the
guy would go to touch the plate. I forgot to
tell nothing. I'd be like, it's fucking hot, and I'm like,
oh shit, I'm supposed to tell you that. And I
(11:20):
lied on my job interview and I told the guy
I was waiting tables since I was fourteen years old
from my parents. Never worked in a restaurant once in
New York. I was fucking horrible dropping plates. I would
like scoop when the when the customer would be like
can I take this home and to go back, I
would just scoop it out with my hands, and the
waiter the other waiters were like, dude, don't if you're
(11:41):
gonna do that, don't let the customers see you doing that.
And I was like, shit, I didn't want the best
chefs in the world use their hands. And the person
training me was like, you're not the best chef in
the world. You're horrible. You're fucking horrible.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
Like, we don't serve like hot plates anymore like that.
It sounds like a restaurant that would serve like like
plate that was like scalding. Yes, yeah, yeah. Other than
Peter Lueger, is no one that really does that.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Sometimes you get the sizzling fahida play like a chili
this kind of thing. But that's that's telling you it's
fucking cooking. But my friend Derek Beckele's I hope he
doesn't mind me tell you a story. He worked at
a restaurant in Manhattan. I gotta ask him which restaurant
this is not to put it on blast, just out
of curiosity. He was like, this was not like a
cheap restaurant. He goes, this was a fancy this is
(12:29):
a fans I don't know if it was Mission Star,
but like whatever, but like it was you know, fine dining,
white tablecloth chip and he tells the story. I wish
he was here to tell it. He tells it better
than me. But there was a tomato soup tomato bisk
or something they were serving and everybody's wolfing it down.
It's like the special soup of the day. So soup
(12:50):
djure people. Everybody wolven it down. People ask for seconds
and ship and then he goes back into the kitchen
and he's like, I got more soup. I need more soup.
I got supporters. And the chef was like no, no, no,
And he's like what And he said, like the cauldron
of soup was like dumped out and going down the
drain or something, and there was like a gigantic, dead
(13:12):
bloated rat at the bottom. So he said, like people
were wolfing it down because I had this like gamy rat, Brian,
I was giving it like the perfect flavor.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
It makes me think of this time in high school
where I knew a bunch of kids that were working
at a pizza spot. Again, I just had this thing
in life where I walk in on ship. Yeah back
then I walk in and they're all peeing in the
fucking tomato sauce.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
What why?
Speaker 3 (13:43):
Because they're fucking sixteen years old.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
That's a crime against humanity. People were eating, Yes, that
was the pizza. Come on, Jesus, but Christ.
Speaker 3 (13:57):
It must be something with tomatoes and rats.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
It's because it's.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
I think they were busier and never than.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
That with Aeric Codre.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
With aeric Codre, what's the worst like restaurant review you
ever had? Have you gotten like ripped by I don't
read reviews. I tell my publicist, like, unless it's good,
don't send it to me. I don't care, like I
you know.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
I did get ripped apart by The New York Times.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
I got ripped apart by the Nature.
Speaker 3 (14:35):
By Pete Wells. The he's like he's like the theater critic,
you know, like like the food, you know, like the
type of thing where people are waiting on pins and
needles for his his his review, and then it's a
make or break situation, you know.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
But we opened.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Well luckily, like career wise, I wasn't at a point
where I really gave a funk about it. But the
project we were working on mattered, you know. And I
don't know if you know about this project called Local
I did out in Watts and Oakland. But you know,
it was a project for you know, for the people
I grew up with, you know, like it was like
going back to the neighborhood building a restaurant, employing everyone,
(15:14):
you know, providing Wi Fi internet jobs, nutrition training, and
we were just building, like trying to build a great
restaurant in the hood, you know what I'm saying. Yeah,
And so we started Watts, Oakland, you know, we went
to San Jose, San Francisco, all that, and uh, he
came in and just ripped us apart.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
Man. Just wait, so there's stuffy white New York Times
because I'm asuming they're they're they're they're.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
They were disguises. So I don't know what.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
Food reviewers were disguises when they come in they do
they do, yeah, because they want to be incognitia. They
want to be treated as if they're Yeah, they don't
want special treatment, so they know what the real deal is.
Speaker 3 (15:56):
Yeah, that industry now is kind of fleeting because of
the way the world is and the way the internet is. Right,
but when they were at when they were at in
their prime, you know, there's only five of those fake reservations,
burner phones, whoa you know, disguises like horrible disguise like
this guys you would wear the guys is like you
(16:17):
would wear yeah, like fucking sabotage beastie boys ship and
they would go in restaurants like that.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
So that that guy missed the point of that project.
That project you were trying to bring. You trying to
uplift marginalized communities and bring vitality to the hood. Just
bring bring culture. Yeah, jobs create jobs. So that guy
like that's like a completely missing the point.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
But the thing is we were too high profile chefs
opening a restaurant in watts There was a lot of attention.
You know, everyone was writing about this opening and so
you know, it was a big for them to actually
cover it. And and you know Pete he's a tremendous writer.
He's like, you know, he's the writer of the New
(17:07):
York Times. But he has a shtick where he goes
to a restaurant, like in the beginning of each year
he did Guy Fieri's restaurant, he did. He did a
few others where he just fucking leans in. Hennihilates, He
annihilates you, he gets I think. So I don't know,
but I think he does. And and you know we
got I got zero stars. I got zero stars from
the New York Times. So I would say that's bombings.
(17:31):
It has to hurt, right, It hurts, right, It hurts
on every level. Yeah, even though I say it doesn't hurt,
it hurts, you know, because we're not opening. You know,
we're not the ones peeing in the fucking pizza sauce.
You know, we're trying, you know, like we really care
about this thing, and you know, for us to get
a zero, to do all that work and get it,
you know, even if you know, like your your mission
(17:52):
is higher than that and it's not about the ego,
it's still it still hurts.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Like, you know, has he ever said anything nice? Has
he've always been on yours? Always been after you?
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Do? You feel like I didn't even know I was
on his radar until that? Yeah, So New Yorkers don't
really give a shit about us in l A. I
don't even think we exist you know, so.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Was there like but that's no longer? Is that's still
true maybe back in the day? Is that still like that?
Is there still like an East Coast West Coast Biggie
Tupac chef beef.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
I don't know if there's a chef, but but I
do think that New York's New Yorkers still. I think
that New York is the center of the world, you know,
in many ways, you know. And uh, but they love
to live in l A.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
What about Parisian chefs? Are they even even more cool?
Speaker 1 (18:41):
Man?
Speaker 3 (18:42):
Really like French new wave cinema man, the new, the new,
the new guns.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
I'm talking about the old school cats with the chef
boyarded fucking hats, the rough as hell in the kitchen.
But they're cool.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
They're cool as being something. Really, the French are cool, man,
They fucking smoked cigarette.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Oh no, I'm not.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
I'm not talking about all French people. Chef. French chefs
were the toughest in the their fucking the like brick
ship house fucking I thought they were like the teacher
in that movie Whiplash, like throwing fucking drum symbols at
your fucking head.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
Uh yes, yes, But that's inside the kitchen.
Speaker 2 (19:17):
Outside there outside, so outside the New York chefs are
not their dicks inside and out of the kitchen.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
I wouldn't say it's the chefs. I would say it's
the more the patrons and the diners, you know that,
you know, just like New York and l A in general,
Like a lot of times we get overlooked, you know, like, yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
I think LA is the capital of I mean, I'm
not an expert, but I thought like LA is the
capital of Yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
Yeah, but but you got to remember our casual attitude
and our lifestyle. A lot of people don't think that
we're trying, or it doesn't get computed that we actually
give a ship sometimes. So what I mean by that
is Micheline guide came here years ago. Like I don't
have too much beef with many in life. I'm pretty zen, right,
but fuck the Michelin guy, you.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
Know, straight up and then and everyone Michelin.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
It comes from an era where you fucking you know,
you remember ship and you hold the line. I come
from that era here.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
What does that mean?
Speaker 3 (20:18):
Like, you know, like your word means something like you know,
you got people's back, You fucking like you represent you know,
like and you and you hold down your ship, you
hold down your hood, you know, like the Michelin guy
came to La and told us that we were uncivilized. Yeah,
and that there was no place in this city that
could have great food to their to their measurements because
(20:41):
it wasn't European based, you know. And you know, because
you could go to a restaurant with shorts on or
whatever the case may be.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
You know, and the guys living in like the eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
Exactly, and then they came back years later, seven eight
years later and then reintroduced themselves California, and everyone acted.
Everyone just got back on their dick like they didn't
say that ship. And for me, I just remember.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
You know, so.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
No no, no, no, no, no no no.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
So a lot of people look at us like we
don't we're not trying hard, you know, whereas like in
other other cities, like because it's you know, very European
core base, it looks like it's more intelligent or whatever
the case may be.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
You know, like there's like stuffy blue blood like yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
You know, Miami gets that a lot too. There can't
be great cuisine down in regions where people are just
chilling and having a great time, you know, because it's crazy.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
I didn't know that LA that's so fun that that's
all news to me. That's all news to me because
I thought like LA is the high water mark, and
everybody's trying to catch up to l A. But I
guess it's like this new.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
I would say, like amongst the amongst the people, yes,
you know, but uh but still amongst the guard that
old guard the gates. Yeah, the gatekeepers that control media
or control the industry in the sense that get kickbacks
from giving reviews or things like that. I would say, So.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
It's a corrupt too, there's some corruption there.
Speaker 3 (22:07):
I bet fucking the Michelin guys corrupt ship.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
I've done. I've been to some Michelin Star restaurants that
fucking sucked, that were like dog food. I went to
one in in Prague and I like left and I
was like that was mediocre. And my sister goes, this
place is a Michelin Star, and I was like, dude,
this is I heard that. It's been bullshit from the beginning.
Though it's a tire company, right, isn't a company that
(22:31):
makes tires, it's Michelin it's the same.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
It's the same same company.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
Company is a tire company because they tell me what
the best fucking fog raw is.
Speaker 3 (22:42):
Well, the history of it is, they built the guide
because they want people to buy tires. They want people
to travel throughout Europe. Instead of taking the eurail on
the train. They wanted people to get in their cars
and travel to these remote regions and you know, go
and you know, go into the deep part to France
or you know, Hungary or Czechoslovakia or Prague or whatever.
(23:06):
They wanted them to drive these you know places, and
so the guide was there, you know, to tie it
all in.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So it's almost it's almost kind of been a scam
from the beginning. It's almost like they're in their own
self interest. I think that of the younger generations, nobody's
paying attention to that shit. Maybe I mean, I don't know,
but but I think you said, but I didn't know
that La was the underdog, And that's what I'm saying.
And I wanted to I wanted to apologize to your
(23:33):
business partner, who I think hates my guts because when
we ate together, she was like, why are you leaving?
Speaker 1 (23:38):
La?
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Do you remember this I don't remember this in Chicago. Yeah,
can I tell this story and we can lift it
out if you know, because you were just about to
move to New York so we eat eating in Chicago.
I didn't know your business partners from LA or I
didn't know LA had such underdog status and you spent
your life defending it. I still hate where I'm from.
So anybody that loves where I'm from, I'm like, why
(23:59):
do you love where you're from? I fucking hate where
I'm from Bokwards On, Florida. I don't have any nationalism
or for fucking I'm not like swinging the flash, singing
the national anthem for where I'm from. So I'm like,
your business goes, why are you leaving in LA and
I go? I've been here fifteen years. I'm kind of
(24:19):
bored with it. I'm either in my car, in my office,
or there's no spontaneity. I want to be in New
York against I'm walking around, I run into a friend,
I run into a I went into a restaurant or
a little shop I never saw before. I want that
spontaneity to inform my creativity. I missed, I miss walking,
I missed the diversity.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
Of the area.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
I'm like gushing about New York and I've never met
anybody else that hated me more. During dinner, the entire
time she was like, uh huh like. I was like,
it was reminded me of like if I said that
to Tupac like sugar night, like and she was so
excited to meet you that. Oh yeah, She's just like
(25:00):
did she really think I was talking about La? She
doesn't hate me. I really felt like she turned. She
she was very warm at the top and there was
a sharp one age. It might have been it might
have been I might have been in my own mind,
but I was like, shit, I really shouldn't have some
people actually like where they're from. I should She can
talk shit about book arts on Florida.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
I'm proud of her though, because us in LA, we
don't like to we don't like, we don't like to
back down, you know, from people talk about our city.
Because people talk about our city all the time, they
make fun of it all the time. People make fun
of Elk because people come to LA. It's usually people
that come to LA and don't get everything they wanted
out of the city. You know, whether that's for a job,
(25:43):
for acting, for creative endeavors, for entrepreneurial ships, but whatever
it is. You know, like they'll come to LA because
we're the land of opportunity, and then they'll come and
then they'll they'll leave and say LA is fucking horrible.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
Oh they'll be bitter. They'll be bitter. We get a
lot of that.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
See, I don't think we get a lot of stereotypes,
you know, about who we are. And but then again,
those are things that people think of us as if
like if people only want to Times Square, you know,
and said New York sucks.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
Right, exactly. The stereotype of LA is people are like
I went to LA once, I hated it, and I go, well,
what neighborhood did you go to. I went to Beverly
Hills for twenty four hours, and there was a bunch
of plastic surgery. I go, that is not the Los
Angeles experience. Los Angeles is a massive city with no nexus,
and every single neighborhood has its own identity. It's a
patchwork of various neighborhoods, each with their own very specific identity.
(26:36):
So you really, you really cannot make a broad generalization
about it. I lived there for fifteen years and I
still am figuring out what it's about. So I would
agree with you on that. However, when I traveled the world,
LAS held in high esteem, I thought, yeah, we are
in because I'm from Florida, and I'll tell you the
butt of every joke ever. But I relish in that.
(26:58):
So it's funny that your defensive of LA to me,
because when people make front of Florida, it just gives
me more and more power. I'm like, yeah, because I
grew up hating it. I grew up in these suburbs
is filled with elderly people on death's door, which is fine,
but it just was like not a place for a
kid or a mixed kid that was like full of
energy and creativity. I resented it. So now everybody hating
(27:20):
on Florida and all these Florida man memes, I finally
feel so validated and vindicated and just I'm like, I
knew it, and I knew I got out as soon
as I turned eighteen. For a reason, I feel like
I relish in people's hatred of mine where I'm from.
Not only do I not defend it, I'm like high
five motherfuckers, Like, yeah, I keep a porn gasoline. Yeah,
(27:44):
on the flames.
Speaker 3 (27:44):
Florida is good at being yeah, being the worst of
the worst always.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
I saw a meme it said, America is the Florida
of the world. It's like America compared to other countries,
it's the America. America is the world's Florida. That's what
I said. I was like, yes, but I love Miami.
I will say Miami is the exception because I Miami
was rough. I was born in Miami, and it was
(28:12):
very rough for a while. And then it was like
douchey house music for a while, like euro trash, douchey
club like like mikon Nos fucked Las Vegas, and it
just made this like it was like that kind of
culture which was like vapid and whack. And then and
then all of a sudden, in the past ten fifteen years,
it's had this like renaissance and it's like all the
(28:34):
things awesome about it got more awesome and louder, and
now it's like one of my favorite cities in America.
Speaker 3 (28:39):
Orlando outside of the tour stuff is cool too, man,
there's a lot of great food in them.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Really.
Speaker 3 (28:42):
Oh yeah, yeah, you got it.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
You got only went to Disney World when I was
a little kid, and I haven't been there since.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
I heard Pensa Cola is though too. It's you know,
it's it's rough.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
But Pensicola. People out there that can't be I resent
n besides Roy Jones, it's go out there, all right,
you know.
Speaker 1 (29:13):
With Aerdre, with Aerdre.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
Have you ever been two waisted at work? Has there
ever been a time where you got fucking trash and
you were like ship, I did too much?
Speaker 3 (29:33):
Yeah, I've tried, you know, I'm I'm a celebrated stoner.
I love being you know, I love getting high.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (29:39):
And uh, I thought it would be cool to cook stones,
but it's not. No, Yeah, it's like I thought it was.
You know, I thought it was like rock and roll.
Speaker 2 (29:49):
What happened? There's too much ship going.
Speaker 3 (29:52):
On and so yeah, it's just everything fell apart. I
can't and then and then there are people relying on
you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Did you smoke a blood? Did you do an edible?
Did you smoke a joint?
Speaker 3 (30:03):
Above? Yeah, edible and smoke and just completely stone like
fucking the kid where you kind of got to hold
the edge of the table once in a while, and uh,
but you know, you think everything's cool, but like you know,
like the difference of like maybe going up on stage
or even doing an act or whatever. Stones or the
thing about a kitchen is there are like thirty people
(30:25):
relying on you, right, you know, and then and then
things are coming at a pace that your mind is
not ready for. And then you're dealing with fire and
knives and and you got to remember shit. You can't
just like freestyle and ramble. So that that didn't go well.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
It was recent.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
I try. I always try, Like it's almost like a
seasonal thing. I try every year to get on the
line Stone to see if it to see if you
could hack it, see if I could hack it. And
I can't.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
Edibles too, yeah, edibles will not.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
Yeah, and so yeah, don't. Yeah, I've tried to cook Stone.
We at the Kogi Truck one time made edibles. We
made our cakes into into an edible like trestleg chie cake,
but we didn't know how to measure the butter. So
each cake ended up having probably like an ounce of
weed in it.
Speaker 2 (31:20):
So we were like we ate it.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
So the team, like five of us ate them. And
this was early coke and went out on the street
and we couldn't.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
We couldn't function.
Speaker 3 (31:29):
We couldn't function. We had to leave the truck there
overnight because we couldn't drive it back and we couldn't
count the change. So we would just we just do
like a like trigger like Halloween candy. We just dumped
all our change and our dollar bills like on the thing,
and we just told people just take the fucking money
or leave the fucking money, and then we would just
be making food. We didn't even like follow the tickets.
(31:50):
We would just be making food. Whatever was in that
burrito was in that burrito. It didn't matter any But
that was a great day. Somebody, somebody was Aaron Dennis
on that Saturday. Somebody suited Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
This is this in and now many.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
We were like a Madrid later. Yeah, there's a restaurant
in Japan where the servers are elderly and they have dementia. Yeah,
you just get what you get.
Speaker 3 (32:22):
That's a dream restaurant, man, that's wild. I love that ship.
Speaker 2 (32:25):
You would you would go.
Speaker 3 (32:26):
I would make a restaurant like that. I've tried. I
tried to make a restaurant like that. Kogie was trying you.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Try to hire people with dementia.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
No, I've tried to make a restaurant where nobody could
say or knew what they were getting. Oh he was
that freestyle you just get what you get.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (32:41):
Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2 (32:42):
Like it's like it's like you're the ship, you're the
expert fucking hook it up.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
Yes, I like that, but.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
The dementia has different.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
It's a little different.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
That's that's like Russian Roulette. That's fucking wild.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
But in Japan, because they're so polite to each other,
so everyone is there and they just endure it, which
is amazing.
Speaker 2 (33:07):
Yeah, have you gone to Japan?
Speaker 3 (33:09):
I have I worked in Japan?
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Really?
Speaker 2 (33:12):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (33:12):
I worked in Japan in Tokyo and Yokohama as a
cook back in the day. Oh, that was another time
I bombed in Japan.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
What what? What after New York?
Speaker 3 (33:21):
No? This is yeah after New York. This was two
thousand and three. I worked in the summer of two
thousand and three in Japan to just be better, you know,
like and uh so I was working in Iron Chef
Michiba's kitchen. He was the original Iron Chef. And then
I worked in a hotel in Yokohama, and I thought
I did. I thought I fucking I thought I brought it.
(33:41):
I thought I represented for the US of A. Yeah,
you were like gang Gang Gang Gang. I was dream Team.
I was like at Johnson, I thought I brought it.
And at the end they gave me my my report
card or my analysis, and the only thing the Japanese
could say about me was that was a good eater.
(34:04):
I was.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
It was why, why why you could have fucked up
that bad? Like what?
Speaker 3 (34:09):
What?
Speaker 2 (34:09):
What was that about?
Speaker 3 (34:10):
I've been, I've been. There was a period in my
life where I just I got by because of effort.
And that was for a long period, probably up until
probably up until about two thousand and five. It wasn't
that long ago. And then something kicked in, you know,
later on and then with Kogie, but uh yeah, I
(34:32):
tried my best, and I just couldn't keep up with
these cooks. They're so good in Japan. They're so fucking good.
They're so precise, brutal, Yeah, and they they're just everything
is perfect, the cuts are perfect, and I was just
all thumbs and I was getting through it. But I
was like I was, I was like a guy sweating bullets,
you know, like everything, And they were supposed to make
(34:56):
these comments on like how my aptitude was and all
these things, and the only thing they wrote was that he
was a great.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
Oh that's a kick of the fucking crotch.
Speaker 3 (35:03):
But that's a bomb. But it's great, you know.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
Don't you think that all those failures and trials and
tribulations is what has made you so successful?
Speaker 3 (35:12):
I think, not only just me, but it helps. I
think it's what helps me relate to a lot of
others because a lot of you know, we all fuck up, man,
we all bomb, you know, and that's what your podcast
is about. It's just we're not in a society where
we can share those things a lot or admit to
those things, because we're judged on those things. But I
think it would be better if we're able to express
them more, because then we can like all like laugh
(35:34):
about them and then like analyze them and then use
them as a part of like our own kind of identity,
you know, because without that then we're all just trying
to be kind of the same model of things. But
but yeah, I you know, I just hope that we
can talk about them more, because yeah, I think that's
what helps me relate because you know, I feed people
(35:55):
on the streets all day every day, right, And I
think it's just the way that we express ourselves, the
way our food taste. They can taste, you know, like
mistakes and failures and speed bumps in our food, you know,
as far as like when you eat it and it
just doesn't feel like fully put together, you know, it
feels like there. There have been a lot of you know,
things that got that to that point. And I think
(36:17):
that's what it makes Kogie relate to so many people. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
because they're going they might be going through it right now.
They might have fucked up at their job and they
come and eat at Kogie and they're like, oh shit,
really fucked up too.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
You know.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
It makes it human. We're not human, Yeah, it makes
it human. Wow, it's fucking fascinating. Wait, I had fucking
one another. Oh has there any ever been like a
robbery or like some fucking crazy ass customer going fucking nuts,
or like a meltdowns or anything at any of your
restaurants somebody coming in but naked and taking a ship
on the wall, any of that kind of fucking crazy shit.
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Oh man, I'm sure, there are plenty of chefs that
have gone through that we have been lucky we haven't.
But early in the Kogie days, I was the fucking
train wreck because I would take food out of people's
hands because when I went, what happened was when they
were yes, really yes. When what happened was when we
(37:10):
started kogi. We were all out of a job, and
it was our freedom, like it was like truly like
our ability to just do whatever the hell we wanted.
And so for me it was like finally my chance
to be just like this is what I serve and
that's what you get, you know, like just like no substitutions,
no sauce on the side, no nothing. And so it
(37:31):
was sushi bar style, almost class style in my mind.
And so when people would start to ask for things,
instead of getting mad, I would get so mad, but
instead of like getting violent or anything like that, I
would just walk out of the truck. I would take
their food out of their hand midpipe. I would replace
it with a crumpled out bill and then we would
(37:52):
close the doors and take off. So that was that
was kind of the koge style, and I kind of.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
They asked for a substitute oh yeah, yeah, God forbid,
they asked for sauce on the side. Were you like
hot tempered in those days? Was it like hot like
hot blooded? No, it was frustrated.
Speaker 3 (38:12):
It was earnest. I'm kind of actually proud of it
at the time. Man. Yeah, it was very earnest. You know,
it was very earnest. There was there's a famous sushi
bar chef here called uh Nozawa that his family now
runs Sugarfish and we do the same. He was, you know,
if you asked him for a California rolely kick you out,
you know.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
So it was kind of like sho Dreams of Sushi
meets like the soup Nazi from Seinfeld. Yeah, no soup
for you.
Speaker 3 (38:39):
Yeah, except on the streets. Yeah, that you know. But
it was all out of love and that eventually evolved
into a deeper love where we took care of people.
But I think Kogi's and everything that we do has
been lucky in the sense that you know, people relate,
you know, people feel like we're a part of them.
So you know, like we can't go anywhere, you know.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, so fuck.
Speaker 3 (39:03):
But no one's coming naked. I take a shit.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
Maybe I'll do it tonight. Yeah, you would have to.
They tried to stop us, and we can't be stopped.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
Can't be stopped, man, Roy Chai, thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (39:16):
All right, thank you, shr with a redre all right,
listen up, we got something special for you. Got a
burning story that you're itching to tell about when you
bombed or absolutely failed in life. Now's your chance to
tell me all about it, Babel. I want to hear
your worst, most cringe worthy what the fuck was I thinking?
(39:38):
What just happened moment? So pick up your phone and
dial seven one six Bombing. That's seven one six two
six six twenty four sixty four and leave me a
voicemail and we might just play it on a future episode.
Bombing with Eric Andre is brought to you by Will
Ferrell's Big Money Players Network and iHeart Podcast. Our executive
producer is Olivia Aguilar, Our producer is Bei Wang, Our
(40:00):
research assistant is David Carliner. Our editor and sound designers
Andy Harris, and our art is by Dylan Vanderbergh. Go
rate us five stars and drop a review on your
podcast app a choice
Host
Eric Andre
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