August 27, 2021 • 24 mins
This episode of “Summer Series: From The Beach” was recorded poolside at the W Hotel South Beach on a breezy Miami day in February of 2020.
Anne Burrell’s most recent cookbook is “Own Your Kitchen: Recipes to Inspire & Empower”. You can find it and much more at her website here: http://www.anneburrell.com/
For more updates on “Four Courses with Geoffrey Zakarian”, follow Geoffrey on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/geoffreyzakarian
“Four Courses with Geoffrey Zakarian” is a production of iHeartRadio and Corner Table Entertainment.
“Four Courses” is created by Geoffrey Zakarian, Margaret Zakarian, Jaret Keller, and Tara Halper. Our executive producer is Christopher Hassiotis. Four Courses is produced by Jonathan Hawes-Dressler. Our research is conducted by Jesslyn Shields.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hello, listeners of Four Courses with Jeffrey Z. Carrion. It's
your host, Jeffrey. I'm here today to share a very
special announcement. One thing you may know about me from
social media is that I love meeting my friends from
the food world at events around the country, and I've
even made it an annual ritual to interview many of
them at the South Beach Wine and Food Festival in Miami.
So for the rest of this summer, we will be
(00:23):
bringing you our summer series From the Beach. Each Friday,
will be publishing short and intimate conversations that I've had
with some of the top talent in the food world,
and even beyond. The conversations you'll here for the next
six weeks were recorded pool side at the w Hotel
in South Beach as my friends and I enjoyed great
cigars and magnums of rose as we discussed our past,
(00:44):
present and future. Without further delay, please enjoy the final
installment in our summer series From the Beach with the
chef and TV personality and Barrel. Honestly, I don't know
if I'm at the top of my game, Like, what
does that mean? Really? Because it's also I feel like
(01:04):
there's levels to everything. I mean, and I'm sure you
have to. You know, like you think about like starting
off as a young cook and you get like I
get to work saw Te, I got to be sush chef,
and then you get to be the chef and you
have these levels of stuff. And then I remember starting
off on the Food Network on Iron Chef, and every
(01:27):
time that I would hear a new season would come back.
I mean, I remember going back going to bed when
I think like and I'm like, I allowed myself like
these little minutes of happiness. So then I was like,
I'm at the top of my game. And then Secrets
of a Restaurant Chef came after that, and I was like,
I'm now at the top of my game. So that's
(01:49):
what I mean. There's always levels of you always have
to be striving to push yourself to be better, to
be thoughtful. I mean, you know in food everything's been
done before instead, but how do you keep your dishes fresh?
How do you keep your premptations for us? How do
you keep reinventing yourself to make it interesting? In US
(02:10):
sea and an ever growing sea of people that are Yes,
there's chefs, but there's like everyone who has an Instagram
feed is now doing cooking videos, and which is amazing
because it just says how fantastic food is, and food
is now a form of entertainment and not just something
we have to do to get by, but it's for
(02:32):
the masses and it brings people together. But people in
our position, like you know, we came up. When we started,
there was no food network even to ever think about
being on. No. It was like, am I gotta have
a job. I want to go to work in a restaurant.
I want to work slid time. I want to be
a chef. I want to be the chef. I hope
(02:55):
I get reviewed by the New York Times. I hope
I get like written up in gourmet magazine, in any
little press that was anything, and that was all there was. Yes,
really interesting you mentioned that, I want to go back.
I want to talk about that, like we in some
ways are shaped by our desire to be liked, which
is can be good because you work really hard and
(03:15):
you strive and you get better, but then it's bad
because like some food reviewer, you're you're striving to impress
quits and then you get someone else and you're like,
oh my god, but you don't know this person who
we're all trying to figure out, like, oh, he likes this,
he doesn't want to be set in the corner of sheet,
doesn't like that. Oh the last review they killed this
guy because he did this, And you're like, it's not
a way to live, like you know, some random random
(03:38):
bar and be like, oh, they didn't give me my
martiniqu cold enough and Burrell's restaurant sucks. Yeah, no, that's
about what it is. It was nothing to do with me.
So I am thankful. I don't know if you are.
I'm thankful for Instagram and all the other bloggers because
now it's all like it's diffused. It's diffused and sometimes
it's confused, but it's diffused so that nothing really hits you.
(04:00):
It's not a dagger anymore. Now. It's like you might
get a text to say, hey, I was there, I
I didn't like it on Instagram, and then you can say,
you know what, come back tomorrow. We can answer them,
and that softens it so it's less Yes, so I
don't feel I still feel that I have to police people,
and I'm still insecure and chefs masochistic is what we are.
I know you're the same. You work to ourselves. You
(04:23):
don't know what's happening the next You don't know what's
gonna happen next year. People, what is your five year plan?
Is there such a thing? Really? I'm fifty, do I
have a five year plan? I didn't even know I
had a year plan. I've just like to be here.
But it's so funny that you mentioned that, like how
social media started, because I remember back to the day
(04:45):
when my first show, Secrets Have a Restaurant started and
it aired at like nine thirty on a Sunday morning,
and I was like, oh my god, did I just
really do all of that? Did I say all of that? Yes?
You did, And it was great. It was irreverend, it
was different. So but the next day Bob Tushman, who
was the vice president of the Food Network, called me
(05:06):
and he's like, don't read the blogs and I'm too late.
I am ready did and he's like, I just know
that you are going to be one of our most
polarizing talent. So and I was like, okay, I mean
I just want everyone to like me, but they know
if you affect people enough, good to go to their
(05:29):
computer and write something good or bad. You have done
your job because the worst thing that you can be
is vanilla exactly. And I like, yes, appears to color
in less favor. That's what we always were looking for. Deliciousness,
the zest and the joy and what we get to
do in life, Like we are professional pleasure providers. We are,
(05:53):
you know, I've never heard of that. You know, like
food makes people happy? They do. And I try to
tell peoples like our chefs, I'm like, guys, they're putting
this food in their mouth and digesting it. There's no
profession that does that. You know. You go to the theater,
they're like, entertain you. You want to become a professor
and make people smarter, but they're ingesting what you cook
(06:14):
with your hands. It's a serious thing. You gotta really
wear gloves. You got but you get it's like a
big deal. It affects you. Then you go home. You're like,
you don't do that when you have a bad professor,
Like you know, I'm like, okay, I'm not gonna go
to class tomorrow. It's a big deal. And how intimate
is that? As human beings? We are so lucky that
we get to eat for pleasure, for pleasure, and it's
(06:36):
but it's so much more than that. It's about family,
it's about your history, it's about your body image, is
about your emotions, it's about holidays. It's about you know,
smells and things that take you back to a place
and time, and that we get the sort of joy
to help people achieve that with their own families. Absolutely spectacling.
(07:08):
So you went to Italy for a while. How long
were there? My sister and I have just decided that
anything that was like a significant time ago, we're just
gonna call twenty years. I mean, it is usually much
more than And I'm like, oh my god, am I
old enough to be able to say, like, because, okay,
so ago, I was there for a year. I graduated
(07:31):
from the CIA, which we are all the lumps, and
I had never been to Europe before. I had never
I mean, I'm from Syracuse, New York, where like Italian
food was like chicken barm and you know, I thought
I knew what Italian food was. And I got there
and I was like, oh my god. I just remember
the first morning that I arrived in Italy and we
(07:51):
were like on this like bus was a whole group
of students and I'm just looking at everything, like the
root signs are different, and the cars are little, and
you know, and there was this field of poppies. It
was like it was on fire. And it was like
seven o'clock in the morning of being up all night
on a flight, and I just looked at him like, yes,
I am in the right place. So the year was
(08:13):
just magical for me. I lived in Alba. I went
just lived in Alba and went to school in Barolo,
and then worked in restaurants in Umbria, Umbria, Tuscany. And
how did you get those jobs? It was like, as
we worked for free, but they had to house us
and feed us, so you've got all that knowledge. I
looked at it. I was like, no, I here, because
(08:35):
whatever I'm learning I have with me for life. What
was that like the first dish that you learned and
You're like, this is a taste that I couldn't I
don't believe existed, Like was it like a catch Pepe
or like something with Ancho. I was all in the
North Monte so, but I can tell you the pinnacle moment.
(08:56):
I sort of felt like with my entire year, there
was when we were working in in Tuscany, and it
was a thirty restaurant and it was a husband and
wife that owned it, and the wife was the chef,
and the husband was like batshit crazy running that front
of the house. And he loved the Beatles so much,
but he did not speak English, so he knew all
(09:17):
the sounds of all the words, but did not really
know the words to all the Beatles songs and would
sing them and he would be drunk at the end
of every night. It was during that year that they
were like, all right, we're thinking, we're like going to
move on to another place now, and they're like a
spent specta boba, like wait for the new oil, the
new oil. Were like, what is this the new oil?
(09:38):
What is it? And it was olive oil season, and
in this town it was sixty people that lived in
the town. And clearly there was a church because it's Italy.
There was like a cafe to gain an his fresso,
and there was a Friend Oil, which is an olive
press and olive oil press. And the day that it opened,
we burned bread on the fire and we walked across
(09:59):
the street to the Friend Toyo. Just as the new
olive oil was coming out of the press, and I
was like I tasted it and it was like you
feel it and you feel thousands of years of culinary
history and the most pristine flavor I have ever had
(10:20):
in my life. And I was like, I get it.
Respect your ingredients. It was it was magical. Yeah, to me,
it's the basics. I'm all about the basics. Like I
was like, low text, whatever memory. When you're making a dish,
I want this to taste like what I had at
La La La well roasts. I know your your style.
(10:41):
You're like when you graduate from culinary school and you
think you know everything. So then I would I got
to Italy and it would be like I'm like burning
it up as far as I'm concerned. And then they
the Italians would taste stuff and they'd be like a
bono ma, which means it's good, but and it's just
(11:04):
like not exactly what they knew. And then so I
came back to the States. I worked for Lydia Bastiana
and she would be like bono ma, and I'm like
this math like stop with it, like this is good food.
And it was finally a couple of years later when
some Italians told me that it was. They tasted my
(11:26):
matre shauna sauce and they were like, on uh, you
have the Italian flavor. And I was like, finally I've
got it. Like that to me, like because when you
think you know everything, and you're like you have so
much still left to learn, and it's like you don't
know what you don't know, and it's just as a
(11:47):
matter when you go and look at these recipes, is
seven thousand ways to make it, and you have to
have like some confidence in like you know what I'm
gonna distill down, Yes, seven thousand ways into one. So
if you may just give me that recipe the five
things you have to do to make it. So it's
very funny because it's like always with me, there's no
(12:09):
simple answer. But like you know, and amata shawna sauce,
like if you go to Rome, no onions, you go
to a machi like onions sometimes no tomatoes. Like, so
I think there's like a book brewing in me about
in search of the perfect amata chaa. But how I
do it? I render guanciale. So you got like a
nice like and you gotta do it low and slow
(12:32):
to like that pork jowl is like sort of pasty
and golden and crispy, and you get that huge fat
pan full of fat, and then I do tons of
onions and low and slow in that guanciala fat um
and tons of salt and tons of crushed red pepper,
(12:53):
and then uh san marzano tomatoes, low and slow and
take your time and add water and reduce, add water
and reduce, and you like you feel the soul of
that sauce come alive. And then bucatini. There's no way
to eat it in a sexy way. Like it's definitely
not like a date night pau stuff, but it's like
when you want to get in there and like I
(13:14):
love your stuff and like really like I could scrap
that onto my face any day of the week if
you happy about it. That was that's the taste. So
that's like to me, like the Italian kitchen is just
about ingredients. It's so simple and it's a stop but
you know, like it's that you've got to just respect
the ingredients and allow them to be at their peak
(13:38):
of freshness and deliciousness when they are. And it's like
that's why I love to cook seasonally because it's like
you overdose on stuff when they're in season, and then
like by the end of the seating you're like all
right bye, and then like by the time you're done
with that, like a new friend comes around and it's
like every like month there's like, oh hi, I've missed you,
(13:59):
and then you overdo is not gonna be like see
you next year. I watched a couple of episodes I
talked to you last night about worst Cooks, and you're
really an incredible teacher. You'll talk down to them, you
(14:21):
like give that recipe. I was watching you make dumplings,
and you were talking like you were talking to a
culinary student. You were not talking like you were talking
to a bunch of worthless, lousy cooks. And what it
did to them is even if they knew they were
terrible and they know they're bad, it's not like when
we cast a show to find real good cooks, that's hard.
It's not hard to find bad cooks. And I'm like,
(14:41):
all these years on the Food Network and no one's
gotten any better. I'm like, thank god, it gives me
a job, that's right. So it's like you're a great
teacher and you teach you, and I see them be
like and they're like in their eyes light up and
they like move towards you closer, and they like kind
of think there's a whisper of both like you actually
might be able to do this. And that's because if
you're teaching, so how what what is your brain power
(15:04):
telling you that you have to get across how you
you have to hook them. There's a way to hook someone,
And there's a way. Then they just turn off. They
turn off, and you can see that happening. It's a
glaze over goodbye. You can see when people are not engaged.
How do you do that? Think you're very good at that,
By the way, I think about like I think probably
(15:24):
because I had so many bad teachers. I seriously don't
remember paying attention in school, grade school, high school, four
years of college I did not care. And then I
got to culinary school. It was the first time I
was at the right place at the right time and
my life. So you know, when you are engaging someone,
And so that's why I have lots of like b
(15:46):
t v rts to boil, reduced to zimmer, you know
that kind of stuff. And I have like funny little
ways to like try to engage people. But it's also no,
I will not talk down to them. I will not
blower my standards. I look at them and I'm like,
I know you can do this, and I like the
first thing I teach always like that we learned in
(16:06):
culinary school means you know, and I'm like, trust the
means on plas process. It works, it does. And everyone
I say, if you're a frantic cook, you're allows you
you cannot be frantic. And I'm like, you're gonna cut yourself.
You're gonna burn yourself, or you're worse, you're gonna burn
someone else. Right now, cut someone else. If you look
at the whole thing, it's like it's overwhelming. So I'm like,
(16:30):
break it up into pieces. Knife cuts matter and is.
But then I also tell people, I'm like, all right,
if you've had a crap day and everything went terrible,
please at least make sure the rim of the plate
is clean. So I have at least one nice thing
to say. It was like no, because on worse cooks,
it was like, it is absolutely my mission. I am
(16:53):
going to teach you. I will give you all the
information you need to know. I will give you the
tools but it's up to you to pick up those
tools and use them. And if you notice, when they
turn off, they're going to fail. When they when they
lose it, they're going to fail. But when they listen,
they will. You can bluff a bit into it and
get a color a couple of things right. If you
(17:14):
season properly, you can bluff it. Even if you overcook
a steak. If you overcook the steak and not season,
it's going to be like you're not paying attention. So
there's things you can't do. They're tasting if they get
some knife cuts that are right. It felt like the
plating looks at all like you give people any little
bit of encouragement. It's like, look how much you've just
learned and you're here for just a minute. Like yes,
(17:36):
And I tell people every single time on the first
day it doesn't matter if you're here for a short
time or a long time. This show will change your life.
You know. It's a really well put. That's why I
feel such a responsibility. Yes, Worst Cooks is a circus.
It is. It's a bunch of yahoo's that come in
and they're bad, and they know they're bad, and we're
(17:57):
laughing at them, but they know they're bad, so it's
not in a mean way. But all they have to
do is go up from there and it's like, see,
you can do this, and it's it's almost like a transformation.
And I'm like that teacher, you know, that that strict
teacher that you had, and you kind of hated them
(18:18):
when you were in their class, but when you got
past it and you were like, I loved them and
they made me rise to the occasion. When you travel,
(18:38):
you travel a lot, so how do you select a restaurant?
How do you take from that something you want to
take home. The biggest thing for me when I travel,
I go to a city, the first thing I think
about is like where I'm gonna eat. It's always, oh
my god, always we can't go to us, we can't eat,
We're not going to the city. It's like, where are
we going? And who do I know in this city
that I can call her reservation? But I mean that's
the beauty of the Chef network, you know, And that's
(19:00):
why like festivals like this are so fun. That's why
I like, I kind of love Instagram that when you
see when we all see each other, you kind of
have an idea what's going on in everyone's life, So
it's not just like Hi, how are you doing? And
you repeat your resume like oh, I saw you were
in Iceland. I saw you were like you know, and
it's like where do we eat? What did you like?
That kind of stuff? Where have you been lately? That
(19:23):
has really raised the bar for you a country that
you've really been in shock? Um, all right, I will
not to exist. I was not in shock, but I
I've been there twice of late, and I really really
enjoyed it. In New York Veronica. Have you been there?
I've just looked at it, but I haven't eaten there.
I've been there twice. It is first of all, it's
(19:44):
a stunning restaurant. It's stunning beautiful, and I mean it's
you know, you feel like you're in like seeing Petersburg,
Russia or Paris, yes, kind of, and you're gonna have
caviar service. And then they have Chicken Kiev. Who has
Chicken Kiev in the man? Am I on a flight? No?
Exactly like am I just the Russian team room used
(20:06):
to have still open, it still has it so delicious
and like lovely flaming desserts and Russian honey cake and
so delicious. Really, Ima, what's great about that is is
Stephen and the ownership has decided to go so back
in time. I loves that are so good that people
(20:26):
forgot about them. They're like, oh, no one eats or
cooks like that. But you know, actually, you can really
make stuff really good if you pay attention, because back then,
I don't think a lot of people have the product.
There's such great product Now in New York you can
go back and make it really amazing chicken kiev and
be like, wow, there's a lot that's a hard dish.
And if every doesn't understand what chicken kieva, it's chicken
stuff with butter deep fried. Now think of that. But
(20:47):
it's like so like I tell you, Veronica, it's so
perfectly rolled and like to get it like every single one,
like the perfect evenness, and like when it's the chicken
perfectly cooked, and then when you cut it, like the
butter spurts every where like it is not there's a
lot of technology in that dish. There's so many dishes
like that that have been so bastardized and that people
(21:09):
are like, but it's like, no, they were beautiful dishes
and they're historic dishes for a reason. And Santa Klibiac salmon.
When I worked at the Circuit, we used to have
as a special on Wednesday, and it was a whole
salmon stuffed with rice and spinach and then pastry saffron
or some bacon. And if you overcooked it, the sam
we get overcooked. The puff pastry wasn't cooked enough. The
(21:32):
rice had to be just right. It would be a mush.
And if it's right and delicious, it all cuts perfectly.
And it's like beef Wellington for salmon. Beef Wellington. I
mean that's another and it's one of those dishes. It's
probably three years old, and they're like for people, like
people are eating it up. You know, it's kind of fantastic.
So not gluten free, dairy free pito. It's nothing. It's
(21:54):
like when people ate, they dined, they died, did not
that's a good point. They dined, Jeffrey. I would think,
here a man who dines. Yes, I love dining. I
mean it's lost. I mean I've trust me. We grab
stuff to go and you know we go to have
a chop salad and you've gotta run and you know,
having sushi and we get it, but dining is like
(22:14):
fantastic when it's done right, it's fantastic and you feel respected,
and it's a sense of we are living life. It's
gonna come to an end. Three times a day we
get a chance to sort of like some like enjoy
the ride while we're here. Isn't that the best? And
that's why I love this profession and that's why I
think it's important that we keep it up at the
(22:36):
highest level. And I think that I've learned a lot
from the best, because the best only want to get better.
They don't really have a plan. They don't really know
what the next five years are going to happen, and
they can only hope that they get up the next
day and they have as much energy or more energy,
and then now they're taking care of themselves more so
they can do more. So I think that's really what
(22:57):
the key is. This restaurant industry is transformed us to
like stay around longer, be healthier, and that dropped it
young absolutely, and the restaurant industry the way it is now,
I mean, as hard as it is to make a living,
because it's impossible, especially in New York to make a
living in a restaurant, but it is more civilized than
(23:17):
it has ever been, you know, and it's like it
just shows like food is so respected in and of
itself and the people that created I mean, I remember
years ago when I was thinking of going to culinary
school and I told my father and he's like, you
want to do what a girl like? You want to
go work in a kitchen? And I'm like, but it's
(23:39):
my passion. He's like, fine, do whatever you want, but
don't ask me for any money. And I was like,
you know, and I'm like, you want to go work
in a kitchen? Kitchen like, yes, I do. And honestly,
I could not have it any other way to way
Hello, listeners of Four Courses with Jeffrey Z. Carrion. It's
your host, Jeffrey. I'm here today to share a very
special announcement. One thing you may know about me from
social media is that I love meeting my friends from
the food world at events around the country, and I've
even made it an annual ritual to interview many of
them at the South Beach Wine and Food Festival in Miami.
So for the rest of this summer, we will be
(00:23):
bringing you our summer series From the Beach. Each Friday,
will be publishing short and intimate conversations that I've had
with some of the top talent in the food world,
and even beyond. The conversations you'll here for the next
six weeks were recorded pool side at the w Hotel
in South Beach as my friends and I enjoyed great
cigars and magnums of rose as we discussed our past,
(00:44):
present and future. Without further delay, please enjoy the final
installment in our summer series From the Beach with the
chef and TV personality and Barrel. Honestly, I don't know
if I'm at the top of my game, Like, what
does that mean? Really? Because it's also I feel like
(01:04):
there's levels to everything. I mean, and I'm sure you
have to. You know, like you think about like starting
off as a young cook and you get like I
get to work saw Te, I got to be sush chef,
and then you get to be the chef and you
have these levels of stuff. And then I remember starting
off on the Food Network on Iron Chef, and every
(01:27):
time that I would hear a new season would come back.
I mean, I remember going back going to bed when
I think like and I'm like, I allowed myself like
these little minutes of happiness. So then I was like,
I'm at the top of my game. And then Secrets
of a Restaurant Chef came after that, and I was like,
I'm now at the top of my game. So that's
(01:49):
what I mean. There's always levels of you always have
to be striving to push yourself to be better, to
be thoughtful. I mean, you know in food everything's been
done before instead, but how do you keep your dishes fresh?
How do you keep your premptations for us? How do
you keep reinventing yourself to make it interesting? In US
(02:10):
sea and an ever growing sea of people that are Yes,
there's chefs, but there's like everyone who has an Instagram
feed is now doing cooking videos, and which is amazing
because it just says how fantastic food is, and food
is now a form of entertainment and not just something
we have to do to get by, but it's for
(02:32):
the masses and it brings people together. But people in
our position, like you know, we came up. When we started,
there was no food network even to ever think about
being on. No. It was like, am I gotta have
a job. I want to go to work in a restaurant.
I want to work slid time. I want to be
a chef. I want to be the chef. I hope
(02:55):
I get reviewed by the New York Times. I hope
I get like written up in gourmet magazine, in any
little press that was anything, and that was all there was. Yes,
really interesting you mentioned that, I want to go back.
I want to talk about that, like we in some
ways are shaped by our desire to be liked, which
is can be good because you work really hard and
(03:15):
you strive and you get better, but then it's bad
because like some food reviewer, you're you're striving to impress
quits and then you get someone else and you're like,
oh my god, but you don't know this person who
we're all trying to figure out, like, oh, he likes this,
he doesn't want to be set in the corner of sheet,
doesn't like that. Oh the last review they killed this
guy because he did this, And you're like, it's not
a way to live, like you know, some random random
(03:38):
bar and be like, oh, they didn't give me my
martiniqu cold enough and Burrell's restaurant sucks. Yeah, no, that's
about what it is. It was nothing to do with me.
So I am thankful. I don't know if you are.
I'm thankful for Instagram and all the other bloggers because
now it's all like it's diffused. It's diffused and sometimes
it's confused, but it's diffused so that nothing really hits you.
(04:00):
It's not a dagger anymore. Now. It's like you might
get a text to say, hey, I was there, I
I didn't like it on Instagram, and then you can say,
you know what, come back tomorrow. We can answer them,
and that softens it so it's less Yes, so I
don't feel I still feel that I have to police people,
and I'm still insecure and chefs masochistic is what we are.
I know you're the same. You work to ourselves. You
(04:23):
don't know what's happening the next You don't know what's
gonna happen next year. People, what is your five year plan?
Is there such a thing? Really? I'm fifty, do I
have a five year plan? I didn't even know I
had a year plan. I've just like to be here.
But it's so funny that you mentioned that, like how
social media started, because I remember back to the day
(04:45):
when my first show, Secrets Have a Restaurant started and
it aired at like nine thirty on a Sunday morning,
and I was like, oh my god, did I just
really do all of that? Did I say all of that? Yes?
You did, And it was great. It was irreverend, it
was different. So but the next day Bob Tushman, who
was the vice president of the Food Network, called me
(05:06):
and he's like, don't read the blogs and I'm too late.
I am ready did and he's like, I just know
that you are going to be one of our most
polarizing talent. So and I was like, okay, I mean
I just want everyone to like me, but they know
if you affect people enough, good to go to their
(05:29):
computer and write something good or bad. You have done
your job because the worst thing that you can be
is vanilla exactly. And I like, yes, appears to color
in less favor. That's what we always were looking for. Deliciousness,
the zest and the joy and what we get to
do in life, Like we are professional pleasure providers. We are,
(05:53):
you know, I've never heard of that. You know, like
food makes people happy? They do. And I try to
tell peoples like our chefs, I'm like, guys, they're putting
this food in their mouth and digesting it. There's no
profession that does that. You know. You go to the theater,
they're like, entertain you. You want to become a professor
and make people smarter, but they're ingesting what you cook
(06:14):
with your hands. It's a serious thing. You gotta really
wear gloves. You got but you get it's like a
big deal. It affects you. Then you go home. You're like,
you don't do that when you have a bad professor,
Like you know, I'm like, okay, I'm not gonna go
to class tomorrow. It's a big deal. And how intimate
is that? As human beings? We are so lucky that
we get to eat for pleasure, for pleasure, and it's
(06:36):
but it's so much more than that. It's about family,
it's about your history, it's about your body image, is
about your emotions, it's about holidays. It's about you know,
smells and things that take you back to a place
and time, and that we get the sort of joy
to help people achieve that with their own families. Absolutely spectacling.
(07:08):
So you went to Italy for a while. How long
were there? My sister and I have just decided that
anything that was like a significant time ago, we're just
gonna call twenty years. I mean, it is usually much
more than And I'm like, oh my god, am I
old enough to be able to say, like, because, okay,
so ago, I was there for a year. I graduated
(07:31):
from the CIA, which we are all the lumps, and
I had never been to Europe before. I had never
I mean, I'm from Syracuse, New York, where like Italian
food was like chicken barm and you know, I thought
I knew what Italian food was. And I got there
and I was like, oh my god. I just remember
the first morning that I arrived in Italy and we
(07:51):
were like on this like bus was a whole group
of students and I'm just looking at everything, like the
root signs are different, and the cars are little, and
you know, and there was this field of poppies. It
was like it was on fire. And it was like
seven o'clock in the morning of being up all night
on a flight, and I just looked at him like, yes,
I am in the right place. So the year was
(08:13):
just magical for me. I lived in Alba. I went
just lived in Alba and went to school in Barolo,
and then worked in restaurants in Umbria, Umbria, Tuscany. And
how did you get those jobs? It was like, as
we worked for free, but they had to house us
and feed us, so you've got all that knowledge. I
looked at it. I was like, no, I here, because
(08:35):
whatever I'm learning I have with me for life. What
was that like the first dish that you learned and
You're like, this is a taste that I couldn't I
don't believe existed, Like was it like a catch Pepe
or like something with Ancho. I was all in the
North Monte so, but I can tell you the pinnacle moment.
(08:56):
I sort of felt like with my entire year, there
was when we were working in in Tuscany, and it
was a thirty restaurant and it was a husband and
wife that owned it, and the wife was the chef,
and the husband was like batshit crazy running that front
of the house. And he loved the Beatles so much,
but he did not speak English, so he knew all
(09:17):
the sounds of all the words, but did not really
know the words to all the Beatles songs and would
sing them and he would be drunk at the end
of every night. It was during that year that they
were like, all right, we're thinking, we're like going to
move on to another place now, and they're like a
spent specta boba, like wait for the new oil, the
new oil. Were like, what is this the new oil?
(09:38):
What is it? And it was olive oil season, and
in this town it was sixty people that lived in
the town. And clearly there was a church because it's Italy.
There was like a cafe to gain an his fresso,
and there was a Friend Oil, which is an olive
press and olive oil press. And the day that it opened,
we burned bread on the fire and we walked across
(09:59):
the street to the Friend Toyo. Just as the new
olive oil was coming out of the press, and I
was like I tasted it and it was like you
feel it and you feel thousands of years of culinary
history and the most pristine flavor I have ever had
(10:20):
in my life. And I was like, I get it.
Respect your ingredients. It was it was magical. Yeah, to me,
it's the basics. I'm all about the basics. Like I
was like, low text, whatever memory. When you're making a dish,
I want this to taste like what I had at
La La La well roasts. I know your your style.
(10:41):
You're like when you graduate from culinary school and you
think you know everything. So then I would I got
to Italy and it would be like I'm like burning
it up as far as I'm concerned. And then they
the Italians would taste stuff and they'd be like a
bono ma, which means it's good, but and it's just
(11:04):
like not exactly what they knew. And then so I
came back to the States. I worked for Lydia Bastiana
and she would be like bono ma, and I'm like
this math like stop with it, like this is good food.
And it was finally a couple of years later when
some Italians told me that it was. They tasted my
(11:26):
matre shauna sauce and they were like, on uh, you
have the Italian flavor. And I was like, finally I've
got it. Like that to me, like because when you
think you know everything, and you're like you have so
much still left to learn, and it's like you don't
know what you don't know, and it's just as a
(11:47):
matter when you go and look at these recipes, is
seven thousand ways to make it, and you have to
have like some confidence in like you know what I'm
gonna distill down, Yes, seven thousand ways into one. So
if you may just give me that recipe the five
things you have to do to make it. So it's
very funny because it's like always with me, there's no
(12:09):
simple answer. But like you know, and amata shawna sauce,
like if you go to Rome, no onions, you go
to a machi like onions sometimes no tomatoes. Like, so
I think there's like a book brewing in me about
in search of the perfect amata chaa. But how I
do it? I render guanciale. So you got like a
nice like and you gotta do it low and slow
(12:32):
to like that pork jowl is like sort of pasty
and golden and crispy, and you get that huge fat
pan full of fat, and then I do tons of
onions and low and slow in that guanciala fat um
and tons of salt and tons of crushed red pepper,
(12:53):
and then uh san marzano tomatoes, low and slow and
take your time and add water and reduce, add water
and reduce, and you like you feel the soul of
that sauce come alive. And then bucatini. There's no way
to eat it in a sexy way. Like it's definitely
not like a date night pau stuff, but it's like
when you want to get in there and like I
(13:14):
love your stuff and like really like I could scrap
that onto my face any day of the week if
you happy about it. That was that's the taste. So
that's like to me, like the Italian kitchen is just
about ingredients. It's so simple and it's a stop but
you know, like it's that you've got to just respect
the ingredients and allow them to be at their peak
(13:38):
of freshness and deliciousness when they are. And it's like
that's why I love to cook seasonally because it's like
you overdose on stuff when they're in season, and then
like by the end of the seating you're like all
right bye, and then like by the time you're done
with that, like a new friend comes around and it's
like every like month there's like, oh hi, I've missed you,
(13:59):
and then you overdo is not gonna be like see
you next year. I watched a couple of episodes I
talked to you last night about worst Cooks, and you're
really an incredible teacher. You'll talk down to them, you
(14:21):
like give that recipe. I was watching you make dumplings,
and you were talking like you were talking to a
culinary student. You were not talking like you were talking
to a bunch of worthless, lousy cooks. And what it
did to them is even if they knew they were
terrible and they know they're bad, it's not like when
we cast a show to find real good cooks, that's hard.
It's not hard to find bad cooks. And I'm like,
(14:41):
all these years on the Food Network and no one's
gotten any better. I'm like, thank god, it gives me
a job, that's right. So it's like you're a great
teacher and you teach you, and I see them be
like and they're like in their eyes light up and
they like move towards you closer, and they like kind
of think there's a whisper of both like you actually
might be able to do this. And that's because if
you're teaching, so how what what is your brain power
(15:04):
telling you that you have to get across how you
you have to hook them. There's a way to hook someone,
And there's a way. Then they just turn off. They
turn off, and you can see that happening. It's a
glaze over goodbye. You can see when people are not engaged.
How do you do that? Think you're very good at that,
By the way, I think about like I think probably
(15:24):
because I had so many bad teachers. I seriously don't
remember paying attention in school, grade school, high school, four
years of college I did not care. And then I
got to culinary school. It was the first time I
was at the right place at the right time and
my life. So you know, when you are engaging someone,
And so that's why I have lots of like b
(15:46):
t v rts to boil, reduced to zimmer, you know
that kind of stuff. And I have like funny little
ways to like try to engage people. But it's also no,
I will not talk down to them. I will not
blower my standards. I look at them and I'm like,
I know you can do this, and I like the
first thing I teach always like that we learned in
(16:06):
culinary school means you know, and I'm like, trust the
means on plas process. It works, it does. And everyone
I say, if you're a frantic cook, you're allows you
you cannot be frantic. And I'm like, you're gonna cut yourself.
You're gonna burn yourself, or you're worse, you're gonna burn
someone else. Right now, cut someone else. If you look
at the whole thing, it's like it's overwhelming. So I'm like,
(16:30):
break it up into pieces. Knife cuts matter and is.
But then I also tell people, I'm like, all right,
if you've had a crap day and everything went terrible,
please at least make sure the rim of the plate
is clean. So I have at least one nice thing
to say. It was like no, because on worse cooks,
it was like, it is absolutely my mission. I am
(16:53):
going to teach you. I will give you all the
information you need to know. I will give you the
tools but it's up to you to pick up those
tools and use them. And if you notice, when they
turn off, they're going to fail. When they when they
lose it, they're going to fail. But when they listen,
they will. You can bluff a bit into it and
get a color a couple of things right. If you
(17:14):
season properly, you can bluff it. Even if you overcook
a steak. If you overcook the steak and not season,
it's going to be like you're not paying attention. So
there's things you can't do. They're tasting if they get
some knife cuts that are right. It felt like the
plating looks at all like you give people any little
bit of encouragement. It's like, look how much you've just
learned and you're here for just a minute. Like yes,
(17:36):
And I tell people every single time on the first
day it doesn't matter if you're here for a short
time or a long time. This show will change your life.
You know. It's a really well put. That's why I
feel such a responsibility. Yes, Worst Cooks is a circus.
It is. It's a bunch of yahoo's that come in
and they're bad, and they know they're bad, and we're
(17:57):
laughing at them, but they know they're bad, so it's
not in a mean way. But all they have to
do is go up from there and it's like, see,
you can do this, and it's it's almost like a transformation.
And I'm like that teacher, you know, that that strict
teacher that you had, and you kind of hated them
(18:18):
when you were in their class, but when you got
past it and you were like, I loved them and
they made me rise to the occasion. When you travel,
(18:38):
you travel a lot, so how do you select a restaurant?
How do you take from that something you want to
take home. The biggest thing for me when I travel,
I go to a city, the first thing I think
about is like where I'm gonna eat. It's always, oh
my god, always we can't go to us, we can't eat,
We're not going to the city. It's like, where are
we going? And who do I know in this city
that I can call her reservation? But I mean that's
the beauty of the Chef network, you know, And that's
(19:00):
why like festivals like this are so fun. That's why
I like, I kind of love Instagram that when you
see when we all see each other, you kind of
have an idea what's going on in everyone's life, So
it's not just like Hi, how are you doing? And
you repeat your resume like oh, I saw you were
in Iceland. I saw you were like you know, and
it's like where do we eat? What did you like?
That kind of stuff? Where have you been lately? That
(19:23):
has really raised the bar for you a country that
you've really been in shock? Um, all right, I will
not to exist. I was not in shock, but I
I've been there twice of late, and I really really
enjoyed it. In New York Veronica. Have you been there?
I've just looked at it, but I haven't eaten there.
I've been there twice. It is first of all, it's
(19:44):
a stunning restaurant. It's stunning beautiful, and I mean it's
you know, you feel like you're in like seeing Petersburg,
Russia or Paris, yes, kind of, and you're gonna have
caviar service. And then they have Chicken Kiev. Who has
Chicken Kiev in the man? Am I on a flight? No?
Exactly like am I just the Russian team room used
(20:06):
to have still open, it still has it so delicious
and like lovely flaming desserts and Russian honey cake and
so delicious. Really, Ima, what's great about that is is
Stephen and the ownership has decided to go so back
in time. I loves that are so good that people
(20:26):
forgot about them. They're like, oh, no one eats or
cooks like that. But you know, actually, you can really
make stuff really good if you pay attention, because back then,
I don't think a lot of people have the product.
There's such great product Now in New York you can
go back and make it really amazing chicken kiev and
be like, wow, there's a lot that's a hard dish.
And if every doesn't understand what chicken kieva, it's chicken
stuff with butter deep fried. Now think of that. But
(20:47):
it's like so like I tell you, Veronica, it's so
perfectly rolled and like to get it like every single one,
like the perfect evenness, and like when it's the chicken
perfectly cooked, and then when you cut it, like the
butter spurts every where like it is not there's a
lot of technology in that dish. There's so many dishes
like that that have been so bastardized and that people
(21:09):
are like, but it's like, no, they were beautiful dishes
and they're historic dishes for a reason. And Santa Klibiac salmon.
When I worked at the Circuit, we used to have
as a special on Wednesday, and it was a whole
salmon stuffed with rice and spinach and then pastry saffron
or some bacon. And if you overcooked it, the sam
we get overcooked. The puff pastry wasn't cooked enough. The
(21:32):
rice had to be just right. It would be a mush.
And if it's right and delicious, it all cuts perfectly.
And it's like beef Wellington for salmon. Beef Wellington. I
mean that's another and it's one of those dishes. It's
probably three years old, and they're like for people, like
people are eating it up. You know, it's kind of fantastic.
So not gluten free, dairy free pito. It's nothing. It's
(21:54):
like when people ate, they dined, they died, did not
that's a good point. They dined, Jeffrey. I would think,
here a man who dines. Yes, I love dining. I
mean it's lost. I mean I've trust me. We grab
stuff to go and you know we go to have
a chop salad and you've gotta run and you know,
having sushi and we get it, but dining is like
(22:14):
fantastic when it's done right, it's fantastic and you feel respected,
and it's a sense of we are living life. It's
gonna come to an end. Three times a day we
get a chance to sort of like some like enjoy
the ride while we're here. Isn't that the best? And
that's why I love this profession and that's why I
think it's important that we keep it up at the
(22:36):
highest level. And I think that I've learned a lot
from the best, because the best only want to get better.
They don't really have a plan. They don't really know
what the next five years are going to happen, and
they can only hope that they get up the next
day and they have as much energy or more energy,
and then now they're taking care of themselves more so
they can do more. So I think that's really what
(22:57):
the key is. This restaurant industry is transformed us to
like stay around longer, be healthier, and that dropped it
young absolutely, and the restaurant industry the way it is now,
I mean, as hard as it is to make a living,
because it's impossible, especially in New York to make a
living in a restaurant, but it is more civilized than
(23:17):
it has ever been, you know, and it's like it
just shows like food is so respected in and of
itself and the people that created I mean, I remember
years ago when I was thinking of going to culinary
school and I told my father and he's like, you
want to do what a girl like? You want to
go work in a kitchen? And I'm like, but it's
(23:39):
my passion. He's like, fine, do whatever you want, but
don't ask me for any money. And I was like,
you know, and I'm like, you want to go work
in a kitchen? Kitchen like, yes, I do. And honestly,
I could not have it any other way to way
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