December 10, 2021 • 23 mins
In this special three-part series of Four Courses with Geoffrey Zakarian, we’re turning the tables to learn more about Geoffrey -- his childhood, his growth as a chef and celebrity, and his reflections on balancing business and family. In this second episode, we hear about Geoffrey’s early career trajectory, from a bold move that charmed the executive chef at Le Cirque, to himself becoming an executive chef at the height of New York City’s culinary scene in the 80s and 90s.
For more information on "Four Courses With Geoffrey Zakarian," follow Geoffrey on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/geoffreyzakarian"
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
My name is Jeffrey Zcarrien and you're listening to Four
Courses with Jeffrey Z. Carrion from my Heart Radio. Today
we are continuing are Turning the Table series where our
executive producer, Christopher Hesiotis takes over as our host and
puts me in the hot seat to answer questions about
how I got to where I am today. This is
part two of our three part series. If you haven't
(00:26):
listened to our first Turning the Table episode and you
want to know more about how I first caught the
culinary bug, go back and listen to part one. Now.
In today's episode, we pick up my story right as
I was formally stepping into the culinary world at LASERK,
which was just an incredible experience in and of itself.
But before I could even begin to imagine moving up
in this world, I needed mentors. Christopher knew that mentorship
(00:50):
is something I frequently asked guests about here on Four Courses,
and he had a hunch that he needed to ask
me too. We hope you enjoy. But Jeffrey, as you
got your career started, you know you are an apprentice
chef Atlas Circuit. You had you had a mentor in
Alan Selach, the renowned chef. You speak a lot about
(01:11):
mentorship when you talk to successful people on your podcast.
I have a suspicion that this obsession of yours kind
of dates back to these early days in your career.
Can you tell me what it is about that relationship
working with chefs that that really solidified that mentor mente
relationship for you and how important it is. I really
(01:33):
think that I'm gonna speak as a young man to
all the young men and women now whore into the field.
Mentorship is everything, even if it's not perfect mentorship, you know,
you need to find someone. That's what I always say
to people when they asked me, how do I know?
How do I get involved? How what do I do?
What do I do? I'm like, I don't have a blueprint,
(01:54):
but what I can tell you is what you probably
don't want to hear. And I said, you have to
stop the thinking about money, stop thinking about how many
hours you're working, and start thinking about, like what do
you want your life to look like in five years?
And then start thinking backwards. Right, It's like, okay, let's
start from like, let's have to have this picture. Now,
how do I start. What's the start point? I said,
(02:16):
I can give you the start point, but that's it.
I can't instruct you on manners. I can't tell you
how to respect people. I can give you the start
point and tell you that if you do this for
at least a year, you'll have the secret and you
don't have to learn it from me. You're gonna know
exactly what to do because it will be right in
front of you. They're like, Okay, well I'm here, I'm
(02:38):
a year later, I've done what I want to do.
Now I know what I want to do here. I'm
gonna go left for this much time. I'm gonna go
right for this much time, and it's all gonna be answered.
And I tell him very simply, to find someone, find
the best person possible, and then write it all down
on a list. Take those top five people you think
are the best in the field, and then go put
a bee next to them. By that, I mean those
(03:00):
are bees. Go find a's because your natural inclination is
to find people you actually think would be easy to ask.
They'll say, yes, I said, those are the bees. You
don't want the bees ever, Okay, those are for other people,
not you. Do you want to be really great? Go
for the a's people that you wouldn't dream of asking
that you would say no, I could know, it's not
a chance. Those are the people you want to ask
(03:23):
and ask to work for them. Say what do you have.
I'll do anything anything. I'll work in the front of
the house, at the back, I'll do I'll do anything,
bus tables, I don't know. I'll work as a late
night prep, I'll do overnight. I'll do whatever you want
if you can stick with it. The rest of it
will be handed to you by yourself, and the rest
is just going to be your story, not my story.
(03:44):
And I said, that's exactly what I did. And I
didn't have anyone telling me to do that. I just
happened upon it. And I happened upon a guy named
Alan Psiak who was Ella Syric And it was probably
a couple of days after I graduated. I got a
job at another restaurant. I didn't like it, and I
asked someone at the restaurant who was another CI grad.
He said, we'll go. You know, you should see. I
think they're hiring it list Cirque. And I went to
(04:06):
the Cirque and he told me, he said in a
very bad English. To this day, he's one of my
dearest friends. He's still alive. Thing he's eighties seven. And
he said, I don't have a job now. I have nothing,
no job. There's no job here. I have nothing. And
I gave him, you know, the resume graduated. I said, well,
I was just working next door over there. Said why
are you leaving here? I said, I said the food
isn't good. Just like that, I swear I saw a
(04:27):
glimmer in his eye that was check one. So I
felt a little confidence coming on board. He goes, and
you know, you know it's you know, they're doing a
good job there. I said, I know. I said, but
I think there's better. And I didn't say it is
better here. I said, I think there's better, and I
knew it better. Was is I just ate around the world? Right?
It was something else, and so I knew that the
(04:48):
food wasn't good. I just didn't have the hierarchical standing
to say it. Very brazen and kind of stupid, but
it worked. And he said I don't have anything. I said, Jeff,
I'll take anything. I've saved up some money. I'll work
for free until something opens and he goes, Okay, come tomorrow,
just like that. Matter of fact, he's a smart businessman, right.
(05:10):
I learned a very dear economic lesson from him. So
I started working the next day and I was at
the bottom of the Totem pole. But I was Atlas
circ And I want to tell you, I did some
research before, and I knew Sarah MACCIONI, I knew what
they had. They had three Star New York Time, they
had Alan Psiach, they had everyone who was everyone was
eating in that restaurant. I mean, every president, every star Hollywood. No,
(05:33):
you just canna go back and look, it's been open
since the early seventies. And uh, I was around two
that I landed there after I graduated from CIA. Yeah,
and Jeffrey, for those that don't know, this is a
big name. Can you paint a picture of what it's
like for a guest to just walk into that place
and what their experience is like. Yeah, so it's like,
you know, it's like going on working for like Robert
(05:55):
de Niro or Danielle Craig or it's a big deal.
And it was the biggest deal there was, and you know,
it was the place to go and back in the
early eighties and the seventies. This twenty seven thousand restaurants
in New York. They were like six or eight or
ten maybe top restaurants in New York back then. That
was it. I mean, there were restaurants, but they weren't
(06:16):
great finding and it was all French and Italian, mostly French.
Like we were just discovering French cuisine and we were
copying and imitating and all that, but we were like
getting into it. And it really went rapid once it
got in this country, because you know, it was like
all this information about food and then Gourmet magazine and
then Julia Child and all this is like it was
really coming up, and there was starting to be celebrities
(06:38):
around like Emerald Legassi and Jonathan Waxman and you know,
Alice Waters, and it was American food was growing. But
we were babies. This is was the pinnacle of the
best French restaurant in the country. And I was working
here for free. But I looked left and I looked right,
and the roster of who was there all turned out
to be one and two in three star michil and
(07:00):
chefs later on in their career and very successful American chef.
So the mentorship is everything. I never would have been
able to do what I'm doing today or been able
to talk to you about what I'm doing today. If
I didn't have that mentorship, I would be doing well,
I'm sure because I was. I'm scrappy and I'm a
hard worker. But in the level of entry I've been
given to the cultural luxuries of life. It's incredible and
(07:24):
it wouldn't have happened unless I had that Alan Psyak
sort of like holding my hand. It's showing me how
to do it in his own way, which wasn't gentle.
By the way. It wasn't always was gentle sometimes, but
it was not always gentle because gentle didn't work the
Jeffrey if you could go back to those late seventies
early eighties days, not as a young scrappy guy offering
(07:48):
his labor for free, but as a diner, as a guest,
as someone you know, excited to go eat at list cerc.
What would you order off of that menu? Wow, it's
same thing I ordered today. It's no different. It's kind
of crazy. No one's asking me that question. It's kind
of wild. I think it's a it's it's the Dover
soul that's done table side. If I see it on
(08:10):
the menu, I ordered. I just closed the menu. And
if it's really expensive, I expected to be really good,
because Dover Soul needs to be expensive because it's a
flight from the Straits of Dover. When a fish goes
on a plane, it's expensive. And I remember to this
day how we made it over there, because I was
one of the people that prepared some of the musing.
Plus he was probably the largest seller of white truffles
(08:31):
in the country Cereal. I mean he would get kilos
and kilos and kilos of white truffles. I remember receiving them.
And white truffles are this fungus. They're all wrapped in paper,
coming a big box, and there's like three guys bringing
them in. Each one is to three back then now
there's seven eight And he would buy kilos of them.
(08:54):
I mean literally, the bill was ten fifteen thousand dollars.
This is in the early eighties. That's wholesale. So I
would have some white truffles in any form that we offered.
I would have the Dover soul and I would have
a kramber Lay. They had a great wine cellar, so
I probably have a nice bottle of Burgundy, which is
not really a fish wine, but I love burgundy, or
a white burgundy, and that would be my lunch at
(09:16):
Las Yerk. And when I think of food, actually I
think of like those kinds of dishes because they're so
hard to do because they're so simple. Right, It's like,
you can't be a bathing suit model unless you look
really good without any clothes on, and then any bathing
suit you put on works, right, So if you're if
you're a Kmart model or a Walmart model, which there are,
(09:41):
it doesn't matter if it's a six dollar bathing suit
because it looks great because you look great. Right. It's
the same for food, so people don't understand that. It's
like not about complicated sauces. Yeah, we made all that stuff,
and we had a whole list of menus of very
complicated stuff. But that stuff you could hide, so the
veals a little over overdone. You just pull a bit
more saw us and no one knows it's still delicious.
(10:01):
You can't hide behind cooking and fish properly. You can't
hide behind the perfect custard because it has to be
right at the sweet spot of about twenty degrees internal
and it has to rest. And then if you overcook it,
it's garbage. You have to understand white truffles, how to
shave it, how thin to shave it. How what do
you do with the scraps, because the scraps are like
gold dust. How to make butter out of truffles, how
(10:22):
to store them with eggs, then make truffled eggs, make
the pasta with the eggs yolks that you make, store
the truffles because they in permeate through the so all
that stuff for bowl of pasta. It's literally butter pasta
and shaped white truffles. But it's not right the dover soul.
It's perfect as to be perfectly clean, perfectly cooked. It
(10:45):
has to be held at just the right temperature, has
to be seared properly with just the right flour. And
then the sauce is a brown by the little capers
and lemon, not too much, not too little, and it
has to be just a little bit on the on
the top, and then put the rest on the side,
because you want that customer experience that crust and how
you fell with a spoon not with a knife at table.
I can tell by watching it whether it's cooked properly
or not, because it has to be ever so little resistance,
(11:07):
and all that is years and years and years of perfecting.
It's like all these levels of intricacies that look easy
and seam easy. And you say, I want to I
want a piece of fish. I want to grill a
piece of ficiently. Well, that's it, that's what you want.
You're a chef. Why would you eat something. It's just
the opposite of that. It's the domain of It's like
pure acting and a great script. You don't need much action.
(11:29):
When you see a movie that's really sensational, it's all
about the acting. Then it's about the script, but it's
about that presentational acting that you believe that character because
it's they're so in the character you don't see the
actor anymore. So it's kind of the same thing. But
I don't know what the question was, Christopher, What was
the original question? You say you were just talking about,
(11:50):
you know, soul, That's what I would order delicious. Yeah.
(12:22):
As you moved on in your career, you you became
the executive chef at the twenty one club, you worked
at Maxwell's Plumb. These are all places in the eighties,
anyone in New York would know. But I think it
was around right, you have a major career accomplishment leading
the forty four at the Royalton's right, yeah, and I
think that you know, you gloss still or something very important,
(12:45):
not probably not purposely, but you know, I came from
this incredible love of theater, and I ended up working
in my first real restaurant, being at Les circ was
like the equivalent of like Hamlet, you know, so I'm
like working in this and everything that I loved about
what I discovered in France, that front, the back, the waiter,
(13:05):
the owners, all that conviviality, that the sexiness of its
It's Hollywood. It was all Cirk in his tiny room
was it was all these senses like bombarding you. So
then there was the food, so it was almost the
same thing. I was lucky enough to recreate this and
I landed there. It was so serendipity, right, I just
(13:26):
I sometimes think about, I'm like, how the hell did
I end up there? Of all places? But yes, I
was very fortunate to work in a lot of wonderful places.
At the twenty one Club, which if no one's been there,
it's really it's too bad it's closed. I hope they
reopened it. But it was one of the most iconic
places in the United States. And the wine cellar and
there's a secret wine celler that's incredible. And Maxwell Plums
(13:47):
where I um, you know, the stomping ground of Drew
near parront So a lot of memories there. And the
gentleen named Jeffrey Chatero called me out of the blue
and said where moment again a new restaurant with Ian
Schreeger called forty four at the Royalton, and I'd like
to you to be the executive chef. And I was
(14:07):
like shocked because I you know, I knew Ian Schreeger
infamous from opening Studio fifty four. Steve rebelled and he
went to jail, tax evasion and all that stuff, and
then he came out and he was given a blank
check by a good friend of his to open restaurants.
And everyone told me, you're crazy, mis Ian Schreegar. He's
like a club guy. He's not gonna open find food
(14:28):
and blah blah blah. I said, no, no no, it's something
differently here. I really felt something interesting, And you know,
Philip Stark designed something that was blue and white carpet
with ghosts. I mean, it was literally the most stunning
but out there, freaky looking place you've ever seen. And
I I did food that I felt was what I
wanted to eat, like yummy food, the same memory I
(14:49):
just created. I just okay, what's my memories? What do
I feel I want to have? And I did it,
and uh, those same dishes I use all the time,
and so there's no difference in the factor of what
do the flavors I want to have come out? There's
different ways of getting to those flavors and different techniques now,
but some of those techniques are those dishes are exactly
the same, maybe a few less ingredients. And then I
(15:12):
had the privilege of working for Ian for almost ten years,
and you know, he was a true visionary and he
probably single handedly was one of the two or three
people that created boutique hotels, and that's what that was.
And so I was fortunate enough to get the nod
to go there. I was very scary because he didn't
want to sign. So there's no sign. The restaurant was
in the back of the lobby. Said to walk a
(15:32):
hundred Everything that I knew was wrong. There's nothing what
I thought was right, but it was so striking an illusionary.
It ended up being a smash success, Like a smash success.
And you know, Ian hired all these models, male models,
only to work the front door and all the positions. Unfortunately,
(15:55):
everybody looked good and they were now Monty outfits, but
no one was really very good server or very good
at what they were doing. So the place was mobbed
all the time, but the service wasn't what it should be,
you know, and I used to It was frustrating for
me because I got great reviews in the food and
and lousy reviews on service, and everyone was so nice.
(16:15):
I mean, you can't yell at someone who's in a
money suit and a big smile. He's doing his best,
but he just doesn't, you know, It's just not what
he was trained to do. He wants to be an actor,
or most of wanted to be actors. And I remember
sitting down with them one day. I said, guys, I
know you want to be actors like I would love
being acted too, But you're in a restaurant here, so
(16:36):
for the time being, the eight hours you're here, let's
try acting like waiters and So that was my mantra,
You just act like a waiter, you don't have to
really be that good, And it worked some, but I
actually spent nine years there to like complete surprise, with
two different owners. It was a very very very formative
(16:58):
food wise, business wise, but most importantly social media wise,
because that place was the bee hive of SI New
House in New House publication. Well, tell me, tell me
what it's like to look out at a sea of diners,
these these full tables, and to say that's a really
well known person. That person can change my career, that
(17:21):
person can really push me in the right direction. Is
that what you're thinking? Or are you? Are you the
kind of chef who's back in the kitchen and just
just putting out the best food you can. Yeah, I
had note, I got the glamour, and I guy knew
who they were. You know, it was not one table
every table, As a matter of fact, we had it.
We had three sections of tables, section one, two, and three.
(17:43):
And the further away you got from section three three
was the okay seats two of the very good seats.
One was it. And I saw people go from section
three in a year or two they're in section two,
and another year or two they're in section one. And
then there was a hierarchy. In section one. There was
this booth, the second booth, the third booth, the fourth booth.
So I watched people go from the fourth booth to
(18:04):
the first booth. So it's just this train of progression
in this hierarchical magistrate of Conde Nast and all the
publishing houses in New York City, the biggest ones. And
I was fantastic to watch that dance. So you answer
as no, I just cooked the best food, had great staff,
The food was great. I love what I was doing.
And there was a little gym upstairs, so I go
(18:26):
up at three o'clock workout, and who was working out
next to me mostly all the time was Madonna because
that's what she had a trainer. It was a bizarre time.
But those people in those seats never reviewed me. Those
weren't the reviewers. Those were the Italian Vogue, French Vogue,
g Q, Town and Country. I mean every publisher, everything
(18:47):
that new house owned, which back then was everything, and
it stayed that way for almost ten years. It was
a big, big deal. And so you know, Grating Carter,
who was the you know when a Vanity Fair. Now
he's at airmil He started as an editor at Lichfield
Times in Connecticut, and he came to New York and
get promoted, and he went to various magazines and then
(19:07):
finally he was made Vanity Fair ahead of Vanity Fair,
and he went up those the seeding arrangement and we
did a party for him a lot in his house.
He hired us all the time when school, they would
bring a bartender a bar back. It was delightful to
us and we had a great time. And one time,
we know, he brought this bar back. He was just
probably nineteen twenty. He's a very sort of he looked
(19:28):
like a young Hugh Grant, Okay, flipped hair, thin, very
you know, very together, one of those kids that you
could tell you want to be an actor too. Well.
He brought him his drinks and Graydon liked this guy
and he mentioned it. He ended up like him so
much he made him one of his assistants. He then
rose in the ranks of Vanity Fair to be one
(19:49):
of the executive editors right under Graydon Carter, and he
was in line for his job when he left. And
this was a guy, he was a bar back. So
you just you see that and you're like, and when
we tell him we joke with him, it's like we
like used to ordering him around and now he's this
big shot. So whenever we saw him, it was like
a you know, as an inside choke. But this is
a type of environment during that those years and the
(20:10):
eighties and nineties. It was shocking all this promotion and
all the things that were happening, and things were just
like going nuts back then, and really New York was
kind of at its best and had some rough years,
but it really was an amazing place to be. So
that's the networking was way before the internet, way before
social media. None of that was all done at a
(20:31):
restaurant with a martini and it was meeting. It was
a meeting, and I mean it was that you know,
the three martini lunch was very much alive, but you know,
you didn't have that texting and all came about so
much later. And that's something Jeffrey that I think you've
carried through your career, that idea of a restaurant as
a social not even a destination, but an institution. Right,
(20:53):
it's a if you look at restaurants you opened later
in the two thousands, places like Town or Country, the
Tutor House, the Lambs Club. Right, these are all really
great spaces that you would want to hang out in,
you would want to spend time in, even if there
wasn't any amazing food, even if the kitchens were only subpart.
(21:14):
But they weren't, right, They were really really solid places
serving green food. No, no, we did. We were very fortunate.
Like you know, I believe there's a streak there, and
I don't really believe in awarding stars to restaurants. I
believe in writing a review. But we've got three stars.
I think three or four restaurants in a row, which
is real is unheard of. The only person I really
surpassed that was Alfred Portali, so it was something to
(21:37):
strive for. But you're right, I would never open a
restaurant unless I love the environment. It was cool and
had to feel convivial, and I thought it was sixty
forty environment to food. Now I think it's seventy. And
that doesn't mean that thirty isn't Still. Part of what
it means is you can have the greatest chef in
the world with the greatest financer who can spend the
(22:00):
most money, the best china, the best silver ware, all that.
But here's the thing. Anybody can get that. Anybody can
go to Brooklyn, open a little restaurant and buy the
best china, the best It doesn't mean anything. It's meaning less.
What is meaningful is when that person walks in and like, Wow,
this is what you know. It's that psychgeist. What is it? Well,
(22:20):
what it is? It's very hard to do and recreate
what it is isn't just one plus one is two.
It's like, it's the music, it's the feeling, it's the wow,
it's the flow, it's the lighting, it's all that stuff
I mentioned to you that you love. And if you
sit and you get great treatment and you're sitting down
and the food is a B minus, that restaurants in
a minus. Thanks very much for listening to Four Courses
(22:45):
with Jefferys Carian, a production of I Heart Radio and
Corner Table Entertainment. Four Courses is created by Jeffrey z Carrion,
Margaret Zecarrion, Jared Keller, and Tara Helper. Our executive producer
is Christopher Hasiotis. Four Courses is produced by Jonathan Habes Dressler.
Our research is conducted by Jesselyn Shields. Our talent booking
(23:07):
is by Pamela Bauer at Dogtown Talent. This episode was
edited and written by Priya Mahadevan. Special thanks to Katie
Fellman for help as recording engineer. For more podcasts from
My Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
My name is Jeffrey Zcarrien and you're listening to Four
Courses with Jeffrey Z. Carrion from my Heart Radio. Today
we are continuing are Turning the Table series where our
executive producer, Christopher Hesiotis takes over as our host and
puts me in the hot seat to answer questions about
how I got to where I am today. This is
part two of our three part series. If you haven't
(00:26):
listened to our first Turning the Table episode and you
want to know more about how I first caught the
culinary bug, go back and listen to part one. Now.
In today's episode, we pick up my story right as
I was formally stepping into the culinary world at LASERK,
which was just an incredible experience in and of itself.
But before I could even begin to imagine moving up
in this world, I needed mentors. Christopher knew that mentorship
(00:50):
is something I frequently asked guests about here on Four Courses,
and he had a hunch that he needed to ask
me too. We hope you enjoy. But Jeffrey, as you
got your career started, you know you are an apprentice
chef Atlas Circuit. You had you had a mentor in
Alan Selach, the renowned chef. You speak a lot about
(01:11):
mentorship when you talk to successful people on your podcast.
I have a suspicion that this obsession of yours kind
of dates back to these early days in your career.
Can you tell me what it is about that relationship
working with chefs that that really solidified that mentor mente
relationship for you and how important it is. I really
(01:33):
think that I'm gonna speak as a young man to
all the young men and women now whore into the field.
Mentorship is everything, even if it's not perfect mentorship, you know,
you need to find someone. That's what I always say
to people when they asked me, how do I know?
How do I get involved? How what do I do?
What do I do? I'm like, I don't have a blueprint,
(01:54):
but what I can tell you is what you probably
don't want to hear. And I said, you have to
stop the thinking about money, stop thinking about how many
hours you're working, and start thinking about, like what do
you want your life to look like in five years?
And then start thinking backwards. Right, It's like, okay, let's
start from like, let's have to have this picture. Now,
how do I start. What's the start point? I said,
(02:16):
I can give you the start point, but that's it.
I can't instruct you on manners. I can't tell you
how to respect people. I can give you the start
point and tell you that if you do this for
at least a year, you'll have the secret and you
don't have to learn it from me. You're gonna know
exactly what to do because it will be right in
front of you. They're like, Okay, well I'm here, I'm
(02:38):
a year later, I've done what I want to do.
Now I know what I want to do here. I'm
gonna go left for this much time. I'm gonna go
right for this much time, and it's all gonna be answered.
And I tell him very simply, to find someone, find
the best person possible, and then write it all down
on a list. Take those top five people you think
are the best in the field, and then go put
a bee next to them. By that, I mean those
(03:00):
are bees. Go find a's because your natural inclination is
to find people you actually think would be easy to ask.
They'll say, yes, I said, those are the bees. You
don't want the bees ever, Okay, those are for other people,
not you. Do you want to be really great? Go
for the a's people that you wouldn't dream of asking
that you would say no, I could know, it's not
a chance. Those are the people you want to ask
(03:23):
and ask to work for them. Say what do you have.
I'll do anything anything. I'll work in the front of
the house, at the back, I'll do I'll do anything,
bus tables, I don't know. I'll work as a late
night prep, I'll do overnight. I'll do whatever you want
if you can stick with it. The rest of it
will be handed to you by yourself, and the rest
is just going to be your story, not my story.
(03:44):
And I said, that's exactly what I did. And I
didn't have anyone telling me to do that. I just
happened upon it. And I happened upon a guy named
Alan Psiak who was Ella Syric And it was probably
a couple of days after I graduated. I got a
job at another restaurant. I didn't like it, and I
asked someone at the restaurant who was another CI grad.
He said, we'll go. You know, you should see. I
think they're hiring it list Cirque. And I went to
(04:06):
the Cirque and he told me, he said in a
very bad English. To this day, he's one of my
dearest friends. He's still alive. Thing he's eighties seven. And
he said, I don't have a job now. I have nothing,
no job. There's no job here. I have nothing. And
I gave him, you know, the resume graduated. I said, well,
I was just working next door over there. Said why
are you leaving here? I said, I said the food
isn't good. Just like that, I swear I saw a
(04:27):
glimmer in his eye that was check one. So I
felt a little confidence coming on board. He goes, and
you know, you know it's you know, they're doing a
good job there. I said, I know. I said, but
I think there's better. And I didn't say it is
better here. I said, I think there's better, and I
knew it better. Was is I just ate around the world? Right?
It was something else, and so I knew that the
(04:48):
food wasn't good. I just didn't have the hierarchical standing
to say it. Very brazen and kind of stupid, but
it worked. And he said I don't have anything. I said, Jeff,
I'll take anything. I've saved up some money. I'll work
for free until something opens and he goes, Okay, come tomorrow,
just like that. Matter of fact, he's a smart businessman, right.
(05:10):
I learned a very dear economic lesson from him. So
I started working the next day and I was at
the bottom of the Totem pole. But I was Atlas
circ And I want to tell you, I did some
research before, and I knew Sarah MACCIONI, I knew what
they had. They had three Star New York Time, they
had Alan Psiach, they had everyone who was everyone was
eating in that restaurant. I mean, every president, every star Hollywood. No,
(05:33):
you just canna go back and look, it's been open
since the early seventies. And uh, I was around two
that I landed there after I graduated from CIA. Yeah,
and Jeffrey, for those that don't know, this is a
big name. Can you paint a picture of what it's
like for a guest to just walk into that place
and what their experience is like. Yeah, so it's like,
you know, it's like going on working for like Robert
(05:55):
de Niro or Danielle Craig or it's a big deal.
And it was the biggest deal there was, and you know,
it was the place to go and back in the
early eighties and the seventies. This twenty seven thousand restaurants
in New York. They were like six or eight or
ten maybe top restaurants in New York back then. That
was it. I mean, there were restaurants, but they weren't
(06:16):
great finding and it was all French and Italian, mostly French.
Like we were just discovering French cuisine and we were
copying and imitating and all that, but we were like
getting into it. And it really went rapid once it
got in this country, because you know, it was like
all this information about food and then Gourmet magazine and
then Julia Child and all this is like it was
really coming up, and there was starting to be celebrities
(06:38):
around like Emerald Legassi and Jonathan Waxman and you know,
Alice Waters, and it was American food was growing. But
we were babies. This is was the pinnacle of the
best French restaurant in the country. And I was working
here for free. But I looked left and I looked right,
and the roster of who was there all turned out
to be one and two in three star michil and
(07:00):
chefs later on in their career and very successful American chef.
So the mentorship is everything. I never would have been
able to do what I'm doing today or been able
to talk to you about what I'm doing today. If
I didn't have that mentorship, I would be doing well,
I'm sure because I was. I'm scrappy and I'm a
hard worker. But in the level of entry I've been
given to the cultural luxuries of life. It's incredible and
(07:24):
it wouldn't have happened unless I had that Alan Psyak
sort of like holding my hand. It's showing me how
to do it in his own way, which wasn't gentle.
By the way. It wasn't always was gentle sometimes, but
it was not always gentle because gentle didn't work the
Jeffrey if you could go back to those late seventies
early eighties days, not as a young scrappy guy offering
(07:48):
his labor for free, but as a diner, as a guest,
as someone you know, excited to go eat at list cerc.
What would you order off of that menu? Wow, it's
same thing I ordered today. It's no different. It's kind
of crazy. No one's asking me that question. It's kind
of wild. I think it's a it's it's the Dover
soul that's done table side. If I see it on
(08:10):
the menu, I ordered. I just closed the menu. And
if it's really expensive, I expected to be really good,
because Dover Soul needs to be expensive because it's a
flight from the Straits of Dover. When a fish goes
on a plane, it's expensive. And I remember to this
day how we made it over there, because I was
one of the people that prepared some of the musing.
Plus he was probably the largest seller of white truffles
(08:31):
in the country Cereal. I mean he would get kilos
and kilos and kilos of white truffles. I remember receiving them.
And white truffles are this fungus. They're all wrapped in paper,
coming a big box, and there's like three guys bringing
them in. Each one is to three back then now
there's seven eight And he would buy kilos of them.
(08:54):
I mean literally, the bill was ten fifteen thousand dollars.
This is in the early eighties. That's wholesale. So I
would have some white truffles in any form that we offered.
I would have the Dover soul and I would have
a kramber Lay. They had a great wine cellar, so
I probably have a nice bottle of Burgundy, which is
not really a fish wine, but I love burgundy, or
a white burgundy, and that would be my lunch at
(09:16):
Las Yerk. And when I think of food, actually I
think of like those kinds of dishes because they're so
hard to do because they're so simple. Right, It's like,
you can't be a bathing suit model unless you look
really good without any clothes on, and then any bathing
suit you put on works, right, So if you're if
you're a Kmart model or a Walmart model, which there are,
(09:41):
it doesn't matter if it's a six dollar bathing suit
because it looks great because you look great. Right. It's
the same for food, so people don't understand that. It's
like not about complicated sauces. Yeah, we made all that stuff,
and we had a whole list of menus of very
complicated stuff. But that stuff you could hide, so the
veals a little over overdone. You just pull a bit
more saw us and no one knows it's still delicious.
(10:01):
You can't hide behind cooking and fish properly. You can't
hide behind the perfect custard because it has to be
right at the sweet spot of about twenty degrees internal
and it has to rest. And then if you overcook it,
it's garbage. You have to understand white truffles, how to
shave it, how thin to shave it. How what do
you do with the scraps, because the scraps are like
gold dust. How to make butter out of truffles, how
(10:22):
to store them with eggs, then make truffled eggs, make
the pasta with the eggs yolks that you make, store
the truffles because they in permeate through the so all
that stuff for bowl of pasta. It's literally butter pasta
and shaped white truffles. But it's not right the dover soul.
It's perfect as to be perfectly clean, perfectly cooked. It
(10:45):
has to be held at just the right temperature, has
to be seared properly with just the right flour. And
then the sauce is a brown by the little capers
and lemon, not too much, not too little, and it
has to be just a little bit on the on
the top, and then put the rest on the side,
because you want that customer experience that crust and how
you fell with a spoon not with a knife at table.
I can tell by watching it whether it's cooked properly
or not, because it has to be ever so little resistance,
(11:07):
and all that is years and years and years of perfecting.
It's like all these levels of intricacies that look easy
and seam easy. And you say, I want to I
want a piece of fish. I want to grill a
piece of ficiently. Well, that's it, that's what you want.
You're a chef. Why would you eat something. It's just
the opposite of that. It's the domain of It's like
pure acting and a great script. You don't need much action.
(11:29):
When you see a movie that's really sensational, it's all
about the acting. Then it's about the script, but it's
about that presentational acting that you believe that character because
it's they're so in the character you don't see the
actor anymore. So it's kind of the same thing. But
I don't know what the question was, Christopher, What was
the original question? You say you were just talking about,
(11:50):
you know, soul, That's what I would order delicious. Yeah.
(12:22):
As you moved on in your career, you you became
the executive chef at the twenty one club, you worked
at Maxwell's Plumb. These are all places in the eighties,
anyone in New York would know. But I think it
was around right, you have a major career accomplishment leading
the forty four at the Royalton's right, yeah, and I
think that you know, you gloss still or something very important,
(12:45):
not probably not purposely, but you know, I came from
this incredible love of theater, and I ended up working
in my first real restaurant, being at Les circ was
like the equivalent of like Hamlet, you know, so I'm
like working in this and everything that I loved about
what I discovered in France, that front, the back, the waiter,
(13:05):
the owners, all that conviviality, that the sexiness of its
It's Hollywood. It was all Cirk in his tiny room
was it was all these senses like bombarding you. So
then there was the food, so it was almost the
same thing. I was lucky enough to recreate this and
I landed there. It was so serendipity, right, I just
(13:26):
I sometimes think about, I'm like, how the hell did
I end up there? Of all places? But yes, I
was very fortunate to work in a lot of wonderful places.
At the twenty one Club, which if no one's been there,
it's really it's too bad it's closed. I hope they
reopened it. But it was one of the most iconic
places in the United States. And the wine cellar and
there's a secret wine celler that's incredible. And Maxwell Plums
(13:47):
where I um, you know, the stomping ground of Drew
near parront So a lot of memories there. And the
gentleen named Jeffrey Chatero called me out of the blue
and said where moment again a new restaurant with Ian
Schreeger called forty four at the Royalton, and I'd like
to you to be the executive chef. And I was
(14:07):
like shocked because I you know, I knew Ian Schreeger
infamous from opening Studio fifty four. Steve rebelled and he
went to jail, tax evasion and all that stuff, and
then he came out and he was given a blank
check by a good friend of his to open restaurants.
And everyone told me, you're crazy, mis Ian Schreegar. He's
like a club guy. He's not gonna open find food
(14:28):
and blah blah blah. I said, no, no no, it's something
differently here. I really felt something interesting, And you know,
Philip Stark designed something that was blue and white carpet
with ghosts. I mean, it was literally the most stunning
but out there, freaky looking place you've ever seen. And
I I did food that I felt was what I
wanted to eat, like yummy food, the same memory I
(14:49):
just created. I just okay, what's my memories? What do
I feel I want to have? And I did it,
and uh, those same dishes I use all the time,
and so there's no difference in the factor of what
do the flavors I want to have come out? There's
different ways of getting to those flavors and different techniques now,
but some of those techniques are those dishes are exactly
the same, maybe a few less ingredients. And then I
(15:12):
had the privilege of working for Ian for almost ten years,
and you know, he was a true visionary and he
probably single handedly was one of the two or three
people that created boutique hotels, and that's what that was.
And so I was fortunate enough to get the nod
to go there. I was very scary because he didn't
want to sign. So there's no sign. The restaurant was
in the back of the lobby. Said to walk a
(15:32):
hundred Everything that I knew was wrong. There's nothing what
I thought was right, but it was so striking an illusionary.
It ended up being a smash success, Like a smash success.
And you know, Ian hired all these models, male models,
only to work the front door and all the positions. Unfortunately,
(15:55):
everybody looked good and they were now Monty outfits, but
no one was really very good server or very good
at what they were doing. So the place was mobbed
all the time, but the service wasn't what it should be,
you know, and I used to It was frustrating for
me because I got great reviews in the food and
and lousy reviews on service, and everyone was so nice.
(16:15):
I mean, you can't yell at someone who's in a
money suit and a big smile. He's doing his best,
but he just doesn't, you know, It's just not what
he was trained to do. He wants to be an actor,
or most of wanted to be actors. And I remember
sitting down with them one day. I said, guys, I
know you want to be actors like I would love
being acted too, But you're in a restaurant here, so
(16:36):
for the time being, the eight hours you're here, let's
try acting like waiters and So that was my mantra,
You just act like a waiter, you don't have to
really be that good, And it worked some, but I
actually spent nine years there to like complete surprise, with
two different owners. It was a very very very formative
(16:58):
food wise, business wise, but most importantly social media wise,
because that place was the bee hive of SI New
House in New House publication. Well, tell me, tell me
what it's like to look out at a sea of diners,
these these full tables, and to say that's a really
well known person. That person can change my career, that
(17:21):
person can really push me in the right direction. Is
that what you're thinking? Or are you? Are you the
kind of chef who's back in the kitchen and just
just putting out the best food you can. Yeah, I
had note, I got the glamour, and I guy knew
who they were. You know, it was not one table
every table, As a matter of fact, we had it.
We had three sections of tables, section one, two, and three.
(17:43):
And the further away you got from section three three
was the okay seats two of the very good seats.
One was it. And I saw people go from section
three in a year or two they're in section two,
and another year or two they're in section one. And
then there was a hierarchy. In section one. There was
this booth, the second booth, the third booth, the fourth booth.
So I watched people go from the fourth booth to
(18:04):
the first booth. So it's just this train of progression
in this hierarchical magistrate of Conde Nast and all the
publishing houses in New York City, the biggest ones. And
I was fantastic to watch that dance. So you answer
as no, I just cooked the best food, had great staff,
The food was great. I love what I was doing.
And there was a little gym upstairs, so I go
(18:26):
up at three o'clock workout, and who was working out
next to me mostly all the time was Madonna because
that's what she had a trainer. It was a bizarre time.
But those people in those seats never reviewed me. Those
weren't the reviewers. Those were the Italian Vogue, French Vogue,
g Q, Town and Country. I mean every publisher, everything
(18:47):
that new house owned, which back then was everything, and
it stayed that way for almost ten years. It was
a big, big deal. And so you know, Grating Carter,
who was the you know when a Vanity Fair. Now
he's at airmil He started as an editor at Lichfield
Times in Connecticut, and he came to New York and
get promoted, and he went to various magazines and then
(19:07):
finally he was made Vanity Fair ahead of Vanity Fair,
and he went up those the seeding arrangement and we
did a party for him a lot in his house.
He hired us all the time when school, they would
bring a bartender a bar back. It was delightful to
us and we had a great time. And one time,
we know, he brought this bar back. He was just
probably nineteen twenty. He's a very sort of he looked
(19:28):
like a young Hugh Grant, Okay, flipped hair, thin, very
you know, very together, one of those kids that you
could tell you want to be an actor too. Well.
He brought him his drinks and Graydon liked this guy
and he mentioned it. He ended up like him so
much he made him one of his assistants. He then
rose in the ranks of Vanity Fair to be one
(19:49):
of the executive editors right under Graydon Carter, and he
was in line for his job when he left. And
this was a guy, he was a bar back. So
you just you see that and you're like, and when
we tell him we joke with him, it's like we
like used to ordering him around and now he's this
big shot. So whenever we saw him, it was like
a you know, as an inside choke. But this is
a type of environment during that those years and the
(20:10):
eighties and nineties. It was shocking all this promotion and
all the things that were happening, and things were just
like going nuts back then, and really New York was
kind of at its best and had some rough years,
but it really was an amazing place to be. So
that's the networking was way before the internet, way before
social media. None of that was all done at a
(20:31):
restaurant with a martini and it was meeting. It was
a meeting, and I mean it was that you know,
the three martini lunch was very much alive, but you know,
you didn't have that texting and all came about so
much later. And that's something Jeffrey that I think you've
carried through your career, that idea of a restaurant as
a social not even a destination, but an institution. Right,
(20:53):
it's a if you look at restaurants you opened later
in the two thousands, places like Town or Country, the
Tutor House, the Lambs Club. Right, these are all really
great spaces that you would want to hang out in,
you would want to spend time in, even if there
wasn't any amazing food, even if the kitchens were only subpart.
(21:14):
But they weren't, right, They were really really solid places
serving green food. No, no, we did. We were very fortunate.
Like you know, I believe there's a streak there, and
I don't really believe in awarding stars to restaurants. I
believe in writing a review. But we've got three stars.
I think three or four restaurants in a row, which
is real is unheard of. The only person I really
surpassed that was Alfred Portali, so it was something to
(21:37):
strive for. But you're right, I would never open a
restaurant unless I love the environment. It was cool and
had to feel convivial, and I thought it was sixty
forty environment to food. Now I think it's seventy. And
that doesn't mean that thirty isn't Still. Part of what
it means is you can have the greatest chef in
the world with the greatest financer who can spend the
(22:00):
most money, the best china, the best silver ware, all that.
But here's the thing. Anybody can get that. Anybody can
go to Brooklyn, open a little restaurant and buy the
best china, the best It doesn't mean anything. It's meaning less.
What is meaningful is when that person walks in and like, Wow,
this is what you know. It's that psychgeist. What is it? Well,
(22:20):
what it is? It's very hard to do and recreate
what it is isn't just one plus one is two.
It's like, it's the music, it's the feeling, it's the wow,
it's the flow, it's the lighting, it's all that stuff
I mentioned to you that you love. And if you
sit and you get great treatment and you're sitting down
and the food is a B minus, that restaurants in
a minus. Thanks very much for listening to Four Courses
(22:45):
with Jefferys Carian, a production of I Heart Radio and
Corner Table Entertainment. Four Courses is created by Jeffrey z Carrion,
Margaret Zecarrion, Jared Keller, and Tara Helper. Our executive producer
is Christopher Hasiotis. Four Courses is produced by Jonathan Habes Dressler.
Our research is conducted by Jesselyn Shields. Our talent booking
(23:07):
is by Pamela Bauer at Dogtown Talent. This episode was
edited and written by Priya Mahadevan. Special thanks to Katie
Fellman for help as recording engineer. For more podcasts from
My Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
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