February 19, 2024 • 38 mins
Restaurateur Danny Meyer opened Union Square Cafe and Gramercy Tavern in New York more than 30 years ago and proved values matter. One could not only treat staff with the respect they deserve, but make customers happy. Happier, as they say, when they leave than when they arrived. Danny then launched Shake Shack in 2001, a hotdog stand in Madison Park. The rest, as they say, is history. Today, when Ruthie has a question about fair policies for the people who work with her or how to think about expanding or contracting The River Cafe, or whether it would be possible to do exchanges with their best chefs, Danny is the person she calls.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.
When I started the River Cafe with Rose Gray in
nineteen eighty seven, I was told over and over how
cutthroat it would be. Danny Meyer convinced me otherwise. Opening
(00:20):
Union Square Cafe and Gramercy Tavern in New York more
than thirty years ago, he proved values matter. One could
not only treat staff with respect they deserve, but make
customers happy, happier, as we always say, when they leave
than when they arrived. What surprised us all was that
for his next act, Danny launched Shakeshack in two thousand
(00:43):
and one, a hot dog stand in Madison Park. The rest,
as they say, is history. Today, when I have a
question about fair policies for the people who work with us,
or how to think about expanding or contracting the River Cafe,
or whether it be possible to do exchanges with our
best chefs, I called Danny.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
My heart just melted right back at you.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
In so many ways. I turned to you as my
touchdown for taste.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
There we are, and we're on well eighteenth floor. The
most incredible view to be in New York is to
be high. People love Soho and they love Greenwich Village.
I want to get hot. I was going to say,
I want to get high when I come to New York.
But for me being high as the great luxury. We're
(01:32):
here surrounded, of course, no surprise by food. Amazing doughnuts,
would you calls?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Yes, from Daily Provisions.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
From Daily Provisions. And we have ice cream from Danny
Meyer's daughter, Hayley, and she makes great food, great ice cream,
and she cooked in the River Cafe. She came and
worked with us, so she's part of the family. Now,
(02:02):
do you want to tell us about the ice cream?
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah, let's actually you know what I want to do.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
I want to tell you about the crullers because this
ice cream is going to temper for al times, okay,
and we can we.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Can open them and help that process go.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
But the crullers are pretty much the signature item at
a restaurant called Daily Provisions, which we opened about six
years ago right next door to Unions to the brand
new Union Square Cafe. When we had to move it
after thirty years, we have this extra little space.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
We didn't know what to do.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
With it, and we said, let's give a gift to
the neighborhood. And what did the neighborhood need? We said,
a better cup of coffee, a really good bacon, egg
and cheese sandwich, a really good donut, and a good
roast chicken for dinner. And that's Daily Provisions. And the
cruller is the only donut we serve. And Ruthie, if
(02:54):
you don't think that's one of the top three donuts
you've ever had, I.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Just want I won't keep talking on this podcast, so.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
I want you to cut yourself some of that.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
So tell me about crolers, because tell me about donuts.
It's not my great knowledge.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Donuts.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Doughnuts are often cakey. This, as you will taste on
one bite, is not cakey at all. In fact, it's
quite aggy. And what I love about the cinnamon crawler,
we only make three different kinds. We make, a maple croller,
a cinnamon croller is it's crunchy on the outside and
(03:32):
it's almost your take a bite because it's better if
you try it than if I describe it.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Here we go, So croller, as I said, I'm not
the nash and the cultural heritage croll thing.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Come on, show me what you got.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Mlious first from anybody on this podcast has actually given
me something to eat. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
This is delicious good. It's almost like God is.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
A contrast between the outside and the inside.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yeah, it's very aching.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
This is divine not to tweet, you know, just more
that's a good thing. I don't live next to It Provisions.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
So that is a croller and that is a good one.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Culture.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
All crawlers are donuts, but not all doughnuts are crawl.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
These are until you tell me how you make them?
Do you know?
Speaker 2 (04:28):
I do? But that's the only thing we got calling
for us.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
So when you tell me how you make your state secret,
I got it.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Like everything at the River Cafe, anything away this is
they're just they're just so good. Have a sip of
your coffee with it, please.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Okay, this is not a right.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
So those are crawlers.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
And then Hallie after she learned how to make ice
cream at the River Cafe and also in Rome.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
I think she learned in Rome, and then she came
to she opened.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Right down the street from Daily Provisions, and she is
doing such a great job. That was exactly three years ago.
They just had their third birthday.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
It's kind of seasonal toot ice cream one the summer, and.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Yeah, she's got six that are always on and then
she changes one every single day. Now, there's there's a
few here that we're going to try, and we have
to because you gave her a lot. I want information.
I'm going to start off with adds dream o.
Speaker 1 (05:36):
There's still not is that what it's called.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
It's named that for her mom, Audrey, because this is
Audrey's favorite flavor combination, which is vanilla and peanut butter.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
So swelled through it, swirled through it.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
I think I better try somewhere we're at it. I'll
get in trouble. I'll get in trouble with two ladies
in my life.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
M m, this is delicious. ID you have to try this? Well?
That sounds what's good? You know it's really good? Is
vanilla ice cream? Part?
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Well?
Speaker 1 (06:13):
When she was growing up, was ice cream her favorite dessert.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
I think she has probably had ice cream every day
of her life for the last twenty five years.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
So as a child, she was five years old, yep.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
She worked in an ice cream store when she was
at Yale and New Haven and she just yep, way
before she opened a place. Every single one of her
Instagram posts was eating ice cream in someone else's.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Place, which is pretty cool.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Now that everybody travels, everybody has access to obviously the Internet,
so they can see pictures, read recipes here we're you know,
hear how people feel about the food, et cetera. I
think the curiosity of chefs to kind of cross pollinate
is fascinating. The key, though, is the gimmicky stuff has
(07:07):
in my entire career, it never lasts.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
It's kind of like music. There's eight notes in.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
The octave no matter what you try, plus you know
the sharps and flats, and yet there's a myriad.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Number of songs that can be written.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
And I think the same thing is true in our
industry is there's really nothing that new under the sun.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Now.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
What I love about Ruthie and the River Cafe, and
this is something that I really believe in deeply. It's
not so much about invention as it is cooking food
I know, but cooked better than I knew it could be.
There is an enormous amount of skill involved with that,
(07:47):
and I wish more chefs understood that in excellence lies creativity.
It's not just coming up with something.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
I always say, we don't do ideas, you know, No,
did you ever have an you know? But sometimes people
say I have an idea for something, you have to
listen to it. But generally it's a progress of what
we did. You know, we did a paran almond tarde.
It's strawberry season. We'll put strawberries, or we'll put you
know what Haley is doing with her ice creams. It's
a process. It's your work every day.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, that's what made me fall in love with barbecue.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
For example, when we did blue Smoke, it's what a
great pitmaster does.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
They don't reinvent it.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
They say, you see that angry piece of meat called brisket.
I'm going to figure out something to do with that
over the next twelve hours.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
It's going to blow your.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
Mind just because of meat selection, dry rub temperature, what
kind of wood did I smoke it with, how did
I hold it afterwards? All that stuff is really really hard,
and there's a huge difference between your favorite brisket and
your least favorite brisket. But it's not about can I
drizzle balsamic vinegar on it? And I would say that
(08:53):
from a food standpoint. The reason you are my favorite
chef in the world. I will tell that to everyone,
not just your many listeners here, is that you have
the confidence to make sure that what's on the plate
is essential to that plate, and if it's not essential,
it's not on that plate, and you find a way
(09:14):
to make it taste amazing.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
Do you know how when you edit something, and when
you wrote your book, or when we try to do something,
you go through and you take out a word. I
was saying to them today that friend of mine who
is a screenwright, told me, don't use the word that.
You can always take that out of a sentence and
it still works, which is interesting. And I said that,
you know, when we plate, we do the menu, because
you know, we write the menu for two meals and
(09:37):
then we write it. And I was trying to a
chef on the phone because I was late and we're
talking about her menu, and I said, go through it
and just take one thing off. Almost everything you've done,
just take one whether it's a parsi, whether it's a
sal severity, whether it's the you know, the panchatta, just
take one thing off. And I'm not talking about the
kind of cooking that when you know the cuisine massaur
(09:59):
or that, but it's just thinking, isn't it about?
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Does that really need to be there?
Speaker 3 (10:03):
Yeah, there's a writer's expression which actually applies to the kitchen,
applies to almost everything, which is learn how to murder
your darlings, which is a kind of have you heard
this well?
Speaker 1 (10:14):
I heard Mark Twain once said, if you see the adjective,
shoot it.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
But we all, whenever we write something or cook something,
we assume that that first clever idea we had is
essential to it. In general, generally it's not, but it's
generally the thing we're most in love with that needs
to be the thing that comes off.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Did you know The River Cafe has a shop. It's
full of our favorite foods and designs. We have cookbooks, linen, napkins,
kitchen ware, tote bags with our signatures, glasses from Venice,
chocolates from Turin. You can find us right next door
to the River Cafe in London or online at Shopthrivercafe
dot co dot uk. Of all the books we have,
(11:12):
and I see some of them on your desk, it
was interesting to me that you chose for a recipe
pure al Romana and a recipe from Rome, one of
my favorites, and one of that is in season very soon.
So would you like to read the recipe?
Speaker 2 (11:27):
I would love to tell.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
People how to make it and tell me why you
chose it.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
Well, first of all, I love Rome. That is my
I don't know, it's just my sole place. I always
associate puntarell with Rome. You don't really get it too
often here in New York. When I've had it at
the River Cafe, it's better than when I have it
in Rome, which is hard because we have an expression
(11:50):
hot dogs always taste better at the ballpark. You would
think puntarelli only tastes better in Rome, But at the
River Cafe, you just you know exactly what to do
with it. It's a type of chickory that is not
typically found in the United States. It's not the easiest
thing to handle, and you know exactly what to do
(12:10):
with it. It's about the temperature. It's about the balance
of the anchovy.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
So may I read the recipe?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
Please read the recipe, and if you feel free to
add or take away or comment on anything you like.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
Okay, So we're going to have two heads of puntarelli,
five salted anchovies, and I bet you have a point
of view. On where I should get those anchovies, two
tablespoons of red wine vinegar, one garlic clove, two dried chilies,
one teaspoon of black pepper, four tablespoons of extra virgin
(12:43):
olive oil, and one lemon. So To prepare the puntarelli,
fill a bowl with ice cold water, adding as many
ice cubes as you can fit in there. Pull the
hollow buds from the puntarelli heads. Using a small knife,
slice the buds very thin the lengthwise.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Place them in the water to crisp until they curl up.
This will take about an hour.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Rinse and fill at the anchovies, Cut them into one
half inch pieces and place in a small bowl. Cover
them with the vinegar and stir to let the anchovy dissolve.
Peel and chop the garlic very finely and add to
the anchovies with the crumbled chilies and pepper.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
Add the olive oil.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
Spin dry the punterairelli as for a salad. Place in
a bowl and serve over the anchovy sauce.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Serve with lemon. Yum yeam.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
It's interesting because it feels like a very easy recipe
to make, and it is, and it's one. But when
we're explaining it to the chefs making it for the
first time. The balance of anchovies, the balance of olive oil,
no salt, because the salt it's so salty. With the anchovies,
the christminast. I think for myself it is the ideal
(14:00):
way to start a meal.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
I love it so much, and it just works.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
It works. You know.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
When I was growing up, we used to go to
restaurants and you'd be met with the relish trade, which
was the celery carrots and lindsey pitted black olives on
a bed of crushed ice. But there was something about
that really cold, crispy Sorry, that made a taste.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
But and this is not really that different.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
No, right, maybe every culture has their crispy krispy vegetable.
Tell me about growing up, then let's talk about we're
talking about restaurants. But when you said the words when
I was a kid, So, what was it like growing
up in the Meyer.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
Household in Saint Louis, Missouri. Yeah, Well we didn't. You know,
we had a lot of cooking going on at home.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
My dad was in the travel business, and he was
the first American agent for an organization called Related Compagna,
which would later become relay in chateau, and so we
had French people living in our home, in your home,
in our home, who would work in his office by
and then at nighttime they were around the table and
(15:03):
French was spoken every night lots of times, so the
kids wouldn't understand what they were talking about, which encourage
us to learn French.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
There was always a.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
Bottle of baugeolis on the table, and so I, without
knowing it, I was getting a little bit of an education.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Who did the cooking.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
My dad cooked a lot, My mom did as well.
He and I cooked together. He taught me how to cook.
His favorite dish was ratatoui and we had a dog
by that name, ra Tatui when I was seven years old.
So I grew up, you know, with the smells and
sounds and fun of cooking, and so it was just
(15:40):
kind of part of my upbringing. I got to go
to France pretty early in my life, and then later Italy,
and then I was a tour guide working for my dad.
He started selling group tours. And when my sister, who's
older than I am, turned twenty, she got to pick
a city, so she picked Copenhagen. When I was twenty
I picked the wrong My brother picked Paris, and interestingly,
(16:04):
we all three had a kind of love affair with
the place we picked. I would go back to Rome
to study political science, and and that was supposed to
lead me into being a lawyer, but thank goodness, I
would have been the world's worst lawyer.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Thank goodness. I converted quickly, and I said, why not?
Why not? You know, so embrace My real passion was.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
So growing up you had you had a lot of
French food, and you were you what was it from
that region because France Association.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
No, it's not just that we had French food.
Speaker 3 (16:39):
I grew up appreciating French food, but I really, you know,
growing up in Saint Louis, we didn't have French restaurants
per se. We had great burgers. So I had smash burgers,
which would one day lead to shakeshack, and frozen custard,
which would len one day lead to shakeshack.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
We had.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
Here's what Saint Louis actually did have. Yeah, use have
an amazing immigrant population. It began with lots and lots
of Germans. And that's how you get restaurants that I
used to go to called Schneidhorse and Anheuser Busch, the
beer company was there, et cetera. Lots and lots of
sausage makers, lots of beer companies. So there was that
(17:18):
going forward. There was also something and it still remains,
called the Hill, the Italian Hills. So lots of Italians
came to Saint Louis and they had their South from
the South primarily, and they had their own style of
cooking that came to Saint Louis. To this day, they
all have almost the exact same menus. So their carbonara
has cream in it, which you would never do. Toasted
(17:41):
ravioli with Marina and I.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Wonder where that came toasted that is inchreat go figure.
I don't know, Ruthy, but did you like it as
a kid?
Speaker 2 (17:51):
Of course I did.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Yeah. I mean.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
People you know in London like marmite or whatever that
stuff is called.
Speaker 1 (17:59):
I wanted to do a photography project when I came
to London. I was doing art school of giving Americans
more mte and taking a photograph of the face up
to they ate.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
I promised toasted ravioli would only put a smile on
your face.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
It's really good.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Yeah, okay, so we're okay. On from toasted. So you
grew up in this culture of your mother's cooking, your
father's cooking.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
And getting to cook.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
But what I really liked more than anything was going
to restaurants.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
I just loved it.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
There was one restaurant that is still around called Chris's.
It's a German place, k r eis apostrophe Chris's, and
they gave me an idea that I used when I
opened Union Square Cafe at the age of twenty seven,
which was to have a nightly special that you could
depend on every night of the week. So you knew
(18:48):
if you went in there on Monday nights, yeah, that
was chicken and dumplings night. You knew if you went
in on Tuesday night was sour Brought to Night, which
I didn't really care about too much, but they had
a different special every night.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
We did that.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
When I opened Union Square Cafe because I love the
idea that you could create an habitual regular. But they
also did which I loved from the age of six on.
They remembered my favorite table.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
Yeah, I'm the guy.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
Well, there's probably every kid who liked to have the
table underneath the cuckoo clock, but it meant the world
to me that they remember that.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
I think that's what we talk about, you know, with restaurants,
is that we were talking about this morning, that you'll
go back to a restaurant if they didn't cook the
sea pass to perfection, but you won't go back if
there's a waiter that makes you feel bad about yourself.
Speaker 3 (19:36):
And then furthermore, taking it back to the positive side,
you'll always go back where you feel most loved. Yeah,
and remember, I remember the late James Beard was constantly
accosted in airports, restaurants everywhere because everyone recognized the bald
head with the bow tie. And obviously the question everybody
(19:57):
asked James Beard was what's your favorit restaurant?
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Especially in an airport? Where should I?
Speaker 3 (20:02):
And he said, my favorite restaurant is the same as yours. Yeah,
it's the one that loves me the most. That's hard
to argue with that.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
I would say. You know that you never know with
the table what they've gone through when they come in.
You know, they may have had they have gotten lost,
they might have been fired that day, they may be
celebrating something and most you know, most often or maybe
we should think about, is they may have saved up
to come to the River Cafe.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
That's a really good point.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
Really saved up to come. And so how are we
going to make them feel that everything was, you know,
here for them. And I think that's it's really something
I learned from you. I think we've all learned that
from you. Is how to be happy, making people happy,
you know, simple as that.
Speaker 3 (20:46):
Well, the last thing I want to say about Saint
Louis is that was the biggest lesson I learned because
Saint Louis was long on hospitality. It wasn't necessarily the food.
But then what I got to do, probably because of
the the privilege of growing up with a lot of
travel because my dad's company was a travel business, I
got the flavor of really good food in Italy and
(21:09):
in France. But I also was able to pair that
with the kind of hospitality that I always got in
Saint Louis. And when I moved to New York at
the age of twenty one, there wasn't a lot of
hospitality around here. It was basically, you're lucky to be
eating here, and if you don't feel that way, we've
got a really nice table by the bathroom for you.
(21:31):
There was a lot of that kind of mentality left
over from the studio fifty four.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Eras the red velvet rope.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
What year is well?
Speaker 2 (21:39):
I moved here?
Speaker 3 (21:41):
My first night here was the night John Lennon was
assassinated in December of nineteen eighty and I got my
first apartment in nineteen eighty one. It was not necessarily
a nice city back then, so it was kind of
a slam dunk when I opened Union Square a cafe
to say, well, whoever wrote the rule that good food's
(22:01):
gonna taste worse because you're nice to people?
Speaker 1 (22:03):
Yeah, if you like listening to Ruthie's Table for would
you please make sure to rate and review the podcast
on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, o, wherever you
get your podcasts. Thank you. Going back then to leaving
(22:32):
Saint Louis and what was food like after that? We
suddenly you're on your own and what am I going
to eat? Or can I afford a restaurant? What was
that world like when you left?
Speaker 3 (22:42):
I couldn't stop discovering things everywhere. So when I was
in college at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, Sunday night
could be the local burger king, because that's what I
had enough money to do. But I also would go
to their little Italy and find the best we call
them grinders. Every town has a different name for submarines
or poe boys. In Hartford they're called grinders. And I'd
(23:05):
go find the best pizza in the city. It was
all inexpensive stuff, go find the best espresso I could find.
Couldn't understand why the espresso there would be served with
a lemon peel and the cappuccino would be served with cinnamon,
which is not what I had seen. But again, because
of my dad's travel business, until I was twenty one,
(23:26):
I could fly anywhere that pan Am flew for forty
four dollars round trip forty four dollars. So every time
we had a three day weekend, I got myself down
to Kennedy Airport and I went.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
I would almost always go to run.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
I went to Venice once in the middle of winter,
which is the loneliest place on earth. I did go
to London and I really enjoyed it.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Okay, but you hadn't started. Yeah, this was still pre.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
This was still pre in Square Cafe.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
But I was educating myself and I would eat anywhere
by myself. You know, I'd go to Popeyes Fried Chicken
any anywhere where I could, or I'd go to diners
in Long Island. I would just get in my car
and go see what was was.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
Do you have friends who shared that passion or not.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
As much as I did.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
You know, I would drive people crazy because I couldn't
like New York is one of the greatest walking cities
in the world, and I couldn't pass a menu on
the outside of a building without studying it. And I
would do that in every town in Italy, every town
in France. When I went to London by myself for
those two weeks, I had this book.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
I think American.
Speaker 3 (24:37):
Express published the book, and it was their reviews of
you know, one hundred restaurants. And I didn't have much
of a budget, so I saved up for the ones
I could get into. There was one restaurant that I
went to and they wouldn't take me as a solo diner,
so I made a reservation for two and I walked
(25:00):
dan and I kept looking at my watch, Where's my friend,
Where's my friend? And I finally ordered a decent bottle
of wine for myself so they wouldn't kick me out,
you know, no solo diners going to order a single
bottle of wine. But you know, I was learning about
hospitality too, because they weren't very, very nice at that point.
(25:20):
But you know, I just I just love discovery. I
think discovery is one of the great things in life
when and by the way, as you get older, you
can still discover things you've never tried before.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
But when it comes to food, it's like.
Speaker 4 (25:38):
Can I ask you a question. When you were traveling
and exploring all these places, were you conscious of a
difference between a restauranteur and the chef or were you
seeing it then a chef's eze or.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
That's such a good question. I think I probably was.
There were many many restaurants at that time where you
didn't have.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
Any idea who the chef was.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
Know, you obviously had some trail blazers in London everywhere
when it came to chefs, and I was very, very
inspired and motivated by that. As a matter of fact,
when I first broke the news to my parents that
I was not going to become a lawyer as everyone
had expected, but so I was going to go into
this business, I said, I want to be a chef.
(26:20):
Because I had seen people like Alice Waters and Joyce
Goldstein and Jeremiah Tower and Wolfgang Puck and Paul Prudhom
you know, I can mark guy named Mark Miller and
the Miller Yeah, yeah, great memory. And all these people
had liberal arts educations. So I wasn't going to let
my parents down, but I was afraid to tell them.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
I wanted to be a restaurateur.
Speaker 3 (26:43):
And so it got to the point where my dad said, well,
then you're going to really need to you better get
some cooking in and he set up two stages for
me in Bordeaux at places that had been part of
laying chateau. And the first one I went to was
called La Reserve in Paysack Love Reserve.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
Where where was that reserve? Restaurants called Aurey Cat.
Speaker 3 (27:12):
Yeah, so this one was in the Bordeaux village called.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
Paysack pe s S A C. And the day I
got there.
Speaker 3 (27:22):
As a stagier, they had just lost their second star,
and so everyone in the restaurant was completely demoralized. As
a matter of fact, on day two, four of their
cooks left because God forbid, they did not want to
have a one star. Micheline restaurant on their on their resume.
So what that meant is I got a big promotion meeting.
(27:43):
I got to open the oysters and pull the feathers
from birds and chop the shallots and all that kind
of fun stuff. But I also got to cook family
meal for them, and that was that.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Was a big deal.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
Well, the very first day that I got to cook
family meal, I'll never forget. I made my grandmother's spare
ribs with her barbecue sauce Cote de port, Cote de port,
and they loved it. And then I made a pasta
for them, and I forget what the pasta was, but
(28:16):
I could not believe my eyes that all these mishline
level cooks, you know what, they dressed my pasta with ketchup.
They just started pouring ketchup all over the noodles. I've
never seen that in my life, but I guess they
considered that to be a good.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
Pass your did you feel more Italian than French and
more French than Italian or was it?
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Well?
Speaker 3 (28:34):
During that time I had also spent I probably spent
half my time in Italy. I was in Rome, Bologna, Milan, Sardinia,
and I think I probably always felt like both. I
think that, you know, the original Union Square Cafe menu,
we had pasta dishes, we had confe de Canard.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
Union Square just changed the way we thought about restaurants.
It did. It was a I remember going with Richard.
It must have been what year.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
Did you open nineteen eighty five?
Speaker 1 (29:05):
Yeah, it must It was certainly before the River Cafe.
And we used to make some journeys to New York.
And I remember, you know, there's certain things. You remember
where you were when that song played, or where you
are when you had that I remember where we were,
where we sat, the whole square. How did that happen?
How did you Well?
Speaker 3 (29:24):
I wanted to open a restaurant that, if only it existed,
would be my favorite restaurant in the world. And as
I was saying earlier, it was truly an amalgam of
my favorite places to eat in the world. They were
always I had no interest in being an exalted kind
of restaurant, but I wanted to be a place that
you would feel equally comfortable wearing jeans or wearing a
coat and tie, if that's what you felt like.
Speaker 1 (29:47):
It's called Union Square Cafe.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
Union Square Cafe and that's what we did.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
With the River Cafe. People always said, why did you
put the word cafe, you know, which is not a cafe,
But you didn't. We didn't. I think probably just wanted
to step away from that.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
And let people know that everyone's welcome for every kind of.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
Occasion of something.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Doesn't that you can eat.
Speaker 3 (30:06):
At the bar from the day we opened. We had
good wines by the glass from the day we opened.
But I actually had the But Jesus scared out of
me because early on, as I was planning this thing,
my uncle introduced me to the guy that was the
food and beverage director at the Harvard Club. He said,
you need to talk to this guy because he knows
everything about restaurants. So the guy starts grilling me, what
(30:28):
kind of restaurant are you going to open? And I said,
I don't know. I'm going to have a little French stuff,
a little Italian stuff, a little California kind of stuff.
And he said, I'm going to tell you right now
it's not going to work.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
And I said, what do you mean?
Speaker 3 (30:42):
And he said, when people decide where they want to
eat in New York, they say French, Italian, Chinese, German,
no one says, let's go out and eat eclectic. It's
not going to work. And I fortunately did not let
that stop me. I just wanted to have food that
I loved. And to this day, you know, I've already
(31:03):
been in touch with two of our chefs today, three
of our chefs. Actually, I just that's one of my
favorite parts of my job is talking about food.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
So from from Union Square, the next you expect you
did another one, you did. I'm not going to have
just one restaurant. I'm going to do another restaurant.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
You ten years after the Square cafe.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
That was ten years later.
Speaker 3 (31:24):
Yep, because I said, I'm never opening a second restaurant
like someone else.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
I know.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
I'm I remember once calling you, as I kept saying,
for advice, and I said, should I do river cafe cafes?
And we could do? Somebody wants me to do one
here and and he said, really, don't think about more
than one. You did say that to me. You said,
just think one and then grow, you know, don't think
did you think.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Did I say don't think about a river cafe cafe?
Or don't think many river many?
Speaker 2 (31:49):
That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
When you started Shakeshack when you did, you didn't think
it would be a global thing that I know.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
We wanted to open something to help Madison Square Park.
In fact, we did open a second Shakeshack for five years.
Can you believe that it just was never ever. The
part of the plan was that we wanted to have
a place that, if it worked, would attract people day
and night to keep the park safe, because people make
people using a park, keep park safe. And then furthermore
(32:18):
that a percentage of every sale would go right back
into the park. That's all we wanted to do, and
it worked. It worked so well that we said we
better do a second one because the biggest complaint we're
getting is the.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Lines are day long.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
They're still long. I have to say there's one around
the corner from in Victoria from where.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
I live Victoria, Nova.
Speaker 1 (32:38):
Yeah, and in the line so long, Well.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
People need to get the app that.
Speaker 3 (32:43):
That's kind of like when you see people waiting in
line to pay their tolls, why didn't you just get
easy Pass.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
It's not that it's one thing.
Speaker 4 (32:49):
You both got amazing restaurants and you've got just one restaurant,
and you can create that and create that. It's being
the best food and the best service together. How did
you do that when you're running out dozens of them?
It must be very different skills.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
Yeah, I think the common skill set is if you
can actually really really advance the workplace culture and the
hospitality culture for all of your stakeholders, that's common to
all of them. As a matter of fact, I care
as deeply about the guest experience in the workplace experience
at Shakeshack as I do at the Modern or Gramercy
(33:25):
Tavern or Manhattan. The skill set that goes with that
is completely different. So for example, if you're going to
get a job at the Modern, which has two Michieline stars,
we're going to look deeply into your work resume. Do
you have the wine knowledge or do you have the
culinary knowledge? At Shakeshack. I don't think one person in
(33:49):
the history of Shakeshack has ever been asked, can I
please see your credentials for how well you make milkshakes
or burgers. I think we hire one hundred percent for
emotional skills in hospitality skills, and then believe that we
can teach and train people. So that's the thing that
every day I get up. If I have one job.
It's truly, you know, fueling the culture how we do things.
Speaker 1 (34:15):
And that culture, I think is what you do, what
we try to do with the people who actually work
and go to work every day. And I think if
we want to go to work, they'll want to go
to work. I think if my view is that we
want somebody to want to come to.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Work, absolutely, And I think, what of the many, many
things that you've done brilliantly, is you've created two communities
that have fallen in love with each other, the people
who work there and the people who dine there, and
then collectively.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
I see it every time I go.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
We we do, we try.
Speaker 2 (34:48):
Excuse me, I feel it every time I do.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
I want you to come more. When do you come again?
Speaker 2 (34:52):
I don't think I ever go to London and don't
see you. So don't give me that. I don't go
to London all the time.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
The guilt, guilt, guilt. So food is can which it
is if it's love, it's sharing, it's staving off hunger,
it's thinking about what you want to eat with excitement
and getting to know culture. It's also comfort. And so
I suppose my last question to you, Danny Meyer, my
friend nice speed dial is what would be your comfort food?
Speaker 2 (35:20):
Fried chicken, fried chicken, really good fried chicken.
Speaker 1 (35:24):
Okay, and what do you do? How do you make that? Well?
Speaker 3 (35:27):
I actually don't make it that often because it makes
a bloody mess and there's so much good fried chicken
that you can get out there. But when I do
make it, it's very, very very simple. It's very simple.
So the key thing is obviously getting a good chicken.
The next key thing is what are you frying it in?
And you're going to laugh, but I use Crisco.
Speaker 1 (35:48):
Yeah, Crisco, Motzola oil, Crisco. Yeah, they're pure, aren't they?
It's pure? Is it pure? Is Crisco? I know it?
Sola is pure. Large mother used to use Motzola oil
because it was pure.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
This is loud, this is lard.
Speaker 3 (36:01):
And you get a reasonably shallow frying pan with the
top on it. And meanwhile, with the chicken, you've just
seasoned it salt and pepper. That is it, salt and pepper,
lots and lots of black pepper. And then you dredge
it in flour that's also been seasoned with salt and pepper.
That's it, and then you cook it one side down
(36:26):
over sort of medium high heat, right and then as
soon and you've got to be somewhat patient. You can't
turn it too quickly or it'll stick to the bottom.
But if you just make sure that the bottom has
cooked pretty well, turn it over, lower the heat, put
the top on, the lid on and so it steam
(36:46):
finishes the whole thing and it should come out pretty
crispy and just absolutely delicious and you feel yep, And
I spend the rest of the time cleaning up the
kitchen after.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
That, not much comfort. Well, thank you, Danny. It's great
to see you. I'll see you in line.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
I love that you came here to do this and
I love this podcast.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
Now it's honor to have you and delicious food.
Speaker 2 (37:07):
I'm so happy, all right, Brawlers forever.
Speaker 1 (37:10):
And Hallie is ice cream. Thank you, Thank you for
listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.
Speaker 4 (37:30):
Ruthie's Table four is produced by Atami Studios for iHeartRadio.
It's hosted by Ruthie Rogers and it's produced by William Lensky.
This episode was edited by Julia Johnson and mixed by
Nigel Appleton. Our executive producers are Faye Stewart and Zad Rogers.
Our production manager is Caitlin Paramore and our production coordinator
(37:51):
is Bella Selini. Thank you to everyone at The River
Cafe for your help in making this episode.
You're listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.
When I started the River Cafe with Rose Gray in
nineteen eighty seven, I was told over and over how
cutthroat it would be. Danny Meyer convinced me otherwise. Opening
(00:20):
Union Square Cafe and Gramercy Tavern in New York more
than thirty years ago, he proved values matter. One could
not only treat staff with respect they deserve, but make
customers happy, happier, as we always say, when they leave
than when they arrived. What surprised us all was that
for his next act, Danny launched Shakeshack in two thousand
(00:43):
and one, a hot dog stand in Madison Park. The rest,
as they say, is history. Today, when I have a
question about fair policies for the people who work with us,
or how to think about expanding or contracting the River Cafe,
or whether it be possible to do exchanges with our
best chefs, I called Danny.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
My heart just melted right back at you.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
In so many ways. I turned to you as my
touchdown for taste.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
There we are, and we're on well eighteenth floor. The
most incredible view to be in New York is to
be high. People love Soho and they love Greenwich Village.
I want to get hot. I was going to say,
I want to get high when I come to New York.
But for me being high as the great luxury. We're
(01:32):
here surrounded, of course, no surprise by food. Amazing doughnuts,
would you calls?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Yes, from Daily Provisions.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
From Daily Provisions. And we have ice cream from Danny
Meyer's daughter, Hayley, and she makes great food, great ice cream,
and she cooked in the River Cafe. She came and
worked with us, so she's part of the family. Now,
(02:02):
do you want to tell us about the ice cream?
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah, let's actually you know what I want to do.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
I want to tell you about the crullers because this
ice cream is going to temper for al times, okay,
and we can we.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Can open them and help that process go.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
But the crullers are pretty much the signature item at
a restaurant called Daily Provisions, which we opened about six
years ago right next door to Unions to the brand
new Union Square Cafe. When we had to move it
after thirty years, we have this extra little space.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
We didn't know what to do.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
With it, and we said, let's give a gift to
the neighborhood. And what did the neighborhood need? We said,
a better cup of coffee, a really good bacon, egg
and cheese sandwich, a really good donut, and a good
roast chicken for dinner. And that's Daily Provisions. And the
cruller is the only donut we serve. And Ruthie, if
(02:54):
you don't think that's one of the top three donuts
you've ever had, I.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Just want I won't keep talking on this podcast, so.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
I want you to cut yourself some of that.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
So tell me about crolers, because tell me about donuts.
It's not my great knowledge.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Donuts.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Doughnuts are often cakey. This, as you will taste on
one bite, is not cakey at all. In fact, it's
quite aggy. And what I love about the cinnamon crawler,
we only make three different kinds. We make, a maple croller,
a cinnamon croller is it's crunchy on the outside and
(03:32):
it's almost your take a bite because it's better if
you try it than if I describe it.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Here we go, So croller, as I said, I'm not
the nash and the cultural heritage croll thing.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Come on, show me what you got.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Mlious first from anybody on this podcast has actually given
me something to eat. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
This is delicious good. It's almost like God is.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
A contrast between the outside and the inside.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yeah, it's very aching.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
This is divine not to tweet, you know, just more
that's a good thing. I don't live next to It Provisions.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
So that is a croller and that is a good one.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Culture.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
All crawlers are donuts, but not all doughnuts are crawl.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
These are until you tell me how you make them?
Do you know?
Speaker 2 (04:28):
I do? But that's the only thing we got calling
for us.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
So when you tell me how you make your state secret,
I got it.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Like everything at the River Cafe, anything away this is
they're just they're just so good. Have a sip of
your coffee with it, please.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Okay, this is not a right.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
So those are crawlers.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
And then Hallie after she learned how to make ice
cream at the River Cafe and also in Rome.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
I think she learned in Rome, and then she came
to she opened.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Right down the street from Daily Provisions, and she is
doing such a great job. That was exactly three years ago.
They just had their third birthday.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
It's kind of seasonal toot ice cream one the summer, and.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Yeah, she's got six that are always on and then
she changes one every single day. Now, there's there's a
few here that we're going to try, and we have
to because you gave her a lot. I want information.
I'm going to start off with adds dream o.
Speaker 1 (05:36):
There's still not is that what it's called.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
It's named that for her mom, Audrey, because this is
Audrey's favorite flavor combination, which is vanilla and peanut butter.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
So swelled through it, swirled through it.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
I think I better try somewhere we're at it. I'll
get in trouble. I'll get in trouble with two ladies
in my life.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
M m, this is delicious. ID you have to try this? Well?
That sounds what's good? You know it's really good? Is
vanilla ice cream? Part?
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Well?
Speaker 1 (06:13):
When she was growing up, was ice cream her favorite dessert.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
I think she has probably had ice cream every day
of her life for the last twenty five years.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
So as a child, she was five years old, yep.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
She worked in an ice cream store when she was
at Yale and New Haven and she just yep, way
before she opened a place. Every single one of her
Instagram posts was eating ice cream in someone else's.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Place, which is pretty cool.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Now that everybody travels, everybody has access to obviously the Internet,
so they can see pictures, read recipes here we're you know,
hear how people feel about the food, et cetera. I
think the curiosity of chefs to kind of cross pollinate
is fascinating. The key, though, is the gimmicky stuff has
(07:07):
in my entire career, it never lasts.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
It's kind of like music. There's eight notes in.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
The octave no matter what you try, plus you know
the sharps and flats, and yet there's a myriad.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Number of songs that can be written.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
And I think the same thing is true in our
industry is there's really nothing that new under the sun.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Now.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
What I love about Ruthie and the River Cafe, and
this is something that I really believe in deeply. It's
not so much about invention as it is cooking food
I know, but cooked better than I knew it could be.
There is an enormous amount of skill involved with that,
(07:47):
and I wish more chefs understood that in excellence lies creativity.
It's not just coming up with something.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
I always say, we don't do ideas, you know, No,
did you ever have an you know? But sometimes people
say I have an idea for something, you have to
listen to it. But generally it's a progress of what
we did. You know, we did a paran almond tarde.
It's strawberry season. We'll put strawberries, or we'll put you
know what Haley is doing with her ice creams. It's
a process. It's your work every day.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, that's what made me fall in love with barbecue.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
For example, when we did blue Smoke, it's what a
great pitmaster does.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
They don't reinvent it.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
They say, you see that angry piece of meat called brisket.
I'm going to figure out something to do with that
over the next twelve hours.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
It's going to blow your.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
Mind just because of meat selection, dry rub temperature, what
kind of wood did I smoke it with, how did
I hold it afterwards? All that stuff is really really hard,
and there's a huge difference between your favorite brisket and
your least favorite brisket. But it's not about can I
drizzle balsamic vinegar on it? And I would say that
(08:53):
from a food standpoint. The reason you are my favorite
chef in the world. I will tell that to everyone,
not just your many listeners here, is that you have
the confidence to make sure that what's on the plate
is essential to that plate, and if it's not essential,
it's not on that plate, and you find a way
(09:14):
to make it taste amazing.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
Do you know how when you edit something, and when
you wrote your book, or when we try to do something,
you go through and you take out a word. I
was saying to them today that friend of mine who
is a screenwright, told me, don't use the word that.
You can always take that out of a sentence and
it still works, which is interesting. And I said that,
you know, when we plate, we do the menu, because
you know, we write the menu for two meals and
(09:37):
then we write it. And I was trying to a
chef on the phone because I was late and we're
talking about her menu, and I said, go through it
and just take one thing off. Almost everything you've done,
just take one whether it's a parsi, whether it's a
sal severity, whether it's the you know, the panchatta, just
take one thing off. And I'm not talking about the
kind of cooking that when you know the cuisine massaur
(09:59):
or that, but it's just thinking, isn't it about?
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Does that really need to be there?
Speaker 3 (10:03):
Yeah, there's a writer's expression which actually applies to the kitchen,
applies to almost everything, which is learn how to murder
your darlings, which is a kind of have you heard
this well?
Speaker 1 (10:14):
I heard Mark Twain once said, if you see the adjective,
shoot it.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
But we all, whenever we write something or cook something,
we assume that that first clever idea we had is
essential to it. In general, generally it's not, but it's
generally the thing we're most in love with that needs
to be the thing that comes off.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Did you know The River Cafe has a shop. It's
full of our favorite foods and designs. We have cookbooks, linen, napkins,
kitchen ware, tote bags with our signatures, glasses from Venice,
chocolates from Turin. You can find us right next door
to the River Cafe in London or online at Shopthrivercafe
dot co dot uk. Of all the books we have,
(11:12):
and I see some of them on your desk, it
was interesting to me that you chose for a recipe
pure al Romana and a recipe from Rome, one of
my favorites, and one of that is in season very soon.
So would you like to read the recipe?
Speaker 2 (11:27):
I would love to tell.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
People how to make it and tell me why you
chose it.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
Well, first of all, I love Rome. That is my
I don't know, it's just my sole place. I always
associate puntarell with Rome. You don't really get it too
often here in New York. When I've had it at
the River Cafe, it's better than when I have it
in Rome, which is hard because we have an expression
(11:50):
hot dogs always taste better at the ballpark. You would
think puntarelli only tastes better in Rome, But at the
River Cafe, you just you know exactly what to do
with it. It's a type of chickory that is not
typically found in the United States. It's not the easiest
thing to handle, and you know exactly what to do
(12:10):
with it. It's about the temperature. It's about the balance
of the anchovy.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
So may I read the recipe?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
Please read the recipe, and if you feel free to
add or take away or comment on anything you like.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
Okay, So we're going to have two heads of puntarelli,
five salted anchovies, and I bet you have a point
of view. On where I should get those anchovies, two
tablespoons of red wine vinegar, one garlic clove, two dried chilies,
one teaspoon of black pepper, four tablespoons of extra virgin
(12:43):
olive oil, and one lemon. So To prepare the puntarelli,
fill a bowl with ice cold water, adding as many
ice cubes as you can fit in there. Pull the
hollow buds from the puntarelli heads. Using a small knife,
slice the buds very thin the lengthwise.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Place them in the water to crisp until they curl up.
This will take about an hour.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Rinse and fill at the anchovies, Cut them into one
half inch pieces and place in a small bowl. Cover
them with the vinegar and stir to let the anchovy dissolve.
Peel and chop the garlic very finely and add to
the anchovies with the crumbled chilies and pepper.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
Add the olive oil.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
Spin dry the punterairelli as for a salad. Place in
a bowl and serve over the anchovy sauce.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Serve with lemon. Yum yeam.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
It's interesting because it feels like a very easy recipe
to make, and it is, and it's one. But when
we're explaining it to the chefs making it for the
first time. The balance of anchovies, the balance of olive oil,
no salt, because the salt it's so salty. With the anchovies,
the christminast. I think for myself it is the ideal
(14:00):
way to start a meal.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
I love it so much, and it just works.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
It works. You know.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
When I was growing up, we used to go to
restaurants and you'd be met with the relish trade, which
was the celery carrots and lindsey pitted black olives on
a bed of crushed ice. But there was something about
that really cold, crispy Sorry, that made a taste.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
But and this is not really that different.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
No, right, maybe every culture has their crispy krispy vegetable.
Tell me about growing up, then let's talk about we're
talking about restaurants. But when you said the words when
I was a kid, So, what was it like growing
up in the Meyer.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
Household in Saint Louis, Missouri. Yeah, Well we didn't. You know,
we had a lot of cooking going on at home.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
My dad was in the travel business, and he was
the first American agent for an organization called Related Compagna,
which would later become relay in chateau, and so we
had French people living in our home, in your home,
in our home, who would work in his office by
and then at nighttime they were around the table and
(15:03):
French was spoken every night lots of times, so the
kids wouldn't understand what they were talking about, which encourage
us to learn French.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
There was always a.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
Bottle of baugeolis on the table, and so I, without
knowing it, I was getting a little bit of an education.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
Who did the cooking.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
My dad cooked a lot, My mom did as well.
He and I cooked together. He taught me how to cook.
His favorite dish was ratatoui and we had a dog
by that name, ra Tatui when I was seven years old.
So I grew up, you know, with the smells and
sounds and fun of cooking, and so it was just
(15:40):
kind of part of my upbringing. I got to go
to France pretty early in my life, and then later Italy,
and then I was a tour guide working for my dad.
He started selling group tours. And when my sister, who's
older than I am, turned twenty, she got to pick
a city, so she picked Copenhagen. When I was twenty
I picked the wrong My brother picked Paris, and interestingly,
(16:04):
we all three had a kind of love affair with
the place we picked. I would go back to Rome
to study political science, and and that was supposed to
lead me into being a lawyer, but thank goodness, I
would have been the world's worst lawyer.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Thank goodness. I converted quickly, and I said, why not?
Why not? You know, so embrace My real passion was.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
So growing up you had you had a lot of
French food, and you were you what was it from
that region because France Association.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
No, it's not just that we had French food.
Speaker 3 (16:39):
I grew up appreciating French food, but I really, you know,
growing up in Saint Louis, we didn't have French restaurants
per se. We had great burgers. So I had smash burgers,
which would one day lead to shakeshack, and frozen custard,
which would len one day lead to shakeshack.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
We had.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
Here's what Saint Louis actually did have. Yeah, use have
an amazing immigrant population. It began with lots and lots
of Germans. And that's how you get restaurants that I
used to go to called Schneidhorse and Anheuser Busch, the
beer company was there, et cetera. Lots and lots of
sausage makers, lots of beer companies. So there was that
(17:18):
going forward. There was also something and it still remains,
called the Hill, the Italian Hills. So lots of Italians
came to Saint Louis and they had their South from
the South primarily, and they had their own style of
cooking that came to Saint Louis. To this day, they
all have almost the exact same menus. So their carbonara
has cream in it, which you would never do. Toasted
(17:41):
ravioli with Marina and I.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Wonder where that came toasted that is inchreat go figure.
I don't know, Ruthy, but did you like it as
a kid?
Speaker 2 (17:51):
Of course I did.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Yeah. I mean.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
People you know in London like marmite or whatever that
stuff is called.
Speaker 1 (17:59):
I wanted to do a photography project when I came
to London. I was doing art school of giving Americans
more mte and taking a photograph of the face up
to they ate.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
I promised toasted ravioli would only put a smile on
your face.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
It's really good.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Yeah, okay, so we're okay. On from toasted. So you
grew up in this culture of your mother's cooking, your
father's cooking.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
And getting to cook.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
But what I really liked more than anything was going
to restaurants.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
I just loved it.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
There was one restaurant that is still around called Chris's.
It's a German place, k r eis apostrophe Chris's, and
they gave me an idea that I used when I
opened Union Square Cafe at the age of twenty seven,
which was to have a nightly special that you could
depend on every night of the week. So you knew
(18:48):
if you went in there on Monday nights, yeah, that
was chicken and dumplings night. You knew if you went
in on Tuesday night was sour Brought to Night, which
I didn't really care about too much, but they had
a different special every night.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
We did that.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
When I opened Union Square Cafe because I love the
idea that you could create an habitual regular. But they
also did which I loved from the age of six on.
They remembered my favorite table.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
Yeah, I'm the guy.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
Well, there's probably every kid who liked to have the
table underneath the cuckoo clock, but it meant the world
to me that they remember that.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
I think that's what we talk about, you know, with restaurants,
is that we were talking about this morning, that you'll
go back to a restaurant if they didn't cook the
sea pass to perfection, but you won't go back if
there's a waiter that makes you feel bad about yourself.
Speaker 3 (19:36):
And then furthermore, taking it back to the positive side,
you'll always go back where you feel most loved. Yeah,
and remember, I remember the late James Beard was constantly
accosted in airports, restaurants everywhere because everyone recognized the bald
head with the bow tie. And obviously the question everybody
(19:57):
asked James Beard was what's your favorit restaurant?
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Especially in an airport? Where should I?
Speaker 3 (20:02):
And he said, my favorite restaurant is the same as yours. Yeah,
it's the one that loves me the most. That's hard
to argue with that.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
I would say. You know that you never know with
the table what they've gone through when they come in.
You know, they may have had they have gotten lost,
they might have been fired that day, they may be
celebrating something and most you know, most often or maybe
we should think about, is they may have saved up
to come to the River Cafe.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
That's a really good point.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
Really saved up to come. And so how are we
going to make them feel that everything was, you know,
here for them. And I think that's it's really something
I learned from you. I think we've all learned that
from you. Is how to be happy, making people happy,
you know, simple as that.
Speaker 3 (20:46):
Well, the last thing I want to say about Saint
Louis is that was the biggest lesson I learned because
Saint Louis was long on hospitality. It wasn't necessarily the food.
But then what I got to do, probably because of
the the privilege of growing up with a lot of
travel because my dad's company was a travel business, I
got the flavor of really good food in Italy and
(21:09):
in France. But I also was able to pair that
with the kind of hospitality that I always got in
Saint Louis. And when I moved to New York at
the age of twenty one, there wasn't a lot of
hospitality around here. It was basically, you're lucky to be
eating here, and if you don't feel that way, we've
got a really nice table by the bathroom for you.
(21:31):
There was a lot of that kind of mentality left
over from the studio fifty four.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Eras the red velvet rope.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
What year is well?
Speaker 2 (21:39):
I moved here?
Speaker 3 (21:41):
My first night here was the night John Lennon was
assassinated in December of nineteen eighty and I got my
first apartment in nineteen eighty one. It was not necessarily
a nice city back then, so it was kind of
a slam dunk when I opened Union Square a cafe
to say, well, whoever wrote the rule that good food's
(22:01):
gonna taste worse because you're nice to people?
Speaker 1 (22:03):
Yeah, if you like listening to Ruthie's Table for would
you please make sure to rate and review the podcast
on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, o, wherever you
get your podcasts. Thank you. Going back then to leaving
(22:32):
Saint Louis and what was food like after that? We
suddenly you're on your own and what am I going
to eat? Or can I afford a restaurant? What was
that world like when you left?
Speaker 3 (22:42):
I couldn't stop discovering things everywhere. So when I was
in college at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, Sunday night
could be the local burger king, because that's what I
had enough money to do. But I also would go
to their little Italy and find the best we call
them grinders. Every town has a different name for submarines
or poe boys. In Hartford they're called grinders. And I'd
(23:05):
go find the best pizza in the city. It was
all inexpensive stuff, go find the best espresso I could find.
Couldn't understand why the espresso there would be served with
a lemon peel and the cappuccino would be served with cinnamon,
which is not what I had seen. But again, because
of my dad's travel business, until I was twenty one,
(23:26):
I could fly anywhere that pan Am flew for forty
four dollars round trip forty four dollars. So every time
we had a three day weekend, I got myself down
to Kennedy Airport and I went.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
I would almost always go to run.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
I went to Venice once in the middle of winter,
which is the loneliest place on earth. I did go
to London and I really enjoyed it.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Okay, but you hadn't started. Yeah, this was still pre.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
This was still pre in Square Cafe.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
But I was educating myself and I would eat anywhere
by myself. You know, I'd go to Popeyes Fried Chicken
any anywhere where I could, or I'd go to diners
in Long Island. I would just get in my car
and go see what was was.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
Do you have friends who shared that passion or not.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
As much as I did.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
You know, I would drive people crazy because I couldn't
like New York is one of the greatest walking cities
in the world, and I couldn't pass a menu on
the outside of a building without studying it. And I
would do that in every town in Italy, every town
in France. When I went to London by myself for
those two weeks, I had this book.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
I think American.
Speaker 3 (24:37):
Express published the book, and it was their reviews of
you know, one hundred restaurants. And I didn't have much
of a budget, so I saved up for the ones
I could get into. There was one restaurant that I
went to and they wouldn't take me as a solo diner,
so I made a reservation for two and I walked
(25:00):
dan and I kept looking at my watch, Where's my friend,
Where's my friend? And I finally ordered a decent bottle
of wine for myself so they wouldn't kick me out,
you know, no solo diners going to order a single
bottle of wine. But you know, I was learning about
hospitality too, because they weren't very, very nice at that point.
(25:20):
But you know, I just I just love discovery. I
think discovery is one of the great things in life
when and by the way, as you get older, you
can still discover things you've never tried before.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
But when it comes to food, it's like.
Speaker 4 (25:38):
Can I ask you a question. When you were traveling
and exploring all these places, were you conscious of a
difference between a restauranteur and the chef or were you
seeing it then a chef's eze or.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
That's such a good question. I think I probably was.
There were many many restaurants at that time where you
didn't have.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
Any idea who the chef was.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
Know, you obviously had some trail blazers in London everywhere
when it came to chefs, and I was very, very
inspired and motivated by that. As a matter of fact,
when I first broke the news to my parents that
I was not going to become a lawyer as everyone
had expected, but so I was going to go into
this business, I said, I want to be a chef.
(26:20):
Because I had seen people like Alice Waters and Joyce
Goldstein and Jeremiah Tower and Wolfgang Puck and Paul Prudhom
you know, I can mark guy named Mark Miller and
the Miller Yeah, yeah, great memory. And all these people
had liberal arts educations. So I wasn't going to let
my parents down, but I was afraid to tell them.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
I wanted to be a restaurateur.
Speaker 3 (26:43):
And so it got to the point where my dad said, well,
then you're going to really need to you better get
some cooking in and he set up two stages for
me in Bordeaux at places that had been part of
laying chateau. And the first one I went to was
called La Reserve in Paysack Love Reserve.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
Where where was that reserve? Restaurants called Aurey Cat.
Speaker 3 (27:12):
Yeah, so this one was in the Bordeaux village called.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
Paysack pe s S A C. And the day I
got there.
Speaker 3 (27:22):
As a stagier, they had just lost their second star,
and so everyone in the restaurant was completely demoralized. As
a matter of fact, on day two, four of their
cooks left because God forbid, they did not want to
have a one star. Micheline restaurant on their on their resume.
So what that meant is I got a big promotion meeting.
(27:43):
I got to open the oysters and pull the feathers
from birds and chop the shallots and all that kind
of fun stuff. But I also got to cook family
meal for them, and that was that.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Was a big deal.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
Well, the very first day that I got to cook
family meal, I'll never forget. I made my grandmother's spare
ribs with her barbecue sauce Cote de port, Cote de port,
and they loved it. And then I made a pasta
for them, and I forget what the pasta was, but
(28:16):
I could not believe my eyes that all these mishline
level cooks, you know what, they dressed my pasta with ketchup.
They just started pouring ketchup all over the noodles. I've
never seen that in my life, but I guess they
considered that to be a good.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
Pass your did you feel more Italian than French and
more French than Italian or was it?
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Well?
Speaker 3 (28:34):
During that time I had also spent I probably spent
half my time in Italy. I was in Rome, Bologna, Milan, Sardinia,
and I think I probably always felt like both. I
think that, you know, the original Union Square Cafe menu,
we had pasta dishes, we had confe de Canard.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
Union Square just changed the way we thought about restaurants.
It did. It was a I remember going with Richard.
It must have been what year.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
Did you open nineteen eighty five?
Speaker 1 (29:05):
Yeah, it must It was certainly before the River Cafe.
And we used to make some journeys to New York.
And I remember, you know, there's certain things. You remember
where you were when that song played, or where you
are when you had that I remember where we were,
where we sat, the whole square. How did that happen?
How did you Well?
Speaker 3 (29:24):
I wanted to open a restaurant that, if only it existed,
would be my favorite restaurant in the world. And as
I was saying earlier, it was truly an amalgam of
my favorite places to eat in the world. They were
always I had no interest in being an exalted kind
of restaurant, but I wanted to be a place that
you would feel equally comfortable wearing jeans or wearing a
coat and tie, if that's what you felt like.
Speaker 1 (29:47):
It's called Union Square Cafe.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
Union Square Cafe and that's what we did.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
With the River Cafe. People always said, why did you
put the word cafe, you know, which is not a cafe,
But you didn't. We didn't. I think probably just wanted
to step away from that.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
And let people know that everyone's welcome for every kind of.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
Occasion of something.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Doesn't that you can eat.
Speaker 3 (30:06):
At the bar from the day we opened. We had
good wines by the glass from the day we opened.
But I actually had the But Jesus scared out of
me because early on, as I was planning this thing,
my uncle introduced me to the guy that was the
food and beverage director at the Harvard Club. He said,
you need to talk to this guy because he knows
everything about restaurants. So the guy starts grilling me, what
(30:28):
kind of restaurant are you going to open? And I said,
I don't know. I'm going to have a little French stuff,
a little Italian stuff, a little California kind of stuff.
And he said, I'm going to tell you right now
it's not going to work.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
And I said, what do you mean?
Speaker 3 (30:42):
And he said, when people decide where they want to
eat in New York, they say French, Italian, Chinese, German,
no one says, let's go out and eat eclectic. It's
not going to work. And I fortunately did not let
that stop me. I just wanted to have food that
I loved. And to this day, you know, I've already
(31:03):
been in touch with two of our chefs today, three
of our chefs. Actually, I just that's one of my
favorite parts of my job is talking about food.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
So from from Union Square, the next you expect you
did another one, you did. I'm not going to have
just one restaurant. I'm going to do another restaurant.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
You ten years after the Square cafe.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
That was ten years later.
Speaker 3 (31:24):
Yep, because I said, I'm never opening a second restaurant
like someone else.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
I know.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
I'm I remember once calling you, as I kept saying,
for advice, and I said, should I do river cafe cafes?
And we could do? Somebody wants me to do one
here and and he said, really, don't think about more
than one. You did say that to me. You said,
just think one and then grow, you know, don't think
did you think.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Did I say don't think about a river cafe cafe?
Or don't think many river many?
Speaker 2 (31:49):
That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
When you started Shakeshack when you did, you didn't think
it would be a global thing that I know.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
We wanted to open something to help Madison Square Park.
In fact, we did open a second Shakeshack for five years.
Can you believe that it just was never ever. The
part of the plan was that we wanted to have
a place that, if it worked, would attract people day
and night to keep the park safe, because people make
people using a park, keep park safe. And then furthermore
(32:18):
that a percentage of every sale would go right back
into the park. That's all we wanted to do, and
it worked. It worked so well that we said we
better do a second one because the biggest complaint we're
getting is the.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Lines are day long.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
They're still long. I have to say there's one around
the corner from in Victoria from where.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
I live Victoria, Nova.
Speaker 1 (32:38):
Yeah, and in the line so long, Well.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
People need to get the app that.
Speaker 3 (32:43):
That's kind of like when you see people waiting in
line to pay their tolls, why didn't you just get
easy Pass.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
It's not that it's one thing.
Speaker 4 (32:49):
You both got amazing restaurants and you've got just one restaurant,
and you can create that and create that. It's being
the best food and the best service together. How did
you do that when you're running out dozens of them?
It must be very different skills.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
Yeah, I think the common skill set is if you
can actually really really advance the workplace culture and the
hospitality culture for all of your stakeholders, that's common to
all of them. As a matter of fact, I care
as deeply about the guest experience in the workplace experience
at Shakeshack as I do at the Modern or Gramercy
(33:25):
Tavern or Manhattan. The skill set that goes with that
is completely different. So for example, if you're going to
get a job at the Modern, which has two Michieline stars,
we're going to look deeply into your work resume. Do
you have the wine knowledge or do you have the
culinary knowledge? At Shakeshack. I don't think one person in
(33:49):
the history of Shakeshack has ever been asked, can I
please see your credentials for how well you make milkshakes
or burgers. I think we hire one hundred percent for
emotional skills in hospitality skills, and then believe that we
can teach and train people. So that's the thing that
every day I get up. If I have one job.
It's truly, you know, fueling the culture how we do things.
Speaker 1 (34:15):
And that culture, I think is what you do, what
we try to do with the people who actually work
and go to work every day. And I think if
we want to go to work, they'll want to go
to work. I think if my view is that we
want somebody to want to come to.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Work, absolutely, And I think, what of the many, many
things that you've done brilliantly, is you've created two communities
that have fallen in love with each other, the people
who work there and the people who dine there, and
then collectively.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
I see it every time I go.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
We we do, we try.
Speaker 2 (34:48):
Excuse me, I feel it every time I do.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
I want you to come more. When do you come again?
Speaker 2 (34:52):
I don't think I ever go to London and don't
see you. So don't give me that. I don't go
to London all the time.
Speaker 1 (34:57):
The guilt, guilt, guilt. So food is can which it
is if it's love, it's sharing, it's staving off hunger,
it's thinking about what you want to eat with excitement
and getting to know culture. It's also comfort. And so
I suppose my last question to you, Danny Meyer, my
friend nice speed dial is what would be your comfort food?
Speaker 2 (35:20):
Fried chicken, fried chicken, really good fried chicken.
Speaker 1 (35:24):
Okay, and what do you do? How do you make that? Well?
Speaker 3 (35:27):
I actually don't make it that often because it makes
a bloody mess and there's so much good fried chicken
that you can get out there. But when I do
make it, it's very, very very simple. It's very simple.
So the key thing is obviously getting a good chicken.
The next key thing is what are you frying it in?
And you're going to laugh, but I use Crisco.
Speaker 1 (35:48):
Yeah, Crisco, Motzola oil, Crisco. Yeah, they're pure, aren't they?
It's pure? Is it pure? Is Crisco? I know it?
Sola is pure. Large mother used to use Motzola oil
because it was pure.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
This is loud, this is lard.
Speaker 3 (36:01):
And you get a reasonably shallow frying pan with the
top on it. And meanwhile, with the chicken, you've just
seasoned it salt and pepper. That is it, salt and pepper,
lots and lots of black pepper. And then you dredge
it in flour that's also been seasoned with salt and pepper.
That's it, and then you cook it one side down
(36:26):
over sort of medium high heat, right and then as
soon and you've got to be somewhat patient. You can't
turn it too quickly or it'll stick to the bottom.
But if you just make sure that the bottom has
cooked pretty well, turn it over, lower the heat, put
the top on, the lid on and so it steam
(36:46):
finishes the whole thing and it should come out pretty
crispy and just absolutely delicious and you feel yep, And
I spend the rest of the time cleaning up the
kitchen after.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
That, not much comfort. Well, thank you, Danny. It's great
to see you. I'll see you in line.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
I love that you came here to do this and
I love this podcast.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
Now it's honor to have you and delicious food.
Speaker 2 (37:07):
I'm so happy, all right, Brawlers forever.
Speaker 1 (37:10):
And Hallie is ice cream. Thank you, Thank you for
listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.
Speaker 4 (37:30):
Ruthie's Table four is produced by Atami Studios for iHeartRadio.
It's hosted by Ruthie Rogers and it's produced by William Lensky.
This episode was edited by Julia Johnson and mixed by
Nigel Appleton. Our executive producers are Faye Stewart and Zad Rogers.
Our production manager is Caitlin Paramore and our production coordinator
(37:51):
is Bella Selini. Thank you to everyone at The River
Cafe for your help in making this episode.
Host
Ruth Rogers
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!