March 31, 2020 • 42 mins
Tyler Florence is here to help us with all the cooking tips we desperately need right now.
And Wells Adams alter ego Cooking Wells is a pretty good chef in his own right!
We go all the way back in the cookbook and see what took Tyler to Food Network stardom!
Plus, Tyler shares some quarantine cooking secrets you can’t miss!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
This is a Wells cast with Wells Adams and I
heart radio podcast What Everybody Up. Wells guests coming Back
actually live from my home studio because I don't want
to leave the house. Very excited about day's episode. If
you are one of those people who loves food porn,
(00:21):
you are pumped about my guest today. This is a
Food Network icon. Okay, he's got a bunch of shows
on the Food Network. He's got an amazing restaurant up
in San Francisco. He graduated from the College of Culinary
Arts of Charleston, South Carolina. I know nothing about colleges,
(00:42):
but I can only assume that's the Harvard of Chopping
he's been seeing on Globe Trekker Food nine one one,
How to Boil Water, co hosted Worst Cooks in America
and Tyler's Ultimate. Today's guest is wait for it, Tyler Florence.
Very excited about the show today one. I want to
find find out what's going on in his life. How
the hell he became one of the most popular chefs
(01:04):
on the Food Network. We're I can only assume is
a very very coveted role to get in the culinary world.
Also being a chef and being in the times that
we're living right now. I want to know what we
all should be doing to get through this weird quarantine.
What should we be looking for in the grocery stores.
What should we be cooking? Does he have a zombie
(01:25):
apocalypse meal? I don't know, maybe he does. Anyways, Sit back, relax,
and get ready to probably be hungry at the end
of it. Coming up in just a couple of minutes.
Tyler Florence right here on the Wells Cast. All right
(01:52):
back on the Wells Cast, very excited to have the man,
the myth, the legend of the Kitchen on the show.
Tyler Florence, How are you, my man? I'm great, well els,
how are you? I'm doing good. I mean, we're in
a weird time right now, and I'm actually I think
this is a very apropos time to have you on
the show. You know, I started in the service industry.
(02:13):
People know me as a bartender, and anyone who's working
in the service industry right now is taking a huge hit.
I mean, you own a fantastic restaurant up in the
Bay Area. What is it like in the service industry
right now? Is it completely dead? Is everyone getting fired.
What's going on? You know, it's a combination of everything
you just said. Yes, we're dead, um, yes, we've laid
(02:35):
people off, and and it's it's had. It's a horror show,
to be honest with you, right, and we're trying to
figure out what we can do. You know, we're normally
a very busy restaurant in San Francisco, thank god, kno
come Wood, and have been since we've opened. We're about
to celebrate our tenth anniversary wait for our tavern in
San Francisco, and we we love our associates. We've got
a hundred and fifty people, most of them been with
(02:56):
us for years, and uh, you know, and and that
that's front of the how that's wait staff, bartenders, some
of our front of house managers or some as or
chefs or pastry chefs. We've got employees have been with
us for years, and now we have to look on
the eye and say, listen, we just literally don't have
the cash to keep you on the books for longer
than say, you know, two weeks. And we tried really
(03:16):
really hard just to kind of keep everybody on board.
And so what we've done from a business standpoint is
scaled down tremendously because we you know, at the end
of the day, we want there to be something that
we can hire them back for. So we're trying to
keep our expenses down to a minimum. Right now, we're
doing takeout. We're exclusively on caviare by no means is
that a windfall from a cash standpoint, but something it's
(03:37):
something to keep about. About twelve people employed in the
kitchen right now, and we just got a food truck,
right so, you know the idea with that you could
do curb side to pick up. We're trying to create
more curbs where you can pick up our food. Right.
So the the food truck is bouncing around from neighborhood
to neighborhood, and we have a very tight protocol as
far as getting the food to people through a window,
right So the food is cooked inside the truck, but's
(03:58):
boxed in this bag. In the bag just tape shut
and it goes through a windows. There's very minimal contact.
We're just trying to keep that going. You know, we're
looking at how we can start to cater hospitals next
week with our food truck. And then it feels dangerous,
but you know those people have to eat too, so
we're just trying to be creative about it and and
figure out what we can do to just stay alive.
(04:18):
That's the restaurant's side for sure, and that's everybody. It's
a scary time. And like we've been sending my brother
and I've been sending pizzas and sandwiches to all the
e R doctors because those guys are just like they're
just they're the entire time. And I think that's a
really cool thing you guys are doing. And hopefully this
will be over sooner rather than later, although I don't
(04:38):
know if if it is or not. On the other
side of things, I wanted to ask you, you know,
it's scary time to go to the grocery store and
you can't go to farmers markets. I feel like you
are a guy who I assume goes to the farmers
markets and grocery stores and finds things to cook amazing
meals in your restaurants. Do you have suggestions for people
out there trying to figure out what the hell to
(05:00):
go get, you know, in times of crazy long quarantine. Yeah,
I mean, first of all, I would just tell everybody
to simplify your menus, Right, I would really focus on
things that have a lot to do with rice and
I have a lot to do with pasta, or have
a lot to do with dried beans. Right, we always have,
you know, a couple of pounds or always like you
in the last two weeks, we always have, you know,
a couple of pounds of beans. They're they're soaking on
(05:21):
the countertop too, so we can turn that into you know,
a chili they'll last a couple of days, where you know,
a candelini bean soup that we can last for a
couple of days. And then like the ric thing has
been really important for us because you know, you can
turn that to a stir fry. You can make just
sort of a big sort of like you know, saute
pan yummy mash up with like veggies and spinach and
chicken and rice and you know, splash and karaki sauce
(05:43):
on it and something have have something like a nice
big bowl of something warm. And then pasta. For sure,
We've been crushing a lot of pasta. And the big
question I've gotten from people is like can I make
something and then freeze it and then pull it back
out again? What can I make and freeze, and my
suggestion is to don't do that at all, only because
especially if you put something if you make a pasta dish,
the carbohydrates and the posta will absorb the sauce and
(06:05):
then by the time you reheat it, it's going to
be dry as a bone. So my suggestion is to
make things individually, like the ingredients, right. Like, so let's
just say you're gonna, you know, go deep with three
or four pounds of ground turkey and then cook that
with you know, diced onion and garlic and fresh time
and olive oil and you know, a little bit of
salt pepper, and then let that cool off and then
take the cooked ground turkey and then bag that and
(06:26):
then freeze that. And you can do the same thing
with vegetables, right, just to get ahead of it, like
you know, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, broccoli, you know, green beans,
you name it, roasted on the sheep pan and then
take it out back. And then when you're looking for
something to make, all of a sudden you have these
individual ingredients and then you're going back to you know, beans,
pasta and rice. Right, you know, what can I do
with this? Can I make Can I make some tacos tonight?
(06:47):
Can I make you know, pasta? You know, with ground turkey,
you can go bowling, as you can go tacos. You
can do so many different things with it. So I
think that's sort of like the smart call is to
not make something ahead of time, but make the individual
ingredients at a time and then kind of make something
that feels hot and fresh right there at the moment,
depending on what you're into that day. I love it
almost like a Mexican kitchen, you know, or like all
(07:09):
the same ingredients makes seventeen million different dishes. Kinda kind
of absolutely. So here's my my issue. We went and
stocked up the refrigerator and the pantry, you know, when
we knew that we were going to be staying at
home a lot. Now I tend to like board eat,
you know, like it's like, why do I do, Like
I'm on the seventeenth season of West World, Let's just
(07:31):
go make something else. And I imagine for you it's
even harder because the stuff that I'm making is in
any good, But the stuff that you make is always
really good. So is it hard for you to like
not be like board cooking constantly during the quarantine. We
have a lot of potato chips here in the house.
I know that for sure, And you know I have
to you know, preteen kids. I have a twelve ye
(07:53):
old son and love ye old daughter and and there,
you know, I don't know where the snacks are going,
but there, you know, there, you know we used every
day there is one less big bag of potato ships.
So we're trying our best just to make sure that
we're you know, that those things end up becoming you know,
like a treat instead of a full sit down gorge
fest watching television. And my look and you look down.
I've eaten two huge bags of lace potato ships, watching
(08:15):
West World over and over again. So we're trying our
best just to make sure there's like scheduled meal times,
and I think that's important. Like thank god, our schools
have finally gotten it together with Zoom, but this has
been strange for everybody in schools just aren't really prepped
for this kind of at home teaching. So the first
two weeks have been we're kind of rough figuring out
what to do. Like they were sending you know, work
(08:36):
via email, but all the instructions were really complicated and
nobody really knew what to do. But now there's actually
Zoom classrooms that our kids do every day. At least
there's a beginning, in the middle and an end to
the day where it feels like there's some sort of
structure and we're not getting up And so this is
what I would tell everybody. Just get up and treat
it like it's a normal day, Like get up, get
a shower, go exercise right like, like make a meal
(08:57):
and then think about lunch. Boredom can really uh, you
fill in the gaps of what you would normally do
from a scheduling standpoint. So I think just being very
aware of your day and what you're eating will make
that recovery from a gym standpoint once all of this
is over a little easier for everybody. But yeah, I'm
with you. I mean, like some of the first couple
of days, we're like, okay, well I just felt like
(09:19):
I was eating a lot, But now we're just trying
to get to a really deep routine. Yeah, I'm glad
the Zoom thing is there, especially for my sisters. I
have nine nieces and nephews, and one sister sent me
a meme where it was like homeschooling is going well.
Two kids have been suspended for fighting and the teacher
has been fired for drinking on the job. Yeah, yeah,
(09:41):
I mean, people, this is so weird. I mean all
of this is so weird for people, man, that you know,
people are at home just just trying to, you know,
make the day go by faster or or be a
little less anxious and and honestly, like whatever it takes,
you know what I mean, Like, if you're in the Edibles,
do it, man, If you want a glass of wine,
do it. Like, other than just just starting to get
stirred crazy, just try to enjoy yourself a little bit.
(10:02):
I don't think there's anything wrong with God. I would
rather be a little buzzed and then really anxious, you know,
because I think the anxiety for a lot of people
just because you just get bombarded with the news. Turn
the news off. That would be my other thing. Like
it's not going to change. The news is not going
to change today or tomorrow or any time in the
near future. It's just gonna be new stats that aren't
gonna be good to hear or listen to, and just
(10:23):
gonna do crazy things with your brain. I would minimize
like how much news you're consuming on a daily basis,
so you're not just sort of spinning out of control,
and just try to make try to make the new
normal normal exercises, So like yesterday I had ten miles
on my pelts on and uh and and I've got
sort of a busy day today, but I'm gonna schedule
that around like seven eight o'clock tonight. I wanna do
another ten miles just because it makes me feel so
(10:45):
much better. My head is so clear when I've had
some exercise and some really kind of pumping some oxygen
in your blood. So that that would be my my
recommendation from everybody. Man. I know it's weird, but get
in the kitchen, cook something, you know, hang out with
your kids, and make the something that they'll never a
they'll never forget it anyway, but make it, you know,
a moment where you all came together as as your
(11:06):
tribe and and really you know, created some bonds that
will last in the rest of your life. If you're
making banana bread, if you're making you know, scrambling eggs,
if you're making spaghetti sauce and you bring the kids in,
you guys are doing this together and they feel like
they're part of the solution. Um it makes them less anxious.
And instead of watching news, maybe watch one of the
shows that you're on, because you are on a lot
of television shows, Globe Trekker Food, How to Boil Water, Work,
(11:31):
Cooks in America. And then I was looking at your
Instagram earlier today and you've got a new YouTube series out, yeah,
wolf it Down. Yeah yeah, so so we just launched
a new Wolf of Down, a new YouTube brand which
is sort of a multimedia platform. We're very excited about it,
and we have there's two YouTube channels they're going with
the brand. Right now, there's wolf it Down and you
can look that up on YouTube. And then then and
(11:52):
then there's wolf it Down I t K, which stands
for in the Kitchen. So Wolf it Down is gonna
be a travel and adventure series and sort of like
a behind the scenes look at the high profile culinary world.
And then the Wolf of Down I t K is
just us in the kitchen, you know, really hardcore d
I Y cooking projects which are always always so much
fun to kind of get into. So we're doing that.
(12:12):
Wolf it Down dot Com is up in live right now.
Our first newsletter goes out next week, which is very exciting,
and then our retail store is gonna open up soon.
We've got some fun collaborations right now, because like there's
so many people that are from a brand standpoint, Like,
whoever you're into, whatever relationships you have, you know, make
make a bonding relationship with those people. Call them up
(12:33):
and say, hey, listen, let's work on a thing together.
Let's make a limited edition run of something, because everybody
wants to feel like they have some connection. And and
those branding relationships right now will carry you on forever.
If they know that you were there for them in
the rough times, they'll be there for you when time
is really really good too. We're reaching out to all
of our branding partners and saying, hey, what can we
(12:54):
do big and small? Like tonight we're doing um a
live telecasts with one of our wine partners, this big
wine club called Cooper Salk. They didn't have any money
because they just like close all the restaurants and laid
off five thousand people. And I'm like, dude, don't worry
about It's not about money right now. It's about us,
you know, doing things together as a group, because like
we've been working together for years and you were there
for me, and now I'm there for you. Right. So anyway,
(13:16):
we're doing a live broadcast tonight with Cooper Stalk, which
is gonna be great, and and and all. This was
starting to wrap itself up into kind of a new
brand right now that we're very excited about called wolf
It Down, which is cool, and it's it's about, you know,
wolf it down. It's sort of like taking a crusty
piece of bread and making sure you get the last
little bit of delicious sauce out of the bowl. Right.
It's it's that philosophy in life and just like making
(13:36):
sure that you're you're seeing everything, you're getting everything, you're
doing everything, you're tasting everything, and and it's gonna be
a really fun project to work on. I mean, you've
been on a ton of television shows on Food Network
and stuff, and I imagine that is a very coveted
position to be in in the culinary world. I mean,
everyone I would assume would want their own television show.
(14:00):
I don't know if anyone told you kind of what
the premise of the show is, but it's an origin
story show. I like to find out how people got
to where they are now, how did you get that
blue check mark? How did you get like the seventeen
different television shows? And then people can use that as
a blueprint in their life whatever it is, whether it's
cooking or acting or you know, being accountant of how
to become successful. So I want to take a quick break,
(14:21):
and when we come back, I want to find out
how the hell you became such a big name in
the world of culinary television. Okay, you got it? Stick around, guys,
(14:42):
all right back on the Wells Cast. I have Tyler
Florence on the show. He owns the very popular restaurant
in santances Are called Wayfair Tavern. He's been seen on
so many different television shows like Globe Tracker, Food One,
How to Boil Water, Worst Cooks in a Erica. He's
got a YouTube series out right now called Wolf Fit Down.
(15:04):
And I just want to know how the hell you
got here. I know that you're a Southern guy, right
like I. You went to school in the South. That
were you born in South Carolina? Yeah? I was born
in South Carolina, and uh, I you know, I grew
up in a small town called Greenville, which is northwestern
part of the state. And if you're from Greenville, you
(15:25):
said Greenville, not Greenville, It's Greenville, So Greenville, South Carolina.
And then I went I went to culinary school in Charleston.
I was there for about four and a half years,
going to school and hanging out. And then I moved
to New York City after that and that was in
and moved to Brooklyn, New York and lived in Brooklyn
for almost ten years, and then then moved to Manhattan,
and you know, worked with a bunch of restaurants, and
(15:45):
then I kind of stumbled into the Food Network a
long time ago. Man, this is my twenty fourth year
on Food Network, twenty four years, and it's been it's
been a crazy ride, you know. I I feel incredibly
lucky and grateful to say that my career and maybe
maybe two dozen other people have had so of a
(16:06):
similar track. It's one of those things that once you
get there, because I've seen a lot of people get there,
it's really hard to stay there, right And that's the
most important thing is making sure that you've got the
ability to take those opportunities when they come and really
rise to the occasion. From a branding standpoint and stay
there and and and do really great things and be
(16:26):
that person of people that you that you know you are,
even if you're growing into that position. Just just to commit,
Like I think that's the most important thing, just to
commit who you are from a branding tracks standpoint. But
I mean, it's it's a long story. Lots of details
in there, you know, but but who went and wear
But I mean, but for the most part, you know,
we started out as an executive chef when I was
twenty five years old in Manhattan and one of the
(16:50):
executives from Food Network stumbled into the restaurant that was
the executive chef of and you know, really like what
we're doing from a food standpoint. And I was out
walking around the tables and saying hi to people, and
and she handed me her card and say, hey, listen,
you know, we got this brand new food channel on
And of course I had heard of it because it
was blown up in New York City, in l A
and Chicago. And so I did one guest appearance in
(17:10):
n and that was it. And so you know when
two years after that, I had I had my first show.
Let's rewind the reel. It's just a little bit, so
like the years, I don't know, nineteen eighty five year
in Greenville, South Carolina. Are you an only child? Do
you have siblings? Are your parents chefs? What's happening in
the family. I have three brothers, there's four of us altogether,
(17:32):
and uh and my my, my parents aren't chefs. You know.
My dad had a lot of different jobs going up.
You know, he's always just sort of a fighter and
a hustler and doing all kinds of cool things. And
my mom was an accountant her whole life, so you know,
she was the interesting thing about my mom's position, right,
So she was the accountant for the local NBC station
in Greensville, South Carolina growing up, and so she was
(17:54):
a single mom because my parents divorced when I was
I guess I was in third grade. And so she
would take us to the studio, and my older brother
and I would just run around the studio while she
was working, and we would literally sit in the control
room and watch the director cut the news live. So
in this interesting way, like by the time when I
when I got to the television world, I felt very
(18:14):
comfortable being in a room with cameras and televisions, and
I kind of understood the positions and what who did what,
and and obviously from a culinary standpoint, I kind of
had that unlock. Now standing in front of the camera
and cooking and talking is a whole different skill that
needs to be sharpened as you go along. Definitely took
a while to kind of get good at that, but
being in the studio itself, I surprisingly felt very, very
(18:37):
comfortable with it early on. So grew up in South Carolina,
got three brothers, parents not really cooks, but you know,
growing up in the South, everybody eats a lot and
cooks a lot, and so there was always you know,
hot left hot fried chicken popping out of kitchen someplace,
and uh and yeah, I mean you know when in
the South everything is like brown and good. So did
(18:57):
you know, I mean, you went to culinaries. So there
was a thought process too, this is what I want
to go do. I assume you knew you wanted to
do it. I don't know. And sometime in the middle
of high school, were you cooking a lot as a kid? Yeah,
so I started cooking just for fun, I mean, you know,
and I remember when I was in like seventh grade
or yeah, seventh grade in my locker, you know, because
there was the everybody puts pictures up in their locker,
(19:19):
and I had at pictures of hot chicks, uh, Tony
Tony Hawk and no kidding, Julie Child and that that's
what the inside of my locker looked like when I
was a kid, just because like I just I just
really loved cooking. I just thought it was amazing. So
on the weekends, you know, we would watch we'd sort
of flip back and forth from you know, cartoons to
what was happening on PPS and and I just really
(19:40):
gravitated towards that. I just thought it was fun and
uh and really just started kind of cooking along with
my parents and my on my dad's side, the family.
It's an interesting kind of cocktail between you know, on
my mom's side being remotely and sort of this the
inside of a studio capacity, but also on my dad's
side because my dad was the youngest of eight kids,
and so I mean I have a really big family
on his side, and so every weekend was somebody's thing.
(20:03):
Every weekend was a birthday party or you know, anniversary
or or something. So we're always cooking, packing up food,
in the car and then taking these things to these
big huge pot look things um all over the place,
like what they call covered dish in in in the South. Um.
So we're always just sort of rehearsing what ultimately became
practice of being a restaurant early on as a kid.
(20:23):
And I started working in restaurants professionally Wants fifteen and
I started washing dishes. Yeah, So I started washing dishes
when I was sophomore in high school and just started
washing dishes kind of really gravitating towards what was happening
on the on the other side of the line. And
then I moved to prep and then you know, started
working on you know, I'd make the holidays and then
helped the butcher butcher down flaming on and then I
you learn how to crack lobsters. And when you have
(20:45):
those epiphanies as like a young chef, like have you
have you seen ratitui se Ratitui? Yeah, that's my suggestion
to everybody, especially if you're young, if you're twenty two
and you've got nothing holding you back, you know, it's
like take your back and take your knife bag and
go max out your credit card. Who cares? But go
to Paris, right, go to New York City, go to
(21:06):
Los Angeles, go cook and a big city with big
name chefs are doing big things right, and absorbed their energy,
absorbed their talent, and absorbed who they are as people
as much as possibly can because all this stuff will
come back to you tenfold later, right, And so those
moments where you crack a lobster and you dip into
like fresh lemon mannies for the first time and you
taste that and you're like, oh my god, where remy
the rat? You know? And his brother he tasted strawberries
(21:28):
and parmesan cheese for the first time and they were like, Oh,
it's amazing. It's had a bunch of experiences like that,
and then, you know, then I waited tables and I
bus tables and really fell in love with the restaurant industry.
And then by the time I went to culinary school
when I was eighteen and went to Johnston and Wales
University in Charleston, South Carolina. When I went to the
culinary school there, I had already had four and a
half years of restaurant experience, and then just just smoked
(21:52):
culinary school, just smoked it and I stayed around for
two more years, and then I got a bachelor's degree
in hotel restaurant management, because you know, anybody can can
I scal it? But you know, a chef that doesn't
know what they're doing with food costs and labor controls
can can bankrupt the restaurants six months so and so
I just felt I felt having that knowledge would be important.
So I stuck around and got a business degree and
(22:12):
then uh and night in two thousands, two thousand fifteen,
they gave me an honorary doctorate, which I thought was
a lovely, lovely gift. So do you make everyone call
you doctor? Now? Should I? Right? I mean, it's kind
of hot. I never really know what to do with it,
you know, I mean should I? I mean, you know,
at least put your driver's license. Yeah. First of all,
what was the name of the restaurant that you started
(22:33):
washing dishes at a place called the Fish Market in Greenville,
South Carolina or green Bowl? Is it still there? No?
I got to close a long time ago, okay, so um.
And then also the school that you went to for
culinary school was at the same school that you got
your business management UM degree in. Yeah, yeah, so Johnson
Wales University, they moved to Charlotte. They closed the campus
(22:56):
and they moved to Charlotte. Maybe I'm almost ten years
after I graduated, so I I gotta you know. So
I got my culinary business degree in in the same
year I moved to New York City. Uh. And then
I think they moved to UM to Charlotte. Must have
been UM in the early two thousands, sometimes two thousand,
four thousand five, but they've been in Charlotte. The campus
(23:17):
is stunning. Uh and uh and yes, the school's healthier
I think in Charlotte. But um, yeah, for sure. I
mean your culinary is really important to kind of get
a good foundation, not everything, to be honest with you right,
like you know, because I I think it's it's really
more about what you can do and not necessarily what
you say you did or where you went. It's really
more about your physical ability, especially in the kitchen. So
(23:40):
you can either go to school or go to the
school of hot stoves. You know, like if you if
you just started to say, you know, I worked in Paris,
I worked in London, I worked in l A, I
worked in New York. I mean that that is that's
better than a culinary degree if you've got the grit
to stand to stick it up. I actually almost went
to College Charleston. The reason why I did because I
remember the ratio was seven to two women to men,
(24:02):
and I was like, there's no way I'm ever going
to graduate if I go to a college that has
this many beautiful women. So I imagine that was very
formative time for you as a cook, but also as
a good looking young Tatif Florin doctor Tati Florid going
to coint Charleston. I lived right behind the College Charleston,
and my apartment was right next to a couple of sororities.
So it's all true, my friend. I mean, you said
(24:24):
everyone should at some point grab their bag of knives
and go to Paris, and and you kind of glazed
over there. You know. I know you went to New
York in Manhattan and Brooklyn, but did you go to
Paris first? Well, I think my first trip to Paris.
I've never cooked in Paris. I've cooked in Italy, I
staged in Italy, and I saw you in London, but
I've I've never never cooked in Paris, although I've been
there many times. You know, and then my first trip
(24:45):
to Paris, I was nineteen. You know, I didn't have
any money whatsoever, and so you know, and you and
and just tasting like baggets of brill and tomatoes and
olive oil is a very very special experience. But just
kind of walking around and just sort of smelling the
culture and soaking up a society that really pays attention
to food. It's such a high level. And you know,
you pick up everything. You graduate, you go up north.
(25:07):
Did you go to Brooklyn first? Yeah? So I graduate
from culinary school and I moved to I mean, I
got a job with Charlie Palmer at Oriel in New
York City, and uh found a dirt, cheap apartment in
in Brooklyn, New York. In uhum got Cobble Hill and
(25:27):
which is now a super hot neighborhood. But it was
right erneath the brighterneath the b QUI every time a
truck would go by the building with shake and and
I can't hear how much it cost, but it was
just it was nothing. And I didn't have any money either. Man.
As I moved to New York City, I signed an
additional loan check like like two thousand five bucks, which
felt like a lot of money at the time. But
I moved to New York City with two thousand five
dollars to my name, and that was first month's rent,
(25:50):
last month's rent, the security deposit, and about five hundred
dollars until I got a paycheck. Right But to me, like,
I knew that that was the next step, regardless of
how painful it was going to be for the short term,
but I knew that was the next step. I had
to be a man. Are you the executive chef at
the point in which Food Network comes and kind of
(26:10):
scoops you up. I was twenty five years old and
I was the executive chef of a restaurant called Sibo
And it's still there, which I'm very proud of. It's
on the second Avenue, right on the Constitutor City, right
there on the east side, and you know, uh, contemporary
Italian and we were were getting like huge buzz all
over the city and uh, you know, just really kind
(26:32):
of cracking into fantastic Italian food and making it up
a lot of it, honestly, because at five, you know,
I had been to Italy a couple of times, but
not to the point where I had really cooked there,
because that was a little bit later in in my
life moment. I was almost thirty and uh um, just
really loving it. And then Food Network. You know, one
(26:53):
of the executives from the network happened to be in
the restaurant. It was really the right place at the
right time story, and she handed me her card and say, hey, listen,
do you want to come? Do you know the news
next week with us? And I jumped on it, and
for years I always said yes. I prepped my own food,
I showed up on time, I knew my recipe cold,
and just got better at every single time. This is
(27:14):
like in the infancy of the Food Network, though, right, yeah, man,
this is dude, this is this is okay. So the
first gig was news, you said, yeah. They had this
live news show called in Food Today with Donna Hanover
who happened to be Giuliani's like now ex wife, and
David Rosengarten. It was called in Food Today, so they
(27:35):
would do sort of a recap what was happening in
like the news food world, and then at the end
of it they would have a chef to a live demo.
Got it, Do you remember what you cooked that first
that first time on TV. I do man, I do.
I did this like Morrel, salad, morele and water cross.
This episode is making me hungry. Okay, so go do
this news thing. But when does it pivot into like
(27:57):
they gave you a show or you got to like
had to be the focal point of said show. Yeah,
that was two years later. So and then between they
were they were using me to fill in on every
show that they had, because most of the shows they
had at that point where we're all about guests coming
in to do things right. So Sarah Malton I was.
(28:18):
I did her show a bunch. You know. I did
Ready Set Cook, which is, you know, precursor to Iron
Chef and Chops now, you know, the sort of a
blind box ingredient cook off. I did that a bunch,
and so I was on I mean I was on
television once a week anyway, I mean, chef is your
all these like really really early infancy food network shows.
(28:39):
And then they offered they said, hey, you know you
want to do this full time and they gave me
they offered me a development deal that was like twenty
thousand bucks twenty something like kind of you know, not
not nothing but not a lot. But it was just
in the I was I'd hit that point in my career,
my my culinary career. I was just I was just
probably a little burnt out anyway, because you know, was
(29:00):
twenty five and I'd be cooking professionally. Stuff was like
fourteen fifteen years old, and uh and well so this
is more and I was just looking for something different
to do anyway, and I just felt I felt to myself, Um,
you know, if I don't do this, because I can
always go back and cook. If I don't do this,
I'll never know what it's like, and I feel like
I'll regret it for the rest of my life. I
turned in my resignation and signed up full time with
(29:23):
Food Network, and the rest is kind of history. I mean,
we did our first show is called Food nine one one,
and I was the first chef on Food Network to
not wear a chef's coat, okay because every chef you know,
to me, it felt like a Superman cave. So you know,
I could do it because I have this jacket on
and you don't, and maybe you can't, right, So I
(29:43):
want to sort of change the storyline a little bit
where it was just me as an everyday guy. We
could go into your house and show you how to
cook things, right, because like that's where the rubber meets
the road when it comes to connecting with people. How
can you help them in their own home, because that's
where they're cooking every day, right, and that's the audience
that's consuming your content. So help them in their own space.
(30:03):
So we started doing this cool show where I would
travel around the country and help people out with their
everyday food emergencies, and and you know, it was a
huge success. We were Amala Gassis leading for got three
or four years, and and we got we shot ninety
episodes a year for six years. That's so you've quit
working in Manhattan, when do you make the trick over
(30:24):
to San Francisco. I was in New York City for
fourteen years. I met my lovely wife, Tolan at the
Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, in two thousand
and four. She was living in Manhattan at the time,
and I was still shooting television pretty heavily. So we
started dating after the festival. Back in Manhattan. Two years later,
we got married and got pregnant and then figuring out
(30:46):
what my next step was going to be. I figure out, like,
I've been in New York City for a long time too,
and I love California like you you love California. Yeah,
but I grew up here though, So yeah, I grew
up in the South and you know, specifically shooting with
Food Network. So every time we go to California, I
just imagine myself living there. She's from Marinn and that's
where we're living now, just north of San Francisco, just
(31:07):
across the gold Gate Bridge. Her parents live here, and
she grew up here. So when we were dating, we
would come to your folks and hang out in San
Francisco for a couple of days and and I'm like,
there no reason in the world I wouldn't just want
to love living here. So so when we were expecting
our first child together, I said, let's just jump. I
think life is short. Life is for living. And we
moved to California in two thousand seven. Awesome. It's so
(31:28):
funny because I do this show a lot with actors
or musicians, and the one common denominator that we found
with all like really successful people is that they all
started in the service industry. Yeah, it teaches you you
know how to hustle. It's like it's a lot of
(31:48):
late nights, but it's also flexible in terms of like
you can go make your audition or you can go
play your gig and get someone to cover for you.
And this is the first episode where we had someone
that actually continued doing the food industry thing and became
uber uber successful. So I love It's become like full
circle here. I'm not a very good cook. I like
to cook, and i like to mess around in the kitchen,
(32:10):
and I'm obsessed with all that is food porn and
Food Network and everything. You watch a lot of these shows,
and every chef has that kind of their own personality.
Do you have people that you watch on Food Network
who you're like, man, I really I really like their
style or I like their persona. Who are you a
(32:30):
fan of in the Food Network world? Ray Drummond, the
Pioneer Woman's I love her stuff. She's so great and
so it's easy to listen to and and I love
her storytelling, and I love the fact that they can
you know, she goes out in the field and and
she you know, she was so it's not just sort
of like locked into a studio that's actually they shoot
some of the surroundings and that's part of the story.
(32:50):
UM and Garden is just you know, she's she's she's
the queen. Nobody's better than her. Um. I love her
food style and I love her her direct to camera
con it ends so just so refreshing to watch, and
and her ability to kind of make um make messy
look beautiful and you know, and I think a lot
of people feel very confident, but it's not about perfection.
(33:10):
It's about flavor and and so just making it taste
really really great and kind of play it together and
in a way that feels effortless. So I think that's
always kind of fun to watch. Um. You know, as
far as like the competition, stuff goes like a Duff
versus Buddy, which I think is just so hysterical because
I know both of them. Duff is a really good
friend of mine, so I'm team Duff all the way.
(33:30):
I think that he's such a super talent and even
just him, you know, making cakes on a regular basis,
That brother is a fantastic chef. He's an amazing chef.
He's a great cook. So I I like watching him
cook a lot, you know, Bobby is just always just
you know, he's just He's an endless well of culinary
talent and inspiration and hustle and and he's funny. And
(33:52):
I love what he's doing on on Instagram. I think
it's a little like Curb Your Enthusiasm as cooking series
he's working on. I think those are super funny. You know,
everybody has their own little thing, everybody, And that's what
I love about Food Network. There's something for everybody. You know,
when when you log on and it's like you guys
got a huge audience and and uh and and Rachel's
kind of bouncing back in and out, and you know,
(34:12):
the Chops franchise is huge, and and so there's always
something really cool to gravitate towards. When you started dumping
jumping the Food Network, there's somebody that you're gonna love
and and and that's why I love about so you
always kind of connect with the personality first, and and
that's what makes the network so successful. The very personality driven.
This is that moment that I think separates a lot
of people, right because there's a lot of people that
(34:33):
have great personalities, but they don't really have the background
or the depth of knowledge to keep keep it going
for ten seasons. And this is where this and this
moment right here, what I'm saying right now is that
moment where like culinary professionals, because right now it feels
like that thing that part of Nashville is thinking about doing. Yeah,
(34:55):
we'll just jump into a cook and show will be great.
We'll make what mommy used to make in the kitchen.
You're gonna last six episodes, right, and you're gonna run
out of gas because you've got you because you don't
really have just um a lifetime of cooking knowledge that
you could walk up to a counter of ingredients and
ice cold, talk about every bit of it and ice cold,
(35:15):
make an amazing meal and thirty minutes and know what
that's all about. If you have the enthusiasm for it,
that's the most important thing because that will drive you right.
So then then there's the personality side of it, and
no one's gonna watch a dud in the kitchen, doesn't
matter how good you are. So you have to be
very engaging with a lot of people. And then the
third part about this is you have to know what
you're talking about. You have to know what you're talking
(35:37):
about and you have to be the smartest person in
the room when it comes to cooking, and you have
to have the authority to be able to, you know,
write did everything sixteen cookbooks, right, So your curiosity, your
ability to write great recipes, testing them out thoroughly, and
then you could literally just create another season at thirteen
episodes and another season at thirteen episodes and never run
(36:00):
out of gas when it comes to creating great content.
If you have to play fake it till you make
it for a little while until you get to that
point that you're incredibly competent with it. That's just reading, reading, reading, right.
I have over a thousand cookbooks in the house, right,
and so so you you you kind of pick up
a little technique here and ingredient there, and some sort
of interesting tip here, and you fold those with a
(36:21):
new position. So so you're not knocked anybody off, but
you have sort of a fresh, pinpointed place on that
like that. That's the difference between you know, hopping on
Food Network for a couple in this because you know
you're you're you've got a good name, and then surviving
and lasting for a really really long time. And that's
just having the depth of knowledge to be able to
just cook forever. Love it, Tyler. I want to be
(36:41):
respectful of your time. But before I let you, guys,
wanted to do a rapid fire question with you. Is
that good? Let's do it all right? Rapid fire questions
with Tyler Florence. Number one. Did you ever have a
poster hanging on your bedroom wall? Yeah, bunch man, it
was fair faucet ANDLDS up on. Yeah. That's a good
combo right there, like the really good fair faster and
(37:02):
you know what I'm talking about, the one piece and
she's got this like root beer brown one piece bathing
suit on and like with like that malibu like tousled hair. Yeah, yeah, exactly,
like rock and roll and pretty girls. And that was
my life, man, That's what I was into. The first
concert you ever went to in the vein of music,
(37:22):
if I say sean On, you know what I'm talking about. Yeah, yeah,
So I went to go see sean On my dad
uh In one of his you know iterations of his career,
he sold advertising for local radio station in upstate South Carolina,
and we used to go to we used to go
he shows all the time. As a matter of fact,
my first big concert was Kiss. I want to go
see Kiss in nineteen seventy nine with your makeup on.
(37:42):
So they Kiss Alive Tour, she kiss Alive two tour
and uh and and yeah it was. It was amazing.
I got I got dressed up as Paul Stanley with
a big star and uh, yeah it was great. Man.
Were were my older brother and I were part of
the Kiss army and we used to play play tennis
rackets to Kiss albums all the time and the Rock
and Roll a ninth party every day. Make model first car.
(38:03):
My first car was a nineteen sixty six Comic Capri.
I was a Mercury. It was a tank. I think
you got maybe eight miles to the gallon. I bought
it from my grandfather for five hundred dollars that I
made myself when I was fifteen years old, washing disiance.
Who would you call to get you out of jail?
I would call my wife. I would call my wife
because like in in uh and I either, you know,
(38:24):
regardless of the circumstances of how I ended up in jail. Um.
You know, she first of all, she would just like
calmly say, okay, let's take care of business, and then
she'd give it to me when I when I when
I got home, because obviously I was doing something naughty.
Nobody better than Planet Earth and a hustle to my wife. Nobody.
I think you're the first person everyone always answers with
either my manager or my my assistant. You're the first
(38:45):
person that said the right answer, which is your significant other? Yeah,
I'd call my wife. If I called my manager, if
I called my agent, or call my lawyer. They called
my wife. Let's save the quarter. Yeah, what's your favorite
pizza topping? I can't tell you. I'm really in the
chili oil, right if we had to go top top
top top top, you know, like to me, so, um,
I am so a chili head and so like drizzling
(39:07):
chili oil over top of you know a really great uh,
like you know, Pepperoni pizza has like handmade sharko three
on top of it, or if even if it's just
like a white pie with like you know, clam and
Dutch mel chili oil, broccoli, bacon, Um, you know, mushroom
chili oil is just I use chili oil and everything.
What is your go to hangover cure in terms of
(39:29):
food green juice, man, green nutrition. Yeah, man, yeah, well no, no,
it was seriously man, because like you know, you want
to say biscuits and gravy. You want to say where
those run sharrows? Right? You want to say like a
greasy eggs now, which you want to say that. But
I can tell you if I, if I've had a
little too much the next day, is just a big
(39:50):
blast of nutrition in my body. Just so I'm I'm
doing my body a favor because those greasy eggs may
feel good for a second, but they're not gonna do
anything for your hangover. Yeah, the last one. Waffles are pancakes, yo,
waffles for pancakes. Man, Um, waffles are pancakes. I'm gonna
have to side with my twelve year old son. I'm
saying waffles. I'm saying waffles all day because pancakes, man,
(40:11):
because you know, I like the I like the crunchy
bets with with the waffles, and you can do a
lot with them and and pancakes. And you know it's
the sort of monochromatic on your palette when you first
buy and your last by it's all kind of the
same thing. Fluffy delicious, don't get me wrong, but for
that crispy, delicious texture waffles all day. Tella Florence, thank
(40:32):
you so much for being on the Wells Cast. Your
story is amazing, super inspirational. I've met you before. You're
a great guy in and out of the kitchen. So again,
thank you so much for all you do. Man, my
absolute pleasure man. And you know these like positive broadcast
right now or exactly what people want to hear. And
I gotta tell you and conclusion right now, there's an
(40:53):
opportunity to be innovative and start that company that you
always wanted to start, that one that you and your
best friend have been talking about for years. Now is
the time to do it. Absolutely. If you want to
follow Tyler, you can on I guess all social media is.
You're just at Tyler Florence, right, I'll just one word
yep at Tyler Florence and then check out our new
(41:14):
YouTube channels. It's wolf it down and then wolf it
down I t K which means in the kitchen. Yeah,
if you go follow him on Instagram in his bio,
he's got a link to the YouTube channel, So just
go there, give him a follow, and then go watch
the YouTube channel. Is there anything that you are working
on or wanting to promote that I didn't ask you about.
We've got a brand new restaurant coming up to Chase
Center with the Gold State Warriors sometime this year. Fingers Crossed.
(41:35):
Food Network is awesome as always, great food truck race
Thursday's nine o'clock. The new season's out. Yeah, we're just
we're just loving everybody. Man all right, Tyler, thanks so
much for taking the time. Stay safe out there. Yeah,
hopefully we'll we'll have you on again, all by, Thanks
so much. By take care of YouTube. See I'm hungry,
now go make some food. Subscribe to Wealthcast on I
Heart Radio, Apple Podcasts, or anywhere you get your podcasts.
(41:58):
It's the Internet.
This is a Wells cast with Wells Adams and I
heart radio podcast What Everybody Up. Wells guests coming Back
actually live from my home studio because I don't want
to leave the house. Very excited about day's episode. If
you are one of those people who loves food porn,
(00:21):
you are pumped about my guest today. This is a
Food Network icon. Okay, he's got a bunch of shows
on the Food Network. He's got an amazing restaurant up
in San Francisco. He graduated from the College of Culinary
Arts of Charleston, South Carolina. I know nothing about colleges,
(00:42):
but I can only assume that's the Harvard of Chopping
he's been seeing on Globe Trekker Food nine one one,
How to Boil Water, co hosted Worst Cooks in America
and Tyler's Ultimate. Today's guest is wait for it, Tyler Florence.
Very excited about the show today one. I want to
find find out what's going on in his life. How
the hell he became one of the most popular chefs
(01:04):
on the Food Network. We're I can only assume is
a very very coveted role to get in the culinary world.
Also being a chef and being in the times that
we're living right now. I want to know what we
all should be doing to get through this weird quarantine.
What should we be looking for in the grocery stores.
What should we be cooking? Does he have a zombie
(01:25):
apocalypse meal? I don't know, maybe he does. Anyways, Sit back, relax,
and get ready to probably be hungry at the end
of it. Coming up in just a couple of minutes.
Tyler Florence right here on the Wells Cast. All right
(01:52):
back on the Wells Cast, very excited to have the man,
the myth, the legend of the Kitchen on the show.
Tyler Florence, How are you, my man? I'm great, well els,
how are you? I'm doing good. I mean, we're in
a weird time right now, and I'm actually I think
this is a very apropos time to have you on
the show. You know, I started in the service industry.
(02:13):
People know me as a bartender, and anyone who's working
in the service industry right now is taking a huge hit.
I mean, you own a fantastic restaurant up in the
Bay Area. What is it like in the service industry
right now? Is it completely dead? Is everyone getting fired.
What's going on? You know, it's a combination of everything
you just said. Yes, we're dead, um, yes, we've laid
(02:35):
people off, and and it's it's had. It's a horror show,
to be honest with you, right, and we're trying to
figure out what we can do. You know, we're normally
a very busy restaurant in San Francisco, thank god, kno
come Wood, and have been since we've opened. We're about
to celebrate our tenth anniversary wait for our tavern in
San Francisco, and we we love our associates. We've got
a hundred and fifty people, most of them been with
(02:56):
us for years, and uh, you know, and and that
that's front of the how that's wait staff, bartenders, some
of our front of house managers or some as or
chefs or pastry chefs. We've got employees have been with
us for years, and now we have to look on
the eye and say, listen, we just literally don't have
the cash to keep you on the books for longer
than say, you know, two weeks. And we tried really
(03:16):
really hard just to kind of keep everybody on board.
And so what we've done from a business standpoint is
scaled down tremendously because we you know, at the end
of the day, we want there to be something that
we can hire them back for. So we're trying to
keep our expenses down to a minimum. Right now, we're
doing takeout. We're exclusively on caviare by no means is
that a windfall from a cash standpoint, but something it's
(03:37):
something to keep about. About twelve people employed in the
kitchen right now, and we just got a food truck,
right so, you know the idea with that you could
do curb side to pick up. We're trying to create
more curbs where you can pick up our food. Right.
So the the food truck is bouncing around from neighborhood
to neighborhood, and we have a very tight protocol as
far as getting the food to people through a window,
right So the food is cooked inside the truck, but's
(03:58):
boxed in this bag. In the bag just tape shut
and it goes through a windows. There's very minimal contact.
We're just trying to keep that going. You know, we're
looking at how we can start to cater hospitals next
week with our food truck. And then it feels dangerous,
but you know those people have to eat too, so
we're just trying to be creative about it and and
figure out what we can do to just stay alive.
(04:18):
That's the restaurant's side for sure, and that's everybody. It's
a scary time. And like we've been sending my brother
and I've been sending pizzas and sandwiches to all the
e R doctors because those guys are just like they're
just they're the entire time. And I think that's a
really cool thing you guys are doing. And hopefully this
will be over sooner rather than later, although I don't
(04:38):
know if if it is or not. On the other
side of things, I wanted to ask you, you know,
it's scary time to go to the grocery store and
you can't go to farmers markets. I feel like you
are a guy who I assume goes to the farmers
markets and grocery stores and finds things to cook amazing
meals in your restaurants. Do you have suggestions for people
out there trying to figure out what the hell to
(05:00):
go get, you know, in times of crazy long quarantine. Yeah,
I mean, first of all, I would just tell everybody
to simplify your menus, Right, I would really focus on
things that have a lot to do with rice and
I have a lot to do with pasta, or have
a lot to do with dried beans. Right, we always have,
you know, a couple of pounds or always like you
in the last two weeks, we always have, you know,
a couple of pounds of beans. They're they're soaking on
(05:21):
the countertop too, so we can turn that into you know,
a chili they'll last a couple of days, where you know,
a candelini bean soup that we can last for a
couple of days. And then like the ric thing has
been really important for us because you know, you can
turn that to a stir fry. You can make just
sort of a big sort of like you know, saute
pan yummy mash up with like veggies and spinach and
chicken and rice and you know, splash and karaki sauce
(05:43):
on it and something have have something like a nice
big bowl of something warm. And then pasta. For sure,
We've been crushing a lot of pasta. And the big
question I've gotten from people is like can I make
something and then freeze it and then pull it back
out again? What can I make and freeze, and my
suggestion is to don't do that at all, only because
especially if you put something if you make a pasta dish,
the carbohydrates and the posta will absorb the sauce and
(06:05):
then by the time you reheat it, it's going to
be dry as a bone. So my suggestion is to
make things individually, like the ingredients, right. Like, so let's
just say you're gonna, you know, go deep with three
or four pounds of ground turkey and then cook that
with you know, diced onion and garlic and fresh time
and olive oil and you know, a little bit of
salt pepper, and then let that cool off and then
take the cooked ground turkey and then bag that and
(06:26):
then freeze that. And you can do the same thing
with vegetables, right, just to get ahead of it, like
you know, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, broccoli, you know, green beans,
you name it, roasted on the sheep pan and then
take it out back. And then when you're looking for
something to make, all of a sudden you have these
individual ingredients and then you're going back to you know, beans,
pasta and rice. Right, you know, what can I do
with this? Can I make Can I make some tacos tonight?
(06:47):
Can I make you know, pasta? You know, with ground turkey,
you can go bowling, as you can go tacos. You
can do so many different things with it. So I
think that's sort of like the smart call is to
not make something ahead of time, but make the individual
ingredients at a time and then kind of make something
that feels hot and fresh right there at the moment,
depending on what you're into that day. I love it
almost like a Mexican kitchen, you know, or like all
(07:09):
the same ingredients makes seventeen million different dishes. Kinda kind
of absolutely. So here's my my issue. We went and
stocked up the refrigerator and the pantry, you know, when
we knew that we were going to be staying at
home a lot. Now I tend to like board eat,
you know, like it's like, why do I do, Like
I'm on the seventeenth season of West World, Let's just
(07:31):
go make something else. And I imagine for you it's
even harder because the stuff that I'm making is in
any good, But the stuff that you make is always
really good. So is it hard for you to like
not be like board cooking constantly during the quarantine. We
have a lot of potato chips here in the house.
I know that for sure, And you know I have
to you know, preteen kids. I have a twelve ye
(07:53):
old son and love ye old daughter and and there,
you know, I don't know where the snacks are going,
but there, you know, there, you know we used every
day there is one less big bag of potato ships.
So we're trying our best just to make sure that
we're you know, that those things end up becoming you know,
like a treat instead of a full sit down gorge
fest watching television. And my look and you look down.
I've eaten two huge bags of lace potato ships, watching
(08:15):
West World over and over again. So we're trying our
best just to make sure there's like scheduled meal times,
and I think that's important. Like thank god, our schools
have finally gotten it together with Zoom, but this has
been strange for everybody in schools just aren't really prepped
for this kind of at home teaching. So the first
two weeks have been we're kind of rough figuring out
what to do. Like they were sending you know, work
(08:36):
via email, but all the instructions were really complicated and
nobody really knew what to do. But now there's actually
Zoom classrooms that our kids do every day. At least
there's a beginning, in the middle and an end to
the day where it feels like there's some sort of
structure and we're not getting up And so this is
what I would tell everybody. Just get up and treat
it like it's a normal day, Like get up, get
a shower, go exercise right like, like make a meal
(08:57):
and then think about lunch. Boredom can really uh, you
fill in the gaps of what you would normally do
from a scheduling standpoint. So I think just being very
aware of your day and what you're eating will make
that recovery from a gym standpoint once all of this
is over a little easier for everybody. But yeah, I'm
with you. I mean, like some of the first couple
of days, we're like, okay, well I just felt like
(09:19):
I was eating a lot, But now we're just trying
to get to a really deep routine. Yeah, I'm glad
the Zoom thing is there, especially for my sisters. I
have nine nieces and nephews, and one sister sent me
a meme where it was like homeschooling is going well.
Two kids have been suspended for fighting and the teacher
has been fired for drinking on the job. Yeah, yeah,
(09:41):
I mean, people, this is so weird. I mean all
of this is so weird for people, man, that you know,
people are at home just just trying to, you know,
make the day go by faster or or be a
little less anxious and and honestly, like whatever it takes,
you know what I mean, Like, if you're in the Edibles,
do it, man, If you want a glass of wine,
do it. Like, other than just just starting to get
stirred crazy, just try to enjoy yourself a little bit.
(10:02):
I don't think there's anything wrong with God. I would
rather be a little buzzed and then really anxious, you know,
because I think the anxiety for a lot of people
just because you just get bombarded with the news. Turn
the news off. That would be my other thing. Like
it's not going to change. The news is not going
to change today or tomorrow or any time in the
near future. It's just gonna be new stats that aren't
gonna be good to hear or listen to, and just
(10:23):
gonna do crazy things with your brain. I would minimize
like how much news you're consuming on a daily basis,
so you're not just sort of spinning out of control,
and just try to make try to make the new
normal normal exercises, So like yesterday I had ten miles
on my pelts on and uh and and I've got
sort of a busy day today, but I'm gonna schedule
that around like seven eight o'clock tonight. I wanna do
another ten miles just because it makes me feel so
(10:45):
much better. My head is so clear when I've had
some exercise and some really kind of pumping some oxygen
in your blood. So that that would be my my
recommendation from everybody. Man. I know it's weird, but get
in the kitchen, cook something, you know, hang out with
your kids, and make the something that they'll never a
they'll never forget it anyway, but make it, you know,
a moment where you all came together as as your
(11:06):
tribe and and really you know, created some bonds that
will last in the rest of your life. If you're
making banana bread, if you're making you know, scrambling eggs,
if you're making spaghetti sauce and you bring the kids in,
you guys are doing this together and they feel like
they're part of the solution. Um it makes them less anxious.
And instead of watching news, maybe watch one of the
shows that you're on, because you are on a lot
of television shows, Globe Trekker Food, How to Boil Water, Work,
(11:31):
Cooks in America. And then I was looking at your
Instagram earlier today and you've got a new YouTube series out, yeah,
wolf it Down. Yeah yeah, so so we just launched
a new Wolf of Down, a new YouTube brand which
is sort of a multimedia platform. We're very excited about it,
and we have there's two YouTube channels they're going with
the brand. Right now, there's wolf it Down and you
can look that up on YouTube. And then then and
(11:52):
then there's wolf it Down I t K, which stands
for in the Kitchen. So Wolf it Down is gonna
be a travel and adventure series and sort of like
a behind the scenes look at the high profile culinary world.
And then the Wolf of Down I t K is
just us in the kitchen, you know, really hardcore d
I Y cooking projects which are always always so much
fun to kind of get into. So we're doing that.
(12:12):
Wolf it Down dot Com is up in live right now.
Our first newsletter goes out next week, which is very exciting,
and then our retail store is gonna open up soon.
We've got some fun collaborations right now, because like there's
so many people that are from a brand standpoint, Like,
whoever you're into, whatever relationships you have, you know, make
make a bonding relationship with those people. Call them up
(12:33):
and say, hey, listen, let's work on a thing together.
Let's make a limited edition run of something, because everybody
wants to feel like they have some connection. And and
those branding relationships right now will carry you on forever.
If they know that you were there for them in
the rough times, they'll be there for you when time
is really really good too. We're reaching out to all
of our branding partners and saying, hey, what can we
(12:54):
do big and small? Like tonight we're doing um a
live telecasts with one of our wine partners, this big
wine club called Cooper Salk. They didn't have any money
because they just like close all the restaurants and laid
off five thousand people. And I'm like, dude, don't worry
about It's not about money right now. It's about us,
you know, doing things together as a group, because like
we've been working together for years and you were there
for me, and now I'm there for you. Right. So anyway,
(13:16):
we're doing a live broadcast tonight with Cooper Stalk, which
is gonna be great, and and and all. This was
starting to wrap itself up into kind of a new
brand right now that we're very excited about called wolf
It Down, which is cool, and it's it's about, you know,
wolf it down. It's sort of like taking a crusty
piece of bread and making sure you get the last
little bit of delicious sauce out of the bowl. Right.
It's it's that philosophy in life and just like making
(13:36):
sure that you're you're seeing everything, you're getting everything, you're
doing everything, you're tasting everything, and and it's gonna be
a really fun project to work on. I mean, you've
been on a ton of television shows on Food Network
and stuff, and I imagine that is a very coveted
position to be in in the culinary world. I mean,
everyone I would assume would want their own television show.
(14:00):
I don't know if anyone told you kind of what
the premise of the show is, but it's an origin
story show. I like to find out how people got
to where they are now, how did you get that
blue check mark? How did you get like the seventeen
different television shows? And then people can use that as
a blueprint in their life whatever it is, whether it's
cooking or acting or you know, being accountant of how
to become successful. So I want to take a quick break,
(14:21):
and when we come back, I want to find out
how the hell you became such a big name in
the world of culinary television. Okay, you got it? Stick around, guys,
(14:42):
all right back on the Wells Cast. I have Tyler
Florence on the show. He owns the very popular restaurant
in santances Are called Wayfair Tavern. He's been seen on
so many different television shows like Globe Tracker, Food One,
How to Boil Water, Worst Cooks in a Erica. He's
got a YouTube series out right now called Wolf Fit Down.
(15:04):
And I just want to know how the hell you
got here. I know that you're a Southern guy, right
like I. You went to school in the South. That
were you born in South Carolina? Yeah? I was born
in South Carolina, and uh, I you know, I grew
up in a small town called Greenville, which is northwestern
part of the state. And if you're from Greenville, you
(15:25):
said Greenville, not Greenville, It's Greenville, So Greenville, South Carolina.
And then I went I went to culinary school in Charleston.
I was there for about four and a half years,
going to school and hanging out. And then I moved
to New York City after that and that was in
and moved to Brooklyn, New York and lived in Brooklyn
for almost ten years, and then then moved to Manhattan,
and you know, worked with a bunch of restaurants, and
(15:45):
then I kind of stumbled into the Food Network a
long time ago. Man, this is my twenty fourth year
on Food Network, twenty four years, and it's been it's
been a crazy ride, you know. I I feel incredibly
lucky and grateful to say that my career and maybe
maybe two dozen other people have had so of a
(16:06):
similar track. It's one of those things that once you
get there, because I've seen a lot of people get there,
it's really hard to stay there, right And that's the
most important thing is making sure that you've got the
ability to take those opportunities when they come and really
rise to the occasion. From a branding standpoint and stay
there and and and do really great things and be
(16:26):
that person of people that you that you know you are,
even if you're growing into that position. Just just to commit,
Like I think that's the most important thing, just to
commit who you are from a branding tracks standpoint. But
I mean, it's it's a long story. Lots of details
in there, you know, but but who went and wear
But I mean, but for the most part, you know,
we started out as an executive chef when I was
twenty five years old in Manhattan and one of the
(16:50):
executives from Food Network stumbled into the restaurant that was
the executive chef of and you know, really like what
we're doing from a food standpoint. And I was out
walking around the tables and saying hi to people, and
and she handed me her card and say, hey, listen,
you know, we got this brand new food channel on
And of course I had heard of it because it
was blown up in New York City, in l A
and Chicago. And so I did one guest appearance in
(17:10):
n and that was it. And so you know when
two years after that, I had I had my first show.
Let's rewind the reel. It's just a little bit, so
like the years, I don't know, nineteen eighty five year
in Greenville, South Carolina. Are you an only child? Do
you have siblings? Are your parents chefs? What's happening in
the family. I have three brothers, there's four of us altogether,
(17:32):
and uh and my my, my parents aren't chefs. You know.
My dad had a lot of different jobs going up.
You know, he's always just sort of a fighter and
a hustler and doing all kinds of cool things. And
my mom was an accountant her whole life, so you know,
she was the interesting thing about my mom's position, right,
So she was the accountant for the local NBC station
in Greensville, South Carolina growing up, and so she was
(17:54):
a single mom because my parents divorced when I was
I guess I was in third grade. And so she
would take us to the studio, and my older brother
and I would just run around the studio while she
was working, and we would literally sit in the control
room and watch the director cut the news live. So
in this interesting way, like by the time when I
when I got to the television world, I felt very
(18:14):
comfortable being in a room with cameras and televisions, and
I kind of understood the positions and what who did what,
and and obviously from a culinary standpoint, I kind of
had that unlock. Now standing in front of the camera
and cooking and talking is a whole different skill that
needs to be sharpened as you go along. Definitely took
a while to kind of get good at that, but
being in the studio itself, I surprisingly felt very, very
(18:37):
comfortable with it early on. So grew up in South Carolina,
got three brothers, parents not really cooks, but you know,
growing up in the South, everybody eats a lot and
cooks a lot, and so there was always you know,
hot left hot fried chicken popping out of kitchen someplace,
and uh and yeah, I mean you know when in
the South everything is like brown and good. So did
(18:57):
you know, I mean, you went to culinaries. So there
was a thought process too, this is what I want
to go do. I assume you knew you wanted to
do it. I don't know. And sometime in the middle
of high school, were you cooking a lot as a kid? Yeah,
so I started cooking just for fun, I mean, you know,
and I remember when I was in like seventh grade
or yeah, seventh grade in my locker, you know, because
there was the everybody puts pictures up in their locker,
(19:19):
and I had at pictures of hot chicks, uh, Tony
Tony Hawk and no kidding, Julie Child and that that's
what the inside of my locker looked like when I
was a kid, just because like I just I just
really loved cooking. I just thought it was amazing. So
on the weekends, you know, we would watch we'd sort
of flip back and forth from you know, cartoons to
what was happening on PPS and and I just really
(19:40):
gravitated towards that. I just thought it was fun and
uh and really just started kind of cooking along with
my parents and my on my dad's side, the family.
It's an interesting kind of cocktail between you know, on
my mom's side being remotely and sort of this the
inside of a studio capacity, but also on my dad's
side because my dad was the youngest of eight kids,
and so I mean I have a really big family
on his side, and so every weekend was somebody's thing.
(20:03):
Every weekend was a birthday party or you know, anniversary
or or something. So we're always cooking, packing up food,
in the car and then taking these things to these
big huge pot look things um all over the place,
like what they call covered dish in in in the South. Um.
So we're always just sort of rehearsing what ultimately became
practice of being a restaurant early on as a kid.
(20:23):
And I started working in restaurants professionally Wants fifteen and
I started washing dishes. Yeah, So I started washing dishes
when I was sophomore in high school and just started
washing dishes kind of really gravitating towards what was happening
on the on the other side of the line. And
then I moved to prep and then you know, started
working on you know, I'd make the holidays and then
helped the butcher butcher down flaming on and then I
you learn how to crack lobsters. And when you have
(20:45):
those epiphanies as like a young chef, like have you
have you seen ratitui se Ratitui? Yeah, that's my suggestion
to everybody, especially if you're young, if you're twenty two
and you've got nothing holding you back, you know, it's
like take your back and take your knife bag and
go max out your credit card. Who cares? But go
to Paris, right, go to New York City, go to
(21:06):
Los Angeles, go cook and a big city with big
name chefs are doing big things right, and absorbed their energy,
absorbed their talent, and absorbed who they are as people
as much as possibly can because all this stuff will
come back to you tenfold later, right, And so those
moments where you crack a lobster and you dip into
like fresh lemon mannies for the first time and you
taste that and you're like, oh my god, where remy
the rat? You know? And his brother he tasted strawberries
(21:28):
and parmesan cheese for the first time and they were like, Oh,
it's amazing. It's had a bunch of experiences like that,
and then, you know, then I waited tables and I
bus tables and really fell in love with the restaurant industry.
And then by the time I went to culinary school
when I was eighteen and went to Johnston and Wales
University in Charleston, South Carolina. When I went to the
culinary school there, I had already had four and a
half years of restaurant experience, and then just just smoked
(21:52):
culinary school, just smoked it and I stayed around for
two more years, and then I got a bachelor's degree
in hotel restaurant management, because you know, anybody can can
I scal it? But you know, a chef that doesn't
know what they're doing with food costs and labor controls
can can bankrupt the restaurants six months so and so
I just felt I felt having that knowledge would be important.
So I stuck around and got a business degree and
(22:12):
then uh and night in two thousands, two thousand fifteen,
they gave me an honorary doctorate, which I thought was
a lovely, lovely gift. So do you make everyone call
you doctor? Now? Should I? Right? I mean, it's kind
of hot. I never really know what to do with it,
you know, I mean should I? I mean, you know,
at least put your driver's license. Yeah. First of all,
what was the name of the restaurant that you started
(22:33):
washing dishes at a place called the Fish Market in Greenville,
South Carolina or green Bowl? Is it still there? No?
I got to close a long time ago, okay, so um.
And then also the school that you went to for
culinary school was at the same school that you got
your business management UM degree in. Yeah, yeah, so Johnson
Wales University, they moved to Charlotte. They closed the campus
(22:56):
and they moved to Charlotte. Maybe I'm almost ten years
after I graduated, so I I gotta you know. So
I got my culinary business degree in in the same
year I moved to New York City. Uh. And then
I think they moved to UM to Charlotte. Must have
been UM in the early two thousands, sometimes two thousand,
four thousand five, but they've been in Charlotte. The campus
(23:17):
is stunning. Uh and uh and yes, the school's healthier
I think in Charlotte. But um, yeah, for sure. I
mean your culinary is really important to kind of get
a good foundation, not everything, to be honest with you right,
like you know, because I I think it's it's really
more about what you can do and not necessarily what
you say you did or where you went. It's really
more about your physical ability, especially in the kitchen. So
(23:40):
you can either go to school or go to the
school of hot stoves. You know, like if you if
you just started to say, you know, I worked in Paris,
I worked in London, I worked in l A, I
worked in New York. I mean that that is that's
better than a culinary degree if you've got the grit
to stand to stick it up. I actually almost went
to College Charleston. The reason why I did because I
remember the ratio was seven to two women to men,
(24:02):
and I was like, there's no way I'm ever going
to graduate if I go to a college that has
this many beautiful women. So I imagine that was very
formative time for you as a cook, but also as
a good looking young Tatif Florin doctor Tati Florid going
to coint Charleston. I lived right behind the College Charleston,
and my apartment was right next to a couple of sororities.
So it's all true, my friend. I mean, you said
(24:24):
everyone should at some point grab their bag of knives
and go to Paris, and and you kind of glazed
over there. You know. I know you went to New
York in Manhattan and Brooklyn, but did you go to
Paris first? Well, I think my first trip to Paris.
I've never cooked in Paris. I've cooked in Italy, I
staged in Italy, and I saw you in London, but
I've I've never never cooked in Paris, although I've been
there many times. You know, and then my first trip
(24:45):
to Paris, I was nineteen. You know, I didn't have
any money whatsoever, and so you know, and you and
and just tasting like baggets of brill and tomatoes and
olive oil is a very very special experience. But just
kind of walking around and just sort of smelling the
culture and soaking up a society that really pays attention
to food. It's such a high level. And you know,
you pick up everything. You graduate, you go up north.
(25:07):
Did you go to Brooklyn first? Yeah? So I graduate
from culinary school and I moved to I mean, I
got a job with Charlie Palmer at Oriel in New
York City, and uh found a dirt, cheap apartment in
in Brooklyn, New York. In uhum got Cobble Hill and
(25:27):
which is now a super hot neighborhood. But it was
right erneath the brighterneath the b QUI every time a
truck would go by the building with shake and and
I can't hear how much it cost, but it was
just it was nothing. And I didn't have any money either. Man.
As I moved to New York City, I signed an
additional loan check like like two thousand five bucks, which
felt like a lot of money at the time. But
I moved to New York City with two thousand five
dollars to my name, and that was first month's rent,
(25:50):
last month's rent, the security deposit, and about five hundred
dollars until I got a paycheck. Right But to me, like,
I knew that that was the next step, regardless of
how painful it was going to be for the short term,
but I knew that was the next step. I had
to be a man. Are you the executive chef at
the point in which Food Network comes and kind of
(26:10):
scoops you up. I was twenty five years old and
I was the executive chef of a restaurant called Sibo
And it's still there, which I'm very proud of. It's
on the second Avenue, right on the Constitutor City, right
there on the east side, and you know, uh, contemporary
Italian and we were were getting like huge buzz all
over the city and uh, you know, just really kind
(26:32):
of cracking into fantastic Italian food and making it up
a lot of it, honestly, because at five, you know,
I had been to Italy a couple of times, but
not to the point where I had really cooked there,
because that was a little bit later in in my
life moment. I was almost thirty and uh um, just
really loving it. And then Food Network. You know, one
(26:53):
of the executives from the network happened to be in
the restaurant. It was really the right place at the
right time story, and she handed me her card and say, hey, listen,
do you want to come? Do you know the news
next week with us? And I jumped on it, and
for years I always said yes. I prepped my own food,
I showed up on time, I knew my recipe cold,
and just got better at every single time. This is
(27:14):
like in the infancy of the Food Network, though, right, yeah, man,
this is dude, this is this is okay. So the
first gig was news, you said, yeah. They had this
live news show called in Food Today with Donna Hanover
who happened to be Giuliani's like now ex wife, and
David Rosengarten. It was called in Food Today, so they
(27:35):
would do sort of a recap what was happening in
like the news food world, and then at the end
of it they would have a chef to a live demo.
Got it, Do you remember what you cooked that first
that first time on TV. I do man, I do.
I did this like Morrel, salad, morele and water cross.
This episode is making me hungry. Okay, so go do
this news thing. But when does it pivot into like
(27:57):
they gave you a show or you got to like
had to be the focal point of said show. Yeah,
that was two years later. So and then between they
were they were using me to fill in on every
show that they had, because most of the shows they
had at that point where we're all about guests coming
in to do things right. So Sarah Malton I was.
(28:18):
I did her show a bunch. You know. I did
Ready Set Cook, which is, you know, precursor to Iron
Chef and Chops now, you know, the sort of a
blind box ingredient cook off. I did that a bunch,
and so I was on I mean I was on
television once a week anyway, I mean, chef is your
all these like really really early infancy food network shows.
(28:39):
And then they offered they said, hey, you know you
want to do this full time and they gave me
they offered me a development deal that was like twenty
thousand bucks twenty something like kind of you know, not
not nothing but not a lot. But it was just
in the I was I'd hit that point in my career,
my my culinary career. I was just I was just
probably a little burnt out anyway, because you know, was
(29:00):
twenty five and I'd be cooking professionally. Stuff was like
fourteen fifteen years old, and uh and well so this
is more and I was just looking for something different
to do anyway, and I just felt I felt to myself, Um,
you know, if I don't do this, because I can
always go back and cook. If I don't do this,
I'll never know what it's like, and I feel like
I'll regret it for the rest of my life. I
turned in my resignation and signed up full time with
(29:23):
Food Network, and the rest is kind of history. I mean,
we did our first show is called Food nine one one,
and I was the first chef on Food Network to
not wear a chef's coat, okay because every chef you know,
to me, it felt like a Superman cave. So you know,
I could do it because I have this jacket on
and you don't, and maybe you can't, right, So I
(29:43):
want to sort of change the storyline a little bit
where it was just me as an everyday guy. We
could go into your house and show you how to
cook things, right, because like that's where the rubber meets
the road when it comes to connecting with people. How
can you help them in their own home, because that's
where they're cooking every day, right, and that's the audience
that's consuming your content. So help them in their own space.
(30:03):
So we started doing this cool show where I would
travel around the country and help people out with their
everyday food emergencies, and and you know, it was a
huge success. We were Amala Gassis leading for got three
or four years, and and we got we shot ninety
episodes a year for six years. That's so you've quit
working in Manhattan, when do you make the trick over
(30:24):
to San Francisco. I was in New York City for
fourteen years. I met my lovely wife, Tolan at the
Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, in two thousand
and four. She was living in Manhattan at the time,
and I was still shooting television pretty heavily. So we
started dating after the festival. Back in Manhattan. Two years later,
we got married and got pregnant and then figuring out
(30:46):
what my next step was going to be. I figure out, like,
I've been in New York City for a long time too,
and I love California like you you love California. Yeah,
but I grew up here though, So yeah, I grew
up in the South and you know, specifically shooting with
Food Network. So every time we go to California, I
just imagine myself living there. She's from Marinn and that's
where we're living now, just north of San Francisco, just
(31:07):
across the gold Gate Bridge. Her parents live here, and
she grew up here. So when we were dating, we
would come to your folks and hang out in San
Francisco for a couple of days and and I'm like,
there no reason in the world I wouldn't just want
to love living here. So so when we were expecting
our first child together, I said, let's just jump. I
think life is short. Life is for living. And we
moved to California in two thousand seven. Awesome. It's so
(31:28):
funny because I do this show a lot with actors
or musicians, and the one common denominator that we found
with all like really successful people is that they all
started in the service industry. Yeah, it teaches you you
know how to hustle. It's like it's a lot of
(31:48):
late nights, but it's also flexible in terms of like
you can go make your audition or you can go
play your gig and get someone to cover for you.
And this is the first episode where we had someone
that actually continued doing the food industry thing and became
uber uber successful. So I love It's become like full
circle here. I'm not a very good cook. I like
to cook, and i like to mess around in the kitchen,
(32:10):
and I'm obsessed with all that is food porn and
Food Network and everything. You watch a lot of these shows,
and every chef has that kind of their own personality.
Do you have people that you watch on Food Network
who you're like, man, I really I really like their
style or I like their persona. Who are you a
(32:30):
fan of in the Food Network world? Ray Drummond, the
Pioneer Woman's I love her stuff. She's so great and
so it's easy to listen to and and I love
her storytelling, and I love the fact that they can
you know, she goes out in the field and and
she you know, she was so it's not just sort
of like locked into a studio that's actually they shoot
some of the surroundings and that's part of the story.
(32:50):
UM and Garden is just you know, she's she's she's
the queen. Nobody's better than her. Um. I love her
food style and I love her her direct to camera
con it ends so just so refreshing to watch, and
and her ability to kind of make um make messy
look beautiful and you know, and I think a lot
of people feel very confident, but it's not about perfection.
(33:10):
It's about flavor and and so just making it taste
really really great and kind of play it together and
in a way that feels effortless. So I think that's
always kind of fun to watch. Um. You know, as
far as like the competition, stuff goes like a Duff
versus Buddy, which I think is just so hysterical because
I know both of them. Duff is a really good
friend of mine, so I'm team Duff all the way.
(33:30):
I think that he's such a super talent and even
just him, you know, making cakes on a regular basis,
That brother is a fantastic chef. He's an amazing chef.
He's a great cook. So I I like watching him
cook a lot, you know, Bobby is just always just
you know, he's just He's an endless well of culinary
talent and inspiration and hustle and and he's funny. And
(33:52):
I love what he's doing on on Instagram. I think
it's a little like Curb Your Enthusiasm as cooking series
he's working on. I think those are super funny. You know,
everybody has their own little thing, everybody, And that's what
I love about Food Network. There's something for everybody. You know,
when when you log on and it's like you guys
got a huge audience and and uh and and Rachel's
kind of bouncing back in and out, and you know,
(34:12):
the Chops franchise is huge, and and so there's always
something really cool to gravitate towards. When you started dumping
jumping the Food Network, there's somebody that you're gonna love
and and and that's why I love about so you
always kind of connect with the personality first, and and
that's what makes the network so successful. The very personality driven.
This is that moment that I think separates a lot
of people, right because there's a lot of people that
(34:33):
have great personalities, but they don't really have the background
or the depth of knowledge to keep keep it going
for ten seasons. And this is where this and this
moment right here, what I'm saying right now is that
moment where like culinary professionals, because right now it feels
like that thing that part of Nashville is thinking about doing. Yeah,
(34:55):
we'll just jump into a cook and show will be great.
We'll make what mommy used to make in the kitchen.
You're gonna last six episodes, right, and you're gonna run
out of gas because you've got you because you don't
really have just um a lifetime of cooking knowledge that
you could walk up to a counter of ingredients and
ice cold, talk about every bit of it and ice cold,
(35:15):
make an amazing meal and thirty minutes and know what
that's all about. If you have the enthusiasm for it,
that's the most important thing because that will drive you right.
So then then there's the personality side of it, and
no one's gonna watch a dud in the kitchen, doesn't
matter how good you are. So you have to be
very engaging with a lot of people. And then the
third part about this is you have to know what
you're talking about. You have to know what you're talking
(35:37):
about and you have to be the smartest person in
the room when it comes to cooking, and you have
to have the authority to be able to, you know,
write did everything sixteen cookbooks, right, So your curiosity, your
ability to write great recipes, testing them out thoroughly, and
then you could literally just create another season at thirteen
episodes and another season at thirteen episodes and never run
(36:00):
out of gas when it comes to creating great content.
If you have to play fake it till you make
it for a little while until you get to that
point that you're incredibly competent with it. That's just reading, reading, reading, right.
I have over a thousand cookbooks in the house, right,
and so so you you you kind of pick up
a little technique here and ingredient there, and some sort
of interesting tip here, and you fold those with a
(36:21):
new position. So so you're not knocked anybody off, but
you have sort of a fresh, pinpointed place on that
like that. That's the difference between you know, hopping on
Food Network for a couple in this because you know
you're you're you've got a good name, and then surviving
and lasting for a really really long time. And that's
just having the depth of knowledge to be able to
just cook forever. Love it, Tyler. I want to be
(36:41):
respectful of your time. But before I let you, guys,
wanted to do a rapid fire question with you. Is
that good? Let's do it all right? Rapid fire questions
with Tyler Florence. Number one. Did you ever have a
poster hanging on your bedroom wall? Yeah, bunch man, it
was fair faucet ANDLDS up on. Yeah. That's a good
combo right there, like the really good fair faster and
(37:02):
you know what I'm talking about, the one piece and
she's got this like root beer brown one piece bathing
suit on and like with like that malibu like tousled hair. Yeah, yeah, exactly,
like rock and roll and pretty girls. And that was
my life, man, That's what I was into. The first
concert you ever went to in the vein of music,
(37:22):
if I say sean On, you know what I'm talking about. Yeah, yeah,
So I went to go see sean On my dad
uh In one of his you know iterations of his career,
he sold advertising for local radio station in upstate South Carolina,
and we used to go to we used to go
he shows all the time. As a matter of fact,
my first big concert was Kiss. I want to go
see Kiss in nineteen seventy nine with your makeup on.
(37:42):
So they Kiss Alive Tour, she kiss Alive two tour
and uh and and yeah it was. It was amazing.
I got I got dressed up as Paul Stanley with
a big star and uh, yeah it was great. Man.
Were were my older brother and I were part of
the Kiss army and we used to play play tennis
rackets to Kiss albums all the time and the Rock
and Roll a ninth party every day. Make model first car.
(38:03):
My first car was a nineteen sixty six Comic Capri.
I was a Mercury. It was a tank. I think
you got maybe eight miles to the gallon. I bought
it from my grandfather for five hundred dollars that I
made myself when I was fifteen years old, washing disiance.
Who would you call to get you out of jail?
I would call my wife. I would call my wife
because like in in uh and I either, you know,
(38:24):
regardless of the circumstances of how I ended up in jail. Um.
You know, she first of all, she would just like
calmly say, okay, let's take care of business, and then
she'd give it to me when I when I when
I got home, because obviously I was doing something naughty.
Nobody better than Planet Earth and a hustle to my wife. Nobody.
I think you're the first person everyone always answers with
either my manager or my my assistant. You're the first
(38:45):
person that said the right answer, which is your significant other? Yeah,
I'd call my wife. If I called my manager, if
I called my agent, or call my lawyer. They called
my wife. Let's save the quarter. Yeah, what's your favorite
pizza topping? I can't tell you. I'm really in the
chili oil, right if we had to go top top
top top top, you know, like to me, so, um,
I am so a chili head and so like drizzling
(39:07):
chili oil over top of you know a really great uh,
like you know, Pepperoni pizza has like handmade sharko three
on top of it, or if even if it's just
like a white pie with like you know, clam and
Dutch mel chili oil, broccoli, bacon, Um, you know, mushroom
chili oil is just I use chili oil and everything.
What is your go to hangover cure in terms of
(39:29):
food green juice, man, green nutrition. Yeah, man, yeah, well no, no,
it was seriously man, because like you know, you want
to say biscuits and gravy. You want to say where
those run sharrows? Right? You want to say like a
greasy eggs now, which you want to say that. But
I can tell you if I, if I've had a
little too much the next day, is just a big
(39:50):
blast of nutrition in my body. Just so I'm I'm
doing my body a favor because those greasy eggs may
feel good for a second, but they're not gonna do
anything for your hangover. Yeah, the last one. Waffles are pancakes, yo,
waffles for pancakes. Man, Um, waffles are pancakes. I'm gonna
have to side with my twelve year old son. I'm
saying waffles. I'm saying waffles all day because pancakes, man,
(40:11):
because you know, I like the I like the crunchy
bets with with the waffles, and you can do a
lot with them and and pancakes. And you know it's
the sort of monochromatic on your palette when you first
buy and your last by it's all kind of the
same thing. Fluffy delicious, don't get me wrong, but for
that crispy, delicious texture waffles all day. Tella Florence, thank
(40:32):
you so much for being on the Wells Cast. Your
story is amazing, super inspirational. I've met you before. You're
a great guy in and out of the kitchen. So again,
thank you so much for all you do. Man, my
absolute pleasure man. And you know these like positive broadcast
right now or exactly what people want to hear. And
I gotta tell you and conclusion right now, there's an
(40:53):
opportunity to be innovative and start that company that you
always wanted to start, that one that you and your
best friend have been talking about for years. Now is
the time to do it. Absolutely. If you want to
follow Tyler, you can on I guess all social media is.
You're just at Tyler Florence, right, I'll just one word
yep at Tyler Florence and then check out our new
(41:14):
YouTube channels. It's wolf it down and then wolf it
down I t K which means in the kitchen. Yeah,
if you go follow him on Instagram in his bio,
he's got a link to the YouTube channel, So just
go there, give him a follow, and then go watch
the YouTube channel. Is there anything that you are working
on or wanting to promote that I didn't ask you about.
We've got a brand new restaurant coming up to Chase
Center with the Gold State Warriors sometime this year. Fingers Crossed.
(41:35):
Food Network is awesome as always, great food truck race
Thursday's nine o'clock. The new season's out. Yeah, we're just
we're just loving everybody. Man all right, Tyler, thanks so
much for taking the time. Stay safe out there. Yeah,
hopefully we'll we'll have you on again, all by, Thanks
so much. By take care of YouTube. See I'm hungry,
now go make some food. Subscribe to Wealthcast on I
Heart Radio, Apple Podcasts, or anywhere you get your podcasts.
(41:58):
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