Chef David Reyes shares his remarkable journey from Chicago's Humboldt Park to culinary innovation at St. Pete Distillery, revealing how experiences in European Michelin kitchens and family traditions shaped his cooking philosophy.
• Growing up in inner-city Chicago during the 1980s amid violence and danger
• Learning foundational hospitality principles at grandmother's table where "nothing was missing"
• Transitioning from Army medic to culinary school despite family skepticism
• Training in French kitchens where bread was thrown at him for being undercooked
• Working stages at legendary restaurants including Alinea in Chicago
• Developing restaurants across America as a concept chef
• Creating award-winning dishes sometimes without tasting the final combination until service
• Building culinary p
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
I think, okay, that's enough.
So I take the bread out, I putit in a basket, I put it in the
pass and the chef takes it.
He looks at it, he squeezes itand he whips it at me and it
hits me right on the chest,bounces out and he says in
broken English, did it hurt?
And I said no, he's like that'sbecause you didn't cook it
enough.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Hello food fam.
This is the Walk Talk podcastwhere you will find the perfect
blend of food fun and cookingknowledge.
I'm your host, carl Fiorini.
Welcome to the number one foodpodcast in the country and the
official podcast for the NewYork, california and Florida
restaurant shows, the PizzaTomorrow Summit and the US
Culinary Open at NAFM.
We're recording on site at IbisImages Studios, where food
(00:54):
photography comes alive and Iget to eat it.
Email us to learn more info atthewalkandtalkcom.
Today's guest Chef, david Reyes,brings a story rooted in
resilience, passion andrelentless creativity.
Growing up in Chicago'sHumboldt Park neighborhood,
david found early purpose in thekitchen, inspired by his
grandmother's unforgettablehospitality.
(01:15):
After serving as a medic in theArmy, david shifted gears and
followed his love for cooking,traveling through France, spain
and Italy to sharpen his craft.
His journey took him throughstages at legendary kitchens
throughout the Chicago area.
Love for cooking, travelingthrough France, spain and Italy
to sharpen his craft, hisjourney took him through stages
at legendary kitchens throughoutthe Chicago area To building
restaurants from the ground upacross the country.
Today, chef Reyes is drivingculinary innovation at St Pete
(01:36):
Distillery, blending his finedining roots with an exciting
new frontier Craft Spirits,rooftop restaurant projects and
expense experiential dining.
His story is one of grit,vision and a deep love for
bringing people together throughfood.
Man, I'm excited we hadsomething today in this kitchen
(01:57):
that was happening.
Glad you enjoyed it, man.
Chef, welcome to the program.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Finally, Finally, we are here.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Right, we've been talking about this for years,
for years and a half a dozentimes today leading up to this.
You know, for people out therewho think they want to start a
podcast or get into broadcastingand whatnot, let me tell you
something it isn't easy.
Nothing is easy.
It's fun, don't get me wrong.
(02:28):
The, the lights, the camerasthe action yeah, a lot of prep,
a lot of prep, and then you getthe giggles and what happens?
It falls apart six times in arow like oh my gosh.
and that's the fun part indeed.
And for those if you don't knowwhat I'm talking about,
normally I run through openingmonologue with the precision of
a I don't know what, but Surgeon, a surgeon.
(02:50):
But today, no, today was.
Today was fun.
Just say it like that.
I'm probably going to laughthroughout this whole, this
whole episode.
All right, let's, before wejump into you know who you are,
where you came from.
Let's talk about the food babyyou brought the heat today.
What do you got?
Speaker 1 (03:08):
Two dishes I've had a lot of fun with throughout my
career.
The dish that we featured first, the mango soup, is something
that when I came across it I wasa young cook carving my way
through kitchens in Mexico andthe immediate thought was this
is good, but I think it could bebetter.
Throughout my career it's had alot of evolutions and I
(03:31):
featured it on plenty of menusin different formats and you
know today's was the latest.
Glad you enjoyed it.
It definitely represents a lotof the flavors that I'm
comfortable with.
You know the beauty behindusing subtle acids in
combination with a lot of othersubtle flavors to make sense out
of a nice dish.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I thought it was wonderful because you did you
know I say it a lot oh, you knowyou taste the layers, but you
do, and it's really great.
You know the citrus, theceviche, like everything just
really really tied togetherwonderfully.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Yeah, you know, the latest addition to that was
influence from cooking at Haikuand concentrating on a lot of
Asian ingredients fish sauce.
I absolutely love fish sauce.
There is it's such a broadspectrum fish sauce and it's
largely misunderstood.
So you know, that was one ofthose subtleties in that mango
(04:25):
soup that made a lot of sense,that brought a savory factor to
the table.
The second dish was ouraward-winning dish that we
brought to the Tampa Bay Wineand Food Festival, which was a
lot of fun, happened two weeksago Talk about an event that
brings the culinary worldtogether in Tampa.
That's done a great job ofdoing that.
So what I wanted to do was diginto my past and bring out some
(04:45):
things that I was verycomfortable with and I shared
with you something very intimatethat I don't think I would say
to a lot of people, and nowwe're going to put it out on a
podcast.
A lot of times and I don't knowhow this is going to sound, but
a lot of times I'll formulate adish and I won't taste it until
we're serving it, and I know alot of the components will make
sense.
I've had them in differentcombinations in the past and
(05:09):
this is one of those dishes.
This is one of those disheswhere I'm like in my head it all
just makes sense.
It tasted real good, everycomponent tasted real good.
It wasn't until the day of thatwe're doing samples of these
bites for the public that I putthe whole thing together and I
was so happy.
I was really excited.
We had played with the plate up, didn't even taste it then, and
(05:31):
then we we took it on stage,put it together and we won.
So it was.
We were very proud of it.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
There's a lot to unpack with that.
I think that once you hit acertain place in your chefdom,
you you kind of know what'sgoing to work.
I mean, you should be tested, Imean everything should be
tested.
Yeah, I'm not discounting thatat all, but you're going to know
like this is going to pair wellwith that and this should go
(05:57):
well with this and yada down theroad, right, right, but then at
the end of it you're winningcompetitions like that.
That's where it gets a little,that's where it's funny, that's
where it gets a little bizarre.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
It does, and it's not the first time it's happened,
it's, I don't know again, Idon't know how that's going to
sound, but it's.
It's not the first time thatit's happened.
It's, you know, been multipletimes during special specialty
dinners.
You know a wine pairing or adrink pairing, and you know I
conceptualize this whole thingin a, in a bite, in a morsel,
(06:27):
and it all just makes sense inmy mind.
Really, don't wait.
I don't find out that it worksuntil the day of and luckily it
does.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
The only people that that's going to bother are the
people who come in second, thirdand fourth.
Do you understand, right?
Yeah, yeah, I could see that.
So if you're listening second,third and fourth, you know,
there you go.
Like you know, don't eat yourheart out, right?
Well, that's enemies I don'twant to make any enemies.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
No, yeah, that second dish I got to tell you the the
core of it is one of my favoritedishes.
To prepare that to me.
When I first tasted it wascomplete surprise.
I was in Puerto Vallarta, I wasworking at a really nice hotel
and one of the sous chefsbrought forth this dish that he
had prepared with his family andit was basically a snapper
(07:13):
wrapped in banana leaf withplantain.
That was the core of the dish.
Right, I added bacon grease tothat and, like a few other
elements, that became arestaurant dish.
That's the core of the dishthat we serve today and that we
won that competition with.
So there's a lot of a lot moreto it.
(07:34):
It's not something that I justdreamt up.
You know, there's some historythere.
So, yeah, we were very proud ofit, but I literally had not
tasted the whole combinationuntil the day of and you saw the
photography brilliant,absolutely brilliant.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
I'm I can't wait to post geeked about, yeah, what I
saw.
So let's talk humboldt park,yeah, and 1980s.
That's where you're from.
Can you describe that?
Speaker 1 (07:57):
yeah, you know, those are the kind of things that you
don't realize are exceptionaluntil you're far from it.
I remember, early in my career,I was at a table with the owner
of a hotel that I was workingat and he asked me the question
tell me about your upbringing,tell me about growing up?
And I said well, I grew up inan inner city of Chicago, deep
(08:20):
on the west side of Chicago, onthe northwest side of Chicago,
and growing up I didn't spend alot of time outside.
I wasn't allowed to.
There was a lot of things goingon in the neighborhood that were
unsavory and I guess my parentswanted to protect me from
shootings, stabbings, listen,the fact that I brought up, that
I saw my first dead body atlike six years old, that I
(08:45):
looked up and everybody had waswide eyed and incredulous.
I thought to myself well, thatmight be a little weird, you
know, that might be odd.
And there was other things thatyou know, looking back, coming
up, you know, in grade school,and having shootings outside
across the street, and thinkingto myself, well, I guess that's
going to cut recess short, notreally focusing on the fact that
(09:08):
there was a shooting outside,you know, or a drive-by and
things like that.
You know, unfortunately, werekind of normal and you know
again, you don't realize howexceptional they are until you
look back.
That certainly helped shape theway I approach what.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
I do, Chef.
Growing up in your city is alittle different, and while I
can identify with a little bitof what you have going on there
me growing up in Brooklyn forfive years as a child I've seen
my share of stuff.
It sounds to me, though, thisreally had something to do with
(09:42):
the shaping of who you are nowand who you became.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Yeah, it certainly.
You never forget things likethat.
You know it makes it so thatyou can, you can find a
commonality with any group.
You know, growing up inner city, you're surrounded by people
that you know, sometimes a fewgenerations into that
neighborhood and that style ofliving, and you know you're
comfortable with that.
You're comfortable, you canmake things relative.
(10:05):
Then, transitioning into thisworld of fine dining and finding
a way to relate to guests thathave a much higher expectation,
a much higher you know, let'ssay, education, class, whatever
you want to call it, and findingcommonality, there has been
something that I've, I thinkI've strived with.
(10:26):
You know I've, I've always beenable to relate to anybody that
I'm, that I'm working with ortalking to, and whether we're
talking about fine watches orthings that happen in inner city
, chicago Roots and hospitalityis really what you're getting
into and if you look at it, youhave the rough upbringing on one
(10:49):
hand, but on the other you haveyour grandmother.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Why don't you go ahead and explain a little bit
how maybe she might've softenedthe edges for you a little bit?
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Yeah, being surrounded by family was
certainly an influence in mycareer.
Early on, I had to decide whatinspired me to be in the
culinary world, what inspired meto be in the restaurant
business, and I quicklyidentified, sitting at my
grandmother's table, atsomething that I wanted to
(11:20):
convey to other people, and thatwas a feeling of nothing is
missing, because you would sitat her table and she would
literally bring everything toyou.
Some things were in like littleseparate dishes, it was very
Spanish style serving, andwhether you wanted anything to
drink, any utensil, it was aninsult to get up and want
(11:42):
something.
She was insulted.
She would be like what are youdoing?
You know, I'd be like grandma,I have to use the bathroom,
relax, you know.
So it was that feeling ofthere's nothing missing at this
particular moment.
The company was always good, ofcourse, and my mother also
conveyed that feeling as well,but you know, it certainly was
something that I felt.
That's what I want to convey toother people is this wonderful
(12:05):
feeling of there's nothingmissing, you know, getting up
from the table and feelingabsolutely satisfied, like you
could have done nothing to makethat better, and so that's
that's.
That is a very special feeling,you know, take into account.
You know, cooking with my mother, cooking with my father growing
up, was also a thing.
We didn't eat out much, youknow I, I, I joke and say you
(12:27):
know we'd be able to go toMcDonald's if we got good grades
.
So I basically never went toMcDonald's, so things like that.
It was true, I, we really neverate out, we always ate in.
It was, you know, we were, weweren't.
You could say we had a humblebeginnings.
You know we my, my inner innercity, part of Chicago, you know
(12:51):
it's, it was.
It was great for me.
I mean, I love the way we grewup, despite all the challenges.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
When you're talking about Spanish heritage or
Italian heritage, the first andsecond generations typically
have a similar upbringing andinto that third, everything
starts to change.
I feel like that, like yourparents, my parents, our
grandparents, they're builtdifferent.
They were different, they werea different breed of individuals
(13:17):
.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
I'd absolutely agree.
I mean the tenacity you know todo what my parents did come
here as immigrants, establishcitizenship, work their tails
off, buy a house, buy anotherhouse, put kids through private
school in that neighborhood.
Like I look back and I think,man, I can't see myself doing
(13:39):
that, Like I just you'd have tohave a really good job.
You know my dad never stoppedworking hourly.
You know he wasn't never asalaried guy.
My mother worked for thearchdiocese of Chicago for
almost half her life.
You know cooking and cleaningand but to accomplish what they
(14:01):
did I I'm forever grateful.
You know, and I look back and Ithink that was really that's a
lot of tenacity.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
To me the essence of a show, a podcast broadcast,
whatever I think, in the spiritof folks who become chefs or
live in this food industry.
The stories of the families, Ithink, are one of the most
fascinating aspects of all ofthis, because what drives
(14:32):
somebody to go into the foodbusiness is beyond me.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
You want to know something really funny.
When I decided that I wasn'tgoing to go through and continue
my medical career and Iannounced to the family that I
was going to culinary school, alot of my family members were so
disappointed.
They were like, why would youdo that?
Don't do that, don't changewhat you're doing.
And it was funny to me becauseI didn't expect that.
(14:58):
But you know, the more time Ispent in the culinary world, in
the restaurant world, I was like, oh, that's what they're
referring to.
Like it's tough, it's a grind,it's a.
You know, at the end of the dayit's a trade.
Right, there's artistry to itand that's one of the things
that I absolutely love.
But it's a trade.
You have to make sense out ofeverything.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
When I talk about it.
I say I did 10 years in thefood business on the restaurant
side.
Like it's a prison sentence,right, because kind of it's kind
of that.
You know it is great whenyou're young and you're doing
that work and you're makingmoney and and it's a kind of a
it's it's a bit of a fast life.
You know, everybody goes outafterwards, you're up until six
(15:40):
in the morning and you're doingall that stuff and there's like
a camaraderie to it, it's fun,there's something to it and you
learn a lot out of that.
If you make it out on the otherside, there's a lot of really
positive lessons.
The problem is a lot of us don'tright, and and you know it is a
rough life, you know, if itwere like I would tell my, my
kids I would say, look, becausethey're still young, you're
(16:01):
going to work at a restaurantfor one year and you're going to
do some stuff in the back andyou're going to do some stuff in
the front and then you're out.
I want you to experience whatit is to deal with the public
when they're hungry.
Sure, and because of it's thechain reaction that just goes
all the way from the hostess tothe server, to the bartender, to
(16:24):
the line cook, to the GM, tothe F&B director, to whoever it
is.
Everybody feels what the guestputs out there and it all stems
from the guest and the servicethat you have to give to that
guest, or else it would be easy.
Who?
Speaker 1 (16:41):
cares.
Yeah, most of us spend the bulkof our career burning the
candle at both ends, you know,and it takes a toll on a lot of
us.
I think it takes a toll oneverybody.
It's just whether what we dowith it is what makes the
difference.
Right, and certainly I was veryproud of how I started my
career.
A lot of things that I didbefore I got deep in the
(17:04):
restaurant business came intoplay.
Growing up around food, beingsurrounded by intense flavors,
growing up eating home-cookedmeals all the time All that
played influence on the start ofmy career and I noticed that
and I would step very carefullyevery step of the way.
I wanted to make sure it wasthought out, there was purpose,
(17:27):
there was a trajectory.
I never started somethingwithout the end in mind, the way
I've kind of precededeverything I've done.
You know I can't say it's allbeen perfect, but it's certainly
been extremely interesting andfun.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Well, let's talk military discipline in the
kitchen.
You served as a medic in thearmy before you know getting
into the into the restaurantworld.
Right, based on the on our, ourpregame conversation, you know
there were, you know there weresome pressures that influenced
again who you are today.
(18:01):
Right, you gave up a career inin, in, possibly medicine,
possibly medicine.
Right, I was going to say that.
Hold on, let me say thatbecause that's where that's.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
My idea was.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
Let's I want to get into medicine.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
right when I left, there were so many things that
came into play.
One of them was staying calmright in the face of adversity.
I remember one time in culinaryschool the instructor came up
to me and we were in a veryintense part of the class and we
had to do things that all werevery.
It was important to be on timeand be clean.
You're being very.
(18:37):
Everybody was observing you,the instructors were very
observant.
And he goes up to me.
He's like you seem to be calm,why, and I go, well, chef, no
one's going to die today, right,it's all just food.
And he's like huh, Okay, hewalks away and I thought well,
it didn't seem exceptional to me, but I guess it is.
(18:57):
And you know, that's the beautyof what we're doing, as
intensive as it may be, you knowit's it's only our egos that
are really on the line.
You know, if you do everythingwith love and intent, you should
be all right.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
You know what's really funny when I was younger
I took a detour in life and gotinto things I shouldn't have
been getting into.
And when I, when I got out ofthat lifestyle, I was always
looking over my shoulder.
I would go to bed one eye open.
You know the whole thing.
And when I got, when I left,when I left a food business and
I and I started this other,these other ventures, right, and
when I was finished with thoseventures and I got into, you
(19:40):
know, the, the food distributionand sales part of the business,
I would just go cold callingLike it was nothing.
It was.
I was new to, to outside sales.
It was the easiest thing ever.
And my, my sales manager, hesaid to me when to me he goes,
you're not nervous about this atall and I'm like nobody's going
to hurt me, like nobody's outto you know they're not going to
(20:01):
get me.
You know what I mean.
It's okay, like this is theeasiest thing ever.
I don't have to worry aboutanything or anybody.
Speaker 1 (20:07):
Sometimes the best advocate is what you don't know.
You know it's and I that's comeinto play for me, so much you
know it.
There's been so many fads andfay trends in the culinary world
and I've never really beenheavily influenced one way or
another.
I pay attention and I certainlyhave used it when it, when it's
(20:27):
made sense, but the fact of thematter is, nothing will ever
replace great flavor.
You know a great ingredients?
There is no.
You know I love moleculargastronomy.
Like I say, I play in it.
It's not a focal point of my my, my career or any one of my
menus.
It all just has to make sense.
(20:48):
Every fat has come and gone andwhat stays is just good food
done right.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
The happiest things for me are the simplest.
Oh, absolutely.
It's usually in front of a sinkand it's usually a morsel, a
bite of something, and I takethat little bite and I have that
, like you know, thousand yardstairway and I'm just enjoying
(21:15):
whatever it is that I'm eatingthere.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Come hell or high water around me, I don't even
pay attention.
I'm literally.
The walls can be falling downand I'm just sincerely eating
whatever that thing is Right.
That's one of my happiestmoments, Believe it or not.
Like I love my kids, my wife,all that stuff it's great.
But when, when you're talkingabout like a singular thing for
(21:40):
me that's what it is I mean Ifell into the right business, I
suppose, for that.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
Right, it is.
It's a beautiful thing.
I mean, simple food can caninvoke memories, can invoke just
passion and and you know itcould make you cry A good meal
can make you cry.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
It started with me, and I'll tell you where.
With a fresh mozzarella, as akid, you know, they would come
home.
Somebody would, you know, go tothe store, come back with you
know, the wax paper with a youknow nice, fresh, juicy
mozzarella, break it out and Ican hear the paper folding and
(22:20):
opening, and then they would getthe salt.
They'd put a little salt, sliceit up.
There was always some tomatoesand basil and oil.
And here you are over the sinkjust eating this.
Is that a meal?
No, it's just really awesome toeat.
Right, you know?
And yeah, it started there.
I know that's where where itall began for me, but where it
(22:40):
began for you, part of the wayis through your travels, Right?
Speaker 1 (22:47):
Yeah, I, when I got, when I left the military, you
know I traveled a little bit,but I kind of left a bug and
this, this want to get out ofthe norm.
Once I discovered there wasmore to this life than just
Chicago, I wanted to see it, allyou know.
So I did what I could to getout and using, you know,
(23:09):
culinary school as a vehicle,under the premise that I wanted
to go learn.
You know, I traveled throughEurope, southern France,
primarily Southern France.
The beauty of Southern Franceis it's an hour away from Italy
and an hour and a half away fromSpain.
So my days off I would spendtraveling in and out of other
countries, which is easy to dowhen you're in Europe.
(23:31):
And any opportunity I could, Iwould cook.
I would take a stage, whichback then was still a very
normal thing to line up a stage,work somewhere for free, just
to learn.
And most of the time that Ispent in Europe was under stages
for two-star Michelinrestaurants.
(23:51):
One-star Michelin restaurants,literally.
I would be challenged to thepoint where they would say
you're going to work the dishand until you can speak enough
French and show that you havethe organizational skills to
work garmanger, you're going towork the dish and I would
basically take it up as achallenge learn every French
word.
I could immediately A couple ofphrases.
(24:12):
How do you say this in French?
Saying that in French was keyto learning a lot more.
What is the name of this?
All those terms in French wereclutch.
So the first day I moved out ofthe plonge which is the dish pit
, I I was on garbage and one ofthe primary jobs was in a combi
(24:35):
oven finishing off bread orbread service.
And here I am, the first dayI'm finally out of the dish pit
and I'm putting bread.
They'd call to you know, breadservice, and in French,
everything's in French, you know.
And I stick two pieces of breadin, shut the door, wait for it
anxiously, like this is thefirst time I'm going to, I can't
(24:57):
wait and I think, okay, that'senough.
So I take the bread out, I putit in a basket, I put it in the
pass and the and the chef takesit.
He looks at it, he squeezes itand he whips it at me and it
hits me right out of the chest,bounces out and he says in
broken English he's good.
Did it hurt?
And I said, no, he's likethat's because you didn't cook
(25:18):
it enough.
And I'm like, well, you couldhave just said it needs to be
crispy, like, okay, got it.
So you know, moving on, thingslike that happened all the time.
There was when I finally made itpast a few more stations onto
the main station where you werecooking with the chef side by
side, I remember it like it wasyesterday.
(25:40):
I'm plating my first dish andI'm thinking to myself man, am I
killing it?
This dish looks good.
And the chef walks up rightbehind me and he looks and he
takes the dish and he puts it onmy chest.
Mind you, we were in an openkitchen so everybody in the
dining room could see what'shappening.
And if you ever got like asmudge of something on you or
(26:02):
anything, you'd have to go runto the changing room which was
two levels down down the streetbecause it was a hotel and
change and then come right back.
And so he'd made me wear myfirst plate and I gripped the
plate to my chest, nice andtight, and I'm like I guess it
didn't look good enough.
He's like it didn't look goodenough.
And so I ran with the plate tomy chest down to the changing
(26:26):
room to change and it's like,okay, you certainly learn the
lesson.
And it's like, okay, youcertainly learn the lesson, you
know you move on.
You can't take anythingpersonally, that's not the first
time or the last time, and youknow, it's things like that.
How do you convey that?
How do you convey that feelingto cooks that you're trying to
teach?
This needs to be anunforgettable moment, and you
(26:47):
can't really shove a plate intheir chest or throw bread at
them, so you have to come upwith creative ways on how to
convey ideas wait a minute here,hold on, I gotta stop this for
a second listen.
Speaker 2 (26:59):
There's a difference between what that chef was
teaching you right, becausethat's what he waited, that.
That is such a a unique way toget your point across.
But he didn't throw a knife atyou.
He didn't take a saucepan andhit you over the and I'm not
(27:21):
saying they don't do that either, and I know that that happens
too.
But something like that, Ithink, is even today, should be
absolutely acceptable, becausethere's nothing that proves the
point, and I'm so glad that youexplained it.
In a kitchen like that, you getdirty.
You gotta go, man, right,didn't he prove a point?
(27:42):
You're wearing the dish, soit's not just that it was a
smudge, no, you're wearing thewhole dish.
Yeah, like, wow, that is likeset up such a metaphor, like
that's beautiful, I think that's.
I think everything should belike that.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Well, the idea was as good as you might think it
looked, it could be better.
And when I came back I paidattention and, sure enough, that
plate could have looked a lotbetter.
Listen, I've been in kitchenswhere I'm side by side with
another cook or another chef orchef de partie, whatever, and
(28:16):
you know I'm constantly beingtold move or move that, move
this, and the next thing, youknow, I'm burned.
Like you know, a pot justgrazed my arm conveniently to
remind me that I was taking uptoo much space or I wasn't being
aware enough.
Sabotage, I mean, that used tobe a thing where somebody would
(28:37):
crank your heat.
You're reducing a sauce foryour station and somebody comes
up right behind you and theywant that position, so they're
going to sabotage your station.
That was a thing.
So how do you take all theseviolent happenings that happened
in a kitchen and convey that tonew cooks now in this day and
age?
So that's a very difficultthing to do.
(28:58):
However, there's always a goodway to do it and sometimes it's
pretty funny.
For example, this was years agoand I had a problem with a prep
crew constantly leave emptyboxes in the walk-in cooler and
I'd say the next person to leavean empty box has to wear the
box for the rest of the day ontheir head, no matter what size
(29:19):
the box.
And I literally had a couple ofprep cooks wearing a box on
their head for the rest of theday Guess what.
Nobody ever did that again.
It was fun, funny, but it wasmemorable.
And those are some of thechallenges that come with the
territory.
You know you can't throw aplate at somebody, but maybe you
can put a box on their head.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
Michelin restaurants anywhere on the planet.
Not an easy place to be clearly, right, you were in Europe.
I'd love to hear some of thenames of the places that you
were at.
Speaker 1 (29:58):
And then where did you land when you came back?
Stateside, one of the othervery memorable restaurants still
there.
It's in a town called gosh.
This town, it is called tedduchenne, I think ted duchenne.
It's right above monaco,between monaco and nice, and it
literally overlooks monaco.
It's a hotel in there, godknows how long.
The restaurant is called LeChef d'Or, which is the Golden
Goat, basically translates intoSpent some time there,
exceptional pedigree.
(30:19):
They put out some amazing foodand have taught some amazing
chefs that are still in theindustry.
I also worked at a restaurant ina small town near Toulouse
called Cours du Ciel, which isCords in the Sky that's what it
translates into, because it waspretty high up in altitude.
(30:42):
It was a city that had threelayers of fortification that was
built in 1200 by the count ofToulouse to hide the Cathars
during the Crusade.
So there was a lot of historyinvolved there, and so I mean
talk about exceptionalexperiences.
We would take this I swear itwas like a two cylinder little
(31:03):
truck into the city to go to themarkets, collect everything,
and it literally came back soloaded that we would have to
meet the truck halfway downbecause it couldn't make the
truck up that we would have tomeet the truck halfway down
because it couldn't make thetruck up and we'd have to push
it up, like literally, it's, youknow, revving it as high as it
could and it's trying to makethis.
You know road that led up tothe restaurant.
We're pushing it.
(31:23):
And, by the way, that restaurantwas in what would have been
referred to as kind of like thecastle, but it didn't look like
a traditional castle.
It looked like a very opulentbuilding and where we would sit
to eat family meal.
If you listed that as arestaurant, you'd have people
from around the world trying toeat there, because the view was
(31:45):
exceptional.
It was in the garden that wewould use for the restaurant,
but it would overlook the Frenchcountryside.
You'd watch sheep kind of justpasture and move from one side
of the hill to another, and Imean it was just gorgeous and we
would have family meal there,you know.
So everything was veryinspiring there.
(32:05):
You would wake up really early.
You'd probably stage in thebakery making bread that was
later going to get thrown at youand then you'd go home, take a
nap.
Do lunch service?
Go home, take a nap, do dinnerservice.
Speaker 2 (32:19):
You literally just live, eat, breathe culinary
Before you get into Chicago,explain how somebody would work
for free, just for theexperience, because I think a
lot of the people who go out andeat don't recognize that number
one.
But then number two, you've gotthe new class of restaurant
(32:43):
folks coming through, you know,and I feel like they would.
I think they would appreciatestaging, but I think the
insurances and the liabilitiesand everything kind of eats,
that all up and and and justmurdered it.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
Yeah, you know, I think you could say it was about
15 years ago where the stagestarted to disappear in the
culinary industry still aliveand well in Europe, different
parts of the world.
But it's this idea that, inexchange for learning and having
the unique opportunity to bepart of a team for at least a
short amount of time, you workfor free, you know, and for me
(33:17):
it was room and board.
You know, the last restaurant Iever worked at in France was
nice enough to give me a, acheck on the way out and say,
hey, thank you.
They said hey, thank you.
We wanted to make sure that yougot at least some compensation,
and so then I went to go livein London for about a month on
that, you know, and literallystaged in London because they
(33:37):
were able to kind of give me alittle bit of change before I
left.
But anyway, that idea doesn'treally exist anymore, at least
not the way it used to.
You can take on a stagiaire orsomeone that's kind of trying
out for your restaurant, payingminimum wage, if they're willing
to do that.
But yeah, how do you conveythis idea that, okay, you're
going to work for me for freefor about two weeks and then
(34:01):
we're going to decide if we'regoing to hire you or not, based
on what we see.
And you know that's a hard ideato convey.
And you know, even internships,I think, have to be paid now if
you're out of culinary school.
So that wasn't the case when Iwas in culinary school, you know
.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
But even if you didn't get hired, you were
thrilled to get the opportunityto get the stage.
Just to say hey, I have this asa badge Right.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
Yeah, I take this into account.
When I first came back fromEurope, I walked into some
really heavy hitting restaurantsin Chicago and asked them for a
stage.
People like Paul Cahan I waslucky enough to run into back
when he had Blackbird and did astage there, spent a few weeks
there and I did a couple ofstages at Alinea, both of which
(34:49):
were absolutely epic, becauseAlinea, to me, was the first
time I had ever been in akitchen in the U S.
That reminded me of the, this,the essence of of what it is to
be in an in a Michelin starkitchen in Europe.
You know, because in a Michelinstar kitchen in Europe you can
walk in and you don't.
You're not really sure who'sleading the, that station, that
(35:12):
area of the restaurant, becauseeverybody can be mistaken as the
chef.
They're so just passionate andfull of intent that you just not
sure who's actually leading.
Everybody's kind of on thatsame level.
And so at Alinea I mean youhave so many passionate people
on on a team in a small spacethat it's.
It's impressive that there'sthat much passion going into
(35:35):
everything from dishwashing topicking through microgreens in
the basement or doing all thethings.
I remember one of the firsttasks I was given was to pick
microgreens and then later thatday I was breaking down Thai
peppers, thai dried chilipeppers, and I asked what are we
making with this Sriracha?
(35:56):
We're making our own sriracha.
I'm like, how could you improveon sriracha?
But apparently you can, and itwas that nuanced.
That level of attention todetail was exceptional and that
was very inspiring to me.
The unfortunate thing at thetime, they were going to open a
restaurant called Next and I wasgame.
(36:17):
I was for it, I wanted thatposition and I sat down at the
table after my stage was done,after a few weeks, and Grant
Atkins at the time he had a chefde cuisine His name is David
Barron and they both talkedabout how I'm the ideal person
that would join the team thatthey could see the possibility
with.
But then I come to learn thatthat job also paid about $30,000
(36:41):
a year and in 2012, that wasn'tgoing to be enough to get
married and have any sort ofquality of life.
So it was the hardest job Iever had to turn down.
But lessons learned, I loved it.
Things that I learned in thekitchen I still use to this day.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
I don't have this in my show notes for today.
The bear, yeah, I mean.
What do you think?
I mean?
What's the?
What are the connections?
Speaker 1 (37:08):
I'll be completely brutally honest, Season one I
watched got through it.
I hesitate.
I think I stopped after episodefour because I'm like this is
triggering, this is too close tocomfort.
I don't necessarily want to dothat after I get off a long day.
I haven't kept up with it, butI've gotten bits and pieces of
(37:30):
it.
It's very close to real life.
You know, it's certainly likeanything, even cooking shows on
TV.
There's things that happen.
They just don't happen as oftenas you might, you know, see
that conveyed in a show.
But yeah, man, it was real andI love that.
They really highlighted Chicagovery well.
They put it in a very goodlight, as it deserved, because I
(37:52):
mean, that's a cradle for theculinary industry.
I mean, people have grindedtheir teeth in Chicago and gone
off to other parts of thecountry and done great things.
It needed a little boost likethat.
It was cool.
Speaker 2 (38:05):
Yeah, I don't have the level of experience at that
sort of caliber restaurant, thelevel of experience and at at
that sort of caliber restaurant.
But when I I watched the firstseason and I also felt a lot of
that, I don't want to saytriggered, but I felt it like I
was my anxiety, I was sweating,you know, watching some of that
(38:26):
stuff and of course, with me ithad more to do with the front of
the house activity versus theback of the house.
But, man, I'll tell you, likethe show, when I, if I get moved
by a show, I want to watch it.
Yeah, all of it, you know whatI want to.
And I did, I binged that entireseason, whatever, however many
were there, I did it in days.
Yeah, yeah, I did, I binged thewhole thing.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
The plight of the sous chef was all too familiar.
I remember in culinary schoolgetting up at 3 am to make a
baking and pastry class at likefive.
That was brutal.
And then I had to go to therestaurant job that I had after
culinary school was done.
Like you know I think it wassix o'clock or five o'clock I
(39:09):
would go work at a restaurantcalled Red Light on the downtown
near the United Center.
Anyway, it was a brutal day.
You know the funny thing herewe are 20 years later and it's
I'm still having 14 hour days.
Speaker 2 (39:23):
I mean it's definitely relevant.
So we fast forward from thetravel, the experiences.
Now you're building restaurantsfrom the ground up.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
Yeah.
So that diverse background kindof led me to be a part of a lot
of teams opening up restaurants.
I found myself in the positionof hey, you've done that, why
don't you help us do this?
Or why don't you help bring amore refined approach to, let's
say, bar food are?
Why don't you help bring a morerefined approach to, let's say,
bar food?
So I found myself on teamsopening up restaurants concepts
(39:56):
around Chicago.
These were in the early 2000sand so and I again, looking back
, that was pretty lucky,fortunate, because you learn a
lot opening up a restaurant.
You learn a lot about what notto do, you make a lot of
mistakes and you know makingmistakes on someone else's dime
is pretty valuable.
So you know, I kept restaurantjobs and I would help other
(40:18):
people open up differentrestaurants or even help just be
part of the concepting andtasting and testing and whatnot.
I eventually found myself as aconcept chef for a restaurant
group out of Chicago.
They had just sold Bar Louieand they were looking to concept
a lot of other things that werecutting edge kind of high-end
(40:41):
bars, different concepts,mexican, a steakhouse.
So it was very diverse work andI was chomping at the bit to
take it and that brought on andimmediately hit the road.
You know, I think I spent twoyears the first two years of my
marriage on the road for like 10months at a time.
You know, and you learned a lotbecause you go into different
(41:05):
cities.
Every city is a littledifferent when it comes to like
health code, and then hiring isdifferent, job pools are
different.
You know, you get to learn thatit's just a different
expectation.
So it was a lot of fastlearning and that kind of helped
shape what I did for the restof my career.
Speaker 2 (41:21):
How does that transition into the anatomy of a
dish?
Speaker 1 (41:27):
How does that transition into the anatomy of a
dish?
You learn how to take theanatomy of a dish and make it
efficient.
You know, make it so otherpeople can help execute your
work you make.
you take apart a dish to a verynuanced level and you break it
down to.
You know subtle sub recipesthat need that consistency.
(41:49):
So you know when.
When you're talking,reproducing your efforts through
other people on a on a very ona national scale, when you're
doing, let's say, five differentconcepts at once, that's an
extremely important thing toknow how to do.
Well, and a lot of what I didwas literally recipe writing,
breaking everything down to alevel that was easy to
(42:11):
understand and then teaching it.
I was actually doing very littlecooking.
Sometimes.
It was a lot of teaching alittle less cooking, and it
certainly taught me a lot aboutthe anatomy of a restaurant as
well.
You know taking the ideas in arestaurant, breaking them down,
standardizing them so thatthey're much more consistent.
So the anatomy of a dish to mehas always been something I have
(42:34):
a lot of fun with, you know,because I learned so many ways
of doing it.
And you know I wish I wouldhave documented more the anatomy
of certain dishes, like the onethat we came up with for that
competition.
It really started around atable with two other chefs and
just throwing ideas out and thensketching something that looked
like a bunch of scribbles on apaper and then taking that and
(42:56):
making a more refined sketch andthen a more refined sketch, and
then the next sketch had subrecipe lists and then the next
sketch after that was much morewords and a lot less images and
you know it's something thatit's beautiful when you see it
happen.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
You just defined walk and talk, media with that.
There you go, yeah, I mean, amI right, john?
Right, I mean it started with,like you know, crayola crayons
and a three-year-old and we'veturned it into something really
special.
Same scenario, same sort ofanatomy.
If you will, it's Tampa Bay,we're here.
We didn't come from here, butwe're here.
(43:31):
Time is a funny thing.
St Pete distillery Been aroundfor about 10 years.
Yep, you've been there forabout a year and a half or so.
You're taking culinary into awhole nother path.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
Talk about it.
Yeah, it's a unique setting.
The distillery sits on a 30acre lot.
It's privately owned.
It's the largest privatelyowned piece of property in St
Pete.
We intend to develop it into animportant part of the community
really, and part of that issome hospitality, whether it's
restaurants, event centers, aplace where the community can
come together.
Currently we do private events,we do something called the
(44:09):
Dinner Series at the distillery,all with this idea of
highlighting what we're doing atthe distillery.
The St Petersburg Distillery hasthis very unique approach of
highlighting Florida in generalin all of its products uses.
Every piece of cereal grainthat enters that distillery
(44:31):
comes from Florida, which isvery unique in and of itself.
We mill there, we bring upfresh groundwater, we filter it.
Everything we make is withFlorida in mind.
So joining them, installinghospitality, putting together a
program you know, hostingprivate events has been a big
challenge and I certainly see alot more possibility there.
(44:53):
I wish we would grow a lotfaster but you know everything
will come in time Right?
So the dinner series is sort ofa placeholder for the future and
what we want to do on the 30acre lot.
You know we have in mind to beto, to to install this community
oriented restaurant whereeverything surrounds a hearth
oven and everything is cookedwith fire live fire, you know.
(45:16):
So that should be somethingthat hopefully will come up in
the next couple of years.
But the dinner series is kindof an opportunity for us to flex
our culinary muscle and ourcreativity, you know, and, and
so we take the product that'sbeing made and we work with, we
work it into recipes and we do asix to seven course tasting
(45:40):
menu that's paired with uniquecocktails.
Sometimes you're going to eatyour cocktail and drink your
main dish.
Some cocktails are verywhimsical.
There's a lot of components,there's things that'll be done
table side.
So it's a unique opportunityand it's only 20 people at a
time.
So our intent is to kind ofgarner enough attention so that
(46:04):
when we go to construct thatbrick and mortar restaurant it
already has a reputation.
Speaker 2 (46:11):
Do you have aspirations for any glory?
Are you looking for any beard,or are you looking for any
Michelin?
Is it?
Speaker 1 (46:18):
that level.
It's one thing that I'velearned in my career is you
never start with that.
I mean, yes, it's nice,recognition is always great,
right?
If you're doing what you loveto the best of your ability, the
attention will come.
Shoot I, when I returned fromEurope, michelin wasn't even in
Chicago yet.
You know.
So to see the Michelin guidecome through and start rating
(46:41):
restaurants in Chicago and youcertainly like, okay, that's
cool.
But is it a goal of mine?
No, not necessarily.
You know I, I, I certainlyadmire those restaurants, admire
what they're doing, and youknow, I know, having been in
Michelin rated restaurants, thatit takes much more than just
food or a chef.
It takes a multifacetedapproach that has to be well
(47:04):
thought out, and until I'm readyto do that a hundred percent,
then you just do what you love.
You got to get the buy-in fromevery single person in the house
, everyone, from start to finish, from the dishwasher all the
way to the host, to hostess.
It has to be from start.
The definition of a Michelinstar is something worth going
(47:27):
out of the way for, right?
So if you're not ready to dothat, then you're not.
You have no business playing inthat game, right?
So our intent, my intent rightnow, is to showcase what I'd
love to do If we garner enoughattention.
Great, I love it.
But to say that that's my goal,no, that'd be a mistake.
Speaker 2 (47:48):
You brought a couple of bottles of goodies.
We didn't break into them yet.
What did you bring?
Speaker 1 (47:52):
So I brought two of my favorite things we're making,
and one of them is a long timecoming.
It's a four-year straightbourbon, 90% corn, 10% rye.
It's been barrel aged in newAmerican oak for four years.
Aging in Florida is definitelyvery different.
The result of it is somethingvery smooth and that's what
(48:14):
you'll find with this bourbon.
The other thing that I broughtis my other favorite an agave
spirit.
What an agave spirit is isbasically, if we were in Mexico,
it'd be a tequila.
If we were in Mexico, we'd begoing for tacos after this too.
So, without question, right, soan agave spirit.
The agave came from Mexico, wasdistilled at the St Petersburg
(48:36):
distillery, aged in second useoak old whiskey barrels.
Basically, we introduced somecharred wood chips to enhance
that flavor and that color.
The risotto is this beautifulsipping spirit that I absolutely
adore because it reminds me ofthe way tequila used to be made.
Right when we fire roasted thepineapples at the root of the
(48:56):
agave plant and you know, youfire roasted them to soften them
up and get the juices out, andthen what you fermented had this
smoky tinge to it that was akinto some might say mezcal, but
it was tequila.
It's the way it used to be maderight.
It was as clear as vodka, butit had a nice little smoky
finish to it.
And that's what you get out ofthis agave spirit you know, so I
(49:19):
absolutely love it.
I'll put it up against any otheragave spirit or tequila.
Speaker 2 (49:24):
You just, you just took my question away.
I was going to say how is thiscomparing?
How are both of those productscomparing with?
You know, some of the heavyhitters that are out there.
Speaker 1 (49:32):
I think the the bourbon has found its spot as
being this overwhelmingly just,smooth, beautiful, well-crafted
bourbon that Florida should beproud of, and the agave spirit
is just unexpected.
It is so, so unexpected and,frankly, you know I'm a big fan
of tequila.
I have a small tequilacollection and you know, again,
(49:54):
this reminds me of the waytequila used to be made.
Despite not drinking, I stillhave a memory of taste buds and
I still use my taste buds.
But yeah, it's impressive andanybody that is a fan of tequila
definitely falls in love.
Speaker 2 (50:09):
What you're saying really is you shouldn't be
drinking this out of a solo cup.
Speaker 1 (50:13):
Listen, I'm a big fan of drinking out of whatever the
heck you want, right, but itjust tastes better in a heavy
rocks glass.
True story.
Speaker 2 (50:23):
Good, that's a true story, Chef.
You're awesome man.
What you did here today wasterrific.
We're thrilled you came out.
How do we find you on socials?
Speaker 1 (50:33):
Well, I'm at ChefDavidReyes on Instagram and
Facebook.
The distillery is St PetersburgDistillery, both of which will
always feature the latest ofwhat we're doing and how to get
there.
You're going to give us a toursometime, right?
You know?
The funny thing about that iswe just started tours.
We used to be a productionfacility only, so we just
(50:54):
started tours, and it'sdefinitely worth the drive,
definitely going out of the wayfor to come get a tour and
you'll probably see me there.
Speaker 2 (51:02):
Yeah, okay, we're going to put that together again
.
Thanks for coming out today,john.
Let's get these picturesrocking and rolling.
Baby, I feel like you'regetting better every week.
Maybe, right, it's hard toimprove on perfection.
He still doesn't talk.
We've been doing this for twoand a half years.
He still doesn't talk.
All right, guys, listen, loveyou both.
We are out.
I think, okay, that's enough.
So I take the bread out, I putit in a basket, I put it in the
pass and the chef takes it.
He looks at it, he squeezes itand he whips it at me and it
hits me right on the chest,bounces out and he says in
broken English, did it hurt?
And I said no, he's like that'sbecause you didn't cook it
enough.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Hello food fam.
This is the Walk Talk podcastwhere you will find the perfect
blend of food fun and cookingknowledge.
I'm your host, carl Fiorini.
Welcome to the number one foodpodcast in the country and the
official podcast for the NewYork, california and Florida
restaurant shows, the PizzaTomorrow Summit and the US
Culinary Open at NAFM.
We're recording on site at IbisImages Studios, where food
(00:54):
photography comes alive and Iget to eat it.
Email us to learn more info atthewalkandtalkcom.
Today's guest Chef, david Reyes,brings a story rooted in
resilience, passion andrelentless creativity.
Growing up in Chicago'sHumboldt Park neighborhood,
david found early purpose in thekitchen, inspired by his
grandmother's unforgettablehospitality.
(01:15):
After serving as a medic in theArmy, david shifted gears and
followed his love for cooking,traveling through France, spain
and Italy to sharpen his craft.
His journey took him throughstages at legendary kitchens
throughout the Chicago area.
Love for cooking, travelingthrough France, spain and Italy
to sharpen his craft, hisjourney took him through stages
at legendary kitchens throughoutthe Chicago area To building
restaurants from the ground upacross the country.
Today, chef Reyes is drivingculinary innovation at St Pete
(01:36):
Distillery, blending his finedining roots with an exciting
new frontier Craft Spirits,rooftop restaurant projects and
expense experiential dining.
His story is one of grit,vision and a deep love for
bringing people together throughfood.
Man, I'm excited we hadsomething today in this kitchen
(01:57):
that was happening.
Glad you enjoyed it, man.
Chef, welcome to the program.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Finally, Finally, we are here.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Right, we've been talking about this for years,
for years and a half a dozentimes today leading up to this.
You know, for people out therewho think they want to start a
podcast or get into broadcastingand whatnot, let me tell you
something it isn't easy.
Nothing is easy.
It's fun, don't get me wrong.
(02:28):
The, the lights, the camerasthe action yeah, a lot of prep,
a lot of prep, and then you getthe giggles and what happens?
It falls apart six times in arow like oh my gosh.
and that's the fun part indeed.
And for those if you don't knowwhat I'm talking about,
normally I run through openingmonologue with the precision of
a I don't know what, but Surgeon, a surgeon.
(02:50):
But today, no, today was.
Today was fun.
Just say it like that.
I'm probably going to laughthroughout this whole, this
whole episode.
All right, let's, before wejump into you know who you are,
where you came from.
Let's talk about the food babyyou brought the heat today.
What do you got?
Speaker 1 (03:08):
Two dishes I've had a lot of fun with throughout my
career.
The dish that we featured first, the mango soup, is something
that when I came across it I wasa young cook carving my way
through kitchens in Mexico andthe immediate thought was this
is good, but I think it could bebetter.
Throughout my career it's had alot of evolutions and I
(03:31):
featured it on plenty of menusin different formats and you
know today's was the latest.
Glad you enjoyed it.
It definitely represents a lotof the flavors that I'm
comfortable with.
You know the beauty behindusing subtle acids in
combination with a lot of othersubtle flavors to make sense out
of a nice dish.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I thought it was wonderful because you did you
know I say it a lot oh, you knowyou taste the layers, but you
do, and it's really great.
You know the citrus, theceviche, like everything just
really really tied togetherwonderfully.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Yeah, you know, the latest addition to that was
influence from cooking at Haikuand concentrating on a lot of
Asian ingredients fish sauce.
I absolutely love fish sauce.
There is it's such a broadspectrum fish sauce and it's
largely misunderstood.
So you know, that was one ofthose subtleties in that mango
(04:25):
soup that made a lot of sense,that brought a savory factor to
the table.
The second dish was ouraward-winning dish that we
brought to the Tampa Bay Wineand Food Festival, which was a
lot of fun, happened two weeksago Talk about an event that
brings the culinary worldtogether in Tampa.
That's done a great job ofdoing that.
So what I wanted to do was diginto my past and bring out some
(04:45):
things that I was verycomfortable with and I shared
with you something very intimatethat I don't think I would say
to a lot of people, and nowwe're going to put it out on a
podcast.
A lot of times and I don't knowhow this is going to sound, but
a lot of times I'll formulate adish and I won't taste it until
we're serving it, and I know alot of the components will make
sense.
I've had them in differentcombinations in the past and
(05:09):
this is one of those dishes.
This is one of those disheswhere I'm like in my head it all
just makes sense.
It tasted real good, everycomponent tasted real good.
It wasn't until the day of thatwe're doing samples of these
bites for the public that I putthe whole thing together and I
was so happy.
I was really excited.
We had played with the plate up, didn't even taste it then, and
(05:31):
then we we took it on stage,put it together and we won.
So it was.
We were very proud of it.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
There's a lot to unpack with that.
I think that once you hit acertain place in your chefdom,
you you kind of know what'sgoing to work.
I mean, you should be tested, Imean everything should be
tested.
Yeah, I'm not discounting thatat all, but you're going to know
like this is going to pair wellwith that and this should go
(05:57):
well with this and yada down theroad, right, right, but then at
the end of it you're winningcompetitions like that.
That's where it gets a little,that's where it's funny, that's
where it gets a little bizarre.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
It does, and it's not the first time it's happened,
it's, I don't know again, Idon't know how that's going to
sound, but it's.
It's not the first time thatit's happened.
It's, you know, been multipletimes during special specialty
dinners.
You know a wine pairing or adrink pairing, and you know I
conceptualize this whole thingin a, in a bite, in a morsel,
(06:27):
and it all just makes sense inmy mind.
Really, don't wait.
I don't find out that it worksuntil the day of and luckily it
does.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
The only people that that's going to bother are the
people who come in second, thirdand fourth.
Do you understand, right?
Yeah, yeah, I could see that.
So if you're listening second,third and fourth, you know,
there you go.
Like you know, don't eat yourheart out, right?
Well, that's enemies I don'twant to make any enemies.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
No, yeah, that second dish I got to tell you the the
core of it is one of my favoritedishes.
To prepare that to me.
When I first tasted it wascomplete surprise.
I was in Puerto Vallarta, I wasworking at a really nice hotel
and one of the sous chefsbrought forth this dish that he
had prepared with his family andit was basically a snapper
(07:13):
wrapped in banana leaf withplantain.
That was the core of the dish.
Right, I added bacon grease tothat and, like a few other
elements, that became arestaurant dish.
That's the core of the dishthat we serve today and that we
won that competition with.
So there's a lot of a lot moreto it.
(07:34):
It's not something that I justdreamt up.
You know, there's some historythere.
So, yeah, we were very proud ofit, but I literally had not
tasted the whole combinationuntil the day of and you saw the
photography brilliant,absolutely brilliant.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
I'm I can't wait to post geeked about, yeah, what I
saw.
So let's talk humboldt park,yeah, and 1980s.
That's where you're from.
Can you describe that?
Speaker 1 (07:57):
yeah, you know, those are the kind of things that you
don't realize are exceptionaluntil you're far from it.
I remember, early in my career,I was at a table with the owner
of a hotel that I was workingat and he asked me the question
tell me about your upbringing,tell me about growing up?
And I said well, I grew up inan inner city of Chicago, deep
(08:20):
on the west side of Chicago, onthe northwest side of Chicago,
and growing up I didn't spend alot of time outside.
I wasn't allowed to.
There was a lot of things goingon in the neighborhood that were
unsavory and I guess my parentswanted to protect me from
shootings, stabbings, listen,the fact that I brought up, that
I saw my first dead body atlike six years old, that I
(08:45):
looked up and everybody had waswide eyed and incredulous.
I thought to myself well, thatmight be a little weird, you
know, that might be odd.
And there was other things thatyou know, looking back, coming
up, you know, in grade school,and having shootings outside
across the street, and thinkingto myself, well, I guess that's
going to cut recess short, notreally focusing on the fact that
(09:08):
there was a shooting outside,you know, or a drive-by and
things like that.
You know, unfortunately, werekind of normal and you know
again, you don't realize howexceptional they are until you
look back.
That certainly helped shape theway I approach what.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
I do, Chef.
Growing up in your city is alittle different, and while I
can identify with a little bitof what you have going on there
me growing up in Brooklyn forfive years as a child I've seen
my share of stuff.
It sounds to me, though, thisreally had something to do with
(09:42):
the shaping of who you are nowand who you became.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Yeah, it certainly.
You never forget things likethat.
You know it makes it so thatyou can, you can find a
commonality with any group.
You know, growing up inner city, you're surrounded by people
that you know, sometimes a fewgenerations into that
neighborhood and that style ofliving, and you know you're
comfortable with that.
You're comfortable, you canmake things relative.
(10:05):
Then, transitioning into thisworld of fine dining and finding
a way to relate to guests thathave a much higher expectation,
a much higher you know, let'ssay, education, class, whatever
you want to call it, and findingcommonality, there has been
something that I've, I thinkI've strived with.
(10:26):
You know I've, I've always beenable to relate to anybody that
I'm, that I'm working with ortalking to, and whether we're
talking about fine watches orthings that happen in inner city
, chicago Roots and hospitalityis really what you're getting
into and if you look at it, youhave the rough upbringing on one
(10:49):
hand, but on the other you haveyour grandmother.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Why don't you go ahead and explain a little bit
how maybe she might've softenedthe edges for you a little bit?
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Yeah, being surrounded by family was
certainly an influence in mycareer.
Early on, I had to decide whatinspired me to be in the
culinary world, what inspired meto be in the restaurant
business, and I quicklyidentified, sitting at my
grandmother's table, atsomething that I wanted to
(11:20):
convey to other people, and thatwas a feeling of nothing is
missing, because you would sitat her table and she would
literally bring everything toyou.
Some things were in like littleseparate dishes, it was very
Spanish style serving, andwhether you wanted anything to
drink, any utensil, it was aninsult to get up and want
(11:42):
something.
She was insulted.
She would be like what are youdoing?
You know, I'd be like grandma,I have to use the bathroom,
relax, you know.
So it was that feeling ofthere's nothing missing at this
particular moment.
The company was always good, ofcourse, and my mother also
conveyed that feeling as well,but you know, it certainly was
something that I felt.
That's what I want to convey toother people is this wonderful
(12:05):
feeling of there's nothingmissing, you know, getting up
from the table and feelingabsolutely satisfied, like you
could have done nothing to makethat better, and so that's
that's.
That is a very special feeling,you know, take into account.
You know, cooking with my mother, cooking with my father growing
up, was also a thing.
We didn't eat out much, youknow I, I, I joke and say you
(12:27):
know we'd be able to go toMcDonald's if we got good grades
.
So I basically never went toMcDonald's, so things like that.
It was true, I, we really neverate out, we always ate in.
It was, you know, we were, weweren't.
You could say we had a humblebeginnings.
You know we my, my inner innercity, part of Chicago, you know
(12:51):
it's, it was.
It was great for me.
I mean, I love the way we grewup, despite all the challenges.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
When you're talking about Spanish heritage or
Italian heritage, the first andsecond generations typically
have a similar upbringing andinto that third, everything
starts to change.
I feel like that, like yourparents, my parents, our
grandparents, they're builtdifferent.
They were different, they werea different breed of individuals
(13:17):
.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
I'd absolutely agree.
I mean the tenacity you know todo what my parents did come
here as immigrants, establishcitizenship, work their tails
off, buy a house, buy anotherhouse, put kids through private
school in that neighborhood.
Like I look back and I think,man, I can't see myself doing
(13:39):
that, Like I just you'd have tohave a really good job.
You know my dad never stoppedworking hourly.
You know he wasn't never asalaried guy.
My mother worked for thearchdiocese of Chicago for
almost half her life.
You know cooking and cleaningand but to accomplish what they
(14:01):
did I I'm forever grateful.
You know, and I look back and Ithink that was really that's a
lot of tenacity.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
To me the essence of a show, a podcast broadcast,
whatever I think, in the spiritof folks who become chefs or
live in this food industry.
The stories of the families, Ithink, are one of the most
fascinating aspects of all ofthis, because what drives
(14:32):
somebody to go into the foodbusiness is beyond me.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
You want to know something really funny.
When I decided that I wasn'tgoing to go through and continue
my medical career and Iannounced to the family that I
was going to culinary school, alot of my family members were so
disappointed.
They were like, why would youdo that?
Don't do that, don't changewhat you're doing.
And it was funny to me becauseI didn't expect that.
(14:58):
But you know, the more time Ispent in the culinary world, in
the restaurant world, I was like, oh, that's what they're
referring to.
Like it's tough, it's a grind,it's a.
You know, at the end of the dayit's a trade.
Right, there's artistry to itand that's one of the things
that I absolutely love.
But it's a trade.
You have to make sense out ofeverything.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
When I talk about it.
I say I did 10 years in thefood business on the restaurant
side.
Like it's a prison sentence,right, because kind of it's kind
of that.
You know it is great whenyou're young and you're doing
that work and you're makingmoney and and it's a kind of a
it's it's a bit of a fast life.
You know, everybody goes outafterwards, you're up until six
(15:40):
in the morning and you're doingall that stuff and there's like
a camaraderie to it, it's fun,there's something to it and you
learn a lot out of that.
If you make it out on the otherside, there's a lot of really
positive lessons.
The problem is a lot of us don'tright, and and you know it is a
rough life, you know, if itwere like I would tell my, my
kids I would say, look, becausethey're still young, you're
(16:01):
going to work at a restaurantfor one year and you're going to
do some stuff in the back andyou're going to do some stuff in
the front and then you're out.
I want you to experience whatit is to deal with the public
when they're hungry.
Sure, and because of it's thechain reaction that just goes
all the way from the hostess tothe server, to the bartender, to
(16:24):
the line cook, to the GM, tothe F&B director, to whoever it
is.
Everybody feels what the guestputs out there and it all stems
from the guest and the servicethat you have to give to that
guest, or else it would be easy.
Who?
Speaker 1 (16:41):
cares.
Yeah, most of us spend the bulkof our career burning the
candle at both ends, you know,and it takes a toll on a lot of
us.
I think it takes a toll oneverybody.
It's just whether what we dowith it is what makes the
difference.
Right, and certainly I was veryproud of how I started my
career.
A lot of things that I didbefore I got deep in the
(17:04):
restaurant business came intoplay.
Growing up around food, beingsurrounded by intense flavors,
growing up eating home-cookedmeals all the time All that
played influence on the start ofmy career and I noticed that
and I would step very carefullyevery step of the way.
I wanted to make sure it wasthought out, there was purpose,
(17:27):
there was a trajectory.
I never started somethingwithout the end in mind, the way
I've kind of precededeverything I've done.
You know I can't say it's allbeen perfect, but it's certainly
been extremely interesting andfun.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Well, let's talk military discipline in the
kitchen.
You served as a medic in thearmy before you know getting
into the into the restaurantworld.
Right, based on the on our, ourpregame conversation, you know
there were, you know there weresome pressures that influenced
again who you are today.
(18:01):
Right, you gave up a career inin, in, possibly medicine,
possibly medicine.
Right, I was going to say that.
Hold on, let me say thatbecause that's where that's.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
My idea was.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
Let's I want to get into medicine.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
right when I left, there were so many things that
came into play.
One of them was staying calmright in the face of adversity.
I remember one time in culinaryschool the instructor came up
to me and we were in a veryintense part of the class and we
had to do things that all werevery.
It was important to be on timeand be clean.
You're being very.
(18:37):
Everybody was observing you,the instructors were very
observant.
And he goes up to me.
He's like you seem to be calm,why, and I go, well, chef, no
one's going to die today, right,it's all just food.
And he's like huh, Okay, hewalks away and I thought well,
it didn't seem exceptional to me, but I guess it is.
(18:57):
And you know, that's the beautyof what we're doing, as
intensive as it may be, you knowit's it's only our egos that
are really on the line.
You know, if you do everythingwith love and intent, you should
be all right.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
You know what's really funny when I was younger
I took a detour in life and gotinto things I shouldn't have
been getting into.
And when I, when I got out ofthat lifestyle, I was always
looking over my shoulder.
I would go to bed one eye open.
You know the whole thing.
And when I got, when I left,when I left a food business and
I and I started this other,these other ventures, right, and
when I was finished with thoseventures and I got into, you
(19:40):
know, the, the food distributionand sales part of the business,
I would just go cold callingLike it was nothing.
It was.
I was new to, to outside sales.
It was the easiest thing ever.
And my, my sales manager, hesaid to me when to me he goes,
you're not nervous about this atall and I'm like nobody's going
to hurt me, like nobody's outto you know they're not going to
(20:01):
get me.
You know what I mean.
It's okay, like this is theeasiest thing ever.
I don't have to worry aboutanything or anybody.
Speaker 1 (20:07):
Sometimes the best advocate is what you don't know.
You know it's and I that's comeinto play for me, so much you
know it.
There's been so many fads andfay trends in the culinary world
and I've never really beenheavily influenced one way or
another.
I pay attention and I certainlyhave used it when it, when it's
(20:27):
made sense, but the fact of thematter is, nothing will ever
replace great flavor.
You know a great ingredients?
There is no.
You know I love moleculargastronomy.
Like I say, I play in it.
It's not a focal point of my my, my career or any one of my
menus.
It all just has to make sense.
(20:48):
Every fat has come and gone andwhat stays is just good food
done right.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
The happiest things for me are the simplest.
Oh, absolutely.
It's usually in front of a sinkand it's usually a morsel, a
bite of something, and I takethat little bite and I have that
, like you know, thousand yardstairway and I'm just enjoying
(21:15):
whatever it is that I'm eatingthere.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Come hell or high water around me, I don't even
pay attention.
I'm literally.
The walls can be falling downand I'm just sincerely eating
whatever that thing is Right.
That's one of my happiestmoments, Believe it or not.
Like I love my kids, my wife,all that stuff it's great.
But when, when you're talkingabout like a singular thing for
(21:40):
me that's what it is I mean Ifell into the right business, I
suppose, for that.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
Right, it is.
It's a beautiful thing.
I mean, simple food can caninvoke memories, can invoke just
passion and and you know itcould make you cry A good meal
can make you cry.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
It started with me, and I'll tell you where.
With a fresh mozzarella, as akid, you know, they would come
home.
Somebody would, you know, go tothe store, come back with you
know, the wax paper with a youknow nice, fresh, juicy
mozzarella, break it out and Ican hear the paper folding and
(22:20):
opening, and then they would getthe salt.
They'd put a little salt, sliceit up.
There was always some tomatoesand basil and oil.
And here you are over the sinkjust eating this.
Is that a meal?
No, it's just really awesome toeat.
Right, you know?
And yeah, it started there.
I know that's where where itall began for me, but where it
(22:40):
began for you, part of the wayis through your travels, Right?
Speaker 1 (22:47):
Yeah, I, when I got, when I left the military, you
know I traveled a little bit,but I kind of left a bug and
this, this want to get out ofthe norm.
Once I discovered there wasmore to this life than just
Chicago, I wanted to see it, allyou know.
So I did what I could to getout and using, you know,
(23:09):
culinary school as a vehicle,under the premise that I wanted
to go learn.
You know, I traveled throughEurope, southern France,
primarily Southern France.
The beauty of Southern Franceis it's an hour away from Italy
and an hour and a half away fromSpain.
So my days off I would spendtraveling in and out of other
countries, which is easy to dowhen you're in Europe.
(23:31):
And any opportunity I could, Iwould cook.
I would take a stage, whichback then was still a very
normal thing to line up a stage,work somewhere for free, just
to learn.
And most of the time that Ispent in Europe was under stages
for two-star Michelinrestaurants.
(23:51):
One-star Michelin restaurants,literally.
I would be challenged to thepoint where they would say
you're going to work the dishand until you can speak enough
French and show that you havethe organizational skills to
work garmanger, you're going towork the dish and I would
basically take it up as achallenge learn every French
word.
I could immediately A couple ofphrases.
(24:12):
How do you say this in French?
Saying that in French was keyto learning a lot more.
What is the name of this?
All those terms in French wereclutch.
So the first day I moved out ofthe plonge which is the dish pit
, I I was on garbage and one ofthe primary jobs was in a combi
(24:35):
oven finishing off bread orbread service.
And here I am, the first dayI'm finally out of the dish pit
and I'm putting bread.
They'd call to you know, breadservice, and in French,
everything's in French, you know.
And I stick two pieces of breadin, shut the door, wait for it
anxiously, like this is thefirst time I'm going to, I can't
(24:57):
wait and I think, okay, that'senough.
So I take the bread out, I putit in a basket, I put it in the
pass and the and the chef takesit.
He looks at it, he squeezes itand he whips it at me and it
hits me right out of the chest,bounces out and he says in
broken English he's good.
Did it hurt?
And I said, no, he's likethat's because you didn't cook
(25:18):
it enough.
And I'm like, well, you couldhave just said it needs to be
crispy, like, okay, got it.
So you know, moving on, thingslike that happened all the time.
There was when I finally made itpast a few more stations onto
the main station where you werecooking with the chef side by
side, I remember it like it wasyesterday.
(25:40):
I'm plating my first dish andI'm thinking to myself man, am I
killing it?
This dish looks good.
And the chef walks up rightbehind me and he looks and he
takes the dish and he puts it onmy chest.
Mind you, we were in an openkitchen so everybody in the
dining room could see what'shappening.
And if you ever got like asmudge of something on you or
(26:02):
anything, you'd have to go runto the changing room which was
two levels down down the streetbecause it was a hotel and
change and then come right back.
And so he'd made me wear myfirst plate and I gripped the
plate to my chest, nice andtight, and I'm like I guess it
didn't look good enough.
He's like it didn't look goodenough.
And so I ran with the plate tomy chest down to the changing
(26:26):
room to change and it's like,okay, you certainly learn the
lesson.
And it's like, okay, youcertainly learn the lesson, you
know you move on.
You can't take anythingpersonally, that's not the first
time or the last time, and youknow, it's things like that.
How do you convey that?
How do you convey that feelingto cooks that you're trying to
teach?
This needs to be anunforgettable moment, and you
(26:47):
can't really shove a plate intheir chest or throw bread at
them, so you have to come upwith creative ways on how to
convey ideas wait a minute here,hold on, I gotta stop this for
a second listen.
Speaker 2 (26:59):
There's a difference between what that chef was
teaching you right, becausethat's what he waited, that.
That is such a a unique way toget your point across.
But he didn't throw a knife atyou.
He didn't take a saucepan andhit you over the and I'm not
(27:21):
saying they don't do that either, and I know that that happens
too.
But something like that, Ithink, is even today, should be
absolutely acceptable, becausethere's nothing that proves the
point, and I'm so glad that youexplained it.
In a kitchen like that, you getdirty.
You gotta go, man, right,didn't he prove a point?
(27:42):
You're wearing the dish, soit's not just that it was a
smudge, no, you're wearing thewhole dish.
Yeah, like, wow, that is likeset up such a metaphor, like
that's beautiful, I think that's.
I think everything should belike that.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Well, the idea was as good as you might think it
looked, it could be better.
And when I came back I paidattention and, sure enough, that
plate could have looked a lotbetter.
Listen, I've been in kitchenswhere I'm side by side with
another cook or another chef orchef de partie, whatever, and
(28:16):
you know I'm constantly beingtold move or move that, move
this, and the next thing, youknow, I'm burned.
Like you know, a pot justgrazed my arm conveniently to
remind me that I was taking uptoo much space or I wasn't being
aware enough.
Sabotage, I mean, that used tobe a thing where somebody would
(28:37):
crank your heat.
You're reducing a sauce foryour station and somebody comes
up right behind you and theywant that position, so they're
going to sabotage your station.
That was a thing.
So how do you take all theseviolent happenings that happened
in a kitchen and convey that tonew cooks now in this day and
age?
So that's a very difficultthing to do.
(28:58):
However, there's always a goodway to do it and sometimes it's
pretty funny.
For example, this was years agoand I had a problem with a prep
crew constantly leave emptyboxes in the walk-in cooler and
I'd say the next person to leavean empty box has to wear the
box for the rest of the day ontheir head, no matter what size
(29:19):
the box.
And I literally had a couple ofprep cooks wearing a box on
their head for the rest of theday Guess what.
Nobody ever did that again.
It was fun, funny, but it wasmemorable.
And those are some of thechallenges that come with the
territory.
You know you can't throw aplate at somebody, but maybe you
can put a box on their head.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
Michelin restaurants anywhere on the planet.
Not an easy place to be clearly, right, you were in Europe.
I'd love to hear some of thenames of the places that you
were at.
Speaker 1 (29:58):
And then where did you land when you came back?
Stateside, one of the othervery memorable restaurants still
there.
It's in a town called gosh.
This town, it is called tedduchenne, I think ted duchenne.
It's right above monaco,between monaco and nice, and it
literally overlooks monaco.
It's a hotel in there, godknows how long.
The restaurant is called LeChef d'Or, which is the Golden
Goat, basically translates intoSpent some time there,
exceptional pedigree.
(30:19):
They put out some amazing foodand have taught some amazing
chefs that are still in theindustry.
I also worked at a restaurant ina small town near Toulouse
called Cours du Ciel, which isCords in the Sky that's what it
translates into, because it waspretty high up in altitude.
(30:42):
It was a city that had threelayers of fortification that was
built in 1200 by the count ofToulouse to hide the Cathars
during the Crusade.
So there was a lot of historyinvolved there, and so I mean
talk about exceptionalexperiences.
We would take this I swear itwas like a two cylinder little
(31:03):
truck into the city to go to themarkets, collect everything,
and it literally came back soloaded that we would have to
meet the truck halfway downbecause it couldn't make the
truck up that we would have tomeet the truck halfway down
because it couldn't make thetruck up and we'd have to push
it up, like literally, it's, youknow, revving it as high as it
could and it's trying to makethis.
You know road that led up tothe restaurant.
We're pushing it.
(31:23):
And, by the way, that restaurantwas in what would have been
referred to as kind of like thecastle, but it didn't look like
a traditional castle.
It looked like a very opulentbuilding and where we would sit
to eat family meal.
If you listed that as arestaurant, you'd have people
from around the world trying toeat there, because the view was
(31:45):
exceptional.
It was in the garden that wewould use for the restaurant,
but it would overlook the Frenchcountryside.
You'd watch sheep kind of justpasture and move from one side
of the hill to another, and Imean it was just gorgeous and we
would have family meal there,you know.
So everything was veryinspiring there.
(32:05):
You would wake up really early.
You'd probably stage in thebakery making bread that was
later going to get thrown at youand then you'd go home, take a
nap.
Do lunch service?
Go home, take a nap, do dinnerservice.
Speaker 2 (32:19):
You literally just live, eat, breathe culinary
Before you get into Chicago,explain how somebody would work
for free, just for theexperience, because I think a
lot of the people who go out andeat don't recognize that number
one.
But then number two, you've gotthe new class of restaurant
(32:43):
folks coming through, you know,and I feel like they would.
I think they would appreciatestaging, but I think the
insurances and the liabilitiesand everything kind of eats,
that all up and and and justmurdered it.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
Yeah, you know, I think you could say it was about
15 years ago where the stagestarted to disappear in the
culinary industry still aliveand well in Europe, different
parts of the world.
But it's this idea that, inexchange for learning and having
the unique opportunity to bepart of a team for at least a
short amount of time, you workfor free, you know, and for me
(33:17):
it was room and board.
You know, the last restaurant Iever worked at in France was
nice enough to give me a, acheck on the way out and say,
hey, thank you.
They said hey, thank you.
We wanted to make sure that yougot at least some compensation,
and so then I went to go livein London for about a month on
that, you know, and literallystaged in London because they
(33:37):
were able to kind of give me alittle bit of change before I
left.
But anyway, that idea doesn'treally exist anymore, at least
not the way it used to.
You can take on a stagiaire orsomeone that's kind of trying
out for your restaurant, payingminimum wage, if they're willing
to do that.
But yeah, how do you conveythis idea that, okay, you're
going to work for me for freefor about two weeks and then
(34:01):
we're going to decide if we'regoing to hire you or not, based
on what we see.
And you know that's a hard ideato convey.
And you know, even internships,I think, have to be paid now if
you're out of culinary school.
So that wasn't the case when Iwas in culinary school, you know
.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
But even if you didn't get hired, you were
thrilled to get the opportunityto get the stage.
Just to say hey, I have this asa badge Right.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
Yeah, I take this into account.
When I first came back fromEurope, I walked into some
really heavy hitting restaurantsin Chicago and asked them for a
stage.
People like Paul Cahan I waslucky enough to run into back
when he had Blackbird and did astage there, spent a few weeks
there and I did a couple ofstages at Alinea, both of which
(34:49):
were absolutely epic, becauseAlinea, to me, was the first
time I had ever been in akitchen in the U S.
That reminded me of the, this,the essence of of what it is to
be in an in a Michelin starkitchen in Europe.
You know, because in a Michelinstar kitchen in Europe you can
walk in and you don't.
You're not really sure who'sleading the, that station, that
(35:12):
area of the restaurant, becauseeverybody can be mistaken as the
chef.
They're so just passionate andfull of intent that you just not
sure who's actually leading.
Everybody's kind of on thatsame level.
And so at Alinea I mean youhave so many passionate people
on on a team in a small spacethat it's.
It's impressive that there'sthat much passion going into
(35:35):
everything from dishwashing topicking through microgreens in
the basement or doing all thethings.
I remember one of the firsttasks I was given was to pick
microgreens and then later thatday I was breaking down Thai
peppers, thai dried chilipeppers, and I asked what are we
making with this Sriracha?
(35:56):
We're making our own sriracha.
I'm like, how could you improveon sriracha?
But apparently you can, and itwas that nuanced.
That level of attention todetail was exceptional and that
was very inspiring to me.
The unfortunate thing at thetime, they were going to open a
restaurant called Next and I wasgame.
(36:17):
I was for it, I wanted thatposition and I sat down at the
table after my stage was done,after a few weeks, and Grant
Atkins at the time he had a chefde cuisine His name is David
Barron and they both talkedabout how I'm the ideal person
that would join the team thatthey could see the possibility
with.
But then I come to learn thatthat job also paid about $30,000
(36:41):
a year and in 2012, that wasn'tgoing to be enough to get
married and have any sort ofquality of life.
So it was the hardest job Iever had to turn down.
But lessons learned, I loved it.
Things that I learned in thekitchen I still use to this day.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
I don't have this in my show notes for today.
The bear, yeah, I mean.
What do you think?
I mean?
What's the?
What are the connections?
Speaker 1 (37:08):
I'll be completely brutally honest, Season one I
watched got through it.
I hesitate.
I think I stopped after episodefour because I'm like this is
triggering, this is too close tocomfort.
I don't necessarily want to dothat after I get off a long day.
I haven't kept up with it, butI've gotten bits and pieces of
(37:30):
it.
It's very close to real life.
You know, it's certainly likeanything, even cooking shows on
TV.
There's things that happen.
They just don't happen as oftenas you might, you know, see
that conveyed in a show.
But yeah, man, it was real andI love that.
They really highlighted Chicagovery well.
They put it in a very goodlight, as it deserved, because I
(37:52):
mean, that's a cradle for theculinary industry.
I mean, people have grindedtheir teeth in Chicago and gone
off to other parts of thecountry and done great things.
It needed a little boost likethat.
It was cool.
Speaker 2 (38:05):
Yeah, I don't have the level of experience at that
sort of caliber restaurant, thelevel of experience and at at
that sort of caliber restaurant.
But when I I watched the firstseason and I also felt a lot of
that, I don't want to saytriggered, but I felt it like I
was my anxiety, I was sweating,you know, watching some of that
(38:26):
stuff and of course, with me ithad more to do with the front of
the house activity versus theback of the house.
But, man, I'll tell you, likethe show, when I, if I get moved
by a show, I want to watch it.
Yeah, all of it, you know whatI want to.
And I did, I binged that entireseason, whatever, however many
were there, I did it in days.
Yeah, yeah, I did, I binged thewhole thing.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
The plight of the sous chef was all too familiar.
I remember in culinary schoolgetting up at 3 am to make a
baking and pastry class at likefive.
That was brutal.
And then I had to go to therestaurant job that I had after
culinary school was done.
Like you know I think it wassix o'clock or five o'clock I
(39:09):
would go work at a restaurantcalled Red Light on the downtown
near the United Center.
Anyway, it was a brutal day.
You know the funny thing herewe are 20 years later and it's
I'm still having 14 hour days.
Speaker 2 (39:23):
I mean it's definitely relevant.
So we fast forward from thetravel, the experiences.
Now you're building restaurantsfrom the ground up.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
Yeah.
So that diverse background kindof led me to be a part of a lot
of teams opening up restaurants.
I found myself in the positionof hey, you've done that, why
don't you help us do this?
Or why don't you help bring amore refined approach to, let's
say, bar food are?
Why don't you help bring a morerefined approach to, let's say,
bar food?
So I found myself on teamsopening up restaurants concepts
(39:56):
around Chicago.
These were in the early 2000sand so and I again, looking back
, that was pretty lucky,fortunate, because you learn a
lot opening up a restaurant.
You learn a lot about what notto do, you make a lot of
mistakes and you know makingmistakes on someone else's dime
is pretty valuable.
So you know, I kept restaurantjobs and I would help other
(40:18):
people open up differentrestaurants or even help just be
part of the concepting andtasting and testing and whatnot.
I eventually found myself as aconcept chef for a restaurant
group out of Chicago.
They had just sold Bar Louieand they were looking to concept
a lot of other things that werecutting edge kind of high-end
(40:41):
bars, different concepts,mexican, a steakhouse.
So it was very diverse work andI was chomping at the bit to
take it and that brought on andimmediately hit the road.
You know, I think I spent twoyears the first two years of my
marriage on the road for like 10months at a time.
You know, and you learned a lotbecause you go into different
(41:05):
cities.
Every city is a littledifferent when it comes to like
health code, and then hiring isdifferent, job pools are
different.
You know, you get to learn thatit's just a different
expectation.
So it was a lot of fastlearning and that kind of helped
shape what I did for the restof my career.
Speaker 2 (41:21):
How does that transition into the anatomy of a
dish?
Speaker 1 (41:27):
How does that transition into the anatomy of a
dish?
You learn how to take theanatomy of a dish and make it
efficient.
You know, make it so otherpeople can help execute your
work you make.
you take apart a dish to a verynuanced level and you break it
down to.
You know subtle sub recipesthat need that consistency.
(41:49):
So you know when.
When you're talking,reproducing your efforts through
other people on a on a very ona national scale, when you're
doing, let's say, five differentconcepts at once, that's an
extremely important thing toknow how to do.
Well, and a lot of what I didwas literally recipe writing,
breaking everything down to alevel that was easy to
(42:11):
understand and then teaching it.
I was actually doing very littlecooking.
Sometimes.
It was a lot of teaching alittle less cooking, and it
certainly taught me a lot aboutthe anatomy of a restaurant as
well.
You know taking the ideas in arestaurant, breaking them down,
standardizing them so thatthey're much more consistent.
So the anatomy of a dish to mehas always been something I have
(42:34):
a lot of fun with, you know,because I learned so many ways
of doing it.
And you know I wish I wouldhave documented more the anatomy
of certain dishes, like the onethat we came up with for that
competition.
It really started around atable with two other chefs and
just throwing ideas out and thensketching something that looked
like a bunch of scribbles on apaper and then taking that and
(42:56):
making a more refined sketch andthen a more refined sketch, and
then the next sketch had subrecipe lists and then the next
sketch after that was much morewords and a lot less images and
you know it's something thatit's beautiful when you see it
happen.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
You just defined walk and talk, media with that.
There you go, yeah, I mean, amI right, john?
Right, I mean it started with,like you know, crayola crayons
and a three-year-old and we'veturned it into something really
special.
Same scenario, same sort ofanatomy.
If you will, it's Tampa Bay,we're here.
We didn't come from here, butwe're here.
(43:31):
Time is a funny thing.
St Pete distillery Been aroundfor about 10 years.
Yep, you've been there forabout a year and a half or so.
You're taking culinary into awhole nother path.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
Talk about it.
Yeah, it's a unique setting.
The distillery sits on a 30acre lot.
It's privately owned.
It's the largest privatelyowned piece of property in St
Pete.
We intend to develop it into animportant part of the community
really, and part of that issome hospitality, whether it's
restaurants, event centers, aplace where the community can
come together.
Currently we do private events,we do something called the
(44:09):
Dinner Series at the distillery,all with this idea of
highlighting what we're doing atthe distillery.
The St Petersburg Distillery hasthis very unique approach of
highlighting Florida in generalin all of its products uses.
Every piece of cereal grainthat enters that distillery
(44:31):
comes from Florida, which isvery unique in and of itself.
We mill there, we bring upfresh groundwater, we filter it.
Everything we make is withFlorida in mind.
So joining them, installinghospitality, putting together a
program you know, hostingprivate events has been a big
challenge and I certainly see alot more possibility there.
(44:53):
I wish we would grow a lotfaster but you know everything
will come in time Right?
So the dinner series is sort ofa placeholder for the future and
what we want to do on the 30acre lot.
You know we have in mind to beto, to to install this community
oriented restaurant whereeverything surrounds a hearth
oven and everything is cookedwith fire live fire, you know.
(45:16):
So that should be somethingthat hopefully will come up in
the next couple of years.
But the dinner series is kindof an opportunity for us to flex
our culinary muscle and ourcreativity, you know, and, and
so we take the product that'sbeing made and we work with, we
work it into recipes and we do asix to seven course tasting
(45:40):
menu that's paired with uniquecocktails.
Sometimes you're going to eatyour cocktail and drink your
main dish.
Some cocktails are verywhimsical.
There's a lot of components,there's things that'll be done
table side.
So it's a unique opportunityand it's only 20 people at a
time.
So our intent is to kind ofgarner enough attention so that
(46:04):
when we go to construct thatbrick and mortar restaurant it
already has a reputation.
Speaker 2 (46:11):
Do you have aspirations for any glory?
Are you looking for any beard,or are you looking for any
Michelin?
Is it?
Speaker 1 (46:18):
that level.
It's one thing that I'velearned in my career is you
never start with that.
I mean, yes, it's nice,recognition is always great,
right?
If you're doing what you loveto the best of your ability, the
attention will come.
Shoot I, when I returned fromEurope, michelin wasn't even in
Chicago yet.
You know.
So to see the Michelin guidecome through and start rating
(46:41):
restaurants in Chicago and youcertainly like, okay, that's
cool.
But is it a goal of mine?
No, not necessarily.
You know I, I, I certainlyadmire those restaurants, admire
what they're doing, and youknow, I know, having been in
Michelin rated restaurants, thatit takes much more than just
food or a chef.
It takes a multifacetedapproach that has to be well
(47:04):
thought out, and until I'm readyto do that a hundred percent,
then you just do what you love.
You got to get the buy-in fromevery single person in the house
, everyone, from start to finish, from the dishwasher all the
way to the host, to hostess.
It has to be from start.
The definition of a Michelinstar is something worth going
(47:27):
out of the way for, right?
So if you're not ready to dothat, then you're not.
You have no business playing inthat game, right?
So our intent, my intent rightnow, is to showcase what I'd
love to do If we garner enoughattention.
Great, I love it.
But to say that that's my goal,no, that'd be a mistake.
Speaker 2 (47:48):
You brought a couple of bottles of goodies.
We didn't break into them yet.
What did you bring?
Speaker 1 (47:52):
So I brought two of my favorite things we're making,
and one of them is a long timecoming.
It's a four-year straightbourbon, 90% corn, 10% rye.
It's been barrel aged in newAmerican oak for four years.
Aging in Florida is definitelyvery different.
The result of it is somethingvery smooth and that's what
(48:14):
you'll find with this bourbon.
The other thing that I broughtis my other favorite an agave
spirit.
What an agave spirit is isbasically, if we were in Mexico,
it'd be a tequila.
If we were in Mexico, we'd begoing for tacos after this too.
So, without question, right, soan agave spirit.
The agave came from Mexico, wasdistilled at the St Petersburg
(48:36):
distillery, aged in second useoak old whiskey barrels.
Basically, we introduced somecharred wood chips to enhance
that flavor and that color.
The risotto is this beautifulsipping spirit that I absolutely
adore because it reminds me ofthe way tequila used to be made.
Right when we fire roasted thepineapples at the root of the
(48:56):
agave plant and you know, youfire roasted them to soften them
up and get the juices out, andthen what you fermented had this
smoky tinge to it that was akinto some might say mezcal, but
it was tequila.
It's the way it used to be maderight.
It was as clear as vodka, butit had a nice little smoky
finish to it.
And that's what you get out ofthis agave spirit you know, so I
(49:19):
absolutely love it.
I'll put it up against any otheragave spirit or tequila.
Speaker 2 (49:24):
You just, you just took my question away.
I was going to say how is thiscomparing?
How are both of those productscomparing with?
You know, some of the heavyhitters that are out there.
Speaker 1 (49:32):
I think the the bourbon has found its spot as
being this overwhelmingly just,smooth, beautiful, well-crafted
bourbon that Florida should beproud of, and the agave spirit
is just unexpected.
It is so, so unexpected and,frankly, you know I'm a big fan
of tequila.
I have a small tequilacollection and you know, again,
(49:54):
this reminds me of the waytequila used to be made.
Despite not drinking, I stillhave a memory of taste buds and
I still use my taste buds.
But yeah, it's impressive andanybody that is a fan of tequila
definitely falls in love.
Speaker 2 (50:09):
What you're saying really is you shouldn't be
drinking this out of a solo cup.
Speaker 1 (50:13):
Listen, I'm a big fan of drinking out of whatever the
heck you want, right, but itjust tastes better in a heavy
rocks glass.
True story.
Speaker 2 (50:23):
Good, that's a true story, Chef.
You're awesome man.
What you did here today wasterrific.
We're thrilled you came out.
How do we find you on socials?
Speaker 1 (50:33):
Well, I'm at ChefDavidReyes on Instagram and
Facebook.
The distillery is St PetersburgDistillery, both of which will
always feature the latest ofwhat we're doing and how to get
there.
You're going to give us a toursometime, right?
You know?
The funny thing about that iswe just started tours.
We used to be a productionfacility only, so we just
(50:54):
started tours, and it'sdefinitely worth the drive,
definitely going out of the wayfor to come get a tour and
you'll probably see me there.
Speaker 2 (51:02):
Yeah, okay, we're going to put that together again
.
Thanks for coming out today,john.
Let's get these picturesrocking and rolling.
Baby, I feel like you'regetting better every week.
Maybe, right, it's hard toimprove on perfection.
He still doesn't talk.
We've been doing this for twoand a half years.
He still doesn't talk.
All right, guys, listen, loveyou both.
We are out.
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