Chef Nick Reveals New Drake Venture & Tiny Sous Chef on the Way

This Monday at KXFM 104.7’s “Best of Laguna Beach,” I welcomed Chef Nick Gstrein, Co-Partner of The Drake Laguna Beach and Co-Chef with his famed dad, Chef Paul. This show was a hoot - audio replay above ☝️, especially as Nick had plenty of amazing announcements and I introduced a new CONTEST I’m doing for live listeners … first run was bumpy on my side of the controls, but Chef Nick killed it!
Here’s what we covered:



✅ Popular plate switchups for spring, including Nick’s favorite, a play on a “light version” of Pork Schnitzel and how Nick uses a vast science to determine when it’s time to order for Peach Season.

✅ Yet another fully acclimated science on how Chef Paul and Nick determine the latest “food trends” that they try out for their own.

✅ When it comes to “tweezer” food, what does this former big-hand college football player do?

✅ My most recent experience with Chef Paul’s “Tasting Menu” craziness. Chef Nick recommends where to reserve your space for the best tasting menu, the best evenings to ask for the Tasting Menu, why rounding up friends makes it even better, and when the chefs DON’T do a Tasting Menu. (lol)

✅ Nick announces that he and his wife are expecting - a BOY! He announces the boy’s name and talks through the Gender Reveal Party and his biggest fear about that entire day. He also talks about how he first met his wife, a lead bartender in a popular watering hole in Austria.

✅ Nick talks about their COMING SOON restaurant, The Drake at Sunset. 

✅THEN, I introduce my “20 on the Line” Listener’s CONTEST … I do 20 rapid-fire questions for Chef Nick and if he answers them all in 2 minutes, listeners then get a shot at a $100 gift card from The Drake. Among the many questions, he notes his favorite musician that matches his cooking vibe, the first toy he’s going to be buying for his son, his biggest guilty pleasure food, whom he’d love to cook for (dead or alive), the name of the bar he met his wife in, the most underrated cooking ingredient of all time, his favorite cocktail at The Drake and more…