Southern Smoke Festival II 2025

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
the-restaurant-guys_2_10- (00:06):
Okay, more shooting chefs in a barrel
here at Southern Smoke.
We have brought along Angie Ritoand Scott Elli from Don Angie.
One of the hardest reservationsto get in Manhattan, New York,
and for a good reason.
Uh, we've also got San Sabino.
These guys are amazing.
and we love your restaurants.
And it's funny that we shouldcome all the way to Houston,
Texas when we are like next toeach other.

(00:27):
All I walk by your restaurantoccasionally.
And you are originally from NewJersey even.
Yes, I am from Awa, New Jersey.
Uhhuh Uhhuh.
so not much going on there.
Well,

Mark (00:36):
bringing culinary professionals to the world.
Actually there's a really goodrestaurant in Wan now in the old
Eli's bagel, uh, Lita.
Oh yeah, Lita Iss a great place.
They're great.
Li's a great place.
Actually, Dave's gonna be on theshow, uh, this spring, so, let's
start with before we do the walkdown memory lane and all our
mutual, connections and, and ourlife up north.
What brings you all the way downto Houston, Texas to, and why

(00:58):
are you participating inSouthern Smoke?
I mean, we've been wanting tocome here for years.
I don't know why.
the restaurants, the kids, yeah.
Stuff going on.
Whatever.
But yeah, we're so stoked to behere.
I mean, it's an amazingfoundation and, um, I mean truly
this entire time, we just keepgoing on and on about how it's
just the most wonderful, wellorganized, like fun event we've
ever done in our life.

(01:20):
Life.
Yeah.
We've, we've been talking aboutthe same thing.
Yeah.
But for a good cause.
Of course.
Uh, so it's like, yeah, it's allthe things.
Chris and Lindsay are theabsolute best.
So, you know, we, they asked usto come and it is like a
well-oiled machine withthousands of, of guests and, and
chefs and, but everything issuper easy for us too.
I mean, it.
Podcasters.

(01:40):
everything was smooth.
This pie.
It's, it's a little weird beingaround this many nice people
though, isn't it?
Yeah.
Come on the south, close to thenorth.
Yeah.
I mean, I'm from, I'm from theMidwest originally.
I'm from Cleveland.
Oh right.
You're from Cleveland.
So I know the vibe, you know,pretty nice people.
Cleveland.
I feel like people are prettynice where I'm from.
Alright, so that brings us to aquestion that Mark has wanted to
ask you.
So we have our restaurant, isnamed it for Mark's grandmother,

(02:02):
Brooklyn, Italian grandma.
Born and raised in Brooklyn.
Yeah, my mother born and raisedin Brooklyn.
And the sign of the restaurantdoes not say Italian restaurant.
It says Catherine Lombardi,Italian American restaurant.
And so how does ClevelandItalian marry Jersey Italian in
a restaurant?
You, how does Cleveland, right?
How does that crossover?
'cause obviously you're, you'reboth Italian Americans.

(02:24):
It's a, it's, yeah, it'sdifferent, but it's the same.
Yeah.
I mean, we're fascinated by likeItalian American culture in
general and just like the manypockets, just communities of
like Italian transplants inAmerica.
I mean, it's truly somethingthat we're just like very
fascinated about by and reallyinterested in.
And I like, we've bonded over somany similarities in our

(02:44):
families and differences.
Mm-hmm.
Like, you know, I feel like ourfirst, we always say our first
conversation, I remember we hadlike late night at a bar was
about copana, you know, andlike.
Talking about differences infamily.
And you, and you knew you weredestined to be married, like
after the conversation actually.
Yeah, pretty much.
But um, you know, there we havelike similar family traditions
that we do differently.
For example, we do, like, weboth do an Easter pie.

(03:05):
Um, pizza rustica.
Yes, exactly.
We, well, very different.
Yeah.
Tell us how, tell us, tell usyour version.
Sure.
So ours is actually, the recipeis in our cookbook Italian
American, and it's based off ofmy.
Grandparents' recipe, it'shilarious because we actually
have a card of the originalrecipe she had in our little, I
have a whole, everything isspelled wrong and it doesn't

(03:26):
make any sense, so we had tofigure it out.
But it's just, it's very simple.
It's basically, um, uh, sorry.
It's uh, sweet Italian sausage,spicy Italian sausage, ham,
mozzarella, provolone,hard-boiled eggs, parsley, and
then the dough is made and youboil all the meat.
First, and then, and you cuteverything up and then you save

(03:47):
all the fat from when you boilthe meat and that's what you
make the dough with all the fatand it's, but it's delicious.
You're, you.
Family recipe is different,right?
Yeah.
So my family, um, I actually,my, they just closed a bakery
that they had for 60 years.
Wow.
In the family.
My grandfather passed away.
It was like a, you know, it'skind of bittersweet.
Um, but yeah, my grandfathercame from Sicily and they would

(04:09):
make a version in the bakery andthey also had like a deli in
there, so they would kind ofuse, you know, they had like
prosciutto and marella and allsorts, like, they used a lot of.
Different like variety of meatsin theirs.
Cured more cured meats fresh.
Yeah.
And they would like bake it in apan, I think just because it was
like in the bakery and they hadlike big hotel pans or whatever.
Okay.
We're telling we don't throwanything away.
Yeah, a hundred percent.

(04:29):
So you got the every in, soevery, yeah.
Hundred percent every, I mean,they would save like my family,
how we made pizza rustica.
It was.
Just the crap we've been savingfor so long.
That's right.
It's just Go pie.
It's getting better.
At least.
Garbage pie.
Garbage pie.
I was gonna make delicious.
So Pizza Tica, I don't know ifyou were, you've seen the movie
Big Night, but the Ano we havea, yeah, so basically the

(04:50):
Timpano in my family, I'm like.
Oh, garbage pie.
They're making garbage pie.
Why are they making such a bigdeal about garbage pie?
I don't get it.
Yeah, they put it in a pastrycrust.
That's why they put it in apastry crust and they hard
boiled eggs.
That was, yeah.
That's so funny.
Funny.
We have a, we have, we have likea bunch of decorations in our
kitchen at Don Angie, and one ofthem is, we have a picture from
that movie, big Night.
And Stanley Tucci came to do anevent like, oh, that's amazing.

(05:11):
A couple years ago.
And he signed it.
'cause it's a, it's a picture ofhim, like, you know, next to the
Pie with, uh, Tony.
I, it's Mark and my favoritefood movie, all Food movie,
period.
Time.
Really?
And since the late nineties,that movie was shot in 96, shot
in Jersey, by the way.
Keyboard.
Yep.
Yeah.
Um, since the late nineties, wehave shown that movie and cooked
the dinner from that movie atleast once a year for 25.

(05:32):
So the hotel across the streethas a, has a screening room like
a.
A, a stadium style screening,which seats like 85 people.
We're like, that's perfect.
So we show the movie to 85people, then 85 of us come back
to the restaurant family style,and we do everything from the
movie.
We wheel the whole pig around.
We do the entire, that's superfun.
It's, it is my, one of myabsolute favorite movie Nights

(05:54):
of the year.
So you should do a big night.
You should do a big night.
You should come to our, I'mtotally, I'm totally okay if you
steal that as long as you cometo ours first.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Done.
Alright, so, so tell, tell me,I, I'm, I really am fascinated
by this topic.
What's another difference, like,a big difference between
Cleveland, Italian, American,Jersey, Italian American?
Well, there's no, like, Angienever had baked clams.

(06:17):
Really?
Oh yeah.
So like, so things that are likeoreg on the east coast.
Uh, so my grandma used to makeeggplant oreg.
Really, which is like, it's,yeah.
Basically the same like breadingsituation.
Yep.
But I think it's just, you know,a product of like whatever, they
didn't have clams around, theyhad eggplant, so, right.
You know, they'd throw the cruston there.
Um, I mean, clams oreg is notreally an Italian Italian thing,

(06:38):
right?
It's Italian American, I think.
Yeah, it did.
I think it's very ItalianAmerican, so, but what my family
did, we didn't really loveoregano.
Oh my God.
So our baked clams are, are likeoregano lists or clams, oreg.
That is, that's wild.
It's delicious.
I don't, it's delicious.
A little bit of lemon on top forthe it, by the way, it's, if you
wanna try, Mark's family'sbakes.
They're available at therestaurant grandmother and is an

(07:01):
Irishman.
It had raw climbs and that wasit.
So I, I really appreciate them.
do you know Anthony Gilio?
He's an Italian food writer.
Uh, wine writer.
He is a great guy.
Sounds great.
Italian American as well.
Yeah.
Married a Sicilian woman, firstgeneration.
Who's here actually?
Who's here?
Oh, Tony's here.
but they're very active in thefood scene.
He's great cooks, food writers,and, um.
He's Italian American and hewrites about immigrant cuisine,

(07:24):
and I thought it was one of themost interesting conversations I
had with him.
And he says, listen, I, Iremember I went to Italy for the
first time and people are likesaute and mushrooms and grill
and stuff.
And he had grown up with hisfamilies and in a north Jersey,
Italian American cuisineculture.
And he looked at the food that'sgoing on in Italy.
He is like, what the hell is allthis stuff?

(07:44):
Yeah.
And one of the things he saidwas that.
When, when, especially in an erabefore the internet, when
immigrant cuisines would comewith you and then would change
because of the differentingredients or whatever, they
would get frozen in time herebecause, oh, that's grandma's
lasagna.
Mm-hmm.
We can never change that.
Right.
She changed.
That's true.
You know, and I, I know, and itgets stuck in time.

(08:06):
Whereas in Italy, food continuesto evolve.
American food continues toevolve, but I think that's a
really cool way that itpreserves.
Kind of esoteric food traditionsthat really are, I think Italian
American cuisine has a valueapart from Italian or American
cuisine.
And I, I think it deserves amatter of respect.
It's not like a weak imitation.
I, I think it's tremendous.

(08:27):
What, to what extent does thatinform your cooking, or does
that inform your cooking at DonAngie?
Yeah, I mean, I think we'reunapologetically Italian
American.
I mean, I.
I, I don't want, you know, we,we try to, I think it's
important to make thatdistinction, you know, we're not
trying to do, we respectregional Italian cuisine.
In fact, like, I mean, it's soimpressive.
Italy has preserved so manytraditions because they have all

(08:49):
these, you know, protections inplace, like the prosciutto's
been made the same way.
Mm-hmm.
Right?
Harmony, honey, all thesethings.
And that's why they're sowonderful and I respect that.
But like, what we do issomething totally different.
It's, it's our, we're trying todo something new and exciting.
But we use a lot of likefamiliar flavors and you know,
at the end of the day, we wantthe meal to be like comforting
and, you know, not intimidatingfor people.
Like, we want there to be thislike approachability to it, so

(09:11):
Love it.
Yeah.
Listen, I, I like food thatmakes you feel good, right?
Yeah, of course.
I like making people feel good.
That's what, that's why I'm inthis business.
Yeah.
So it's Italian American foodmakes people feel good.
That's why there's a zillionItalian American restaurants.
Well, and you know I'meverywhere.
Yeah.
But because people love the foodso much, but, but some of them

(09:32):
suck.
Yeah.
And that's, and that's just theway it is.
Ones that suck.
I like, I mean it's like, I meanwe, that's like what Angen,
before we had our, our sun, weused to, that's all we would do.
We seek out red sauce places andjust go and kind of like.
Rate them and be like, yo, thisone's really, this one's really
good for, uh, their Caesarsalad's really good, but the
other stuff's not so great.
Or, this one makes a really goodshrimp farm.

(09:52):
You know, I'll, I'll tell youwhat I think really changed the
game for me.
So, first of all, as a kid, youwould never go to Italian
restaurant.
He suggests that we open Italianrestaurant, name it after my
grandmother and like.
Why would anybody ever go to arestaurant like that?
They eat that food at home everyday.
Not if you have my grandmothers,you don't.
But so, but in going to Italianrestaurants, what happened to so

(10:16):
many Italian restaurants?
Certainly in Jersey, you knowthis, so every pizzeria in the
world saw Italian, like ItalianAmerican restaurants charging
more for their food.
So they started to emulate them,but.
If your tomato sauce comes outof a number 10 can, and your
mozzarella cheese is pre gratedwith cornstarch on it, you're

(10:37):
not emulating them at all.
Yeah.
So you, you, there is adistinction I think between the
Italian American restaurantsthat we're talking about and the
Italian American restaurant thatis simply open a can pour it
onto some pasta and say that'sthat's Italian.
Yeah.
Agreed.
I like to make it as a nonItalian at the table, feeling

(10:59):
mightily outnumbered.
I, I, there's another thingthat's going on here, though.
If you take French cuisine, likehigh ho French cuisine or
various forms of French cuisine,and you make it mediocrely, it's
terrible.
I mean, it's terrible.
The onions aren't sweated down.
The garlic is too harsh.
The, the pastry doesn't rise.

(11:21):
It's te, it's disgusting.
If you take Italian Americancuisine.
And you make it kind ofhalf-ass, it's still pretty
good.
I mean, like in a pinch, you'rehungry, you're drunk, you're
gonna eat it.
You know what I mean?
You drink the calamari and someflour, you fry it.
Yeah.
Throw on a Caesar salad andyou're, and you're on your way.
But I think that's what, and westrive for this as well, but
with you guys and you know,places like carbon, it's, it's

(11:43):
hard in a way sometimes for usto make a distinction.
Like we have things in our menuthat, yes, you have seen those
words on the local pizzeria'smenu.
That has very, very little to dowith what we make or what you
make.
And I think that sometimespeople look down on Italian
American food.
Not anymore really, but in thebeginning I think people got,

(12:03):
yeah, early on for sure, ItalianAmerican, you can't charge for
that.
I'm like, well, but I'm usingthe better reveal and I'm u and
I'm making things from scratchand I have to charge more for
that.
But I, I, I think that you guysare, are, are, are leaders in
doing that.
And your success is amazing.
Is it still impossible to get areservation in here?
Uh, hold on.
By using better VL Francismeans.
And there's veal in our veal.
Yeah.
Right.
It's not, I, I remember, well, Iremember and we'll answer that

(12:25):
question, but I remember being akid and my dad getting like a
veal Parmesan hero from thepizza place.
Mm-hmm.
And he goes, well, you know,it's not really veal, right?
I'm like, what do you mean?
He's like, yeah, it's justpounded pork or Oh pork.
And I'm like, and bread.
And I'm like, oh, I thought itwas veal.
He's like, no, they just usepork.
And they could say it's veallike, I think he's right.
Uh, yeah, I think he was right.

(12:46):
The restaurant is, you know,listen, it's, we're very lucky
for the success.
It's been eight years.
Um, it's a very smallrestaurant.
It's great though.
It's freaking great.
Thank you.
We went after our wine tastingand we went at like 10 30 and we
were so happy to be there.
It was amazing.
Thank you so much.
Yeah, it's really great time.
It's, you gotta come back andtry our, our new restaurant that

(13:06):
we just opened last year, SanSabino.
You know, our ed is constantlytalking about San Sabino.
The shrimp parm is pretty good.
So tell, it might be, it mightbe Ed's favorite restaurant.
Our friend Ed TAUs.
Tell, tell us about, tell ourlisteners about Sabino.
We have to come.
Yeah.
So I mean, it's still.
So it's our, our secondendeavor, Don Angie.
We opened eight years ago, asScott said.
Uh, San know we opened like yearand a half ago.

(13:28):
Um, it's a little bit morefocused on seafood and
cocktails, but it's our, stillour like Italian American style
and kind of our perspective onItalian American cuisine.
So, you know, we serve like aspicy tuna with crispy arancini.
Um, that sounds awesome.
We do a version of that.
Sounds delicious.
We do a version of shrimp parmwith like these giant prawns and
like this like kind of sweet andsour, like super garlicy.

(13:50):
Sauce and like dollops of stinocheese.
Um, we do, one of my favoritethings on the menu is our clam
pasta that we do with Amarillo,which is like a yellow Peruvian
chili.
Um, yeah, so, sounds great.
So, so I want, I wanna ask aquestion around, I gotta answer
that You, out, you outrank me atthis table.
We'll go right ahead.
Alright.
So many people in my life,nobody in my family have said,

(14:14):
oh, you can't put cheese onfish.
Yeah.
And I, and I'm like.
I've been putting cheese on fishsince before I knew it was
cheese.
Okay.
I think a lot about what we dois like, we break a lot of
rules, like in general, butthat's not a rule.
It's rule breaking cuisine thatwe, and they're crazy.
Yeah.
If you grade a cheese on, on, onin the broiler on fish, since

(14:36):
literally I was fishing as a3-year-old, Yeah.
The people that say that havenever really had it.
Yeah, they haven't.
I mean, they have and theydunno.
You know what I, I mean?
Yeah.
and we just make stuff thattastes good.
Yeah.
That's it.
Hear it in the story.
We make stuff that we thinktastes good, that we want to eat
over and over again.
And that's all.
And it clearly works becausepeople are coming to Don Angie
and keep coming after eightyears.

(14:56):
So, so let's talk about, uh,your Italian American family.
Um, so you guys own therestaurants together.
You're both chefs, you haven'tkilled each other.
Well, how does it, how does itwork?
How do you make the decisions?
How do you.
how does the, how does themachine and, and the marriage
and the relationship all keepyou alive?
And so, and just to start, yeah.
Know that this table betweenFrance and me is three feet
wide.
Would've been better if it hadbeen four.

(15:17):
Yeah.
I think we have this wonderful,uh, like.
We have strengths and weaknessesthat just like balance each
other really well, honestly,like, and we just kind of, it's
weird.
We've worked together for solong, we know each other so
well.
We communicate withoutcommunicating.
We like read each other's mindsand we kind of just like, sort
of like stay in our lanes sortof thing, you know, like we just

(15:38):
gravitate toward, you heard thatright Francis?
You know, they stay in theirlanes.
I'm not married to you,actually.
Did you hear me?
I know sometimes we're jumpingan alley, but like we just
Right.
Like we just kind of gravitatethose.
There's certain things that eachof us have strengths in that we
know of course.
And you know, like, and that'sjust how it is.
And I ultimately, like, I alwaystrust Angie's opinion on

(15:58):
everything because she and my isthe best cook I've ever worked
with.
And I'm saying that that'sawesome.
Like, she's amazing.
So like, and her grandmotherwas, I hate to say this, like my
grandmother was amazing, but hergrandmother on her dad's side,
her food was unreal.
Like unreal.
And, uh, yeah, it's just so, youknow, I just, we, I ultimately

(16:20):
say, do you think it's good?
'cause I'm trying to see if shelikes it.
Mm-hmm.
You know, if we make somethingand if she likes it, I know it's
good, you know, so That's great.
It's hard sometimes'cause I cantell that she doesn't wanna tell
me if, like, I'll be like, I'llbe like, is it good?
And she'll be like, you know,uh, and I'm like, alright, so
tell me what to change.
And she's like, I don't wannaupset you.
I'm like, you're not gonna upsetme.
I just wanna, you know, I wannamake it, I wanna make it good.

(16:41):
You know, so, so we have a hardrule in our restaurant and hard,
I mean, difficult.
Um,'cause it's hard on ourchefs.
Okay.
So Francis and I sit down withour two chefs, okay?
We have a chef at Ka Lombardi,chef at stage left.
And when a new dish getscreated, we all sit down and if

(17:01):
somebody doesn't like it, wedon't serve it that way, right?
Anybody can veto.
And what we've realized is.
Sometimes there are good disheswe don't serve.
Right.
And that's the, that like I wasa stats major.
Like that's the type two error.
That's the acceptable error,yeah.
Is to not serve a good dish, butthe unacceptable error is to

(17:21):
serve a dish that's not good.
Right.
I agree.
I mean, and by by hearingsomebody descent, you know,
that's got too much salt for me.
we need a little asset to makethat pop.
whatever the thing is.
Having those voices in the roommakes it better.
I agree.
And at the end of the day, Imean, we, we strive to make
things that like appeal to likea wide audience of people.

(17:42):
Mm-hmm.
Like we want our restaurant tofeel like inclusive, like, you
know, if someone's like a littlepicky about food or whatever,
like we really strive to have amenu where.
Anyone can come in and like findstuff that they like on our
menu, you know?
Yeah.
Because at the end of the day,we're like big on hospitality
too.
Mm-hmm.
We want people to feelcomfortable.
We don't want it to be likeintimidating or, you know,
whatever.
So it's not about us with like,the food that we wanna make and
Yeah.
We're, we have very low, we're,we have restaurants and we have

(18:05):
140 employees within those twosmall restaurants.
We wanna make sure that we'reable to support everybody and we
get customers in and the onlyway to do that is to make food
that people like, you know?
So, by the way, there's nothing,like not being able to support
everybody for a while.
No.
That makes you appreciate beingable to able to support
everybody for a while, right?
Yeah.
Alright, so we need to, beforewe conclude, we have to at

(18:26):
least, uh, talk, dishes.
Can we talk about lasagna?
Oh, your role.
Lasagna's cool as hell.
Just made it on the Yeti stage?
Yes.
Oh, did you?
Oh, nice.
Yeah.
Oh, I'm so sad I missed it.
Famous.
Famous.
So tell us about your lasagna.
Well, we wanted to make lasagnathat we started out trying to
make lasagna look nice, right?

(18:47):
So we were like, how do you makearm lasagna?
Looks like a big pile of crap.
Everybody kind of does, andit's, but they all, but here's
the thing, it always tastesgood.
No, it's spectacular.
But like, it's not like it'sreally hard to make serve in the
restaurant.
So we.
Angie came up with this idea forthe lasagna.
We made it and then once we madeit and ate it, we were like,
wow.
It actually, in our opinion,eats better than our regular

(19:08):
lasagna.
'cause it's not stacked on topof each other.
I guess you should say.
It's a, it's, it's a pinwheelstyle lasagna.
So basically, so describe that.
Yeah.
You gotta tell people who havenever been to Donna.
Yeah, for sure.
So it's.
Homemade pasta that we sheetlike paper thin.
Uh, but we make, like our pastarecipe is very specific.
We've spent forever like dialingin the ratio of egg yolks and
whole eggs and three differentflour to make it this kind of

(19:30):
like sturdy dough that willyield, like we can sheet it like
paper thin.
Mm-hmm.
But it still has a bite to it.
Um, and then it's layered withbechamel mozzarella.
Parmesan.
We only use 24 month par.
And then, uh, a bologne saucethat we make.
Uh, it's, it's kinda like aclassic bologne, but then we
also add some like ItalianAmerican inflection.
So we add some crushed tomatoes,which like in bologna, they

(19:51):
don't do that.
Um, we actually add a littlecola tora, a little Italian fish
sauce for like.
Some umami.
Oh, it's very tasty.
And a little bit of, uh, youprobably weren't supposed to let
that one out, but that's allright.
Oh, I mean, whatever.
And, uh, yeah.
And we add some sweet Italiansausage in there for that
fennel, like little ItalianAmerican flavor.
Yeah.
Ours is layered with Italiansausage and meatballs.
It's gotta be in there.
Yeah.
Um, but we roll those pinwheelsup and then we bake them in, um,

(20:14):
like a, just very classic, uh,tomato sauce made with, um, San
Rosano DOP tomatoes.
And then dollops of whippedrobio cheese, which is like a
soft cow's milk cheese, greatcheese, kinda like a cream
cheese situation.
Um, so that's another differencetoo.
It's like tgy and light.
It's not heavy like or hot.
It's definitely has more tangthan Yeah, than a your average
lasagna.
Yeah.
And then it's sort of sliced andserve in the side.

(20:35):
So you see the side of the.
And kind of seared, right?
You guys are?
Yeah.
So you b we basically serve it,uh, there's six little rolls to
a portion, which we say on ourmenu it's for two.
It's really for like a family offour.
It's massive.
Yeah.
Uh oh.
Um, and, uh, two will saying itand uh, yeah, we bake it in the
oven and kind of like Scott wassaying, you get the gold, the
golden crispy top and like sortof the soft bottom.

(20:57):
It's really light.
We serve it with a little garlicfocaccia that we make in house.
It's got like a garlic sofritofolded into the dough.
So, well, if you have to have asignature, that's a great one.
Uh, it was, uh, it's a shamethat we had to come thousands of
miles from home to meet eachother, to meet each other, but I
hope that we will see each otheragain in each other's
restaurants sometime soon.
Yeah.
Let's reconvene north.
You take the timeout.
Talk to us here.

(21:18):
Yeah.
Thank you so much.
Yeah, nice time to meet youguys.
Thanks for coming.
Thank you.
Thanks guys.
That was great.
You guys the best.
Painless.
I hope I'm salivating

the-restaurant-guys_4_10-0 (21:26):
Next up at the Southern Smoke
Festival down here in Houston.
We are having a fantastic timetalking to some really
interesting people.
Next up we have Lucas McKinney.
He's the executive chef atJosephine's.
Yes, sir.
Your tagline is Gulf Coasttradition.
You're located in MidtownHouston and we wanna know all
about the Gulf Coast.
Yeah, I mean, where do we start?
You know, um, so we, we, we'vebeen open about two years.

(21:49):
Uh, we source all Gulf Seafood.
Today we're shucking, uh, mobileraw bar out here.
I guess that's why you broughtthe oyster shank.
Yeah, I've been, yeah.
By the way, I gotta be honest.
I was a little nervous when youshowed up around.
Yeah.
Hey, you came.
No, you gotta keep'em on you,you know, you came armed.
Yeah.
Alright, so, but I let, let'sstart back a little further.
'cause your history goes wayback from before the beginning
of this restaurant.

(22:09):
Yeah.
You've been eating gulf, you'vebeen eating gulf food, Gulf
seafood, eating, preparing,getting, I assume whole life
fishing.
Yeah.
So I grew up in, uh, I grew upin Ocean Springs, Mississippi, a
little small town like rightoutside of Biloxi.
so yeah, I grew up fishing,eating all the seafood, hanging
out, you know, Shing oysterswhen I was little.
and then I went to Ole Miss forcollege and cooked, uh, yeah,

(22:32):
cooked through college.
Uh, and I moved out here in 2018to work with Chris.
So, well, hold on.
Were your parents really mad atyou?
Like mine were, when I said.
Yeah, I got my degree.
I'm, you know, I'm an economicpsychology, statistics triple
major.
I'm gonna make the restaurantbusiness my career.
No.
You know, so, uh, I was kind ofhopping majors, right?
Mm-hmm.
And my mom, uh, I'll neverforget, my mom was like, son,

(22:54):
like, just pick something and gowith it.
Like, just pick something, dude.
Um, and at the time I wascooking, um, and so I actually
dropped out and, and became aprofessional line cook.
Wow.
And then just kind of chasedthat dream.
My, my mom was lessunderstanding than yours?
Well, I think she was just kindof tired of me going back and
forth, you know, so I, I don't,I'm gonna say still is 33 years
later.
Yeah.
My mom's still like.

(23:14):
Restaurant business really well,I wanna talk about the, first of
all, there's a whole culturearound Gulf Seafood and what's
interesting is people don'trealize, like we we're in New
Jersey, we're a coastal.
Yeah.
So we have New England seafoodabove us.
We have, uh, we have twodifferent fisheries on our way
down here off the Atlantic.
Yeah.
but there's a real culturearound Gulf seafood that you've

(23:35):
been involved in since you werea kid.
Tell us about that culture.
And I also wanna know.
About the culture and theseafood?
Has it changed over the years?
Yeah.
What's, I wanna know what'shappening.
Yeah.
What's hap what's going on?
What's the seafood?
Yeah.
You know, I think it's, so likegrowing up, I think it was one
of the, and, and we try toencapsulate this at the
restaurant, right?
Where like my whole life growingup, it was like, you know,
anything, you go catch, youcatch a lot, everyone comes

(23:57):
over, it brings the communitytogether, right?
The neighbors come over or um,you know, you have a fish fry
and all the family comes.
Um, and so.
You know, I think that that'sstill a big part of the heart of
the Gulf, and I think it's,that's a seafood thing in
general, right?
'cause it's such a raw productthat you kind of have to do
something with right away.
You know, you go catch a bunchof crabs, you gotta have a crab
oil, right?

(24:18):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You can't just, you know, youcan't just put'em in the, in the
fridge and wait on'em.
Right, right, right.
So now or never.
Yeah.
You know, and I can't eat'emall.
Right.
Oh yeah.
And so it brings people togetherand I think that that's still
one of the great things aboutGulf seafood and, and the way I
grew up.
a lot of the work that needs togo into it now is, is making
sure that the economy is takencare of the Gulf.

(24:38):
So, like, you know, it's reallyhard for shrimpers out there
now.
Um, you know, a lot of theoysters we're shucking today are
farm raised Gulf oysters, whichis a newer, industry in the
Gulf.
And so through the restaurantwe're doing everything we can to
put those industries on, on, youknow, display and make sure that
we're spending our money withthem and.

(24:59):
And bringing in those productsthat support their families and
their communities.
Right.
So, you know, you talk aboutfarm raised oysters and farm
raised oysters are differentthan a lot of other farm raised
Yeah.
Seafood products.
Farm raised oysters make theaquaculture better.
Yeah.
Okay.
Oysters are filters.
They're gonna make the waterbetter if you, if you put a
whole bunch of oysters into,into bad water.

(25:22):
The water's gonna get better.
Yeah, it absolutely, and it getsbetter fast.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, and you know, it brings afishery, it helps the commercial
fishermen, they get to bringcharters out there.
You know, you'll see.
It's, it's just, it's so much,it's so good for the ecosystem
it's different than say, I mean,and, and I just want,'cause
people may not realize A salmonfarm done responsibly can
provide, put as much pollutioninto the water as a city of 10

(25:43):
pounds.
Right.
It can nuke the water.
Exactly.
It can nuke the ocean.
Yeah.
But, but oysters nothing butgood news.
Right?
Yeah.
Right.
Well, and then, you know, inTexas we have a lot of, you
know, beautiful red fish farms.
Yeah.
and they're right off the coastfiltering the water into the,
into the farm.
The, the, the fish are eatingshrimp that they're putting in
there, you know, it's.
It's a super clean product and alot of like, really awesome jobs

(26:05):
down there.
So thanks Julie.
Um, you know, h beverages upright?
Know, farm Seafood's a wholenother conversation, but the
Gulf does it really well andespecially Texas down in p like
Pius and everywhere.
So.
Well, so I wanna talk, are, arethere different fish coming off
the Gulf now than when you werea kid?
I mean, ha has that changed atall or is it all the same?
Um.
Well, you know, I think thatit's weird'cause you know, when

(26:26):
you're a kid and you're fishing,uh, and then you get to see this
side of it where you'repurchasing and like seeing
what's available.
It's, it's always an everevolving thing.
Right.
And like, it's fun to see like,when the migratory species like
Kobe and when triple tail comearound and, um, but yeah, I
think that, you know, especiallywith like snapper restrictions

(26:46):
and, and the, the regulations inthe Gulf, you do see a lot of
different.
Fish coming about and a lot moreof it is, uh, fish that aren't,
you know, on the posters or fishthat aren't well known.
And so we like to get that inthe restaurant, right?
Like that's, you know, I think,I think that's the job of a chef
we talk to.
We talk to people in, uh,Charleston about that.
And I think great chefs andgreat cooks and great fishermen

(27:09):
bring fish that.
Other people may not immediatelyknow about it and say, here, try
this great fish.
And if we eat a broaderdiversity of fish responsibly,
that's better for the ocean.
It's better for our diet.
And you get to try new stuff.
Yeah.
And you know, if they catch it,they gotta sell it, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, I remember going toFulton Street, right?
And that was the fish market inNew York, it's market in New

(27:30):
York.
And you know, you go to yourlocal fish guy, he's like, I got
two red drum.
I'm like, great.
Let's see what we can do withRed drum.
Right?
I'll buy two red drum.
We'll have.
14 portions of Red Drum in therestaurant.
Yeah.
And we do something cool withit.
My favorite, my favorite is, youknow, we use a lot of local guys
here and, uh, they'll text me,you know, like, they'll be like,
Hey, we, I, I bought a sharkfrom this guy, like.

(27:53):
Is there anything you wanna sellShark?
I'm like, yeah.
Yeah.
And then for our guests, it, itcreates an experience of like,
well, I've never had Shark.
And it's like, mm-hmm.
Well, yep.
We're serving it right now.
You, you might as well try it.
Right.
And so you have regular guysthat are your merchants, or do
you buy directly from boats ordo you go to markets?
So where does it generally comefrom?
Um, so, you know, sometimes, soI like to, I don't like to cut
the middleman out, like, youknow, we have some really great

(28:14):
local markets here.
Mm-hmm.
Um, blue Horizon Airline,seafood, uh, you know, and then
I, there's guys in Louisiana andthen.
There's a really awesome, uh, Ijime like boat that's getting
started here, um, that I reallywant to start working with.
I've been talking to them, but,um, what's an i jime boat?
Uh, so they're, they'repracticing, uh, like ethical,

(28:34):
like killing it Right on.
Oh, right on the boat.
Japanese bleeding at theJapanese way.
Okay.
Sticking the wire down the spotand everything.
Yep.
Um, and it's a super greatproduct.
I'm sorry.
Just, just for our listeners, sowhat that's creating is there
is, uh, a lot more sushi qualityfish coming.
Off of boats then we, than wewere getting for a while.
Right.
Because of the way they'rebutchering.
Very expensive way of thebutchering thing.

(28:55):
It's not typically somethingthat like you would see people
in the gulf do.
Mm-hmm.
Um,'cause it takes a little bitmore work.
It's a little bit moretechnique.
It's just not just gettingthrown in a bucket of ice.
Right.
So, um, it, it's, there's a lotof people out there doing the
good work like that.
So, um, but they'll text me andbe like, Hey, you know, I have
two wahoo on a boat coming in.
Would you like one, you know,and, and be, we love that.

(29:15):
Itll, yes, I would.
It'll be here in the morning.
They're driving in right nowfrom an overnight trip.
You, there's nothing like the,the fishermen calls you from the
boat Yeah.
And says, this is what's comingin.
Well, they'll text our, they'lltext our purveyors and then
they'll call me.
And That's awesome.
So, yeah, it's great.
That's awesome.
It's really great.
So you gotta tell us aboutJosephine's and, you know, your
tagline is Gulf Coast tradition.
What makes a seafood restaurantgreat?
What makes your seafoodrestaurant great?

(29:36):
What's Josephine's?
Um, I think it's like, you know,kind of like what we're talking
about, right?
The adventure.
Um, every day it's, it's, we'rejust getting what's available,
you know?
Uh, we run a lot of specials.
A lot of whole fish.
but I think, I think sourcingand everything that we try to do
in the restaurant, like push theboundaries on, we'll run like,
you know, some classic stuffthat I, I grew up on.

(29:58):
Right.
But then we'll try to push it.
Classic stuff like what?
That you grew up on?
Uh, well this isn't a seafooddish, but like pea salad is like
an old school selling thing thatI grew up on.
we got redfish dip and thingslike that, but we'll, we'll run
like, you know, nook mom, crabfingers, or.
Try to try to put on for the,you know, the people that are
actually in the fisheries now.
It's, and like, kind of, uh, youknow, honor their cultures as

(30:19):
well.
Tell us what that is.
The crab fingers.
I don't know.
Crab fingers.
You know, it is like a Nook masalad with like shaved, uh, what
was that first word?
What was that first word?
Nook Mam.
It's a, uh, it's a Vietnamese,like dipping sauce that's not a
New Jersey Roy for, so, youknow, uh, garlic chilies.
but yeah, you know, a lot ofstuff that like, you know, I
learned working with Chris and.
Putting on for the, you know,the cultures that are in the

(30:41):
Gulf right now, when you preparefish, what do you do that's kind
of a signature besides what'straditional?
Are you, you, you try to pushthe boundaries, you said?
Yeah, I mean it's, it kind oflike, you know, even just the
balance between the farmers thatwe use that are texting us like,
Hey, these are the vegetables wehave.
Um, I have a lot of this herb,or, you know, and we'll figure
it out.

(31:01):
We'll just kind of put ittogether.
And be like, alright, how do wetake what we have?
Honestly, we just buy stuff andthen we have to figure out how
to sell it, right?
Mm-hmm.
Love it.
And so that's kind of thephilosophy.
That's a great fish, by the way.
That's the definition of a greatfish restaurant.
Yeah.
You know, like, I'm good enough.
I don't think that there's, I'mgonna take, I, I need to, I'm
gonna select between the bestquality and not the best
quality.
Whatever species I can get rightnow.

(31:22):
Right.
I will go with that and be ableto make great stuff.
Yeah.
Your restaurant's named afteryour grandmother?
My great grandmother.
Great grandmother.
Yeah.
So I want you as a guy who'snamed a restaurant after his
grandmother.
Yeah.
I want, want you to talk aboutthe responsibility that comes
with naming a restaurant after afamily member.
Um, yeah.
And you know, like when we weredesigning the restaurant, it
wasn't, it was kind of what Ijust threw out and then when my

(31:43):
mom, and my grandfather came, soit was his mother.
Um, they came and ate at therestaurant and when we had like
friends and family and in theback we have, uh, pictures, our
interior designers like pulledout these pictures that my mom
emailed them and they blew'em upand put'em in frames and.
It really just kind of likegrounds you a little bit.
Right.
You know, uh, my family was,immigrants in, in Mississippi
that moved over, um, and startedworking in the seafood factories

(32:07):
and things like that.
And so came from where, so allover the place really like, uh,
my grandfather's side, our,coming from like the Dalian
coast area, um, a lot of thoselike Croatian immigrants that
settled in the, in the Gulf andstarted the shrimping
industries.
Um, his grandfather was acaptain on a shrimping boat.
so it's just one of those thingsthat when it, it means a lot as

(32:30):
a chef, I feel like you, youtravel around and you want to
cook all these things throughoutyour career and then to kind of
settle down and open a spot thatlike, okay, like this is my,
this is my thing.
This is what I grew up on.
This is how, how am I gonnarepresent that and how am I
gonna represent my familytradition?
Right.
And that's kinda why we put thetradition in there, because
it's.
it might have been a traditionof mine to have a giant seafood

(32:51):
cook, you know, boil at thehouse.
But now we get to share thatwith people who have never had
that before.
that's the biggest thing.
You serve your family's food.
It feels good every day.
Yeah, yeah.
Absolutely.
Feels good every day, you know?
And then, you know, um, I,there's a big Italian influence
on our family, so mm-hmm.
I always catch myself cooking abig, like, you know, a lot of
Italian specials, influence andstuff like that.
So it, it always, it's, it's funand it's easy, dude.

(33:13):
It's easy to.
It's easy for it to just comeout from the heart and you don't
have to think about it.
You know it's gonna be good.
You know, that you put what yougrew up on in it.
Right.
You know?
And so I think that that's beenour, that's helped me get
through the day every day.
I have to sitting here with youtwo big guys.
You two big lugs namerestaurants have to your
grandmother, one of'em I halfown.

(33:34):
Um, you know why Big people, bigheart.
Yeah.
You know why still gotta comefrom here.
You know why we didn't name a, arestaurant after my grandmother?
She's a terrible cook.
That's why was terrible.
She was good.
There's no bad cooks in myfamily.
Oh yeah.
Well, Ireland not the same.
I just wanna finish with onelast thing.
So you're here with SouthernSmoke doing this thing.
I know you worked for Chris.

(33:54):
why is Southern Smoke importantto you?
Yeah.
You know, so we talk, I talk tothe staff about it all week.
Like it's, it's our Super Bowl.
especially being here inHouston.
When I moved here, in 2018, I,I've done every one of'em since.
you know, I was, I was a cook.
I was helping other chefs.
Last year I got to representJosephine's for the first time.
That's great.
And be a chef at Southern Smoke.

(34:15):
Um, so I like to think that,like, you know, I worked my way
up through the ranks of SouthernSmoke and, uh, it's really an
honor.
But like, you know, the biggestthing is.
Everything that we do every dayand all the work that we put in
for our, you know, to serveguests.
But it's, it's really all aboutour team.
And I told our team thisyesterday, I was like, you know,
I show up for you guys.
I don't show up to serve guests.

(34:35):
I don't show up to cook the foodup.
Like what drives us is the teamand, and the people in this
industry.
And we're super lucky that allthese people want to come to
Houston and they're all here,you know, giving their time and
volunteering their time.
For what we do and to supportour industry.
And I told the staff like, it's,it's always something that's
gonna be here for you.
And we had awesome chefs come tothe restaurant this week and

(34:57):
it's just been an awesomeexperience and, and we get to do
stuff to give back to our ownpeople, right?
So.
I'll never, I'll always be here.
That's as long as Chris willhave me.
Right.
Dude, I, I have say it is beenlovely to talk to you.
I can't wait to try your foodand, I'm sure you do.
Your great grandmother proud.
Thank you.
You guys too, man.
Thanks for having me on the pod.
Thanks.
Alright brother.
Thank you.
Yeah, thank you guys.
Take care.
Hey, thanks.
I'll bring some moisture here ina minute.

(35:18):
Nice.
Love that.
Luke and Bikini, when he sendsus the oysters, he'll be our new
favorite chef for a few minutes.
Josephine's, in Midtown Houston.
You gotta try it out.
Go back in just a minute guys.
Y'all be good.
Thank you.
Thanks

the-restaurant-guys_3_10-04- (35:30):
So many great chefs here deep in
the heart of Texas.
We have with us Felipe Riccioand Austin Waiter.
They are with GoodnightHospitality.
It's a local group ofrestaurants.
We were at March last night.
Had a lovely time, had somegreat cocktails.
The Marigold Club and RosieCannonball.
The restaurant scene down here,guys, is amazing.
We're really happy to have youguys here.

(35:51):
Thanks for having us.
Yeah, we were thrilled to comefor all the chefs that come from
all over, but you guys are, I wealso wanted to check out
Houston.
Yeah.
It's a pretty cool scene youguys got going on here?
Yeah, it really is.
And it's, it's awesome thatthere's a good mix of, you know,
local chefs and, and people fromout of, the market.
You know, uh, it's great to, towelcome all of them to Houston.
we have two restaurants.

(36:11):
Yeah.
One is on the first floor, oneis on the second floor.
One's a contemporary statehouse.
One's a, uh, Italian American.
Italian American, named after mygrandmother.
You guys have kind of fed off ofour little concept there.
You got a restaurant on thefirst floor.
You got a restaurant on thesecond floor, you got a
restaurant next door.
What's great about that is youcan go to where you're needed.

(36:32):
But at the same time, not bemissed in the place next door.
You know your mom's coming in,your brother's coming in.
Yeah.
Your friends are coming in.
You can make sure you seeeverybody you need to see too.
That's such, yeah.
Yeah.
And, and be.
Be there for the differentstaffs too.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
But yeah, it is, and I thinkit's a testament to how great
the dining culture and the sceneis in Houston to be able to have

(36:53):
that many concepts.
You know, right there, it's,it's very concentrated.
Is it, but it really helps foroperations.
Is it that the dining scene isso much more diverse and there's
a growing dining scene here?
I mean Oh yeah.
Houston's just so large ingeneral, and I think that
diversity and just, it continuesto grow and I think it's
awesome.
some people can have tworestaurants in Houston.
Yeah.
And be.

(37:13):
An hour and a half away fromeach other.
A hundred percent.
You guys are, we are.
We're a stair flight away.
Yeah.
Dude, Houston's crazy.
Like, you, you can drive.
Well, how long will it take todrive across Houston?
45 minutes.
I'm like, yeah, yeah.
At least.
At least.
That's crazy.
Alright, so, but you guys, Iwant to tell everybody about
your restaurants.
It's, it's, it's super high-end,but it's not, I don't know.

(37:35):
It's, it's not precious.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, so talk to us about that.
How does that.
Come out in your restaurants,what do they have in common?
What do, what do Houstonrestaurants or Texas restaurants
have that is different from NewYork or Paris or, I mean, I
think Houston, like, you know,being in the south and our
ability to just treat peopleright.
And I think that, you know, Igrew up in the Northeast and

(37:55):
moving down to Houston was sucha change, but.
The people here are just sonice.
And it's called SouthernHospitality.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's a big one.
That's a big, yeah.
Yeah.
And, and it's part of, it's partof the concept in the ethos at a
place.
Like it's really a, for all of'em.
But at Marigo Club, you know,it's sort of like that Mayfair,
London, you know, French food,but with that southern

(38:17):
hospitality.
You know what's funny?
I just wanna say it a stepfurther'cause I just realized
what it is.
So we, we were, uh, last nightat March.
Yeah.
And we had cocktails at Marchlate and Yeah.
You guys guys have a crazymillion multimillion dollar wine
cellar.
Yeah.
What a wine cellar.
Oh my God.
We're gonna talk about that.
Yes.
Oh my god.
It's spectacular.
But we were there and it, it,there's just a confidence and
there's no self-consciousness atall.

(38:38):
No one's trying to flash.
Yeah.
Yeah, what they have, it's allunderstated.
Yes.
Uh, a hundred percent.
It's very much so a, a huge partof, of Houston.
You know, we don't have a dresscode.
We don't, you know, we don'thave these rules because you'll.
You know, you'll walk in inshorts and a t-shirt and you
might be a, you know, a CEO fora Fortune 500 company.

(38:58):
Right, right, right.
You will.
You see that all the time.
But you mentioned southernhospitality, right?
What's one of the, the hardestthings we have to do, right?
I gotta weed two out of threepossible employees out just by,
Hey, you're not nice enough towork in our restaurant.
Yeah, a hundred percent.
If you don't wanna be with themand hang and you know.
But every converse with them,you don't want to, but is every
everybody down here nice?

(39:19):
Is that what's going on?
No, not everybody.
I'm sorry.
Is it easier to find nice peopledown here than in maybe New York
City to come who are applyingfor waiter jobs?
Oh, for sure.
Yeah, I think so.
And I think like, you know,people grew up here and they
stay here and I think thatreally changes them and, and
their ability to like, take careof our guests.
We are impressed with, and oneof the things from all the

(39:41):
research we've done and therestaurants we've been to down
here and the people we've talkedto down here.
How many people started hereleft and then say, you know
what?
I wanna go back to Houston.
Yeah.
And I, we noticed some of thesame stuff in Charleston when we
went to Charleston.
Uh, just, that's a really coolthing, I think to, to go back to
where you came from and say, youknow what?
I learned some cool stuff.
I'm gonna bring it back to myhometown a hundred percent.

(40:03):
And you know, it's interestingbecause we have very different
stories, like from, from thatperspective.
I was born in Veracruz inMexico, but I moved here as a
young teen and.
My whole career was here excepttwo years in, in Europe, mostly.
Mm-hmm.
Uh, mostly Italy and Spain.
And then, but I had theopportunity to come back
specifically for these projects.
You know, and be a partner forthese projects.

(40:23):
And that's what brought me back,you know, the fact that my
career was here, and the, theindustry is so strong.
And then you have Austin, who,you know, came from, from B
York, Connecticut.
Yeah.
And CIA.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
you know, I feel like I alwaystell this story, but like I was
in a target, uh, and someonecame up to me and said, Hey, how
are you doing?
And coming down from New York,it's like.
I was like, what does thisperson want?

(40:43):
You grabbed my wallet, what'sgoing on?
They're like, what time is it?
You grab your wallet.
Yeah.
You look at your watch, but youdon't take your eye off them,
you know?
Yeah.
And he could have gone anywhere.
I mean, you know, CIA grad, likehe could have gone anywhere in
the world.
Yeah.
And stayed here and for a longtime At, at, at, at Tony's.
You were at Tony's for so long,I, that is so rare.
So he left us to start us to sueas a, uh, intern.

(41:04):
CI intern Right and left as theCDC of the restaurant.
I mean, that, that, that doesn'thappen that often.
No, I hear you.
It doesn't.
So let, let's, well, let's talkabout the Marigold Club and, the
difference between the two,concepts, the March and the
Marigold Club, hard by eachother.
You are the executive chef atthe Marigold Club.
Yeah.
Chef, partner.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Chef, partner.
So, so tell us about theMarigold Club.
Yeah.
What's its purpose?

(41:24):
What's it do differently thananything else?
Well, you know, I think like.
Just for when you first walk in,like the design aspects, there's
nothing really like it.
And I think we wanted to createa place where it really
transports you to London andlike specifically Mayfair.
but like pulling in from allthat European influence of
French cuisine and, and reallylike, you know, for us as
restaurants, like we loveEurope, we love design and I

(41:46):
think it shines through in everysingle concept, but, um, I think
there's a through line.
In the food and, and everything.
So, yeah.
So I will tell you, I went toLondon last January.
Yeah.
Chilton Firehouse in Mayfair wasmy favorite place to, okay,
awesome.
And London is so special becausein pretty much all the other
major markets in Europe, Italy,Spain, France, they have a very
strong, national or regionalfood culture, right?

(42:08):
And so you don't really have alot of restaurants from other
places.
And then you go to London andyou have everything.
You have everything.
And then it's such a highquality, and that's really what
inspired part of it.
What I, what I liked aboutLondon was.
The best restaurants were therestaurants that were doing
non-traditional London food.
Right?
Yeah.
Oh yeah.
That's, that's where the bestfood was.
Yeah.
Well, like really great Frenchrestaurants now.

(42:30):
Mm-hmm.
I mean, there's a bunch of newsushi places there and it's
awesome to see it grow too.
in Ireland, it's, it's verysimilar, right?
Mm-hmm.
So, and a lot of my relativeswill say, yeah, we're gonna stop
and pick up some traditionalBritish food, you know, with
Curry, you know?
Yeah, yeah.
A hundred percent.
Well, they, you know, honestly,they say that chip shops, fish
and chip shops in London aredeclining and more people go for
curry late night.

(42:50):
Yeah.
To a curry shop than they do forfish chip shop.
Oh, I believe it.
I believe it.
Yeah.
I mean, it's, it's part of theculture now, right?
A hundred percent.
So, Felipe, you're born inMexico.
Yeah.
You got a huge Mexicanpopulation here in Houston.
we went yesterday to the, to theHouston farmer's market.
What a, what a cool.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's a cool place.
and the Mexican produce andfoods that were available there.

(43:11):
well, I mean, we have a bigMexican population in New
Brunswick, New Jersey.
Yeah.
There are a whole bunch of foodsthere that we just don't sain,
you know, just like bunches ofsain.
Oh my god.
You know, all the s papa.
have you drawn on that cultureliving here and is that culture
inform your cooking at all?
Yeah, um, it does.
Yeah.
I mean, I grew up.
In Mexico.
Mm-hmm.
My, my, my family's from Naplesand South, Southern Italy and

(43:33):
Seia and Southern Spain.
Explaining the last name.
Uh, exactly.
Explain the last name.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Uh, well, my last name, my fulllast name is Richo Ferre.
You know the two last names?
One very Spanish, one VeryItalian.
Uh, but.
I grew up eating Mexican food,right.
You know, uh, out and incredibleflavors and all that, but I
never really cooked itprofessionally, but I 100%

(43:54):
growing up there, the seafood,all these amazing ingredients
and flavors that are part ofevery cuisine.
Uh, it is a big determinantfactor.
My love for acidity too comesfrom, from Mexican food.
So let me ask you guys, what'sthe future for Houston Texas
Dining, and what's the futurefor your restaurants?

(44:14):
That's, that's, that's a reallyhard one.
Yeah, it was supposed to behard.
I think like, you know, I thinkwe're, we're, we threw a whole
bunch of softballs.
All right.
So now you're, no, that's good.
I mean, I think we're seeing alot more people from, from out
of town coming in opening, youknow, bigger name restaurants,
bigger name, rerate Tours, and Ithink there's gonna be a lot
more of that because everyone'sfinally seeing what Houston is
and how great it is.

(44:34):
And I think, um.
You know, we'll see how thatgrowth, you know, does.
Yeah.
And, and you gotta be a goodoperator.
You have to be unique, you know,houstonians know restaurants,
you know what I'm saying?
You come and you just try totake advantage of, of a growing
market.
It won't, it won't fly like theyknow, you know?
So they're very clever dinersand we're very lucky for that.
So I just wanna talk about Marchfor one second.

(44:56):
'cause we, we spent some timethere last night.
So now the restaurant's beenthere for five years.
And basically you've created its10th iteration of menu.
Yeah, yeah.
10th menu as well.
So just talk quickly about thatwhole process of every six
months, kind of transformingwhat's going on.
So that was always part of theintent of the way we built the
restaurant, right?
The idea is we explore theMediterranean right through the

(45:16):
different menus and just kind ofmade sense, you know, twice a
year.
And that's where, where it trulyall started.
you know, it's an expensive,lengthy meal, all this.
Mm-hmm.
I never wanted to hear someonesay, oh, I've been to March.
I've, I've done it already.
Right.
Nice.
And so the idea is like, youhave this focused, menu and, you
know, where you draw aninspiration from, but you give
people different things, youknow, different flavors,
different ideas, and exploring alarger topic.

(45:38):
And then people love it.
People are like, they want tocome to the new season and
collect it, you know?
Yeah.
And that's an important thing asa, as a business too.
Yeah.
That's great.
So here we are, we're at theSouthern Smoke Festival.
What drew you here?
what's your connection here?
Why, why did you feel you neededto be at this event, besides the
fact that your restaurants arein Houston?
Yeah, I mean, I think, you know,when you distill it all the way

(45:59):
down is, is Chris and who ChrisShepherd is.
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Uh, he's a friend, you know,he's a mentor to the both of us.
he's everything, you know, andhe has done so much for the
city, and it was a cause that hebelieved in and it was a cause
that he believed in, because hebelieved in everyone else in the
industry, and they believed ofhow great.
people are the work in thisindustry, uh, and wanted to make
sure that they were taken careof, rescuing people in this

(46:20):
literally.
Yeah.
Literally, literally rescuingpeople in this industry, our
staff at our restaurant, beingable to give them, uh, an out
where maybe we couldn't dosomething for them.
And having that support is just,you know, now that we have it,
we're so lucky and, and we justneed, yeah.
Do you guys have staff that'shad to utilize Southern Smoke?
Yep.
Yep.
Many, many, you know, because,and that's why we now.

(46:41):
80% probably of our efforts of,you know, donated time, donated
product, whatever it may be.
You know, doing these festivalsis for them, uh, it's for seven
to smoke because then they turnaround and take care of us.
Yeah.
That's amazing.
Well, listen you guys, thanksfor taking the time out of your
really busy.
Yeah.
We appreciate all you guysleaving your grill to Thank you

(47:02):
guys.
Come sit and talk with us,Felipe Riccio.
Austin Waiter.
Uh, thanks a lot.
You guys are great.
Thank you again.
Thanks for coming.
Hey, thanks, fell.
Thanks.
Thank you.
Oh, absolutely.
Hope you guys enjoy next time.
Next time, uh,

the-restaurant-guys_1_10- (47:14):
okay, so for podcasters, uh, Southern
Smoke is the Turkey chute ofgoing to find great chefs and,
and culinary to talk to.
But he, we here with the, thehead honcho of it all.
Chris Shepherd, you run thisthing, and in fact it was our
podcast with you that got usinterested in Southern Smoke and
convinced us to come down here.
Uh, and we got 10 minutes ofyour time while you run this

(47:34):
mammoth event here, Chris.
Yeah, thanks for inviting us.
We're so happy to be here.
No, thank you.
I gotta tell you.
Yeah, I have never heard so manypeople say the same guy's name.
Yeah.
Everybody loves you in one day.
I'm like, who's in my, that'sreally funny.
Uh, I think it's a testament towho you are though, that you
would say who's, thank you.

(47:55):
You are honestly.
After this couple of couple ofhours here, the five hours that
we spent podcasting here.
Yeah.
these people view you as asuperhero.
Yeah, that's that's very kind.
Us too.
Us too.
But I'll tell you what, we'vedone a whole show talking about
Southern Smoke Foundation andall the important work you do.
Yep.
Everybody else is talking aboutall the important work you do.

(48:15):
I would like to talk with youabout the great fucking party
that you're throwing right here,and let's talk about the fun
things.
Oh man, you are throwing onehell of a party.
It's a good banger right now,for sure.
Yeah, man, it's great.
And, and this year it has beenvery beautiful.
The team has done such anoutstanding job.
Um, the production team, FTR,like they really.

(48:37):
Nailed this.
And this is the biggest amountof chefs that we've had, uh,
ever.
adding that much amount ofstress to it, and our footprint
kind of got shrunk a little bitthis year.
Mm-hmm.
Which is great, uh, because itkind of brought it more to in
together, but Yep.
Um, it's, it's a good one.
Guess how many, I'll tell youwhat, here's what, here's what
I'm seeing out there.
Yeah.
Okay.
You have.

(48:57):
So many great chefs here, somuch great food here that even
though the place is full,there's almost no lines
anywhere.
Yeah, I know.
Yeah.
It's intentional.
So it's, it's amazing.
you know, I want to try, youknow, March's food.
So I walked up, grabbed it, hadsome, they put a little caviar

(49:17):
in front for me off I went.
Well, and that's the beauty ofit, is like we have this year,
um, where there's eight chefs inVIP eight chefs doing the Lexus,
uh, what Lexus VIP eight chefsdoing the Yeti culinary stage,
and then everybody else iscooking.
Mm-hmm.
And so when you start to thinkabout it.
And we don't, you know, it's,it's, it is 3000 people roughly,
but we ask them to do, you know,if you can do a thousand

(49:39):
portions, that's great becausethere's not a lot of, there's so
many people here that no onetrying to out.
It's, there's no chance.
No one's trying to out and, butthey're all just getting real
close to it.
Yeah.
You know, and that's the goal isnot to have a lot of waste and
not a lot of leftovers and nothave anybody feel like they prep
too much or anything.
Just do enough to run out atlike, this thing's supposed to
go till eight, run out at seven.

(50:01):
Well, you know, but the thingthat Mark talked about with no
lines and stuff, there's nostress here.
No.
And there's nobody you know, andI think this may be a function.
We were talking about this.
You don't, you don't have enoughpeople from New York here.
No one's stressed.
No one's stressed.
Mark and I were talking aboutthis as a function of being of
Houston.
Restaurants overall.
No one's here to see and beseen.
No one's here to show anythingoff.
No one's here to cut in line.
No, it's a really chill vibe andit's everyone's having a blast.

(50:23):
Lots of smiles.
It, you throw a good party.
Yeah, I mean it's, uh, that'swhy, you know, we spend three
days together as, as a unit, um,with the chefs and, and the
teams and to get them kind oflike, just to get them to know
each other and to, if theyhaven't met, to meet.
then to, to be able to come outhere and like when we do
pre-shift, you know, it's, Ihave a very clear conversation

(50:44):
with them.
Like, Hey man, you want water?
You want some ac, you wanna walkaway and just stop cooking for a
little bit?
Mm-hmm.
Do it.
They'll be here until eight ornine.
So like.
So who, you'll come back.
Yep.
Just take your own time.
Who is all your staff here?
Are these mostly volunteers?
Are these paid interns?
What, who, who, because yourstaff has been amazing to us.

(51:05):
Yeah.
And we're not even chefs.
We're just, you know, I'mtalking for, uh, no, everybody,
it's all our staff.
We have, um, 10 people on staffin Southern Smoke that we have,
uh, Fox Club Media.
They brought their whole team.
They do, or they do our, our,um, Fox Club does all our PR for
us, and they're such a fantasticcompany.
And then, uh, we work with somereally good companies here that

(51:26):
do, uh, like catering events.
And so we bring them on.
And then, uh, ft r is doing our,uh, really doing the backbone of
it and getting everythingorganized.
And, you know, the, this yearit's been one of those things
where all the chefs will tellyou, you know, man from picking
us up at the airport in Alexisto taking our coolers wherever
we need to go.
And then, you know, right whenthey get there.

(51:48):
They're out, they get outta thecar, they pick their coolers up,
and the team at FTR is like, no,no, no.
We got this.
Have a water.
Relax.
Literally, we walked in the doorhere.
Somebody's like, what can we getyou?
Yeah, you need some drinks, youneed some water.
You need, what do you need?
Hospitality starts with our ownneed.
Your table moved around.
How, how, how do you wanna setup?
Yeah.
And by the way, setting us upinto shade in Texas.

(52:08):
Yeah, that's good.
Right?
In October.
Feeling pretty good about youright now.
That breeze is kind of niceright now.
Sitting on my butt for a minute.
It's man pleasant.
I'm all right.
Wow.
How many years has, is Southernsnow?
What number of festival is this?
Uh, this is number eight.
Uh, we've been, we started in2015, so 10 years in, uh, the
first two years, like we talkedabout a while back was for the

(52:29):
MS.
Foundation, Ms.
Society.
And then, uh, hurricane Harveychanged the focus of us to
hospitality and food andbeverage relief.
Dude.
Well, this is, uh, anunbelievable part of your throne
here.
Uh, I, I don't know you thatwell, but I am so fucking proud
of you.
Yeah.
Amazing, amazing thing youdoing.
Thank you.
Thank you.
It's, it's pretty special.

(52:49):
Well, we wanna say to all ourlisteners, listen, next year
Southern, we'll meet you here,foundation.
If we're invited again, we'llmeet you here.
I mean, its a, it's a differenttype of festival and, um, and
not that all, not festivals arebad, right.
You can get really tied into it,but this is one that like, it's
a feel good.
Yeah.
Yep.
It's, it's hospitality from themoment of go it is thought

(53:09):
through for, uh, today is what?
October 4th?
Yeah.
First week of October.
We'll start planning this for2026, starting November.
Um, where we start working thechefs down from a list and, and,
um, slouch taking three weeksoff.
Yeah.
I feel now we gotta get thecanon going.
So that's in the, in the spring.
Um, which is our wine auction.

(53:30):
But this will, we, we spend alot of time with, uh, we call it
the Tetris and, and it'sliterally cue cards on a giant
wall where we just have namesand we start trying to figure
out the mix of chefs and thegood people that we want to
have.
And, Hey, we haven't met thisperson yet, or.
You know, we've met almost allof'em.
I should say that.

(53:51):
Um, I think with the Food andWine Best two chefs, those are
our first time meeting them inSeptember.
Um, but it's, it's, uh, youknow, who supports the
foundation?
Who do we need to learn moreabout this?
And so it's, it's just as muchthanking them for doing what
they're doing, but also invitingthem to learn more about what we
do.
That's amazing.
And it's all about making thecommitment to our industry.

(54:11):
Well, while you guys need to behere next year.
Because this was anextraordinary event like none
other I've ever been to.
I mean, there's people makings'mores all around me right now.
I know.
By the way, I have had a coupleof s'mores already.
Have you?
I'm not gonna lie, it's thefirst time I've been able, I
walked past it.
It's like this just giant bowlof smoked sauce just laying
there.
I was like.
Hold up.
I know I gotta be at thispodcast real quick, but I I

(54:33):
might need a little, little Bdown brought horse over here.
I gotta be honest with you, wheneither one of you guys goes for
the sausage, I, I think it'sokay.
But when Mark channels his innergirl scout, I get a little bit
freaked out.
It's a little weird little, Imean, smores are good.
I'm not gonna lie.
Come on, it's, it's reallybeautiful to see Chris around
here.
Chris, congratulations.
No, my pleasure.
We're happy to be here.
I'm glad you're here, brother.
Thank you.

(54:54):
Thanks for having us.
Thank you.
Literally, take care.
Thanks for being here.
I, I know that, um, you may ormay not have.

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