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Today's show is being brought to you by Bob's Redmill, believers in good food for all. Learn more at Bob's Redmill dot com slash podcast. You're listening to Heritage Radio Network. We're a member supported food radio network, broadcasting over 35 weekly shows live from Bushwick, Brooklyn. Join our hosts as they lead you through the world of craft brewing, behind the scenes of the restaurant industry, inside the battle over school food, and beyond.
Find us at heritage radio network.org. Hello and welcome to Cooking Issues. This is Dave Arnold, your host of Cooking Issues coming to you live on the Heritage Radio Network every Tuesday from roughly 12 to roughly 1245 from Roberta's Pizzeria in Bushwick. Brooklyn. Joined as usual with Nastasia the Hammerlope.
We got Dave in the booth. Dave. What up? Today we got special guest plus Entourage. Plus Entourage.
Richard Blaze. Richard Blaze. I like the soft golf clap. That's usually the applause level idea. I also thought I thought I was gonna be like the dynamic one, but that open is just that's all I got.
It's in it's amazing. It's like it's like literally like I could come in here uh off of a bike or like you know, you could nostasi could wake me up from a sleep and on. Yeah, my kids make me do it every once in a while. Uh you crushed it. Like I don't know if I can even like go on from that point.
Well, like I say, from here all it's all uh, you know, as Trump would say, low energy Dave from here on uh so uh wait we got so let's uh let's just That was my trombone, by the way. Yeah, nice. No, you play beautifully he played beautifully. Thank you. Uh you gotta go bass trombone.
The bass trombone is not a used enough instrument. It's it's not. Um you know I'm more of a banjo ukulele guy, though. We're getting right into like I tried to learn banjo once, failed miserably. Yeah, I never could figure it out.
Um and I hear the ukulele is really where you need to go if you're learning a stringed instrument. You mean because it's just got one. Well, and it's all it's tuned to an open chord. Right. So you can just I mean that's why Tiny Tim, not a musical genius, was able to cut some popular records, you know, on the on the ukulele.
This is true. This is true. But you know, there is a uk there is a ukulele resur every couple of years or every couple of decades, I guess, at this point in my life, I feel there's a ukulele resurgence. Yeah. You know?
Maybe that I fell into that. Maybe that it was. It was like I just felt it in the air. Like I'm yeah, I remember as a small child. I remember Tiny Tim, you know, the horrible crazy Nastasia's probably caught him just wrong.
Doesn't remember him at all. Just wrong. Got married on Johnny Carson, I believe. Oh, really? I think so.
Oh. I don't think it lasted. I thought he was a wrestler. No, no, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
It would be a good name for a wrestler. Yeah. If he was massive. Yeah. What what do you think about bagpipes?
I'm trying to learn the bagpipes. Well, I can't believe you just said that. Because I was gonna ask you, bagpipes or didrido? Oh, bagpipes. Bagpipes.
Uh here's why. Here's why. Okay. Bagpipes, bagpipes are not the kind of instrument that you ever want to hear recorded. It like needs to be live.
It is a martial instrument. It's meant to like scramble eggs the inside of your body. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah. It's portable, loud as you know, loud as hell.
You know. Sometimes, just for inspiration, if I'm on a long run, I will cue up like the Scottish March. Really? Yeah. I queue up long way to the top if you want to rock and roll.
It's like Braveheart. You know, it's like for me. It's just you uh you have Braveheart was a good movie. It w I yeah, I don't remember much of it, but I remember I felt inspired by it. So I uh do we have ever said this on Aaronastasia?
Like I always thought it was like a missed. So the end of Braveheart, so uh uh Mel Gibson is Wallace, right? And so at the end of it, you know, he's a real he's not like a noble person, he's like a knight, whatever, relatively common, or he's being executed at the end because he's given up, right? And so at the end, they're cutting his nuts off, and right before they cut his nuts off, he goes, Free um like that. And I always thought what a great like ad campaign they could have done if he had just said anything else.
Pepsi! That's the last thing. There you go. Wow. Well done.
Wow, see? I haven't seen this since it came out. There you go. So who else we got in the room? Who'd you bring with you?
Let's uh let's say hello to the entourage in case I pepper them with questions or ask them what they like to eat. Oh, okay, I'll go around the room. So Meredith Sidman. Publicist, extraordinaire. Yeah?
And in relation to Josh Sidman from uh uh Westchester, New York? No, but I'm from Western. All right, nice. All right. Leah!
Publicist extraordinaire. Yeah? So this is like big flak attack we got going on. I'm I'm rolling deep because it's Brooklyn, and I felt like to kind of up my street cred, I needed to come in with a big crew. It's gotta roll heavy.
Gotta roll heavy. And then we just met. Joyce. How do you guys hello? Hello.
Nice. So also extraordinaire. I mean, we should not leave that out. Right. I just want to make sure everyone's extraordinary.
He just doesn't think so much of you, Joyce. Yeah, that's the issue. So the reason you're uh you're over here in our fine uh our fine area in Brooklyn is you got a new book coming out in like is it this month or next month? It's today. No way.
This is the launch. Yeah, like this is my first appearance. No. I thought you were on the Today Show. Okay, I was on the Today Show.
This is my first audio appearance. First audio appearance. How was the today's show? How was that like? It was amazing.
You know, a couple years ago, I spilt liquid nitrogen on Kathy Lee's feet and was banned from the Today Show for three years. Really? So they were amazing, though. They had some Pinot Grigio working, and we did this little snap pea salad. Yeah.
She likes she likes snap peas. She likes Pinot Grigio. You know she likes the Pinot Grigio. It was amazing. She had it, I mean they were they were both stunning.
Yeah. Yeah. It was actually a really good segment. I was like, I did that show once. Yeah.
On uh Halloween, right after Hurricane uh Sandy, and I was just I mean, everyone in New York was just so pissed off that I like they were like that guy's never coming back to this show, right? Right. And Nastasia has been waiting for years because she like literally like like loves holding Kathy Lee. Love them. I love them too.
I'm an old school Regis and Kathy Lee guy back in the day. I love Regis. So um my first segment I ever did with Regis, right? We're doing the segment we're outside. It's outside summer grilling with Regis, right?
And he was the first time we ever met many years ago. And he's like, All right, so I'm here with Jeff and we're cooking, and he's like keeps calling me Jeff, but in my head, because I have an ego, I'm like, he's calling me Chef, just go with it. And then like all the way through about seven times at the end, he's like, and uh, that was Jeff cooking up some amazing burgers. We'll see it in a minute. But it's Regis Philbin.
So I'm like, that's okay. He can call me whatever he wants. Whatever the hell he wants. Exactly. Whatever the hell he wants.
Yeah, Regis. Good old days. I used to watch all of the daytime TV. Like when I first got out of college. So they were on back then in the early 90s, and I would do only these three things.
I would watch daytime TV, I would Bondo my Pontiac, and I would uh deep fry uh peppers in uh in my little deep fryer. And that was it. Those are only three things I did before my job started. That's amazing. Yeah.
My future wife was like, what the hell are you doing? Why am I with you? What is your problem? She had a real job. They were great peppers.
They were great peppers. Let's be honest. And the Pontiac was pretty sweet for a couple of years. Yeah. Definitely the cheapest car I ever bought.
Yeah, and now it's Seacrest, by the way. What do you mean? Ryan Seacrest? Kelly and Seacrest. But I don't think it's called Kelly and Seacrest.
It's Kellyan Ryan. So it did she have a fight with uh what's his name? Something happened with Michael, right? Stray hand? And then like all it was a big then they, you know, it's a big reality show of who's gonna get it.
I thought it was gonna be me. Were you in the running? Were you really? No, I was not. No.
Do you my mind I was in the running? Have you been on their show? I have. Was there chemistry okay? Oh, yeah.
I thought the chemistry was great. They're amazing too, of course. So, but like so something happened. Something happened, who knows? But now it's Ryan Seacrest.
All right, so let's talk about your book for a minute. And by the way, call in all of your, as I say, call all of your blaze-related questions in to 718-497-2128. That's 718-497-2128. So this book is called uh So Good, and it's uh 100 recipe. Is it exactly 100 recipes?
I did not care. You know what? This book was interesting because it was like we have to like we were really serious about the 100 recipes. Like it was a metric that I had to hit. Like my publisher's here with me, so I have to, you know.
But we had it had to be a hundred recipes. And I was like, do sauces count? Do condiments count? No. Really?
No, so it's probably over a hundred recipes. Don't tell that to Peterson with his sauce book. The recipe the sauces don't count. That whole cookbook is sauces. It wouldn't even be a book.
You couldn't even say there were any recipes. And that's one of the classic books I love for. Oh, but then it would be a book with no recipes, and that would be a really good marketing angle. Really? Do people want to buy books with no recipes?
Probably not. All right. Well, probably not. Right. So now I read the uh I read the introduction as well.
And so the conceit here is is that people can actually cook this stuff. I mean, the people who listen to this probably are the better off, but you include, and I had this s same issue when I did um, you know, my cocktail book. You include a lot of stuff that the average like Jane and Joe person wouldn't necessarily but you always give away out. I have to. You have to get see, I know where you're going with.
Yes, right. So it's like the the one percent uh Richard Blaze fans, who by the way are known as Blazions, just so we can get these. Blazions, fans of Richard Blaze. That's like a definition, but it's a Star Trek thing. I like it.
It's like the third, you know, there's three definitions for the third one. Blazions. Nice. Um, you know, some of them wanna see uh they want to see the Searsol. They want to see a l some liquid nitrogen.
Yeah. You gotta give it to them. I'll explain. I'm for it. I'm for it.
Like here's the thing it's like I'm a believer in, you know, if this is the way you actually do it, and you're a real live human being, right? Yeah, then just do it that way. And then tell people, look, I don't expect you to do it. And if you were at somebody else's house and you had to cook something, you wouldn't be like, There's no liquid nitrogen, I'm freaking out of here. Exactly.
Exactly, right. Yeah. So there should be some like it so it is. So every once in a while there's a tank of liquid nitrogen in my basement. When I say every once in a while, I mean all all the time.
Yeah. Where do you live? Where do you live? I live a little north of San Diego, Del Mar, California. Right.
Yeah, I'm gonna be in San Diego pretty soon and stop by the restaurant. Oh my gosh, I mean uh the my staff would freak out if you showed up. Yeah, I'm gonna I'll be there. I have to do some sort of uh like thing for for uh a liquor company. You're mythical to my staff.
Like this you know how much streak like how much like cred I'm gonna get in my kitchen because I'm on the show. This guy is good at uh this guy's just in the heat year. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Buttering. It's not, it's not I yeah, I'm I mean buttering it up coast to coast both sides but I'm also being honest.
Oh well I appreciate it so one thing I want to talk to you about and I I noticed in in in this and uh it's something I think it doesn't get talked and it's before we talk about the book in general or any questions um you ever notice how chefs tend to like find an ingredient that they fold into their pantry and it shows up as a highlight a lot I do this all the time and it changes for me every couple of years I change like what that highlight is so I remember Niels Norrin when I was at the FCI you know from you know Okavita and the FCI for a while it was like what does this need? And we were all like ketchup manice. It was always it was nice ketchup manise. That's what this needs ketchup manise. Yes and then like you know but there's always but I noticed and it's something I actually also love and use a lot you love the Calabrian chili oil.
I do love the Calabrian chili oil. Yeah. But but with a lot of these things isn't it like the moment you had or like the first moment that you had with that ingredient. Yeah and you're like oh and then so well like full disclosure a friend of mine's Calabrian whenever he goes over there they bring back like you know some of their family stock and he's like this time it's not as good as last time. Right.
You know what I mean but like but yeah so like I I have learned to the love it yeah and you the great thing with ingredients like that is yeah you associate them with like a a particular place a particular thing but you get addicted to the certain kind of note especially something like that. So the way you describe it is a fruity heat. Right? Right, but not sweet, but fruity heat. So it's like as an alternative to like the classic thing that all the you know, most of the chefs have been doing for the past five, six years just hit it with sriracha, not panish, but like you know, the the hot cock brand of sriracha.
Yeah you know what I mean? Yeah. But it's a more that's a more neutral and doesn't have the oils. Well, how'd you get in how how did you get into the collaborating chili oil and how long have you been into the I I think honestly, and this is uh I I just stumbled upon a jar of it, and it was one of the I it probably was Top Chef or something like that. Where on these shows, you get to carry like ten secret ingredients that are always in your case, and and chili oil was always one of mine.
A bottle of ghee was always one of mine, uh, you know, uh some fish things that are like special to you that you know provide something that something's gonna need in a 48 episode competition. Sometime I'm gonna need something that brings some heat to the game, acidity to the game, uh some salt, umami, whatever it is. Um so that's how I found it. And then it was just like, oh, I kind of also just like it in my fridge to like, you know, drizzle over like ranch dressing, because I'm also like I like ranch dressing. Who doesn't?
I'm just gonna admit that right here. Like we're at Roberta, so it's um I feel embarrassed a little bit. No, my son Dax, that's the first thing he learned how to make. He didn't want to learn to make anything else. Although, you know, he did make for Jen my wife.
He made breakfast in bed first time ever. I'm like, you're 12 years old, about time. What's up, what did he make? What did he make? Uh French toast, you know, classic, like first or something.
And I like so I'm sitting there in bed, and I'm like, first of all, I would never tell him this, and I don't think he was like, you know, I would prefer to eat at a table. That's me, but like whatever. But it's it's no, but my wife was floored, she loved it. Yeah, amazing. He did a great job, but having done this when I was a kid, I was like, what does the kitchen look like?
Of course, right? And it was a disaster, I'm assuming. Nice. I agree with you with the eating in bed sort of thing. Unless you're at a hotel.
Then like who cares about the sheets? Now my bad. Like my favorite thing to do is a hotel chicken wings. Two orders, and then like bathroom towel to wipe down afterwards. You just massage it into the channel.
Like that's a secret fact. Like I'm revealing to you. Like I've we've connected. Nice. Well, let's feel me talk to you about the your uh the chicken rest.
Let's just go to it. Yeah, well. Before I do that, I I notice also like also we're just having a lot of fun. Don't worry about the book. Like, we're just kicking it.
Yeah, no, but like uh this is like so like here's something I do with people's books whenever I get someone's book, right? First thing you gotta read, you gotta read someone's introduction to see where they're coming from, where that particular book is coming from. Get a feel for where they want to go, right? You agree? Sure, yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Then look at a couple of pictures they choose that have nothing to do with a particular recipe to kind of see where their head's at. And so the one that I gravitated to is the picture of like just I assume that whoever you were photographer was like that one, that one, that one. But but cake tester, love it, the cake tester.
You got the cake tester, which is like super, you know, I like hey, was he reading glasses? Yeah, those are those are actually my glasses. Like, that's not even just a prop, chef. That's like, those are my glasses. What about like you can't use that one very often?
You know what it is? I'm obsessed with this sort of what's in my purse sort of stuff. Right, right. So it's just like just uh throw it out there and take a picture of it. And then people are like, oh wow.
He rolls with a cake tester and a pasta cutter. The cake tester is like that's the mark of okay. We okay, we've got the cake test room. Because that's how I test chicken. Yeah.
Is that how you test chicken? Yeah, anything, anything like that. And boop, boop. But I feel like is that is is that still going strong, or is that just like show we're showing our age or what? Well, yes, we're showing our age, probably a little bit.
But um, no, I kind of like it though, right? It's it's a it's kind of one of those like sh it's a yeah, I'm putting the cake tester in. What is that little pin, Chef? What do you have? Yeah, but this is how we did it.
Do you like it? Back in the old days, ten years ago? Right. I mean, t like, here's the other thing, too, is like a lot of people when they're writing stuff, they're like, Oh, stick a thermometer in it. Would you ever stick a thermometer in something?
Well, I will I will say that I'm doing a couple projects right now that I'm and this this sort of like you know this already, because you're amazing, right? But like precision is an interesting thing. So like thermometers, I mean I I sous vide things all the time, right? So that's a very precise way to measure something. Right.
Right. So yes, exactly, but I rely on it and like my knowledge as a right. You don't need the K tester is what you're saying. Well, no, no, no. Cake tester I use.
Okay. So like when I'm deep frying or something like that, the cake tester I use, but I would never shove an instant read into my piece of chicken. Yeah. Well then the juices get all yeah. Yeah, my my you know, my lip and the cake tester are good enough for me.
Yeah, and I also I do like like when you're when you're a good cook and you can just touch something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or when you ask a chef, well, when is it done? When it's done. Yeah.
Like my favorite answer ever, right? Is like when is it finished? Everyone says you can't know, but it that's not true. You can know. You can know.
Like even like something stupid like pancakes, right? If you're if your flame is a little off, you touch the top of the pancake and you're like, is that pancake raw in the center or not? Right. And you're just like, Yeah. Is the French fry done?
So much of it is observational, right? Yeah. We're dork's also. Yeah, yeah. I'm pretty sure.
And uh what else here? Like you got the Coon Recon, that's the that's the peeler to get. Although my wife bought me a Pokemon peeler once that I still like. Yeah, I I mean, listen, I also like it because it's like 49 cents, right? Or probably a dollar forty-nine now.
But I remember there was also something like, oh, it's the best peeler and it's also like not that expensive. Right. They get stolen all the time from you. You can get one now that's a glove with like a safety mechanism, right? I mean, I'm I'm I'm assuming I think so.
You don't go to those type of shops. No. No. You know what they I used to shop all the time. They used to have a really inexpensive store called Lectors, where you could go just to buy beater stuff, and then they went out of business, and so now either you're going to a department store in New York, you're going to a department store, or you have to go high end.
And a lot of times, or a restaurant, a lot of times, like there's no middle zone, there's not a middle zone. You know what I mean? I don't know. Antique shops. Those are always fun.
Oh, yeah. But like, you know, I found some really good like old sabatier knives there. Um, yeah, no, that's all good. I have a massive sabatier knife that um in culinary school, I had to kill a turtle with. It's a really like dark story.
So, what kind of turtle? So I was uh uh at the CIA, right, culinary school, just so everyone's clear. And uh I was the fish kitchen fellowship, which is very prestigious, just so we're all clear. Like they give away one of those a year. And how many students you got?
You got a lot of students. 75 students every three weeks. So like I lived in this fish kitchen basically. And at some point, someone brought in a giant turtle. Like a you know, someone out in the Hudson River brought in a turtle, and they were like, we need we need the fish kitchen fellowship guy to come down here.
That I didn't even have a name at that point, I was just the fish kitchen guy. And then they were like, You gotta cut this turtle's head off. And it was kind of like it's kind of a dark story. I'm kind of sad about it. Well, I was just doing my job, just to be clear.
Yeah. And like turtle murderer. Turtle murderer. You know, people are very uptight about turtles. You know that people are very uptight about turtles, right?
I am too, but for a different reason. You know why? Quick little sidebar here. All right. The book is being out, my book so good, is being outperformed by the teenage mutant ninja turtle pizza cook for.
So you're four killing them. I've like right now, I have a little issue with them. One, because I don't think the Ninja Turtles wrote their own recipes, I'm sure of it. Second of all, I'm not a big fan of them as superheroes. Like, I'd take the X-Men, I'd take any superhero group against the Ninja Turtles any day.
So after here, I'm going to Times Square, I'm gonna take them out, take down a couple ninjas. Yeah, also the other thing about it is not really teenagers anymore. I mean, that's the 80s. No, they don't get they never age. There are age that's not right.
See, teenager is an age. They should just say immature ninja turtles. Yeah. Well mutant. Immature mutant ninja turtles.
Because an age is a thing. You don't get to like stay a teenager forever. You can act like a freaking teenager forever, but you can't actually be one forever. This is an absurdity. Yeah.
It makes no sense. Write your own recipes, Donatello. Yeah, yeah. Well, I don't even I don't even I was never a fan, so I don't even know which one's which. Or I mean, do they what are they?
They like anchovies? My my my girls actually like them. So I had so like that's the other thing. Like they like the turtles better than me. The old school turtles or these new weird, like roided out turtles.
They probably only know the new roided out turtles. Yeah, it's it's uh it's sad. It's garbage, it's garbage. Um but anyway, yeah, this the knife and the turtle, and everyone's upset now, but it was a long time ago, and I was just doing my job. Okay, so apparently, if a turtle goes into its shell, there's a couple of ways you can get the head out.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Stick to lure it out, or the finger the other way, which wouldn't need to do. Um I didn't know about the finger technique, so I'm glad I showed up today. Uh I'll use that in the future. Whoa!
The head pops out, bang. So it was a it was a broomstick handle. Yeah. Yeah, and it went it bit on it, and you chopped it off? Yeah.
Strong. Yeah, this is a disgusting story. I'm sorry. Um, and then so like you do it, like it's part of my fellowship. So I'm learning how to butcher this turtle, and like that's my like I'm learning as a chef.
This is weird because not a fish. Not a fish. Not a fish. But who are you gonna call? The meat?
I mean, I guess you could have called the meat butcher. Right. Well, that's why like uh yeah, rabbits are handled by the poultry person, which you said tastes like chicken in the book. I noticed. I noticed that, but like not a poultry.
Sure. Rodent. Not a poultry. No, right, exactly. You know what I mean?
The scary thing was that turtle haunted me for like days. Because in the walk-in, it was still moving for days after. It was just. Well, they're slow metabolism. They just don't, yeah.
They don't mean it doesn't know it's dead yet. The feet don't know it's dead yet. Every publicist in this room is freaking out right now. We should just be really careful. Okay, hold on.
This is gone to its dark place. Let me mention something to all of you PR folks. Yeah, exactly. Anyone out there in listening land. Almost every piece of meat you've ever eaten, I'd venture to say every piece of meat that you've ever eaten was at one point an animal.
Yes. And turtles, while you might like them, while you should not take turtles that are uh improperly taken from the wild because they take a long time to um replenish and you can crash supplies, and so you should not take wild-caught turtles unless you, I guess, are allowed to in a specific place. All of this is true. And I think they're cool. They are not smart.
They are not the smartest of animals. Here's a uh uh here's something that I judge. So if you eat beef, you shouldn't worry about killing a turtle. Turtles don't have there they there now there's some argument about this. Uh, one of the things I take is does an animal have a sense of play?
Literally, sense of play. Can it play, right? Does it do things other than avoid things that it hates and uh you know get food and sleep, right? Turtles pretty much no play. No play.
There are some the birds, obviously, there, and there are other reptiles that can play. Monitor lizards are uh in the reptile family, like can get to that level where they they have those kind of interactions. But if you don't have a sense of play, pretty much I don't feel that bad about it. Yeah. So that is your note to the publicists in the room, correct?
Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, but the thing is that the people nowadays they get so hyped up about uh, you know, no one wants to separated from the food that we eat. You're right.
Yeah. You know what? How did it taste? Um you know, we made like a traditional like uh, you know, turtle soup with sherry and eh. Yeah.
Yeah. Was it worth it? I mean, you know, I just did my job as student. I was a student. I want to be clear.
Very rarely, with the exception of fish and crustaceans, like the work of killing something makes the food to me not as much fun. I don't know, something about it. I just I don't me personally. But it does give you the gravity. Every cook does need to know all the things you said.
Like, hey, this thing was alive and you need to respect it and you need to eat it and you need to use all of it, right? Um but like I don't, yeah, like frogs. Do you like frogs? No. I'm not a big fan of frogs.
No. But there was a point in my career I was like, ooh, we gotta do a frog dish. Yeah, yeah. I really don't like the way that they're killed where you buy them. You know what I mean?
Like, um, but again, no sense of play, shouldn't worry about it too much. But it's still it's just bad form. You know that you know the way they kill frogs, right? Yeah, tell it, Dave. I I don't, so I'm just by the way.
So if you go to uh at least this is in New York City, if you go to a New York City Chinatown to buy frogs, which is where you get them here. There's a uh a trash barrel full of live frogs where they're just basically crushing themselves. And you know, we're talking about how big is that stuff? It's like three and a half inches? Sure.
Four, somebody about that size. Yeah. And the guy, assuming it's a guy, it's I've only ever had guys. I don't want to, you know, could be anyone, right? Grabs the frog's rear legs, goes phoo boop, sticks the like like lays the frog out, bap onto the cutting thing, bap, bap with the cleaver, takes the two legs off, put the legs in the plastic bag.
They I think they weigh them first because you pay on whole frog weight. Right. Then they take the live rear legless body and throw it into the trash heap along with the fish guts. Because a frog's a fish. Did you know that?
You knew that. Frog's a fish. This is amazing though, but I've never seen the barrel and the butchery of uh Bap Bop Bap Bop. Yeah, because uh, you know, why would you take home that whole frog body that you're about to throw away when you know all you want is that rear, you know, leg. You know, that's the theory of it.
Thank you for making this day worth it to me educationally as well. We have just alienated all of your uh by the way, you have a podcast coming, speaking of listeners, right? Yeah, so no one even knows this is a world premiere. So I am getting into the podcast game, and now I know that I also have to work on my open, by the way. Like, thank you for just like tell like whoa, that's like how my open because you're always worried talking about food on radio or an audio that it's not gonna have any energy, right?
Right, right. But like, oh my god, like now I have now I have a goal. Like to get to that Dave Arnold energy. Punch into it. So yeah, the podcast is gonna be out soon, and it's called Richard Blaze uh is starving for attention, which is perfect for me.
Nice. So what's it what's the I mean, other than food, what's the subject? Like we're getting we're just gonna we're gonna talk to everyone in the industry, I mean, obviously chefs, restaurateurs, and people in the beverage community, but also with a uh really getting into media and television and and you know, people that create food television shows, how it is to produce something, create a television show, and and get into the media side of it. And and uh nightmare, right? Yeah, that's uh yeah.
Seriously, what do you think though? Do you I mean like now that you've been doing it so long, wait, do you what do you think about it? Like, here's here's my thing. A lot without, for instance, the food network, I mean, there wouldn't be I mean, like, come on, I mean, the amount of interest and and that it's generated like countrywide, worldwide, like the food media has done a lot for food writ large that I think it doesn't necessarily get credit for. Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, you have to say it's been great because it's inspired so many people to discover things that they've never known that they would be into.
Uh the only sidebar is that you know, because food is all over the place, that you know, when as a restaurantur and as a restaurant chef, you know, you do get, you know, kids that come in that want to be a celebrity chef. Right. They've never been in the kitchen before. It you know, it took me 12 years before you know I luckily got asked to come on a TV show or something like that. So you get a lot of that.
Like, oh, I I just I want to, you know, I want to do cookbooks and be on TV shows, and you can do that, uh, but you know, it's not what we necessarily need in the restaurant. Right. I mean, that pisses off all of my New York buddy. It pisses them all off, but on the other hand, like you you're griping about something, and yet on the other hand, you're a well-known chef because there is food media. So it's like they get mad about these like young kids coming in and wanting to be all hotshots, and you can't have your cake to use another food reference and eat it as well.
You know what I mean? Yeah. Because you can either own your cake or you can have eaten your cake. This is the only two choices. You know what I mean?
Like, you can't expect to be a well-known chef that people write about and then get pissed off that somebody else wants fame and doesn't necessarily understand the work that's involved. Yeah, and if you microwave that cake. Yeah, super fast. Yeah, then there you go. And then uh people are interested in your cake.
Yeah. Pretty much everybody knows that the solution to this problem is to make two cakes. You make two cakes, one that you you keep for visuals, that's the one that's iced well, and one that has a better icing to cake ratio that you eat that tastes better. I mean, that's the answer. Yeah, yeah.
Well, with almost anything, too. I mean, that's interesting. Like, how do you cook on television? Which is another thing that I really love talking about. It's like you do things like that.
You make two of the dish that you're about to serve so you can test one, so you can pick which one's a little bit better than the other one. Um, yeah. So when you're doing TV, how much prep time do you have? In other words, so here's the issue. I see a lot of people, especially young people starting out, especially if they want to do kind of new technique stuff, they do stuff that they haven't necessarily uh tried, and it can be nerve-wracking, right?
Trying something for the first time on the camera. Oh, well, I mean that's the biggest mistake, right? For all these young kids on shows like Chopped or Top Chef or something like that. Then they're making blueberry snow out of maltodextrin, and it's really not delicious. And everyone's kind of also seen it by this point, and then they get sent home, and then they're like, oh, the the judge doesn't get me.
No, they get you. They get you really well. Uh you thought that, you know, that was some secret thing you just pulled out and it didn't taste good. Right. I mean, the thing is, is that like I think to me it's okay to try some combination you've never tried before, but make sure that if you're gonna serve people, that the technique you're gonna use is something that is in your toolkit, that's in your you understand how it works, you understand why you're using it.
Right? And it has to serve deliciousness. I mean, it's pretty simple. Um, so if you can do both, then you're you know, you're gonna be famous like Richard Blaze. I mean, that's obvious.
We gotta we gotta call it. Let's see what they got. Caller, you're on the air. Hey everyone, this is Anton from Pennsylvania. I'm uh research chemist and training, and I've been following cooking issues for I know.
Where in Pennsylvania? Where in Pennsylvania? Um, I'm in Allentown, but I commute all the way from Philadelphia. Alright, nice. All right.
I was just in Allentown. Yeah, yeah. My I used to have relatives that live there, actually just outside in uh Quitstown. Yeah, yeah. My mom lived in Scranton for a bit.
Really? Nice. We're just connected on so many levels. So what do you got? What do you got for us?
Uh yeah, this is actually my first introduction to Allentown. But um I actually wanted to say before I get to my question that that uh Alton Brown goodies was my first introduction, like really compelling introduction to science and not just food. Really uh that's pretty seminal to uh to where I am now. But in in in regards to my actual question, I've uh been wanting to experiment with homemade miso, and I wanted to know if Storba Miso uh say from Whole Foods would be appropriate for culturing my substrate. Um a friend of mine has uh taken charge of a Korean natural farming program in New Jersey, and we'll be trying to optimize their rice operations, which they claim to be one of the few farms producing rice in the northeast.
Um all this being said, I wanted to use this opportunity to experiment on some novel uh rice strain and uh just kind of play around with Miso. So I wanted to know your thoughts. Uh real quick, I'm gonna can I just take a real quick yeah. Um uh I'm gonna pass on this one. Like I thought we were going to the right place with Alton Brown and then like yeah, this is a Dave Arnold question.
No, well actually, you know, uh you should our CookQuest, who uh is like the Miso master, does uh like a Miso workshops. I w look a lot of I mean depends on what you buy. There are uh there are Misos out there that haven't been dorked with uh and that are still kind of alive, but you can just get Koji. I would just buy the Koji. Uh it's readily available.
And um, you know, look up our go like tweet our CookQuest. That's his Twitter hand, I think it right, R CookQuest. Uh he's been on the show before, actually, and he can hook you up with like the very the very best in Koji strains. But uh, you know, like the here's the issue when you're doing something like that. I mean, unless you have a miso that you love it, love it, love it, love it, love, and like you're like, maybe there's some special mojo about this.
I would just use a and he is of the opinion, by the way, Rich, that's our cook quest, that the strain of Koji isn't necessarily so as important as the um substrate. But right uh, so I would just buy the koji this way you're you're guaranteed to have it work, it's not already been uh possibly you know treated with something or you know, because a lot of times, especially I don't know what misos you're trying to make, but if they're doing like a Shiro Mies or something like this, they they hit it with alcohol to wipe out some of the you know uh a little bit of alcohol to stop it from further um you know uh fermenting or breaking down. So uh I don't know. But I'm interested in this Northeast Rice. Have you guys ever heard of this?
Northeast rice? Anyone, anyone? Northeast rice. I think it's a novelty. He um so my friend uh studied at uh USD chemical engineer there, and I guess he ended up working at a commune in Ohio, California, which I don't know if anybody knows in California.
I just partied in Ohio like two weeks ago. Really? It's an amazing place, yeah. All right. Right.
So he uh he learned some Korean natural farming and uh like worked with indigenous microorganisms. I don't know if any of us like rings a bell. But um he uh yeah, he brought it over here and he kind of ended up talking to um this uh this farm in Paddington, New Jersey called Blue Moon Acres, and uh they were super open to the idea and it looked like they were kind of heading in the same direction. So the stars kind of aligned. And um yeah, I've enjoyed their race.
I mean, they're still pretty young in terms of the actual program, but uh I figured I might as well like use this opportunity, why not? Yeah, all right. Well, you know, like uh let's see. Like my point is is that any s it depends on what they can grow. So like New Jersey, any time that they're not growing a tomato or growing a corn, I want to hit them because like they that's what they should be doing.
But I'm sure there are land types in New Jersey that don't grow great corn and great great uh tomatoes. So then yeah, grow rice, right? I mean, grow rice, I guess. A lot of great things, you know, New Jersey, Garden State. We forget that New Jersey was the garden state.
Especially, you know, Richard, you're a Long Island guy. Yeah. We grew up hating, not hating, but you know, ranking on New Jersey. But it's like you cousin, you give a little, you know, a little hard time to every every once in a while, right? Yeah.
It's like imagine if your cousin was the Jersey Turnpike. Right, exactly. Yeah. You'd give them a pretty hard time. Yeah.
Yeah. But a lot of good things came out of New Jersey, like uh Welch's grape juice. Do you like Welch's grape juice? Love Welch's grapes juice. Yeah, the recipe for Concord Grapes in here, Welch's grape juice, New Jersey, Vineland.
Yeah. Six flax. We used to go from Long Island to six flax. Okay, here's one for you for those who gr any you guys well, you too young. Remember Action Park in Vernon, New Jersey?
I do. Yeah, uh people you I what I didn't realize as a kid, people would die there constantly. Yeah, I had my junior high class trip there. Yeah, sick. It was amazing.
Sick. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, people would apparently get drunk. I was too young. The people who work there would get drunk and rip the regulators off of the go-karts so that the go-karts had unlimited speed at night and they would also be drinking.
So like workers used to die all not forget the kids, workers used to die all the time. Oh. Why don't they bring that place back? Why don't they bring it back? Hey, it's Kathy Irway, the host of Eat Your Words.
Today I'm here with Camilla Salisbury, author of Bob's Red Mill Everyday Gluten Free Cookbook. 281 Delicious Whole Green Recipes. We're gonna get to the bottom of this gluten-free craze. So why aren't people eating gluten and what does gluten-free really mean? Well, there are two main reasons why um people are deciding to go gluten-free these days.
And the first one is really serious. It's for people who have celiac disease, and it's a pretty serious um condition. But then there is also a growing number of people with gluten gluten intolerance or gluten sensitivity. And they're trying out um gluten-free diets because they find that eating foods without gluten just makes them feel better. Okay, got it.
But what actually makes something gluten-free? Well, what makes something gluten-free is essentially that hat doesn't have any um of the protein, gluten in it. And a lot of people are surprised to learn that uh many grains do not contain gluten when in fact just a very small number of grains do. Does anyone offer truly gluten-free options? Um, well, Bob's Red Mill really understands gluten-free options.
Um that means they separate their grains um during the manufacturing process. And so they're testing each batch at every step of the way for purity to ensure that it's gluten-free. So when it says on the package that it's gluten-free, you can be assured that it is gluten-free.com slash podcast. So anyway, I hope that answers the call. Uh sure, caller, you're on the air.
Hey David, it's David from California. How you doing? We're in California. Great. Hey Richard.
Hey, what's up? Love Jennifer and Ivy out here, by the way. Oh. Thank you. Hey, uh, so there's a lot of myths surrounding this.
Should I salt my egg before cooking or only after? And what's the science uh behind why you do one or the other? Before I before I have him answer, what kind of what which style of egg are we talking here? It could be scrambled and omelet, uh almost any style. Well, I you know, this is ironic because Dave, I was gonna ask you the same question.
Like when I came up here, I was like, what am I gonna ask him? I was gonna ask you about how do you you season your eggs before or during or after. Yeah, I season omelets definitely before. Yeah. Maybe like over easy, maybe like just as a finish, but that would that's how I cook.
Yeah, definitely. Uh before uh here's some things. Uh it does change the egg somewhat, and I think in a helpful way. So, like uh you ever make if you like yeah, you ever do like uh sweet egg preparations like a sweet omelet like a tomato or something like this, right? Delicious, right?
But you know when you're blending that stuff beforehand, you can see the yolks go kind of translucent on you when you add like the salt and the sugar. And so you're do you're definitely changing the egg yolk by adding that stuff, I think, in a positive way. That's just my feeling. And so I do it beforehand. And it's, yeah, in a positive way, making it more delicious.
That's right. I'm also a firm, firm believer in uh not having a uh a thing that needs a bunch of salt throughout with some salt on top. I prefer properly seasoned throughout with a little salt on top, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah. So you do uh you like finishing salt though, right?
Because I think that's one of the things that just happens in restaurants that regular restaurants don't do it. And like it's just whether it's a little drizzle of oil, a little citrus, some zest, a little salt, like those little finishing touches. That's why I love the pass, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because you can look at it be like, ah, and then you finish like it's it's not just about spitting food out, it's about like the finishing touches.
And putting the eyeballs on. But like so, but like in a sandwich situation, every freaking layer, every freaking layer gets its own salt, like a little bit. So like when you I slice the tomatoes, now you don't want to salt the tomatoes way ahead of time because it it'll it Christmas gets ruined, it destroyed Christmas over, you're a bad person. You know what I mean? But unless you're making a salsa or something like this, you want to break it down.
But like salt the tomato on and then the every layer gets its own thing. Yeah, with burgers, especially. It's one of my pet peeves. Like, season the tomato that's on the burger. Cause because it wants it.
It wants it. You make the you yeah, you salt the I don't salt the inside of the burger because I don't want the texture to change. So I salt the ever-loving crap out of the outside of the burger. We're on the same camp right there. Right.
We're vibing right now. Also, oh, but you have a stuffed burger, which we'll talk about later. But then the Yeah, and then you salt the different layers because they want it. Because they freaking want it. Back to eggs real quick.
Um, this is something I just did recently. I had a little black truffle on my person. And I brought it on an airplane with me. That's smelly. And it is.
And when I got served an omelet, which most airlines serve a little bit. Please tell me you did not do this. Did you how did you get the shaver on board? I just I had a little a little rasp that somehow like got through. And I just was like, you know what?
Just for my my person sitting next, I was like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna give this guy a show. And I pulled out a little black truffle on an airplane and just rasped, just showered this, you know, vomiting. With real black truffle. And like it was kind of amazing. Did it unovercook the omelet?
I mean, it made it kind of like enjoyable in the entertainment value of it. Right, right, right, right. Yeah. Yeah. How do you k those things are I was surprised that I even got on the plane with a truffle, not only just the rasp.
If you you know what? Like, I bet you a little oil as well could bring that omelet back from the brink, right? The oil on the truffle would just be like a topping, and then you could think of the omelet as bread. And if you put some gooey cheese in the omelet, that helps. That helps too.
But they don't do that, do they, right? One of them does. Um, I mean, not to judge airlines on their omelets, but I would say I'm I actually fly Delta all the time, but United has a really good omelet. Yeah? Yeah.
So that's the one thing they can do. During the whole thing with United, I was like, uh, but they make a decent omelet. The omelets, I told last week, uh two weeks ago, I thought they killed a giant rabbit. They ripped that guy off the airplane. It's all right, yeah.
You know what I mean? But their omelets. Good. I mean, that's pretty good. I mean, as far as airlines go.
I gotta keep it real. Like they make a good omelette for an airplane omelet. What kind of container do they in? Like, and how much of the omelet tears away when you open that foil thing? Is it just some sort of hideous nightmare with that like No, they um, so you know, I'm riding up front, Dave.
Okay. So like they're pulling the at least on this flight. And they're they're pulling the foil off up front. I don't see it. And it's a nice little container.
It's per uh they do listen, you know. I mean, I could leave the sausage and sweet potato hash off to the side, but the omelet was pretty good. You put a lot of the truffle on it. Yeah, yeah. I ride, I ride deep coach.
Deep deep coach. Yeah, yeah. Like the seat right before the back bathroom. Yeah, well, Nastasi and I like uh uh does that seat recline? Because if it does, it's too good for them.
And like they, you know, right? That's right. Deep coach, cattle class. You know what I mean? Like, I'm one step above uh the rabbit that United killed by putting it in a freezer.
They do let me deplane with the rest of the passengers, just last. You know what I mean? Oh man. Oh, airplanes. Eggs, has this helped you at all?
Yes, it does. So you're gonna you're gonna chalk it up to urban myth that chefs who say salt it lasts. Well, why would they what's the theory? What's the theory of operation why I would want to salt it at the end only? Uh you'd have to ask the chefs who insist on it.
I don't know. Look, here's here's what I'm gonna say about this. Anyone, most people that I know, even complete Ninkan poops, who are professional cooks that cook all the time. If you taste their food and their food is good, then you even if their explanations are crazy and make no sense to you, it makes sense to kind of focus on their technique and what they do and why they do it, and maybe you learn something that you didn't already know. Like aside from what you and your your head think, right?
So the first thing is is their food good? And then if it is, just observe what they do, and maybe there's a good reason. I don't know. And current company excluded, most chefs are just assholes. Family show.
Oh, sorry. That's all right, don't worry about it. You're allowed to, I was looking, I was looking up, you know, in uh in a North Ireland now, not in like the not in like lower UK, you're allowed to say gobshite on the TV. Oh, I just want to start saying that just in general. It's a good word, right?
Mouth poop. Is that what it means? It translates, yeah, like gobstopper, like everlasting gobstopper, like a mouth like a mouthstopper, the gob being the mouth. Gob shite, mouth. I should have thrown that one.
I apologize, by the way. Gobsite. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we're not in Northern Ireland, but you know.
Alright. Thanks to both of you. And it to tweet us and tell us why I'm not supposed to add the salt until the end. Maybe there's some sort of reason. I don't know.
I I I can't see a reason why I would want the inside of my egg not to taste good. I'll give them the over easy. Like maybe over easy because it's thin and like you can. Yeah, also, by the way, here's a uh here's a uh what am I what you said, uh, an admission. I don't do the French style uh curded scramble egg.
I don't I like an American style scramble, like a hard curd, not the creamy curd. So maybe but no, all those creamy curd ones are salted, but maybe they're salted towards the end. Maybe it affects the curd structure. Maybe that's what the chef is talking about if they're doing the old school French. But there are a lot of those myths, right?
That you just kind of pick up and it's just like, why are you doing it? Oh, because the last 12 people told me to do it this way, but I've never thought about why I'm doing it. Salt 100% and sugar 100% affect the temperature at which the protein sets and probably also the curd structure. So maybe it has something to do with those French, like you know, I'm talking about the super slow, slowly. Is it a moisture issue?
Like uh the whole like salting mushrooms only at the end of a cook time? Which I salt that stuff right at the beginning. Look at you. Yeah, I salt everything right because salt. Salt is your buddy.
Speaking of salt, you put why do all chefs, I like them. Why do all chefs love the bocarones more than the salted anchovy? I like uh I like both for different things. Yeah, they're different. Yeah, one to eat on its own on some on a nice tartine, which was a brusquetta, which now is a toast.
I can't keep up with like what's cool to call call a slab of toast. Uh so I like the boca coronis for that. But like for a sauce or something, right? Just yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. The old school throw it in. I like the tinned packed in salt guys. They're really good. Yeah.
And you know, they recently, um, so for those of you that buy anchovies packed in salt, uh, they they used to for my whole life. They came in a giant, not giant, but like four anchovies, giant can that's like kind of like it looks like an oversized tuna fish can. You know what I'm talking about, right? And it's metal, right? And you have to open it and then it's sitting around in in your in your uh in your fridge, unless you use a boat ton of anchovies, and the can can sometimes ride through, they just move to a plastic tub.
So my god, that's that's blaze for me. Yeah, no plasti don't like the plastic tub? I I I kinda like I buy those just for the tin because the tin is like I love the tin. You love the tin. Right?
All right, all right. I mean, I'll get the plastic tub as well, but I feel like that's try the plastic, try the plastic tub. That's really a shame. So here's here's some random stuff. So uh I noticed you do your squash blossoms in uh in a masa flower.
You get you like the crispy crunch on the masa. I feel people underuse masa on a fry bag. Here's the thing uh native New Yorker who lived in Atlanta for many years and now I live in Southern California, and like my world has been open to all things Mexican, basically. Uh so we have we pay a little homage to you know some traditional Mexican foods at my restaurant in Southern California, and I think that what you're looking at a squash blossom relleno. Yeah, but I like the texture of uh of a masa fried masa dusting better than cornmeal.
Yeah. I think a little not not quite as uh grainy, right? Right, but also like it maintains it. You know how like when you fry in a cornmeal, it like sogs out pretty quickly. It does.
So masa is hard the way corn is hard, and it has the crunch, but I don't think it sogs out as fast. Right. Masa is also the name of one of my sous chefs who's never soggy. It is but it's always crisp and just on top of the page. Japanese?
Japanese strong. But do you like like play off make masa cook masa? No, but you've just inspired that. That's right. So like when we put this dish on the menu.
So a couple other things. I noticed that you like to mess with the names of things to piss off purists. I'm assuming it's to piss off purists. You have a steak tartare recipe in here called carne asada. Oh, yeah, yeah, right.
It makes no sense. Zero sense. Zero sense. Like the anti-sense. Yeah.
And like, whoa, it's yeah, it's raw. It's supposed to be cook. It's cooked. No, it's raw. Yeah, we like to have fun.
We make up words. Like, so when we do uh when we blend some uni into linguini, we just call it lingoonie because like why not just create a word while you're at it. If you're an artist, create the word, not just the food. Well, my favorite pun in this is you do wu Wu-Tang clams. Wu Tang clams.
Because it's got the Chinese sausage. Yeah, but listen, the thing about because it's got the the Chinese sausage, but also Wu Tang clams ain't nothing to shock with. There you go. There you go. And you're selling Nastasia.
Nastasia's a Nastasia loves some puns. Uh so I'm a 90s hip hop kid, so I can't, I'm a native New Yorker. So I can't we'll never break out of that. So Nastasia, brace yourself here. Okay.
Okay. There he there's a Putinesca in here, right? It's Bucetini, but no freaking tomato. Huh. It's got capers, it's got olives, not the right kind for you, but it's got olives in there and capers.
No freaking tomato. Yeah, well, we what are it's a green version of it, right? Yeah. So it's a green version of it. So give me, can you give me?
Like, I know when we start talking about Italian food, the authenticity issue gets pretty strong. Well, it's interesting that you go, you do a green Putin. Yeah, especially. Everything's green in the book. Is this where we're going?
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. No, you do you you do that, so then I'm like, all right, he's doing he's doing a green putnescu. Okay, whatever. Right. I mean, not Putinesca, but okay.
And then I turn the page and I see crab meat and a tie telling, and I'm like, what is he gonna cover this with? And you'd go breadcrumbs. And I was like, that's right. That's right, yeah. Well, we breadcrumbs.
Well, we got the Calabrian chilies. We opened with that. And there's some sort of authenticity, Richard Blaze. There's a little bit there. You gotta go breadcrumbs.
I love breadcrumbs on the pasta, by the way. My son Booker loves it. He puts too much on. He calls it Mount Bretterist. He pours like breadcrumbs all up in his pasta.
But I love breadcrumbs. You also have to care for the breadcrumbs, though. This is a pet peeve of mine, too. Like you have to make the breadcrumbs toasty and delicious. They have to be seasoned.
Right? Like you can't just I've seen on TV shows. Like, you can't just open up Panko and pour it on top of your pasta dish, and you're not, you're really not servicing the dish with. What's that brand that comes in the tub? You know what I'm talking about?
The tub of breadcrumbs that's above the bread aisle. What's that stuff? What's that brand? Don't sleep on 4C. Don't 4C, that's it.
Don't sleep on my mom's go-to 4C breadcrumb seasoning. You've never had Long Island chicken cutlets like that, Dave. Never. Does a Salisbury steak where he re-molds the freaking meat back on the bone. First of all, for any of you that grew up with a television, Salisbury steak.
That's my go-to TV dinner. There you go. But here's why. Because you got the Salisbury steak, and then what lives right over the little cliff there is the cherry cobbler. And if you work a little of that cherry cobbler into your demigloss from the Salisbury steak, you're all ready to go.
You got cherry demigloss, basically. So this is like the most not Swanson's hungry man looking satellite. Well, that's one of my favorite recipes in the book, because it's a hamburger on a giant bone. Like that's what hamburgers have been missing. Do you do this in the restaurant?
We've done it in the restaurant here and there. I I would love to put it on the menu. And maybe the book will drive that. Will Californians pick up a bone like that? Yes.
Yes. Southern Californians? Like what about LA people? Will LA people pick up a bone like that? Yeah, I think they will.
I will say that, you know, the first question in California, you do the menu testing, and you know, does anyone have any questions about the 75 items on this menu? And then the first question is, can you get gluten-free? And you know, can you do that vegan? Yeah, so I mean that's just California. This would be a very difficult vegan recipe.
That would be in yeah, that would be really tough. Because how can how do you make a giant bone out of tofu? I mean, this would you would have to tackle that. Yeah, that's requires an advanced mind. They can have the the herbs and the garlic, but that's about it.
Yeah, no, that's all that's all they can do. Here's one that's gonna drive Nastasi and see. So Nastasia has a very like like, you know, to her fans, well-known vegan face. You ready for it? Yeah.
Vegetarian. It's not I guess it's not vegan. Ready? Beet loaf. Not meat loaf, beetloaf.
What do you think about that fun? You hate beets. I hate beets, but you hate beets. You hate beets. I don't hate beets.
I don't hate that's a lie. That's a lie. I love I love beets. What I don't like is when they taste dirty and they're in giant chunks. I like a pickled beet.
Yeah. I like a sliced beet. I like a beet salad. I like beets in things. I like party hydrated beets.
I'm gonna take it to a place where you might yeah, you wouldn't know that I would go there. I like canned beets. Yeah, I like them. They're earthy. They're earthy.
I don't like when beets sneak up on you like later in the day when you maybe you're going to the restroom. Yeah. And then like you have that one moment where you're like, oh my god. Oh, okay. It's alright, I had beats.
Sneak beads. I had beats. Sneak beats. So is this actually honestly though, it's cooked in the tree. It's delicious.
For real. Yeah, it it it it's tastier than the picture looks. Let me see here. I know this. So you have this other you have a recipe for gumbo, and you're like, gumbo's ugly.
I'm just not gonna shoot it. No, listen, you can't shoot all of it. Actually, the the soup chapter of the book is one of my favorites because they're all sort of soups that are meals. Like, I know you could do the nice little puree soup with some croutons, but like these are all soups, like you put out a big bowl of it, and your family just goes at it. So, like gumbo, kanji, some of the recipes we have in there, they're like meals borscht when it's like just lots of chunky things flowing around.
I like soups like that. You know what you you know what you put in as one of your seminal uh like childhood or like you know, young adult, the tam kagai. You know who doesn't like tom kagai? Yeah. This one over here.
Yeah, I I can I get it. Is it too much fish sauce? It's the coconut milk, right? Yeah, I don't know. Forget, forget, forget.
She's it's crazy. You know what else she doesn't like? Biscuits, biscuits. You wait a second. You don't like beets, biscuits or tamkagai.
Well, coconut milk, hot coconut coconut milk, do not like. Do you like cold coconut milk? No. No. Okay.
Okay, so you don't you you do not like coconuts? Okay, but hold up, hold up. So I noticed in here, and I've seen this a lot in the past uh couple of years, is that people pushing towards cream in in the in the biscuits. So, like, like mixing the butter base down with some cream. So, do you like it because the biscuits just are more tender because there's a little extra moisture in them?
This this recipe is uh an homage to a sort of food scientist, Shirley Correr. Yeah, good, yeah. I've met her a couple times. She wants to be a little bit more. This recipe, if you if there's one recipe you're gonna do that, do that one.
And you like the self-rising flour, you call for the old school source? Yeah, you gotta the lilywhite, you gotta get the the lily white, and uh, you know, maybe there's a little like uh sentiment behind it as well, but it's like a cakey biscuit. Like you you almost have to serve it in the tin because it's you go you can't like remove it from the tin. That's how soft, creamy, supple it is. Can you say supple for a biscuit?
Supple. Yeah. Is that a word for food? Like I hate when people do that, by the way, so I shouldn't. Are these cut or are these dropped?
These biscuits. Uh they're cut, right? Yeah, well, just yeah, fill up the pan and just my Thanksgiving sort of recipe, and we serve it at the restaurant. It's really popular. We gotta wrap it up in a minute.
Okay, uh, so I noticed uh your cornbread recipe doesn't have enough butter. Kidding. Does it have too much butter? No, no, it's like it's good. I mean, it's a lot of butter.
And then when it comes out, put more butter on it. That would be my suggestion. So just for you as you know, like it's uh so we're looking at like um uh a little more oh you do blue. Uh a little more cornmeal than flour, but like you know, pretty close to that kind of classic one one, right? So cup, the cup uh a little over a cup of each, and then two sticks of butter to four eggs.
It's like boom, man. That's like that's like twice waffle butter, which is nice. There's plenty of vegetable recipes in the book. And then a pound, a pound of jalapeno butter to serve on the side. Well, listen, that's you know, you put some in the fridge.
A lot of the recipes in there are okay, you're gonna make this thing jalapeno butter, uh, this mayonnaise sauce, and then you put it in the fridge, because don't you want to have stuff left over? I do. By the way, there's a picture of you, Chef hitting the whipped cream directly out of the uh EC. I have to tell Dax, my son Dax, every day not to do this. Yeah.
So that's example. It is a horrible example. I am a horrible example. I hope that I've made that clear. All right, one more thing.
I'm gonna have you answer one question, but then your chicken recipe, interesting because it's closer to like what I would see, like it goes directly from you do two marinades first. You do a pickled marinade, brief pickled marinade, then in buttermilk, presumably to tenderize and soften, right? And then directly into the into the flour mix, which is very like uh pies and thighs used to do it that way. I think Reburz used to do it that way, but it's like to me an alternate because I'm a dry dust wet thing, and you go right out of the thing, but like it lacquers down, and you're still doing it. I think helps with the Did you lacquer?
Did you lacquer your chicken? It looks so shiny, like it looks like almost pointed. That the picture there, then we toss it back in that sort of Nashville hot sauce, which really works. Yeah, this is the secret. All right, now you're gonna answer this question on the way out before.
Oh my gosh, okay. I'm not prepared for any questions. Yeah, here it is. Vlad, which is an amazing name. Vlad.
Vlad, I want to change my name now. Yeah, Vlad. I have a question about searing duck breast. Every time I sear and finish it in the oven, it comes out good, but when I start to cut it, juices are everywhere. And when I transfer the uh cuts to a plate, the juices continue leaking and it does not look good, especially with mashed potatoes.
I know about resting. I tried it too, but the meat cools down very quickly, and after five minutes rest, the breasts are not hot enough, and some juices are still running to the plate. So this is so then and I'll give you and then uh my current method is to give the breast uh a minute or so at rest and then to cut it and put it on towels to absorb the juices before I plate it. But I'm still losing the juices. What am I missing out on?
Uh and uh Vlad's technique is to um score it, salt, pepper, skin down uh for until it browns, and then in a in a hot oven for seven minutes. Wow, I mean my answer is gonna be super simple. Maybe it's the bird itself, right? Because depending on what that bird's been fed, there could be all sorts of or do you think like if it's frozen, like it's gonna frozen or yeah, sometimes it's like just brined or something. I don't know if the probably hasn't been brined.
Yeah, I tend not to too much because I think it firms up the inside of the firms up the plate. I'm thinking about what he's using. Yeah, we can see it. Uh but also you gotta let it rest. It seems like it's a resting issue, and then like a little little heat lamp, sort of like if it's resting but in a warm space.
That's what I'm saying. Hot plate. Like let it rest, hot plate, hot plate. If you're gonna do a duck breast like this, right? Right.
Warm your plates a little bit. Like if you but he doesn't have two ovens. This is why it's useful to have a plate heater, right? Right. Yeah.
I not to push my own stuff. I sometimes will searz all my plate a little bit to warm it up so that it doesn't cool down your product too much. Uh by the way, if if there ever was like a game of thrones, like sort of like, oh chef, pick your weapon. I grab this ears all. It well, especially if someone has it and you fire it right next to their ear, they're like, what the what?
Yeah, I also like we'll wrap some like like I'm also swinging it. Oh nice. Just so you know, like if you can paint that picture. I probably my lawyers probably say that you should not do that. Don't do it at home.
No, I'm not suggesting that at all, but lawyers are saying we gotta wrap it up. All right, so listen. All right, Dave. Jeez, Luis. All right, so uh so Vlad, uh, you know, if you have more questions or if you want more, we'll we'll deal more.
I have some other questions about cocktails. I didn't get to him. I apologize. We'll get to you. I might not I might be in China next week, people.
So I might not be back next week. I'll let you know via Twitter whether I'm back. We're going to visit because we're doing the spinzall, which is the centrifuge I'm working on. So I have to go to Shenzhen uh to to pre-approve, and it might be next week. How much does it hold like per vial?
Oh well, no, it's enough. It's open bucket, so it's 500 milliliters per bucket, but you can run it continuously, so you can just set it and forget it, walk away from it and do leaders and leaders and leaders. Dude. Working on it. Dude.
Working on it. All right. So you heard it here today. First, this is other than the today show. So we play I'll take I'll take seconds to hold it in Kathy Lee any day.
Uh uh Richard Blaze's new book, still good, out today. Go on Amazon, take a look at it. Thanks so much for you. Thank you. I'm so good.
Please help me beat the Ninja Turtles Pizza Book and jump on and buy a book, please. Yeah, come on. And if you're gonna buy a cartoon-based cookbook, make it be Bob's burgers. Agreed. All right.
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