Hello and welcome to Cooking Enthusiasts, Dave Arnold, host of Cooking Issues coming to you live from the heart of Manhattan, Rockefeller Center, New York City, News Dance Studios. Joined as usual with John right behind me. How are you doing, John? Doing great, thanks. Yeah, back from Belgium.
Nice to have you. Nice to have you. You got Joe Hazenrock in the panels. What's up? Hey man, thanks for flashing up mine.
Oh yeah. Over there in Los Angeles, we have Nastasia the Hammer Lopez. How you doing? I'm good. Yeah, yeah.
We have some stuff to talk about because you apparently went to some sort of amazing concert. It might not be fool related, but you know what? Uh upper upper left, we got uh Quinn. Quinn's uh back uh on the show, hopefully, uh, you know, like uh all the time now. How you doing, Quinn?
Yeah. Yeah, I'm I'm doing uh we do not have unfortunately uh Jackie Molecules because he's uh on his way back from Coachella being the fancy, the fancy, fancy, fancy music man that he is. But today's special guest on the show is David Kong, the founder of Glass Van, the very first, as uh far as I know, the very first uh direct to consumer DTC uh glassware company that is all like hand blown, which we'll get into in a minute. Welcome. Nice, nice to be here.
Yeah, yeah, great, great. So this is the portion of the show where we uh just discuss kind of you know what's happened in the past week or so. Most of the time it's supposed to be food related or and or beverage related, but it doesn't have to be. So anyone got anyone got anything from the past week? Nothing.
Oh, come on, you jerk. So I know my I know my man John was in Belgium, so what do you got? I ate a lot of food. I've had French fries with every meal for the past week. Did you go to that place?
Because you were in Ghent, right? Did you go to that place that's run by that Michelin Star Rider? I just did, yes. It's pretty good. I went there last time too.
Is it still on point? Yeah, yeah, still very good. Still very good. Like great sauces. He's got the best.
Yeah, he's got good mayonnaise. He's got a great mayonnaise game. I appreciate anyone with a good mayonnaise game. He's got a great mayonnaise game. And his potatoes are good.
I don't remember which do you remember which potato he uses? I don't. I was too busy shoveling them into my face. And if they don't have that like counter with the kettle and the second counter up top, I'm like, you're you're an idiot. It's a joke.
You're it's like, it's like, you know, it's I don't know, it's like oh, I'm a race car driver and they're on a moped. You're like, no, you're not. You know what I mean? No, you're no you're not. You know what I'm saying?
It's like, it's like they have developed God's way of doing that. And if you're gonna do it, do it. If you're not gonna do it, don't do it. Yeah. You know what I'm saying?
I agree. Same with the waffle irons. It's like that was so good. Oh my God. So you went also to to Brussels.
You went to Maison d'Endo. Oh my god. Oh my god. So let me ask you this. So for those of you that don't know, uh uh what Dandoi, right?
Maison. Dandois. Right. Uh so like there's two, right? There's the inside, which is mainly a speckaloo game, right?
Where you can get the giant. Has you ever bought one of those giant cookies? My dad used to when we were kids. Like around Christmas. Did they ever get home in one piece?
How do they package those? Rarely. They're like five feet tall. Yeah, they're big. Oh, but we didn't get those huge, huge ones, but we got other big ones, yeah.
They're like, they're like, they're like an eighth of an inch or like thick and like feet tall. I don't know, and they're crispy as hell. So I don't know how it's not like a lavash or something, you can just roll it up. I don't know how the heck anyone gets it home. They're delicious though.
Very good. But the outdoor game, the outdoor with the Liege and the Brussels waffles, money money in the bank. And so uh did you did of course you got both. Yeah, obviously. Yeah, yeah.
It's great. Just with powdered sugar. Yeah, yeah. You know how you know a place is good, uh, David? From waffles?
If if they're run if they're running, if they're running with buckets of uh of the battery and running with big trays of like the liige balls, that's when you know it's gonna be good because they don't even have time. They have to run stuff into it. That's how much they're pumping out of there. Yeah. Am I wrong about that?
Yeah, I don't know. It's great. And you brought now, uh, I asked before the show, uh, David said uh Kong said he's not a huge fan of spicy mustard, but John has brought, and I'm holding it up to the camera. If you're on uh Patreon, you can see on the camera, this is God's mustard. So that's yeah.
Yeah, this is like, you know, like this is the look, there are different kinds of mustard, like right. So, like, you know, you maybe you like a sweet mustard, maybe you like a grainy mustard, but for what this mustard is, it it's the one. Yeah. That's it. That's fine.
My ye can suck it. You know what I mean? Like I've been I've been to their store and it's great, and I like their stuff and you know, the British stuff and Pomery and all that. It's all great. It's all fine.
It's all got a long history, blah, blah, blah. But like this is first of all, they just started shipping it after like 200 years. I don't even know if it's them officially. Yeah, someone's buying it and shipping it, which was the business idea you wanted to do. Yeah.
It's it tastes a little bit. Here, that's yours. And Joe, you want a little bit? I will, please. Yeah.
I'm gonna go home. I'm gonna buy a crap ton of liverwurst, is what I'm gonna do. Nice. Um, but this stuff is itself and it's not something else. Yeah.
You know, like they say in the Deer Hunter movie, this isn't something else. This is this. Yeah. Yeah. My my nostrils are cleared.
Oh, yeah. That's a great mustard. And uh, did you get the old lady or did you get the sun? Which is not old. Yeah, yeah.
The sun. Yeah. Wow. He's uh he's a lot uh more mellow than the than the I'm assuming the mom. I'm assuming that's the mom.
He was pretty chill. Yeah. Remember, folks, when you buy mustard from these people, they give it to you in a glass jar, but they put a plastic wrap over it for fear that metal will touch the mustard. This person lives in perpetual fear of people touching her mustard with metal. Yeah, it's like her biggest fear.
You know what I'm saying? True. Yeah. Yeah. They even saw little wooden spoons at the store.
That's how they want you to ladle it out. Yeah, yeah. I said this before, there's only one horribly disappointing thing about uh Ghent. And uh, and it's horrible. Those little cone-shaped, gummy candies.
Oh, the I hit them to the um Oh my god. Uh you know why you've forgotten them. They're awful. Yeah. It's terrible.
There's it's no reason for them to exist. There's so yeah, they're yeah, they've been around for a long time. Yeah. Yeah. They have less flavor than a poorly dried persimmon.
They are the worst. Yeah, I'm not a fan. Yeah. Not a fan. You know what I'm saying?
Yeah. Anyway. Uh well, I'm sorry you had to go to a funeral, but thank you so much for the grand size of mustard. And you know, I think I might be eating dinner alone today, which means I will be eating all liverwurst. I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna go get me some uh okay.
Question. For those that like pumper nickel, do you like American pumper nickel or do you like like old school German dense as hell full full corn pumper nickel or both for different reasons? I'm not sure I've had the real stuff. Oh, really? Oh, it's good.
It is good. It's cooked for a long time. It goes dark because it's cooked at a low temperature for a long, long time. And so it like self-myhards and goes brown. They don't put caramel color in the actual original stuff.
So it's like is like the the Germans the original, I'm assuming. Yeah, I mean, well, that whole area. So I mean, so is it have the consistency of the like the pretzel bun? No, no, no, no. It's like a brick.
And and you slice it like super thin. And like the the grains are like just barely cracked, and it just holds together. Uh never had it then. Sour because they fermented for a long time. Good.
You like that style, right, John? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Did you get any uh for yourself uh syrup de liège while you were over there? I absolutely did, yes.
Yeah, man. Like I have to say, I know I'm a lover of the I only went there once, but like of all the tiny countries, it is a tiny country that packs a lot of food. Can I say that? Yeah. No, no, it really is.
Yeah. I had uh my first boulet liégeois, so that's a sauce base, or so it's a meatball dish. I think it was veal and pork cooked in a sauce uh that's heavily seasoned with the sirop liage, so it's like a like a game sauce, almost like you know, with the pears and the prunes and all that stuff. And it's just a lot of gravy, a lot of onions, juniper, uh Sardover French fries, and it was so freaking delicious. So so good.
You missed this last week, John, but uh Kev Kevin Jung from Noma was on, and yes, I stole all the Noma stuff that he brought, but uh I'll bring you some, and especially because of this this uh this mustard that you got. But Jack described, and Nastasia, you were there too, right? He described what's the largest meatball that you think would be pleasant? Uh baseball. Hmm.
All right. That's big. That's still big. What do you what do you think? What about you, David?
You meatball. The carbone meatballs, what I think. How big are how big are they? They're pretty big. Yeah.
Like, I don't know if you it's like that big. Yeah, it's probably a baseball. Like a hand, like you had like a handball size in your hand. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tennis bowl.
Yeah. So, like, but how big how big were these ones? They were bigger than a softball, Jack said, right? Like big. Nastasia doesn't remember.
She doesn't care. Uh, but I will say, Nastasia, since I know you went to an amazing concert, it's not food related. I know you just had like homemade chicken tendies before you went to the concert, but what concert did you go to that you think I should go to? This actually relates to you, J. Well, you I I'm only gonna talk about it if you actually go.
What the hell does that mean? How first of all, we have to talk about it now. I would like to go, but I don't know if I'm gonna go. This is a radio show. Like you talk it's not about me.
You talk about this, you talk about this band like every month, probably on the radio show. Yeah. So like if you don't go, I'll be really like it's it's it's unfair that we have to listen to you talk about this band and they're gonna be in New York. I'm trying to get you to talk about it, and you won't. You're just talking about the mechanics of talking about it.
I want you to commit to going. All right, so I went to see a perfect a perfect circle. That's not the band that I would talk about, but yes. Who else is playing that day? Uh and they were the and Primus opened for them.
Les Claypool. So two winemakers, right? Les Claypool from Claypool Vineyards and uh Maynard from what's Maynard's tool related winery called in Arizona? Uh uh anyway. I don't remember.
Do you did you uh David, do you have them on your on your list? You gotta get them on your list. I gotta get Arizona on my list. Like, oh, you're not in Arizona. You shipped Arizona, no, no one we ship we ship to every corner of the earth, but we don't have any.
I don't think we have many clients in Arizona. Like restaurant clients. Yeah, but these guys, like I bet you anything. First of all, like he's a huge weirdo. Like, I'm sure he would just appreciate the idea that you could buy these like hand blown glasses that would get shipped to him.
Same with Claypool. You know what I mean? Like, I bet you both of them would enjoy the concept. No, what do you think, Stas? Yeah, I think that they probably aren't approached by like really high-end people in general.
You know, well, I mean, the thing about the thing about glass fan is it's supposed to be like, well, let's just get into it. Well, we we I still have some things I I I didn't talk about from cooking this week, but like isn't your whole value proposition, right? Is you don't have to spend infinity to get a hand blown glass. And if correct me if I'm wrong, you started this because you did uh you were kind of like gray market importing Zaltos. Uh I wasn't importing it, but I was using it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But you weren't you selling them to like like your friends like on the shirt. Yes, yes, yes. Yeah, you were like, you know, you were like, you're like, I'm the half prizalto guy. You know what I mean?
Like so, I mean Well, it's because like to make the shipping work, you had to buy like 24 or something at a time. Uh, because it was being like FedExed over from the UK or France. And yes, I didn't need like 24 Zaltos, so I like offloaded half of them to someone else. Going back to bases, I wanted to do that when back when I was a bass player, there was a bass I really wanted, but I wanted to become a distributor, but I had to buy like 10 of them. Yeah.
And I couldn't quite get 10 people to sign on to get that to base so I could become a quote unquote guitar store. And then you know what I mean? But anyway. Um speaking of Zaltos, you know, I remember, hey, Stas, you remember this? At Sambar, when we started Booker and Dax uh the bar, we had Libby's and they had Zaltos.
Just to show you what they thought about cocktails versus their wine program. You know what I mean? Oh my god. Listen, this they have not found the the trash closet that they can't shove Nastasi and I in. You know what I'm saying?
It's like it's like I mean, no offense to the Libby Corporation, right? They make a sturdy glass. But uh yeah, yeah. Zalto. Uh and even that's relatively recent, right?
When did the Zalt when did the Zalto uh phenomenon happen? I think the company was started in 2008. Right. Um, and in the US, I would say it really started taking off in the mid 2010s, I would say. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's when I was short history. So like people my age, like it wasn't part of our like growing up lexicon, but like the people like you know, generation or so younger than me. Zalto, Zalto.
Zalto. Well, I I I knew they had something because I I had a box of Zaltos and I was going up an elevator, and it's just some random person was like, Oh, I love those glasses. Man. So I knew like you could build a nice brand selling glassware. New York is a snobby place.
It is. You know, and it's our number one city. Yeah, that's probably why. I mean, like, I'm not saying by the way. What I mean is is that like I I I appreciate good good glassware, I appreciate good things.
But it's like, you know, in New York, you could walk. Any random person could be talking about like and it's it didn't used to be like this. In the 90s, you didn't have like, you know, 20-year-old people walking around talking about like how many Michelin-starred restaurants they went to in general. And I hear this crap on the street all the time. I just don't know.
I mean, it's good, it's good. It's good, I guess, but it's just weird to me. Uh so what did I do for did you cook anything this week, David? Or drink anything interesting? Well, speaking of Belgium, I just bought 24 canteons.
Nice. Yeah. All right. Did you go to the brewery or not this time around? Yeah, I have to.
Yes. Not enough. Never enough, but yes, no, it's good. Yeah. I love that kind of thing.
Oh, and I had uh uh this beer code Oval. It's like this uh Montr no Quebec beer. It's like a kind of like a canteen, but from Quebec. It it was awesome. It was nuts.
And I had it in Toronto of all places. Oh, really? I haven't been I haven't been to Quebec or Montreal in 30 years. Oh, yeah. You should go.
So I was I had no money at the time. We were just pounding Boreal at uh because they still have that beer. Yes, yeah, they do. Yeah, yeah. Um, so uh I was cooking and uh I was using some of my I didn't I can't find so Kevin when he came, John, last week, brought a um he brought me the pork scorer, the Danish pork scorer.
Okay. But now he's he's like he's like, you know, you don't want to just do it with like you know the same cuts that everyone uses, you want to find pork neck. Right. And I can't find pork neck. It's like very fatty, right?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's really nice. But I can't find it. Who's who serves it? Like, or what like I guess you can collar, but who bones it out?
I can't find it at my local butcher stores. I gotta find a place in New York City that sells boned out pork neck or collar so that I because I I want to use it on a fatty cut first. I don't want to do like loin or some trust. Have you heard of this part called like secretto? No.
It's I I think that's why it's called secreto, because like no one knows about it. And it I don't know if it might be from the neck, but it's it's very fatty. It tastes really nice. Well, you know, yeah. What?
Maybe we can talk through La Frito, because get it in, get it in. By the way, I don't know if you know this, David, but John has uh is a chef at a wine bar, so we you know we discussed. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We'll discuss uh we'll discuss uh wine wine glasses in a minute. So anyway, so uh Kevin handed us uh so I'm gonna the whole trick with the the Danish pork is they score the skin and then they crisp it and then you can slice through the scores and it's nice and it renders out.
It's beautiful. But uh he gave me a bunch of number products, including Dashi RDX, which are which is Audashi RX, which is their like kind of like seasonal stuff. And uh so I made a whole bunch of mashed potatoes using my garden guardian serviceware. So for those of you that I haven't talked about it in a while, but that's true. I haven't talked about it in a while, John.
Yep, I'm allowed. It was it was a uh company that made aluminum wear in Los Angeles from uh the 1920s to the like I guess they went out of business in the in the mid 50s, and it's all aluminum. Stuff that's before the war had uh an aluminum lid, and then during the war they moved to a glass lid because um, you know, aluminum shortages, and they stay with glass. So any post war uh World War II, any post war like guardian service has like a glass lid on it. And the whole idea is they seal really well, and aluminum's an amazing conductor of heat.
And so they were one of the people who were pushing waterless cooking. So waterless cooking was cooking uh and it's a you know a was a fad from late, maybe late, like I would say started getting really popular in the early 1900s and stayed popular until about World War II. And um it's only cooked with the water that's in the product, you don't add water to it. So you put the potatoes into the vessel, put the lid on, you bring it up until you just get steam on the top of the lid, and then you turn it all the way down and let the potatoes cook through all the way, and then you rice them with. I use a I use a Bamax uh I don't I I don't actually like the Bamex mixer.
I think it's garbage. I hate it. But uh it's got uh a ricer that you can't get in America. You can only get it from European sources, and that's the best potato masher that God's ever made. You know what I mean?
It's because you ever use one of these? Do you know food mills? You know how much food mills suck? Do you hate food mills like I hate? Yeah, right, right.
Well, so like so like food mills, everyone's like, oh, food mills the way to make a mashed potato, or pushing it through a Tammy if you're a real if you really hate it. Yeah, oh my god. Well, you know, he's dead, so he doesn't even do it anymore. So anyway, so like the the uh you take the ricer and it just it's it's a powered food mill basically, but you just push it down through it, and then I don't use butter, I use cream. What do you think about that, John?
Not both, nope, but cream. I mean, do you? I think butter should be in there, but that's why it's delicious. Yeah, but I just add more cream. I want it to be like light, and then Dashi RDX and some Yondu, even though they will not sponsor the show, those weasels.
Oh, that's too bad. You know why? We don't our contact is gone. Uh it's a delicious product, though. It was a great product, yeah.
Anyway, oh, by the way, uh, before I uh go to oh, oh, so what else? What else did I make? So I made mashed potatoes, and then I made a uh a version of shrimp clementsau, which is the um uh Dookie Chase uh dish. But I first of all, okay, listen, most shrimp that you buy is freshwater farmed shrimp, which is relatively flavorless. It's fine, it's not a bad product.
It's relatively flavor. It's no, it's no uh, it's no what do you call them? Acrevice gris or whatever you call those little suckers. Yeah, covet yeah, covet gris. They're so expensive.
It's like 70 euros a kilo now for them peeled. It's crazy. But the real Clemenceau is made with actual like wildcock golf shrimp, which are good, right? But I mean you I don't have a source of that. So I made it with Langustine tails instead.
And so, and here's how here's how I did it. So also, like the real Clemenceau has crispy potatoes, but instead of doing crispy potatoes, I served it on the mashed potatoes, right? So I made these mashed potatoes with the Guardian service ware. Then I took uh mushrooms, I hit the mushrooms with uh wine and butter, and I steamed them down in the wine, butter, salt, uh, pepper, garlic. And as soon as everything evaporated down and they were starting to sizzle up, I threw in guess what?
Pearl onions that were frozen. Thank you. Because now I'm an adult and I'm never gonna touch a uh raw pearl onion, you know, a uh regular pearl onion again. Threw in the package of pearl onions, sweated those out. Once those started to color up a little bit, threw in the peas, and then worn the Langstein tails, chak chak, chak, chak chak, you know, correct the seasoning on the mashed potatoes.
Very good. Yep, very good. Sounds good. Delicious. All right, so that was my that was my week.
That's the week, that's the the book of the week in review. Uh do you know uh Nastasia told me that at Primus they had a bartender on stage, and whenever they weren't playing, whoever wasn't playing went to the bar and just they were, but it was like a cater waiter. What the hell is that? It's like you own wineries. Get a real bartender.
Sas, am I wrong about this? Isn't what you told me? We don't know who the guy was. He could have been somebody that works on their vineyards, you know. You said to me you just look like an average joker.
Yes. That is true. That is he looked average, but it could have been like somebody that works with them. So you tell me this, I say it, and now you backpedal and make me look like a bad guy. Because it wasn't like Mike Cappuffieri up there, you know, like we don't know who's up there.
Okay. He looked like an average guy. All right. But it wasn't a star tender. Oh, do they still use that term?
Start tender. Oh my god. I'm gonna bring that. I'm gonna bring that back and they call everyone star tender. My my wife.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So do she. My wife's making me watch uh season two of the bear. Yes, it's it's very good, but like the whole yes chef thing, we need to come up with something for bartenders. You know what I mean?
So that people can like like just scream at each other and like, you know, fake give each other props all the time at the bar. You know what I mean? Yes, Tendi, no tendy. You know what I mean? Her tendi.
Three daiquiries all day, Tendi. Wouldn't work. You know what I mean? Like, it's wouldn't work. Uh, all right.
So well, I think I think it would stress people out at the bar to hear that in front of your face the whole time the whole night, you know. You think? Probably. Yeah. Yeah.
I'd be entertained. You like you like it? I'd like it. Yeah. Three day daiquiries melting in the window.
Three daiquiries all day, chef! Oh, you can't say chef. Had to say something else. You know what I mean? Like, you know what I mean?
Heard. Like, everything has to be like, okay, whatever. Uh, what about you, Quinn? You got anything for us before we go into glasses, glasses, glasses? Uh yeah.
I uh we recently got what is known as like a cowboy grill. Well, basically, you know, like a fire pit with a grill over it. I freaking love cowboy grill. Some like armature that you can like swing different grills on and off. Oh, yeah.
Or like hang a pot of uh uh beans or whatever. Do you have you have a cast iron bean pot, my friend? I mean, we cooked something on there, so we we must have a compatible pot. I mean, you need a cast iron camping like a Dutch oven. You need one if you got a cowboy cowboy grill is God's cooking.
What what what what uh fuel did you use? Uh just some wood. Yeah, baby. Do you have a lot of wood where you are? I mean, my brothers went and bought them.
Uh yeah. I don't like have like wood on hand. I used unconscionable amounts of wood on my cowboy grill. But yeah, like what you get a cord of wood? Oh, Quinn or me back in the day.
Yeah. I mean, back in the day, I had nothing but wood. I like we were on 17 acres and trees were falling down left and right. I was like, I'll just burn anything. I would I I would burn a whole house full of wood.
It's like the way people used to write about stuff in the 1800s. They're like, cut down a tree, burn it, make dinner. You know what I mean? It was like that kind of level of wood. Cowboy grill.
Cowboy grill. That's what we burn for the gods. And I would heat it so much that the that the eventually the grill just warped. I ended up not even end up the the grill like ended up being use useless. I had to like have my own grills that I would put over it because it was so dang hot.
So what'd you make on it, Quinn? Well, the previous, we did that one Sunday. The previous Thursday, we got a fresh uh local halibut, fresh off the boat. So we butchered that, and so we we did sort of a seafood feast. A uh sort of non-descript halibut head curry cooked over the fire, and then yeah, like a big, like a nice chunk of um halibut.
Wait, hold on. Well, you just said nondescript. What? What do you mean? You say you didn't like it?
You didn't like the curry. No, my brother, no, my brother didn't like follow a particular style of curry. We were just like free-string. All right, but it it had flavor. You're saying it wasn't it wasn't, it wasn't a specific curry, it was it was some sort of curry-like device.
Not like it was kind of like beige. It was the beige of curries. Yeah, no, again, I like it wasn't like specifically curry or Indian inspired curry or Japanese curry, or just like we have like all these aromatics and spices, and then my brother made a stew. Okay. Stew and curry, huh?
How how wait, so what kind of stew? The curry. But well, this doesn't seem to be like you need the cowboy grill for this. It seems to be a separate problem, right? Unless you just want to cook it out.
We cooked it over the fire because we had grilled halibut and the halibut head. I know we've had this discussion before, but bully base or Chupino, one has to die. Bully based dies or bully based stays. Bleebase dies. Bully-based dyes, I think you're right.
I think you're right. Chupino's delicious. Are you a fan of uh tomato-based uh fish stews, David? It's not my cup of tea, but I mean, I I like a tomato-based fish stew quite a lot. And I'm gonna have to say that uh yeah, I think reigns supreme between that and the bully base.
I'm sure my man Francophile behind me has to go bully base, but only when it's got real gunard in it. Mediterranean lover, freaking. Oh yeah, sure you're not. Sure you're not. Um guy, you know, I haven't, you know.
I've I've never, all the times I've been to San Francisco, I've never had a Chupino in San Francisco. I used to make it quite regularly. You gotta have that garlic bread and the sausage. Yeah. I I will also say I just don't think I've had good Chupino yet.
Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. All right.
So uh here's when oh, we have uh Mad's reference coming on. Wrestling. Oh, awesome. I didn't know that. Oh, nice.
All right. And uh I'm here to promote the Patreon. If you're listening live on the Patreon, first of all, uh, we're gonna talk about GlassFan uh right now, but uh even for uh David has been gracious, even for people who aren't Patreon. If you use uh my name Dave Arnold, you get a discount code but David Arnold. David Arnold.
Come on, man. Dave Arnold. And then uh but the email said. Oh god, geez Louise, we'll make it Dave Arnold. It'll work.
Uh but uh if you're on the Patreon, uh, we have a different code, and you get uh an even bigger discount. You want to tell them uh what they get for being on the Patreon, John? Access to our Discord uh with the community of like-minded people talking about great things all the time, sharing restaurant recommendations. I'm gonna throw up some new Belgian Belgian spots in there that were very tasty. Um access to discount codes with uh people at Kitchen Arts and Letters and Glassfin and a lot of the other great people we work with, um, access to the recordings before we release them to the general public.
So yeah, just a whole bunch of great things at different membership levels, and check it out at patreon.com slash cooking issues. All right, so I was a little skeptical uh, you know, when uh you said, you know, we're gonna we're gonna have you on the show. They, you know, you guys ship me some glasses, and I was like, okay, you're shipping fragile glasses in regular post. And I have to say, not one of them broke. And like your packaging is uh, I mean, I mean you must have breakage because it's life.
But uh the packaging is pretty robust. The packaging looks like it's got to cost you a lot. Yes, it does. Yeah, it's very fancy, you know, packaging. Uh here's a question for you.
When you get the glasses, right? They come in this in this package and you you open it up. Inside the package are is a magnetic strip. Why? It's to uh glue the glass back together if it breaks.
No, I'm joking, I'm joking. Yeah, what's it uh uh it's to uh seal the box um after you've opened the seal in case you need to use the box again. Oh, for people who live where they have space where they can keep a box. Well, a lot of people use the box and take it to a restaurant so that they can drink out of nice glassware at restaurants that don't have nice glassware. I mean, if you came to my restaurant and used a glass, although I you know, like I I would be like, I would be like, I'd be like, oh yeah.
John, what would you do? I would just be like, we're gonna be in for a ride with that person. I think this is how Cato found out about my glasses. Wait, someone brought glassware to Cato? I think so, yeah.
Before they moved, I think. I don't know. Someone that's I believe that's how he found out about me. That listen, listen, listen, like, okay, listen, there are plenty of people out there who need their own stuff in order to feel comfortable outside. And so let's give people the benefit of the doubt, John.
You know what I'm saying? Well, it's it's because a lot of uh restaurants don't have uh good glassware, so you know right. But you're going to Cato and you're paying eight billion dollars for a tasting menu and you don't think their glasses are gonna be nice enough? It might not have been Cato then. Uh he saw it somewhere and someone brought it, maybe it was to a third par third restaurant or something.
Yeah, yeah. So hey, so you have two models, right? Like not models of glasses, models of business, right? So you started with direct uh customers like regular jokers, but we also have a lot of profession. I mean, look, whatever.
I don't mean it, uh you know how I mean it. I mean in the nicest possible way, right, John? Yes. Yeah, yeah. You know, regular, you know, folk, non-industry.
You know what I mean? Yeah. And then uh, but then you also branched out and you do to industry. So if you're industry, you're buying obviously more than two at a time, and you have two different thicknesses of glass. So for those of you that don't know, these glasses are like super thin and they're handmade.
So the average um like normal person uh Riedel glasses, like the ones that I used to get uh for my house are machine made. They're pretty decent, but they're machine made. Riedel also makes a very much more expensive handmade one. Uh, you know, and I I mean back in the day, they owned the entire market before Zalto and that they of a fancy weirdos like the Robert Parker kind of like wine crowd, and they're like, you know, buying all the different sizes of glass where uh si sizes and styles, and like I used I went to see um I forget the older one's name. Was it Maximilian or the younger one was Maximilian?
I forget. I saw Old Man Riedel, the one who's now dead, give a uh uh uh a big tasting where you know he walked you through like all the stuff that I don't actually believe. Like this glass aims the wine at this particular place on your tongue and therefore accentuates this particular flavor. Now you do get different obviously presentations of aroma on different glasses and different you know ways it's structured, but I think you know, a lot of what he he was doing was just amazing salesmanship and and kind of mental manipulation. But I did like the glasses, especially the his fancy handmade.
But you decided handmade glasses should be for everybody. So like why don't you say what the price of like one of your handmade APs is? What do you call the AP again? Do you just call it? Uh the universal is our high-end one.
Right. Uh and we sell that for two for eighty, and obviously you can put the 10% off code. And then we also introduced the new glass, and it's two for 48, and we call that the all-purpose. And that's our uh entry-level hand blown wine glass. And that's also the one that you more likely find at mo at most restaurants, right?
Because like right now, no, because we started with the universal. Right. And so we've been doing that for like four years, and we just started with the all-purpose um like last year. Right. Yeah.
So and what's what's the percentage that you sell of each, you think? Like or more people buying it? Right now, I would say the the higher end is probably like 80% of our sales still. Yeah. Just because it's way earlier.
Also, that's the one where like that put us on the map where there's real like differentiation where like you pick it up and you're like, wow, like this is different than what I've used before. They do feel good. Yeah. They feel they feel ridiculous, like they they're like very thin. Yeah.
If it's the first time you've used a hand blown wine glass, like if you haven't used Zalto before or our other competitors, like when you lift that glass, you're gonna be you're gonna be like, What what on earth is this? Yeah. I did break one, but it wasn't the glass's fault. So here's another interesting fact. You say don't hand wash it because that's how you're gonna break it.
Correct. Did you did you break it hand washing it? No, I put I put it in a freezer. And my freezers are drawer freezers, and so it had settled wrong. And so I can't stand anything in my freezer.
Everything has to lay on its side. And so it laid on its side, but the the the um the base kicked up a little bit, and so when I opened the drawer, it caught the base and just boom shattered the thing on on one of the beers, beer glasses. So I'm trying I'm debating at the bar. So, you know, just whatever, full whatever, uh at Contra Bar, which is you know the bar that I'm starting with uh Jeremiah Stone and and uh Fabian Lanhouskey, you know, who knows when, mid May, something like this. At Contra, they use and in Wild Air, I think, right?
They use your glasses. Yes. Yeah. We designed the tasting glass. If you go on my website, you can see you can buy the tasting glass.
That was as that was designed with them. Yeah, cool. So yeah, so they they're an early adopter. Yes. You know what I mean?
Um, and so we're hopefully gonna use uh we're gonna use you know some of these at the at the bar as well, I hope. Uh going through and you do have a line of uh of bar stuff. But anyway, so like I'm trying to figure out what I'm gonna do with carbonated drinks because everybody with carbonated drinks uh puts it on on ice. Back at Booker and Dak's time, I used to put my drinks just in champagne flutes. Now I'm not a champagne flute guy anymore because it's like a little too concentrated.
So but I was thinking more like an AP glass for carbonated without without ice. At existing conditions, we went to ice, but everyone now with ice uses collins. Collins spears, relative pain in the butt, relatively expensive, and also you're still diluting in ice and having a Collins glass, you also make a Collins glass. But it's a very relatively large volume Collins glass, so it'll require we can make a smaller one for you. Okay, okay.
Um the question is, can I go back to iceless service? And if we do, Jeremiah was like, we want to get a shorter stem, and that's why we're using the beer glass. Or is that what you call it? The beer glass? It's like go to the bistro, I believe is the one you're talking about.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But that's the one I shattered. Jeremiah we'll send you a new one. All right, nice. Jeremiah took the other one up too, uh, because he's gonna use it, use it upstate.
Um, so I'll say this, even though I know that you care mostly about uh drinking wine and these things. Do you know what is uh really really good? Drinking seltzer out of thin glass. Like seltzer is is the most refreshing thing in the world, in my opinion. And drinking seltzer out of the uh out of your stemless your your stemless guy, super thin.
I'm like, this is just even more refreshing because it doesn't it's like the glass isn't there. It's like it's like you are delivering refreshment to your face. Right. You know what I mean? It magically appears in your mouth.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. It I have to say, it does take a little bit of getting used to having the glass be so light. Right. It's just like crazy.
But they don't seem to break in normal things. Uh uh, you know, I don't know. You have most people break them when they look uglier when you hand wash them. Yes, you yeah, definitely just use a dishwasher for sure. It looks better and doesn't break as much.
Honestly, anything, everything I think just tastes better in a thinner, lighter vessel of any kind. Like I was using a ceramic vessel that was really thin, really light, and my tea tasted better and my coffee tasted better. I don't know why. Are you gonna do ceramics? We're thinking about it.
We're working on it. Now here's uh so before I uh before I go uh uh too much further, one thing one thing that I will say though is that the where the wine world and the bar world are different. So the glass that I care most about at the bar uh is the coupe, right? And Nikonora's and that whole variety. But the one thing is that when they're hand blown, they do have different volumes, glass to glass.
And so I have to figure out some way to work with it because I need all of the wash lines to be the same. So whereas at a wine bar, I can pour to a particular line on the glass. At a bar bar, I'm making the drink in a tin and and the recipe always has to stay the same. And it has to look the same in every glass that I pour it into because I use it as a visual check to make sure that um that the recipe was executed properly. And as a even more than that, if I send two glasses with similar drinks to, you know, a table and they see the wash line, which is you know the place where the drink hits the the glass.
If the wash line is different, then people get completely bent out of shape. Yeah, rightfully so, right? Rightfully so. Uh it's the same way where, like, you know, whenever Nastassi and I go out, uh, you know, when like I'm we're doing something out, and we go out to dinner, and we get a tasting, and her friend Pat is sitting next to us, and the waiter likes Pat, so he gets a tall pour and I get a kid's pour in my glass. We're like, what the hell?
You know what I mean, Stas? Remember that? Yeah. I'm sitting there tapping the table and like and like Pat, Pat's getting like Pat's getting like freaking goblets, and I don't even want a full goblet full of wine because that's not even pleasant. Like, I'd rather have two smaller glasses of wine, to be honest, you know, money aside, right?
I'd rather have two smaller glasses of wine. I'd rather have two smaller cocktails. It's more pleasant to hold a smaller cocktail, but don't give me a kid's pour. I'm not a small child. I might act like a small child, but I'm not a small child.
You know what I mean? Jonel from uh Atomics is walking right by us. I don't know. He's one of our commands. Oh nice, getting fish pulled.
Um so, anyways, uh so one of the issues I need to worry about with coops is that. So how do you kind of control getting like uh accurate sizing on a hand blown glass? Yeah, so so yeah, that's not gonna be as good as a machine made on that front. Yeah, but it does look does look a lot better and taste and fee and feel really good. And it doesn't have as much of a thermal mass.
I think if if your drink is going all the way up to the top, then then I can see issues for things that are like a little bit more in the middle, it should be. Um have you liquid nitrogen to your glasses yet? I'll tell you what happens. Yeah. We'll test it pretty soon.
We'll let we'll let we'll let you know. I'm sure it'll be fine. The thinner a glass is, the better it actually is with liquid nitrogen. Right. Because it gets there's less like uh crazy uh stress stuff that that builds up.
Yeah, I mean we're not inventing anything new. There's already a lot of hand blown cocktail glasses out there. A lot of these top 50 world's 50 bars or whatever are using hand blown weasel cocktail glasses. And we're just offering it at a much more affordable um price point. Yeah, yeah.
Wait, well, I mean, much more affordable than that. I mean, it's more than like the garbage that I normally, like Libby's and whatnot. Oh, no offense. Libby's fine, listen, listen. I serve plenty of drinks out of Libby's, it's fine, it's all good.
I mean, uh the Libby Corporation definitely has a reason to exist. I and I have Libby's too. I mean, like, I'm not being the jerk with Talibia, am I? No, no. All right, it's fine.
Yeah. I'm all right. I apologize. I mean, we don't compete with them, obviously. They're probably selling their cocktail glasses for like two bucks a glass or something.
Yeah. Our goal is just that every price point we're the best glass. So that's it. Right. So you're getting you're getting like uh you're getting twice the value for the price.
Exactly. Yeah. Uh so here's what I think's interesting is oh first of all, before is do people have a tendency to overpour into your glasses? Those wine glasses with the really thin stem, if you pour it too high, you're like, oh Jesus, is glass split. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Has that ever happened? Does anyone pour it so high? Does it ever just go chink? Is there like like if you pour one of those tall glasses too tall, if you do like a if you do like a one of those like T you know how on TV, like they go in and they pour like half a bottle of wine into their glass to symbolize I'm in a bad mood. You know what I mean?
Like that's how they Yeah, like the the capacity of some of those glasses is like 750. You can put the whole bottle in if you want. Um we actually had a client, um corner bar that like was making a margarita out of it, and they had like all the ice and stuff, and what happened? It was fine. It was fine.
Didn't it? That stem actually i it's not that easy to break that stem. Because Jeremiah won't let me put ice in one of those glasses with stems. Oh, well, uh yeah. I wouldn't the higher end glass isn't supposed to use uh it's not supposed to have ice.
But the middle one. The the lower the the entry level one you can put ice into it, yeah. So the the the one with the the thin glass, I like if you over pour it, it just first of all, the stem is really tall, so the actual like throat, like actual lever arm of the wine in your hand is like immense, and you feel like you're doing something bad. You feel like you're doing something terrible if you overfill the glass. So you recommend actually only pouring up to the widest portion of the glass in general?
Not not even the widest portion. That cause because even at the widest portion, like on our burgundies or whatever, it's gonna be like a lot of wine. So, you know, you just put whatever five ounces is. You're a five-ounce man? Yeah, I I'm less actually.
I'm I'm I I like to do like as little as possible to be honest, like two or three ounces. Really? Yeah, I'd rather just come back and pour more in. But I don't want, you know, like if I I'm I work so hard to get the price uh the the uh the weight of that glass down to like a hundred grams, and then I don't want to ruin it with 150 grams of wine. Uh there you go.
Okay, okay, fair. Uh I got a question in the Discord. Oh, it's it um from Josh Seaberg. Ah, I like Josh. Yeah.
A hot dog is not a sandwich, whoever. Yes. Um he's curious why you went with such wide-shaped coupes and Nicks and Nora's. Was it for ease of blowing? His Nick and Nora's not that wide, just a coupe.
Okay. He loves all the silver. It's not because of ease of blowing, it was just a design. Gotcha. Just sign.
But then the Nick and Nora is wide for a Nick and Nora, but it's narrow for a coop. Got it. Yeah. Wouldn't you say? Oh now.
Our our goal is just to have, you know, some in every size range, so for all the things that you need it for. Like, we don't have a middle one, just but because we haven't made it yet, but we're gonna make something. The one that I think we're calling a Nick and Nora that I have though is has the volume of a regular coop like coupe. I think it can hold a full five and a half ounces. And the coupe coop is big, big, right?
Yeah. Like do you make an actual like moral like closer to like four ounce Nick and Nora? Uh we can make anything. What what you see on the website is what we have right now, but we can theoretically make anything. So like if if when you say that, like if if I'm a restaurant and I want a glass, a particular shape, like how much time and money am I talking?
How many do I need? Well, if if you're suggesting something that other people are gonna be interested in, then we'll just develop it and add it to our line. Right. And and you'll be our first customer. You know what I mean?
Well, so how about how many, like, oh, but like how long is it take? Like because they gotta make the mold, all your stuff's in wooden molds, right? Very fast. Uh no, they're actually uh not not wood, they're like uh metal. Oh, they're metal molds, yeah.
And then they're like spinning it in the mold by hand. All right, so so how long like like I like I have an idea, I'm gonna open a restaurant. If we're trying to do something like, okay, like company vents that are natural, like they came to me like probably four months ago. They're opening this month. So completely custom.
Completely custom glass. Well, we'll see if you you can be the judge of that when you go. So, like, but if if I want to make something that you hate, how much more does it cost? Like how much how many do I how many do I need to make? Um minimum, then it's just gonna be expensive.
It it will it you probably wouldn't be able to do it as a restaurant. Unless if you're like a big restaurant group or something. Right, but like what is it, like a hundred glasses, like a thousand glasses? Like um more than a hundred. More than a hundred.
A hundred, a couple hundred, probably, and then each glass would be expensive. Right. Because cause that's you know, that's not at a pr mass-produced level. Right. How many molds do they need for each shape?
Like when you're gonna make a shape, how many molds do you need to make? Just one? Yeah, it's just for the bowl. Right, but I mean in other words, like you don't have like five different people doing it at the same time. You don't need five copies of it?
Uh there might be more than one mold, yeah, for for that reason. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So here's the other thing that I find interesting is that uh most people, like we had the maiden folks, you know, on uh before, and most people who go into these kinds of businesses come from these businesses. Right. Right?
Because they have the contacts and like Nastasia and I and John bitterly know how hard it is to get factories sometimes to talk to you unless you like known them for forever. Right. But you came at this because you're like, I like wine glasses and they cost too much, and uh I'm a business person, so I'm gonna do this. How the hell did that work? Like how the hell did you get people to even talk to you?
Because I think people might be interested. This is not a standard model. Like to go into this kind of business not being from it is not standard. Um I the the good thing is I'm the one paying them money. So so uh it hasn't worked for us though.
So that's a that's somewhat helpful. Uh obviously the the harder thing was to get like the the the clients, you know, because I I am not from the business, so it was hard to like, you know, get like our first press was Ray Isle, and that was like um, you know, like two years after, because I didn't have any press contacts, you know, and restaurants it took a while, you know. But once it started going, it started going. But like, so how many, like uh how many different factories is how helpful is it to have different factories so that you can play one against the other? Like, probably pretty helpful, right?
Or is it just because you need more production? We don't play factories against each other. It's just no, no, seriously, we don't. Um, I'm just like, that's not what I want to do. I just want to have I want to be happy and I don't want to make people mad and I don't want people mad at me, you know.
But uh we we do have many factories because things happen. Right, right. Yeah. So if one factory uh, you know, and this is like hand blown wine glasses, like things happen, like like the the furnace shuts down or whatever. So so you so you need some uh options.
And do you find that most of the different factories can produce to the same spec? We only use the top factories that can do this. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
So like how many are there? Like in in the We use all of them. But like I don't even know how big it would it'd be a handful. Really, yeah, we use all of them. Yeah.
All right. Yeah, I mean, like uh the problem for us is is that you know, we have only one factory, and because we only have one factory, they can pretty much put us over a barrel and tell us to do whatever we you know they want us to do. And it's hard to move back and forth because there's a lot of development and all this other stuff. Um I'm assuming that in your world it's like in my world and that you own the molds, they don't, right? Or is it or do they own the molds?
Uh they own the molds. Oh yeah. So it's slightly different from like the so like in the in the products world where we are you pay for all of the molds for like the injection molding stuff, and we own them. So technically, if I wanted to, I could be like, hand me those molds, I'm going to another factory. You know what I mean?
But like Well, yeah, I mean it's easy to to get another factory to make the same molds. It's it's it's not an issue. Yeah. So you want to go through the procedure how one of these suckers is made or no? People might not know.
Sure. You ever you ever go you ever have you ever learned a blow glass yourself? You ever no, no, no? It looks way too complicated. You never want you never wanted to like just go to Urban Glass and try it out.
Maybe it's kind of fun. Yeah. They you know you can go and you can just pay them and like they don't expect that you're gonna ever be good at it, but they teach teach you how to do it. Wow. And it's fun.
I I feel like what they do there must be quite a bit different than I mean, maybe it's similar, but uh I mean I like like I just can't imagine being able to blow my own glass. Like that just seems so hard. Well, they're not they're not making what you do. I mean they I think mo most of the stuff there is uh like glass artisans, they do they do a lot of lamp work and and stuff like that. Um they have probably some people, you know, doing that.
We you know, they teach you to blow like little vases and stuff like this. You know what I mean? So but you should definitely do it for fun because it's right here in the city. Okay. Urban glass and there's another one, not just urban glass, there's a second one.
I don't I don't know, but it's just I don't know, it might be fun, maybe not. Maybe because it's your business, you wouldn't think it's fun. Maybe it's like if someone says, Hey, do you want to go do this cooking thing? I'm like, No. Right.
You know what I mean? Like, I don't know. I don't know. So you want so what's the procedure? How does it how does it work?
Yes, uh so you can also go on our website and it's all shown there. But yeah, so there's a mold and then someone blows the glass and it covers uh the mold, and there's there's some chemistry about the mold and like how that contacts the glass and stuff like that. And then um and then there's a piece at the end of the glass that you stretch to become the stem, and then you attach a piece for the base, and then that base is rolled into like a um like a pancake kind of thing. And then uh and then it's slowly cooled so that it uh um gets more durable and then and then it's cut, the rim is cut and then it's polished, and then yeah, and then it's done. So how many how many people, in other words, like how like from a factory standpoint is it am I making an entire glass or am I blowing the bowl and handing it to to the STEM person?
Uh you're you're doing one part of it. You're doing one part of it. Okay, so how long is it take to make each glass? Each glass probably takes 30 seconds. What?
Yeah, what? But there's like you said, there's 10 people doing it. So you're blowing, given this guy. So my operation takes 30 seconds. But no, no, no, no, no, no.
Like the whole thing probably takes 30 seconds, but everyone's really fast because like they're just doing that one thing. So how long do they need to train? How long do they need to train to do this? It's a long time. Yeah.
And and you have your job, right? Because you're like, Yeah, I'm the STEM person or whatever. So if one person is sick, then you know, then you make a different glass. Yeah, it'd be because like you look person's like, I'm the bowl person, I'm doing I ain't doing the stems. Like that, like that kind of situation.
Yeah, like our our stuff is the most complicated and highest end that a factory will do. So like everything has the stars have to align to make our glass. But if one person is sick, they can make one of the other glasses. Huh. And so, and how does it so are you then s putting sending your packages to the factory?
Because your packages are also their own engineered megilla. So then they're doing it and then it like goes out direct uh or to to a warehouse or whatever, but they pack it into your stuff there. You're not taking delivery of the phone. Yeah, exactly, exactly. It goes right into the packaging and then it's shipped on boats and stuff.
What percentage of glasses do they do they mess up? Do you know, like when they're making it? Like what kind of like Oh, it's high. Yeah, I bet. Because there's there's uh like you know like the the every Hamblin glass is different.
So there's a certain amount of difference that we allow and if it goes above that then it's then it's it yeah. Do they take it home? Do you think all of these folks have like really nice glasses at home? I I don't think they drink very much wine where we make the glasses. No, they don't mean like seltzer is really good out of these things.
Yeah. Right. I'm telling you like uh I served it to my wife the other day I'm like here how much better does that seltzer taste? And she was like if you want we can make a seltzer glass together. Really?
I would love that. Dave Arnold seltzer glass you know like one of the tri one of the tricks I like is uh and I forget where I learned this from who was it dead rabbit somebody maybe I don't remember um two different glasses right so there's a you have a still water glass and a sparkling water glass not because they technically need to be different but for the servers. For the servers. So they know what you have right and usually you want people to drink the seltzer in smaller pieces faster so it doesn't go flat. So the tall glass is the still glass and the short glass is the seltzer glass.
And also most people can't drink as much seltzer as I can. That's true. You know what I mean? Like I can drink a lot of seltzer very quickly it does not bother me bubbles don't bother it actually it disturbs Nastasia watching me drink seltzer seltzer but not as much as when I was sp spewing you with uh bird guts at Hicks right that was the worst was that the worst meal you've ever had with me or when you were eating the meal at Jiro like with an unhinged jaw, like Oh, were they telling you to be like quieter or no no, no? I was just uh I was eating too fast and the our our other guest had to run out because uh his uh butt was set on spray because he was sick.
Anyway, uh but not because of Jiro. Ward Shortle uh writes in I work in wine over the years, have downgraded and quotes the glasses I offer for wine parties I host. One friend is notorious for breaking a glass at everyone's home, flailing he has flailing arm syndrome, or they have flailing arm syndrome. I've recently started using higher quality plastic stem glasses and no one seems to mind. Is there a wine glass etiquette for a certain caliber of wine?
By the way, do you there is no solution for like hot tub places and pools? Uh does Grand Crew Burgundy Riesling champagne have to be poured in a glass van, Zalto, uh Gabriel glass, specially glassware, etc. Can I get away with some cheap o schmeapo plastic stems? I know what you're gonna say, but you will you can respond. Also, hello from a well uh fellow wine berserker, which is a it's been great to see your business grow.
So they they they they appreciate, but they wanna, you know, they don't like these things getting broken by their chode friends. So I mean, yes, I'm biased, but you can drink anything out of a glass van. You don't need to get any other brand. But like uh but what are your thoughts? Like when someone hands like could someone make theoretically a plastic glass that is decent to drink out of?
Uh I I'd love to see it. We we'll offer it if it's pleasant, but I I just don't I don't think it's likely. Yeah. Now the problem with breaking glasses is is not only that it is broken and you have lost the money, but that it also puts glass everywhere. I wonder if anyone has made like a situation where you could put like a light coating on the outside of the glass so that when it breaks, it's not putting glass everywhere.
I mean, like my main fear of broken glass is broken glass. Right. Not the Especially in a restaurant setting, that seems like pretty annoying. Uh yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, it sucks.
Sucks. Typically when our glasses break, it's the stem, so it's not going everywhere. Right. Yeah. But you know, like for for any sort of person who's had to work that kind of service before, the sound of broken glass, like even when you're at a party, it's like it's you know you know what I'm saying?
Yes. Oh my gosh. Yeah, but like our glasses also have like the it's not like the like the really high pitch, it's it's kind of a lower pitch. And so it's just the way that our glasses are. Oh, do you do that thing where you take your glasses and go ding?
Yeah, it's more of like a bong kind of a how much do you hate a seam in a glass when you see a seam in a glass? Oh my gosh. Yes. That's how you tell when it's a real. Oh, yeah.
Oh man. The seams. Yeah. JPM uh writes in by the way, in 50 seconds the music will start playing, but don't worry, we have two minutes. Okay.
Uh when Cato reopened in the row, which is I guess is that what they call that area of LA, Stas? The row? Yeah. I think so. Yeah.
Why? I don't know. I mean, it's not row-shaped. It's like a bunch of warehouses. You can barely figure out how to get in there because you have to penetrate in with your car, and then you know, whatever.
Remember when you rented that giant Jeep and we couldn't get in and out of it? We look like idiots getting in and out of our car. Yeah. Yeah, we look like that idiot that buys a Lamborghini but doesn't know how to use a clutch. Uh when Cato reopened in the row, we were enamored with the glassware, and Ryan spoke so highly of David, uh, you David, uh, and what he was doing with the company that we ordered a set of universals as soon as we got home.
After two to three years, we still use them weekly, and they are in great shape. Thank you. This may seem like a very one-on-one question, but what are the telltale signs of quality in glassware? Right now I am at the I think I know when I see it and feel it, but are there specific attributes that show craftsmanship and quality? Well, you mentioned one where the if there's a seam, then that's a no-go.
There's actually some pretty nice, like machine-made glasses now that don't have a seam, and they're actually just made the same way that uh hand-blown wine glasses made. It's just they've replaced the humans um on every part of the process. But yeah, no, I think uh I think really like the thing that makes the biggest difference is how light in and how thin the glass is. It is crazy. Yes.
Yeah. I mean, like surprising. Yeah. Yeah. Um here's a question for you.
So I noticed on some of the glasses you have uh the the stem, especially on the ones that are like meant to be like all purpose, whether I I think I have the universals, but like that they have a very wide base such that when you're putting them together, they don't crack the bowls together. The bases touch before the bowls do. Is that on purpose or am I just lucky? Uh we make the base bigger, but not for that reason. It's to give a better count counterweight to when the the wine is there.
It also prevents you from smacking the bowls together and means that when you shut the cabinet on it, it touches the base before it touches the bowl. Got it. Which makes me feel better. Can you can you upside down hang those things or is they too fragile? Really?
Absolutely, yeah, yeah. You make me nervous with it. That's not how these things break. They break because they someone threw them on the ground or because you were hand washing them and you snap the stem. Because you're pushing too hard when you go in?
Yeah, exactly. What about uh twisting, twist you can't twist. What about dishwashers at uh commercial dishwashers? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we have like 200 restaurants that use us.
Yeah. So you well, you're in some stupid number of uh of Michelin star restaurants, right? Some crazy percentage of the of the newer Michelin star restaurants use your wares, right? Exactly. All right.
Well, uh, I'm a fan. I like the products. We're gonna be using them at uh Contra Bar, you know, when we open up, hopefully, you know, in the next month or so. Uh the company is Glass van, glass.van, G-L 1 S, G-L-A-S dot V-I-N. Go get you some glasses, uh, David.
Thank you for coming on. David Kong from Glass Van. This is Cooking Issues.
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