Ana Aguilar and Josh Cook

00:00If your leadership team is not on the same page and you are constantly having these long meetings and you're not getting traction, this is your opportunity. Today I'm talking about the entrepreneurial operating system. EOS. Yes, it is based around the book by Gino Wickman and Traction. We use it at our restaurants. They use it at Frothy Monkey. They use it at Edley's Barbecue. They use it at Carrington Row, Germantown Cafe, Park Cafe. Lots of restaurants are using it because it helps. And let me tell you today, Justin Cook is a great facilitator. Justin helps business owners and their leadership teams implement the entrepreneurial operating system, which is a set of simple practical tools, disciplines to help you get better at three things. Vision, traction, and to be healthy. Vision is getting you and your leadership team 100% on the same page with who you are, where you're going, and how you're going to get there. Traction is helping your leaders become more disciplined and accountable to execute on the right things that will make your vision become reality. Because a lot of times you're doing a lot of stuff, but not the right stuff. Healthy is helping your leaders become a healthy, functional, cohesive leadership team.

01:10Because unfortunately, leaders don't function well as a team. If you start with the leaders, the rest of the organization will follow. And you'll get to a point to where your entire team is crystal clear on vision. Everywhere you look, people are executing the things that make your vision come true. And it's a great, healthy, fun place to work. If that resonates with you, you can email Justin right now at justin.cook at eosworldwide.com, or you can call him 615-336-7133 to see if EOS is a right fit for you. He will come down and do an initial kind of introduction and ask you a bunch of questions. It is totally free. Definitely call Justin today. Welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio, the tastiest hour of talk in Music City. Now here's your host, Brandon Styll. Hello, Music City. And welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. My name is Brandon Styll, and I am your host. We have got a fun episode today. And it is a lost episode. Okay, here's the backstory on this one. I was meeting with Ana over at Tantissimo. And we were talking about a lot of things. And she said, it was like a NARA meeting. And she goes, Hey, by the way, when's that episode coming out? And I said, What are you talking about? I put it out two months ago. And she goes, I never saw it. And I said, Oh, so we looked up on Nashville Restaurant Radio on Spotify. And lo and behold, I had recorded like eight interviews in like a two week span. And going into the new year, I never put it out. I never put this episode out. So this was recorded like mid December. Yet here we are Valentine's Day. Happy Valentine's Day. And we are talking with

03:13Josh Cook and Ana Aguilar of Tantissimo. And this was a really fun conversation. These guys are amazing. Little did we know that we're about to have this big ice storm coming up and everybody was going to be closed. And, you know, Tantissimo lost power for like a week and they lost internet for two weeks. So if you are looking to go support somebody right now, they're a great option. And for somebody who's just got such an amazing restaurant, their food's amazing, and the atmosphere is amazing and they genuinely care. So much fun. You'll learn that in this episode. Just just an absolute blast. I know you're wondering, hey, I thought Jim Myers was doing these episodes now. And yeah, Jim lost power and he's he's just been kind of getting everything back together. So we will pick those up here shortly. We've got an episode coming out next week with home grown taproom. I'm really excited about that I am doing. And I will tell you if you're looking with all this ice and everything, I think this is where I've talked about this for years. Matthew Clements over at Robin's Insurance. This is the time where you really if you're dealing with an insurance company that is pushing back on you and is really challenging and you just don't like working with them. And this has been a real pain in the butt because you have loss of inventory. You have loss of business. You have all these different things and you're trying to work the insurance company. If your insurance company sucks, you need to call Matthew Clements. I know he has been hustling out there for all these restaurants and the guy absolutely cares and he wants to make sure that you guys are taken care of. There's no issues. This is why you have a local guy who you know to call. And if you are frustrated and need to talk to Matthew Clements, his number is 863-409-9372. If you'd want to email him and just ask him if you have any questions about any of this stuff, is

05:15your insurance company doing the right thing? Do you want a second opinion? His email address is mclements, m-c-l-e-m-e-n-t-s at robins, r-o-b-i-n-s, i-n-s, robinsins.com. So big time deal right now. This is, if you were listening to me and you got Robin's insurance, you're probably in a really good place. And we have been fielding lots of calls for NARA. We've been helping a lot of restaurants. And guys, it's out of control. It is out of control. You know, when you have an idea that, hey, let me show you what I do and my method for how we do this, working with the vendors, mainly the broad line vendors, and how we're able to save people money. 100% of the time so far we've saved, and we're talking hundreds of thousands of dollars, right? Let that sink in. And this isn't like a sales thing. Like, hey, that is how much money we are saving restaurants, like, weekly. We just closed one last week and we saved, I'm not gonna say I can't, I have NDAs for all this stuff, but 1.2 million over three years that we saved this, this company. And those are just staggering, staggering, staggering numbers. And it could be there for you too. I don't know.

06:38I'm so busy. If I haven't called you, if you're wondering when I'm gonna be coming by proactively, I'm absolutely slammed working with this stuff. So if you want to learn more, please send me an email. Brandon at NaraNashville.com. Follow us on Instagram at Nara Nashville. That's N-A-R-A Nashville. And I'll be happy to come see you. We have Vince Lanni starting up full-time here in the next couple weeks. So we've got a team we're building, we're getting out there and helping restaurants succeed. So if you are somebody out there and you're struggling by any means, I don't care how big you are, how small you are, whatever it is, we typically can help. And we ask a bunch of questions. We learn about your business first and sometimes it's not vendor negotiation. Sometimes it's just sitting down and reviewing a P&L. Sometimes it's I don't even know what the metrics are for what I'm supposed to be hitting for food cost. I don't even know how to create theoreticals. Who do I call for this? It doesn't matter what it is. We're happy to sit down and just answer questions. And we do this out of for free. There's no money out of pocket to you. We're happy to come sit down and just talk. Our mission is to help local restaurants to build stronger restaurants and stronger community. So that is what we are doing right now. We have got another Nara Connect coming up on April the 7th. It is gonna be on a Tuesday from 4 to 7 and it's gonna be at Shotgun Willie's Barbecue over there in I'm gonna call that East Nashville. I think it's technically Madison. It's next to Vega, Swarma and Daddy's Dogs. Which by the way I took my wife the other night. We went to Daddy's Date Night. First time I've ever done that. That is a spectacle. That is amazing. What a fun dinner. I tell you Sean aka Big Daddy really puts on a really fun evening. So if you're listening to this today and it's Valentine's Day and you can get out there I don't think that they have tickets left but man I highly recommend it. It was

08:39just a lot of fun. The hot dog was great. The whole atmosphere was was just fun. Everything about it was just fun. So thank you Sean for doing that and I'm sorry that this episode never aired. I feel terrible about it. But Anna, Josh love you guys. Excited to put this episode out there. Thank you to all of our NARA members. We are we're crushing. We're doing great. Love you guys and enjoy this episode with Anna and Josh. You are listening to Nashville Restaurant Radio. Yeah we are super excited today to be joined in studio with Anna Aguilar and Josh Cook. They are the proprietors at Tantissimo. Welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. Welcome back to Nashville Restaurant Radio. Happy holidays guys. We're happy to have you here. I'm gonna put this out before like the end of the year because I have a lot of episodes in front of you but I want to this out there immediately. Last time we talked we had you two and Maria was here and we were so excited about the future of what Tantissimo was gonna be.

10:02You were like funding it. You were like do you know investors. We're looking for all this stuff. You were operating a business outside of Mickey's like what was it? Mickey's Tavern. What was that called? Malavida. Malavida. Yeah. I don't actually even remember talking about Tantissimo at all at the time like on the pod. We maybe did it after because we were really focused on the food truck at the time. So you did the food truck and now we're like a year and a half later. I don't remember when that was. I feel like it was a while ago. You're back. You've been open now for like seven months. Yeah. Are all your dreams coming true? Tell me about Tantissimo. How's it going? I definitely would say I feel like I am living the dream. It just has a lot of side effects. I wake up a lot from the dream is what you're saying. Like I'm having I'm living the dream but I keep waking up. Yeah. And then I go back to dreaming. Like I'm living it but I'm not feeling it a whole lot all the time. So I have to try to be better at that.

11:07And I'm about to take up journaling because I think that's maybe the only thing that's gonna help. Hmm. Pay attention to the stuff that's like and also thinking back on the journey helps a little bit like because we really do have a restaurant now and it's like kind of wild to to have that. Josh what are you doing? How's your life over there? It's good. We are living the dream. I even dream about working. Entrepreneurship. I have all those stress dreams where it's like I'm asleep. And like I even know I like these aren't have these things aren't happening but it just keeps like these dreams keep happening. We're like oh you got to take the chicken out of the oven or it's burning. I can never get it out of the oven and then I wake up and like it's not real. And it's like the waiter dream we forget to take the ranch to the table and you wake up into it like I never took that lady the ranch that she asked me for and you realize it later but these are like just fabricated. Totally fabricated. Yeah. Wow. So tell us about Tentissimo. What is Tentissimo? I have eaten there. Yeah. It is amazing. Thank you. Latin would it be it would it be appropriate to say that it's a Latin food? It is yeah. It started as like mostly Mexican pastries because my family is from Mexico and then as I realized that I wanted to do something long-term with it and I got requests for like Alfajores which are from Peru slash Argentina don't fight and different pastries that were being requested by like you know a Colombian customer or Puerto Rican customer then I realized there was a need and I wanted to do something more so it became a Latin American concept and now we're farm to table food and beverage celebrating Latin America in Sullivan Park. Farm to table celebrating farm to table food and beverage not just like pastries you're full on savory like lunch and dinner right? Yeah super long gradual

13:10incremental journey from just cakes once a week to everything because we got to test out the cocktail side when we had our long-term residency at Henry James and that's kind of what fleshed out the restaurant concept and now we're living it. Nice how's the how's the general public responding to it are people walking in because I think one of the complaints that people had in Nashville was it was just way too much southern food and fried chicken and just like there's not a lot of world flair that you can go eat really good authentic Latin cuisine I mean there's Las Palmas if you want to go have Mexican but like Alabrije was a great innovator and so was Maiz de la Vida and bringing in like we want to bring authentic Mexican style food and you're saying authentic Latin cuisine is that is the community getting what you're doing? Yeah that's definitely my favorite part we've had people kind of specifically make a point of pulling us aside to say like just how much they value the concept specifically in Sullivan Park but just in general we do get a lot of positive feedback about the food all the time but when someone uses like special words like this place is magical or this is like such a jewel for this concept if there's nothing like this I've never been anywhere like this or like one time this guy had just been to Nicaragua and he was on a business trip so his wife didn't go with him but he brought her into dinner and he was able to share like oh like have this this rum that I was drinking in Nicaragua and I was like oh we actually have a Nicaraguan beer it's Tonya and he was like I went to the distillery or the brewery and so he got to like kind of bring that experience home to share that with his wife I was like we literally made this possible he could not have done this anywhere else on the planet that is living the dream yeah it's those moments that you have where you're like we're making a difference we're we're able to make somebody feel comfortable who's not necessarily from here with their style of food yeah that's what it makes it

15:14Josh what about you man? Yeah I think that people are loving the food definitely have a lot of people come up to the pass and like tell us like you know I always feel like the compliment from like a person that's from like a big city it's like has more weight like oh I'm from Chicago like the flavors you're working with they're really good you know I'm really glad this restaurant's here and what you're doing here is special so you know just having people and like having that open kitchen and having the ability to talk to those people has been great for those who don't remember you guys met at husk right yeah you two met and you two are a couple yeah also Josh and Anna are a couple and you guys met at husk you were the chef de cuisine what were you there the chef the sous chef but I guess you could call it it should have been called CDC I guess yeah he was he was the back house and I was front of house the whole time I was there that's all gotten very muddied over the years but I was not back house till I try my best to bring some Latin flavors to husk when I was there yeah and where does that come from from you because where do you learn how to cook that style of food or build that palette it's funny it started by eating at Mexican restaurants which for the most part Mexican restaurants kind of cater to the American palette so they're not as authentic as people think but those flavors are still there like the flavors of the chiles and the way they cook their food and just like all that so like I always had a love for it so the more authentic like the more authentic recipes I started running into like with honest family and friends I was a while this is like a cuisine that I really so ever since then I've just been doing research and then kind of learning like how technique based like Mexican food and Latin food is and learning like all

17:18the small things that kind of small tweaks and the small things that kind of make you that flavor more authentic you know interesting yeah just kind of like it's weird it's kind of like saying I fell in love with Mexican food through eating Taco Bell you know it's like it's true I don't yeah I'm kind of with you that's where I was kind of introduced to it it was like Taco Bell and then you go oh I'd like I started at mild sauce and then you get to hot and then you get to fire then you're like what's next the nuances are there so like you get like that little taste of like what it could be and then you start diving into and you're like wow this cuisine is amazing what's the favorite thing you're cooking over there right now what's the thing you're most proud of as somebody who's learned to cook Latin cuisine that you're cooking you're like I fucking nailed this I think we've gotten tamales down like yeah as far as like do you have some favorite dishes on like doing the fine dining stuff but like as far as like mastering tamales and then I think I get tamales tamales as you correct him all the time when he says things wrong my southern side comes out sometimes you know feel free to correct me by the way because I need to know this stuff okay I'm ignorant so please let me know yes it tamales and then such a good accent when he does say it in Spanish I'm like your accent is too good for you not to do a run for tortillas oh we're grinding we're grinding in house to be fair I've also got a lot of advice from Julio that's a bold statement right there I know he'll get a laugh from that if he listens and he will yeah because he's uh he's amazing yes do you guys know like Edgar Victoria also do you guys hang out do you guys share anything do you is there like a behind-the-scenes competition you guys have for the master of the tortilla

19:21I'm sure there's like an unspoken thing I'm sure hopefully each person thinks they do it better like by a mile because that's what you should think about your own product but we're right do you want to be in that same when people talk about maize de la vida or they talk about a la brie hey do you want to be in that conversation or do you want to be something that's on your own I think we are on our own that's part of why I intentionally shifted the concept to Latin American and not just Mexican food I think for a minute because we were all three at the farmers market we were like all lumped together and people would confuse like Alebrije and Tantisimo quite a bit or they would think like I was affiliated with Alebrije or they would be like oh I had your your tacos but it like wasn't us and I would just like take the feedback whatever it was um but I think it was nice in some ways at that time Josh wasn't in the business yet so I founded it by myself and being in the conversation with Julio and Edgar was like flattering because I was the only like female kind of holding my own like cuz you're a badass yeah I was trying Josh was back there like giving me like the coach you know um and that was cool but I think now we're pretty separate Josh and I like share a whole different concept and there's a there is some overlap but the concepts are not that similar bar or food we were with them doing pop-ups I feel like we all just like went to middle school together or something like Julio's one of my pop-ups that me and Ana had put together I guess our pop-up was at Chopper Tiki and that was like before the truck was there and Julio it was like a collaboration with Julio that I think that's what got the ball rolling for having the food truck there he was ready to rock though he was like opportunity meets preparation you know by the time we were like oh can we do like pop-ups here they were like we got Julio full-time we were like and then I it worked out for me too because that's where I sold my cakes at

21:26the beginning he was like hey do you want to make my pastries I was like for real I could do this every week yeah and see this it's not a competition I'd say you throw the gauntlet down by saying you'll take the Pepsi challenge with his tortillas yeah I do okay on that one yeah tortillas is it is there over in there tortillas okay it's there it's just fast okay yeah but like I think that people may hear this go you guys are in competition it's like no no no no we're all friends you would love to see them successful they would love to see you successful this is a you're bringing something that's really authentic to the city and you're sharing you're bringing culture that the city doesn't necessarily know about if they think that Las Palmas is that's what I think Mexican food is like no no no come try this or I think this is what food from Peru may be like or anywhere else so you've mastered the tamales yeah what else what is what's the number one seller on the menu right now that isn't tamales my grandma's enchilada sells a lot yeah I'm really proud of that your grandma's enchiladas yeah tell me about that dish that dish is the first savory dish that Tantísimo ever did because again when I started I was only pastries so I wasn't doing savory food and I was very intimidated by it so when I had my first Tantísimo pop-up I was like what am I gonna cook I can make my grandma's enchiladas it's like the only recipe I learned from her that I'm I was sure everyone would love and also I'm really passionate about it because I've never seen any restaurant do enchiladas this way which is why I never order them in general most places because they're inferior but the way to do it is you fry the salsa so there's a really special texture there and then you also fry the tortilla to order before you roll it so it's like a very time sensitive technique driven thing and it's the reason that we do it as a small plate with just one enchilada because it's completely like not feasible to do

23:27like platters this way but I did it and and we serve it now we've served it at Henry James we've done it every chance we've gotten whenever we've had a real kitchen it is special and it's like very technique driven in the sense that like the tortilla the tortilla whoa dude you can't just say tortilla it's okay I'm not the police the tortilla needs to be fried almost to where it's like too hard to roll and then when it's dipped in the salsa it gets soggy but it still has like crispy edges so sometimes as we're training they'll just like pull that out of the fryer a little too early as they know it needs to go like five more seconds yeah or it'll rip my grandma's enchiladas were flour tortillas green bell peppers and chicken and alfredo sauce beautiful sounds delicious I love a good it's I would have happily eaten a plate yeah I eat just like cheese enchiladas I'm like so boring like there's something so comforting just about a good cheese enchilada with really good cheese and a really good sauce with like rice and beans sometimes that's just a easy go-to if you go somewhere like I just want to do the cheese enchiladas and I want like the pole and I want the whole thing let's talk about where you are because I think when you say Sylvan Park people think like on the corner their park cafe Ed Lee's all that stuff right on the corner you guys are just a little bit down the street like you're on the main on Murphy Road right is it Murphy Road 46 46 46 turn it I think it does yeah I mean it's all one there's like the roundabout like if you're coming from West End you come down you see you get the roundabout you just keep going straight right past like the golf course and everything and then you're just right there on the right-hand side there's a star bagel still there at the roundabout yeah the roundabout has like most of the Sylvan Park business that's where people think when you think Sylvan Park in my brain I go to there but like Miele is technically in Sylvan

25:29Park you know so it goes Charlotte side yeah we're about a mile maybe from the roundabout right right next to Richland Park like you can park at Richland Park and it's close enough to where if I hop on my skateboard I could be down by Park Cafe in like five minutes two minutes okay so I just want people to know if you're driving through Sylvan Park like where is this place like it's on that long straightaway past the roundabout on your way to Charlotte it's right there on the right-hand side yeah and I love that because I when we were looking for a place I really really wanted a standalone location like that was huge for me because maybe because we worked at husk and it really felt like such a home like walking because you know you work so many hours and you build a life there over the course of years like you want it to feel like home so I really think this place not only is it a hundred years old and it has a lot of history but having the standalone gives me that feeling but it does share a lot with what's a historic home that's gonna be a bed and breakfast so like I guess we won't be totally standing alone once they open but it's like gonna be really nice that'd be really cool and this is a full service restaurant and you come down you have a server you order off a menu there's a bar you can sit at the bar yeah and then you have a little private dining room also and is there patio there's a patio right we have a patio and a porch a patio and a porch right the hotel opens we'll have a courtyard I was like what do you call it the courtyard area in between the two buildings so it'd be kind of like the vibe of urban cowboy okay but not like as urban Cowboys gets crazy on the weekends it'll have like that vibe of like the little well you guys could get crazy on the weekends too right yeah some of our staff is like they believe in us so much which is really awesome to see but they're like man we're gonna be like a madhouse next summer and I'm like I do believe that I just want to know

27:31what it's gonna be like in January 1st well I mean you know it's a that's a thing that's one of the reasons why I wanted to have you guys on here because I just loved it so much and I just want to get the word out Pentesimo is here it is on 46th aka Murphy Road right there I want people to know where it is I want them to know what it is and that it is a gem and you've got to go try it like go check it out if you've been like sleeping on it like I need to go I gotta go try this place like go try it now like go don't wait you know these restaurants like yours do great in the summertime yeah you think Latin you think beaches and all that's a great summertime place to go but like you guys need support year-round like you know December January February those are big times that for supporting local restaurants and you guys are the owners I mean you know from doing a food truck this is like that American dream of coming in starting a business building it doing something authentic for the community and this is where the community really needs to come together and support you during those a case like the somewhat slower times where it's not traditional seasonal business very excited to be partnering with C&B linen if you know me it's my number one topic of conversation is linen companies and how shady linen companies can be I am just disgusted with how the business practices work in this industry which is why I was so excited when I found C&B linen they're out of Waynesboro Tennessee and they don't charge any fees so the linen price that you have whatever that first linen price is that's your price and so you may say well every year they must raise the price on this seven-year contract right no because they don't do any contracts there's no gas fees there's no clean green service fees there's no replacement there's nothing the only price you pay is the price that you pay for the actual

29:33product I know it's too good to be true no contracts they do formats they'll make custom formats for you they do fresh linens cleaning supplies and guys I just did a tour of their facility and it is immaculate it is state-of-the-art I'm gonna post pictures on my Instagram you can go find them and you can see how absolutely gorgeous this is to the point that they even wash and sanitize every one of their used laundry carts it's just absolutely amazing if you're looking for a linen company you can trust who wants to earn your business every single week go back and listen to our episode with Jason Cruz the owner of C&B linen hear it from his straight from his mouth exactly what they do or you give them a call at nine three one seven two two seventy six sixteen or you can DM me at Brandon still on Instagram for my exclusive pricing through the Nashville area restaurant Alliance super source develops and distributes high quality cleaning products and supplies as well as delivers wear wash housekeeping laundry programs and food service training they partner with restaurants golf and country clubs hotels and resorts schools universities and health care institutions save time and money and reduce inventory by utilizing their high quality products and engaging with their highly trained service specialists if you're looking for wholesale cleaning products like dish machines in Nashville Tennessee they have you covered listen guys this is way more than a dish machine and chemical company they do not make you sign a contract they earn your business every single week and let me tell you I will personally vouch for Jason Ellis and his entire team over at super source if you want a dish machine and chemical company like this give him a call seven seven zero three three seven eleven forty three and if you are a member of the Nashville area restaurant Alliance make sure you tell them that you get the special NARA pricing running a restaurant is tough staff turnover rising cost and the endless tasks that bog you down and take you away from what

31:36you love let Adams Keegan lighten that load they're privately held Tennessee based restaurant and hospitality focused outsourced HR payroll and benefits firm the team at Adams Keegan removes the administrative burdens of HR administration payroll benefits management garnishments unemployment claims compliance 401k and so much more from their proprietary HR IS platform to seamless payroll and competitive benefits that keep your team smiling they've got you covered Adams Keegan lets you focus on what you do best creating unforgettable dining experiences while they handle the rest essentially think of Adams Keegan as your back office HR department right here in Music City one of the many things I love about Adams Keegan is that unlike big publicly traded companies out there they have an incredibly high standard of customer service and that that's what we all need is really good customer service in these areas they don't give you a 1-800 number and make you fill out an IT ticket submission they surround every client with a team of experts all based right here in Tennessee you can call them today at 615-627-0821 or visit adamskeegan.com that's A-D-A-M-S-K-E-E-G-A-N.com for your free HR consultation and see how they can create a customized solution to help your restaurant thrive and like with the cold weather like we definitely stand out as a restaurant with like having a really good coffee program really tell me about your coffee program I don't would know more because I'm more of a he's like I consume a lot of it just pour some espresso and some tonic and just get jittery but we use pit stop coffee it's a super good coffee doing espresso pours at night all day long we have the best decaf I've ever had and Connor roasts it he owns pit stop coffee there they were our neighbors at the farmers market they still are I guess so that was like I'm really proud to partner with farmers

33:40market neighbors like we do tamales at the market every Saturday and to my right is pit stop we do a little trade I give them breakfast they give me espresso and we get to talk about how coffee is going at the restaurant that week we went to their wedding they came to our Thanksgiving like we love those guys and they are so passionate about coffee like I never need to learn I wanted to learn about coffee and now I'm like actually I'm good I'm never gonna get to where you are and I'm just gonna focus on my my thing and thank you so much for what you do and I don't want to hear anymore about it sometimes when Connor's talking about coffee I'm just like nodding my head this guy's a damn scientist yeah I love it so much I remember like when we talked about having him on I was like the way he like his story posts like it's how we want to chef like he is so like committed it's amazing and then to our left we have farms and sorry I'm following pit stop coffee right now I want I like want to learn more about them because I'm like I love passionate people yeah I want to have a guy like that on the show I need to have a guy that really gets into coffee it's so cool his coffee knowledge and understanding is I mean I don't know if I've met any and they really really love it for for the coffee like when we were at Henry James we had them pop up with us for a few brunches that we tried they were like total ghost town I think it was like the best brunch in town and like no one came and they had like the best time serving just like trying pour-overs even just for like us and TJ who was our line cook for the day and they like had a really good day and we're such good sports about it and I'm like this is because they love it like we love it yeah really good people I already followed him on my personal account yeah now the podcast does and then hidden hollar farms is also farmers market vendor that we use they do all of our eggs we've been out to their farm it's beautiful they've got like oh yeah the best pets they have you know that he like grows some of the is it called grow when it's an animal you raise he raises some of the like best lambs in the

35:45country oh chicken they have names I don't think that'd be the hardest job in the world I farmers that have to harvest the lambs at some day like that stuff just like is really hard for me like you don't you don't name that so if you name him you can't you can't name he's got two cows if anybody out there has living there they have names I forgot their name oh yeah I forgot their names too I actually forgot about the cows I remember the donkeys they were just there for protection of the lambs nice oh there are donkeys there are donkeys not cows that's what it was donkeys protect the lambs cuz donkeys are bigger and they'll kick them donkeys apparently mean as hell to like coyotes and stuff they'll stomp them out oh yeah it's very common to pair donkeys with like smaller like smaller animals I can't protect themselves because they're just like they'll fight but they're so sweet they're like big dogs yeah they're sweet to humans yeah I'm sure if I had just randomly approached it would have been different but I had the introduction you're about to say if anybody out there oh it has like because you guys were talking about I guess slaughtering I was thinking of like butchering because I've been trying to get like oh well not that but great I've been trying to get a farmer did to teach me like to break down a whole animal so that is something Josh and I are interested in slash would put in hours for an exchange yeah well there's a lot of people that can break down animals yeah but didn't have to be a farmer I mean there's lots of butchers butchers and and and you know Nashville State has a whole thing I'm sure if you wanted to come in there's some trade time to talk about you could come speak to a class about entrepreneurship and what it takes to open a restaurant maybe they maybe you can hang out while they're defabricating a chicken and you can learn about a lot of stuff because

37:45that's a that's a thing that they do yeah we can do chicken I'm a chicken you want to start buying whole animals and using the whole animal is that what you're doing we haven't yet and it's more like it's more a curiosity I don't know yeah I just like when when I did my very first pop-up and got my first delivery of Bear Creek farm I like was so not a chef that I was like I didn't know I was gonna have to break this down and I remember like like I was alone so I called Josh and was like okay well how do I get to the beer yet part now because like I have to break this chuck roll down that's like still rolled I guess or whatever the fuck and he was like follow the whatever I haven't done a lot of butchery since then but I well by the time I got in there I loved it and it felt so much like it feels to work with dough like interesting not like physically but like the sensation and just like how peaceful and like how you can have for the product so I've craved that ever since and I wish I had more time to dedicate to butchery but maybe on my own as a hobby like what like I'm saying we're just curious to learn more about it always looking for ways to connect more to the product so I think that's a good transition we've talked about all the amazing things what's entrepreneurial life been like for you guys now that you have this business is it all sunshine and rainbows you haven't what are your challenge what are the things if somebody's deciding to open a restaurant right now what challenges are you having that maybe somebody else could identify with or we could work through a best practice or something I think besides like the financial hurdles one of the things that I felt was difficult that does get better and it's way better now is like finding the right team it's like trying to find that balance of having the right people and having the right skill sets and like as a small

39:50business can't really afford wasted labor in the beginning so like even if like someone matches the culture they're a great person but they're just like a huge under performer in the kitchen it's like man I wish that we had the time and money to just have you and bring you up to where you can be which I know you can be but in the beginning it's just like I don't I don't have it I don't have the like extra labor hours to like waste on someone not waste but like build somebody to build somebody up and that's like that's what's really sad for me because I really am passionate about making people better line cooks and better chefs so well it's like the most expensive thing you own and when I say I mean you own physically but like this is you're bringing in money and then you're you have to recreate this all the time and you're spending so much of the money you bring in on labor so I mean it just magnifies every day what type of production you can't say you've got good bones I can make you into something good because I can't invest $20,000 and doing that over the next six months because I don't have an extra 20 grants around but if I'm John George I could take on somebody and I can say hey I see you have the pedigree we're gonna get you there because you have that type of capital but you've got to build to get that capital I mean that's one of those chicken or the egg things yeah you know and it's like just sad because you're like you get to see why the stages were so valuable yeah why it was so mutually beneficial yeah yeah like how like I did unpaid stage it has probably for six months and I think if I didn't do those I don't think I would have been able to get a job there because I didn't have a skill set yet and like once I was there you know around all these people who are like you know have those skill sets and by the time after six months I like had

41:54enough to at least start as prep yeah start as prep and then moves up from there what's the most important skill somebody can have in the kitchen I'm walking in today and I'm applying for a job with you because I love working in kitchens and this what what is the thing you're looking for right now not that you're looking for anybody I don't know what your deal is you said you've got a great team but like what is the thing you would be hiring for I guess hmm that's tough because knife skills are very important for cooking on this level it's like the cuts have to be right and have to be done fast and that's one thing you would run into like something that would take me or my sue like five minutes do would take someone like hour and a half it's like wow this is not like double or triple this is yeah two or three hundred percent slower like some of our pre-screening questions were like do you have your own knives just to know if they have a sense of doing knife work but I don't think like looking for the speed is the number one thing we do look a lot for sense of urgency and following direction cleanliness yeah being coachable yeah just like listening to what was asked and and doing that I'm having like the like just natural ability to like clean up after yourself well and like being aware of like the breadcrumbs you're leaving behind as you work through the kitchen we struggle with that house cows super messy but our most recent hire we were really glad to hear like or just said to to have like a career cook like someone who wants to cook for a living and isn't like kind of just doing it for now that is important if we're gonna invest in someone and the culture fit is really important it's a

43:54hard balance but we honestly like I could not be prouder of our culture and the team in general like I've never ever worked at a place where there was so little like there's there's no problems or drama everybody comes to work and really tries to help each other it's amazing yeah I've learned to like a husk was intense is lots of yelling lots of blowups and I learned like yeah you messed up like a case of chicken we'll find a use for it we'll just try better I am a little upset but what I'm gonna do you know yelling at people and dehumanizing them never gets you the benefit not controlling your emotions in that moment only causes problems in the future and I think there's a that culture of the way that chefs are the Gordon Ramsay what are you some kind of an idiot like that's not okay that's for TV I mean that's not something that people actually do I mean I'm sure you've experienced that I do Gordon Ramsey worked under Marco Piero white so I'm sure he got like physically abused but that's all that that's not today's chefs is it is that other people still doing that there's people who do it and there's I know chefs that are like like riding that fence of like recovering they're like they have really high standards and they'll take you in the walk-in and talk to you sternly and not but not scream at you blow it blow up at you or though a plate at you anything like that but just it is important that they really understand like the the value of the food not even like the cost but the value like I would not want to keep somebody around who didn't care about waste we are very passionate about sustainability and we try to get better at that all the time yeah some of recipes that come from stuff like that just like let's save the pulp from this

45:55puree mm-hmm and see what it turns into that's one thing my mom has like a lot of opinions about how we should run our business but that is one of the things can imagine it's really easy for me to to actually check a box with her when she asks about waste I'm like actually you'll be glad to know like we don't have a lot of waste at all cuz she would watch like Giada on the Food Network and be like I love this woman but like did you see she threw away that part of the lemon like that's so wasteful and I'm like now I'm like well hopefully she was composting but I didn't know about compost at the time cuz we didn't own land yeah and now I'm like this is great you'll love this mom we had a salsa I call it salsa seca which is like dry salsa and it's a byproduct of making chili oil it's like as like garlic ginger all the like the stuff and chili oil and like I just kept all the solids and put in a dehydrator for like two days and added some like MSG salt and citric acid and it's like delicious it's like so good on fruit it's just a byproduct is that the funnest thing when that happens yeah and you play with something and you're like oh hey look this is a byproduct thing and it's delicious it's almost better than the chili oil yeah I love it so yeah there's challenges it's not all sunshine and roses marketing getting people to come in I know is always a hard thing when you're in the building working every day to make every guest a repeat guest and you're trying to try new recipes and you're you're just all it's like how do you let everybody know and do all of the things do you have any what are you guys doing for marketing are you doing anything special or cool or lots of ideas it's hard to implement scrambling scrambling yeah I you're coming to do podcast yeah I think that it'll be a lot better next year the last well when we started the business I had one event per week so I could spend the whole week like marketing it and now we have eight services per week so I don't

48:01get to do it at all I try to do little story posts here and there and my GM helps but I definitely need to get better like our staff is always like hey you should tell people that we have like Coquito and that we made the condensed milk from scratch like and I'm like yeah totally I'm gonna post that like soon or you should tell people that we have flights and I'm like oh my god yeah I gotta tell people soon and then you should tell people that we don't use seed oils I'm like oh that was like the most important thing I wanted to get across when we opened and I just haven't because it's been 90% of our menu is gluten-free right like that I'm like oh yeah I got a market to the gluten-free people like but there's so much that I could spend so long on I'm and then I'm always getting derailed so one of my biggest challenges is how to spend my time still and how to manage the other managers time so those are things to work on but I think getting on like a marketing schedule will help I just had a woman named Jessie Tigges she's a realtor but she has she goes to local restaurants and she finds communities where there's house you know she's oh you're thinking about moving to Sylvan Park I'm gonna go find all the really cool local restaurants and highlight them so if you're looking for a house in Tennessee you can go to her site and you can see all of the restaurants she's getting a massive amount of traction but one of the things she said is just post yeah you don't have to worry about if it's a carousel or if it's in she was reels post reels like every day post a reel if it's you going hey guys it's on I'm here at the restaurant we're opening the door this is come open with me or something and then to say hey did you guys know that we don't use any seat oils there are 90% gluten-free and that we have this and just post like every single day and it the thing is is it feels like it's harder to do than it actually is to grab your phone go to your stories hit it and just talk and say what you're doing and then hit go I'll tell you what it is and this is so dumb but I used to do that all the time when it was just my business and nobody worked for me so it was like just me and what I wanted to make that week it was

50:03really easy for me to talk about because it still felt like my page now it feels like this entities page and I'm like representing like the employees and I don't know if that's what they want to talk about like I have so many mental blocks around it every day I'm like oh this is what I want to talk about but now I'm like I just struggle with it more now I think is if you're not going on that page and expressing personal views I mean if you're not going on the tantissimo page and saying I hate Donald Trump and you know you need to be voting for this like that's one thing that's you using your views on a company page but if you're promoting the business and you're just informing people about what you guys are doing people want to know that people want to know that you are 90% gluten-free and that you don't use seed oils and that you're doing all hey another delivery from farmer Dave this is what we do or when the meat comes like just these little things that you do that seem normal to you every day grab your camera and just film it and put something out there every day because people will start to see it it's like branding like you're just planting seeds everywhere if you don't plant seeds nothing's going to grow yeah there's a few restaurants I'm trying to think of the name of it I don't remember name of it but um they do a lot of like chef posts and like it's really well done they just go over a recipe and there's like they have like a million followers yeah I think the issue we have is we want it to be well done we just got yeah because it's not gonna be like how up to my standards when when it's in the middle of a prep day you know and we have however many tamales to put on and but that's real though I mean you not everybody's gonna have the budget like that a Gordon Ramsay has to have a team come in and do your social media for you you're a small restaurant you guys are bootstrapping this thing getting it going and like a video of you being real what's happening at the restaurant let's people know that you're there let's people know that this is what it is and

52:04it just goes oh I gotta go try that one day it puts you in their rotation well we've been officially called out you need to do that we need to do it it's true I think our videos would look still pretty good with professional I mean like the iPhone they're fantastic and one of the things I'm doing with Nara is I'm sharing all of those yeah so if you follow at Nara Nashville and you go to our stories I'm just going through all of our members and I'm sharing all of their stuff over so you can get it's like a cold all the Nara members everything they post you can find on our stories so you can just kind of look through and see what local restaurants are doing right now shameless plug for my Instagram did you see how I just did that but that's also when you share it I'll share it and then we'll get more people sharing it and then that's how everybody knows absolutely free marketing for everybody out there listening if you didn't hear the Jesse Tigges interview and then she said post at nighttime mmm after two o'clock okay I'm like nighttime for me is like 11 2 in the morning for some reason oh see I'm like five I'm like that's just you said afternoon and I posted of it I posted part of her interview at like 8 a.m. and I posted one last night at 730 and I'm waiting to see which one gets more engagement because I wanted to test it myself nice I tested her saying that at night that morning to see which one like yeah I want to definitely do some more videos in the kitchen of how we do certain things it does also help you like slow down and appreciate what we're doing too because we I think we're missing it quite a bit you ever wanted to buy someone a drink but you're not there maybe your friend just landed a new job maybe it's anniversary maybe just want to say I'm thinking about you that is where shared spirits comes in shared spirits lets you send a real drink to someone at a real restaurant even if you're across town or across the country no gift cards no awkward Venmo no I owe you one you pick the restaurant you pick the drink they get the moment it's simple it's personal and it turns an

54:08ordinary night out into something memorable so next time you can't be there be there anyways with shared spirits if you're a restaurant you want to be on that platform so that people can buy a drink at your place it is so easy setup is so quick go to shared spirits calm today whether you're somebody who wants to buy a drink or somebody wants to give a drink or your restaurant and you want somebody to come redeem a drink shared spirits calm are you one of those people who's always on the hunt for the next restaurant location you open any sweet deals on retail space that may come your way why not be proactive and have the market experts out there working for you the retail team at Lee and Associates led by Miller Chandler and Megan Glaser is your go-to for all things commercial real estate in Middle Tennessee they're located downtown in the heart of it all in the Batman building Miller is a Tennessee native so you know he knows the neighborhoods and demographics and Megan is a California transplant who brings fresh perspective as she fully embraces the music city culture they use the best prop tech like placer AI and Esri to analyze the data while also leveraging their own industry knowledge and relationships to find and negotiate a killer deal for you if you're one of those people and you'd like to get a hold of them their office number is six one five seven five one twenty three forty or better yet you can call them directly to get your conversation started on your next restaurant location you can reach Miller Chandler at six one five four seven three twenty four fifty two or Megan Glaser at seven six zero eight four six sixty one ninety three that is the retail team at Lee and Associates give them a call today you can also visit them at the retail team comm so I've been visiting a lot of restaurants recently and one of the comments I hear a lot is well we just post online we do marketing ourselves and guys you need to speak with a

56:10professional and that is where miles hospitality marketing comes in she works exclusively with independent restaurants and small hospitality groups helping you build a smarter more strategic marketing plan without hiring a full-time team the best part owner Christine miles brings over 25 years of restaurant marketing experience to the table she's worked with everyone from beloved neighborhood spots to national chains and she knows what works in real-world restaurants so whether you need help branding digital marketing social media or just figuring out what actually is worth your time miles hospitality marketing gets it from quick wins to long-term growth they offer everything from graphic design to full fractional CMO services check them out at miles HM comm that's my LLS HM comm mention Nashville restaurant radio and receive a free hour consultation miles hospitality marketing because your marketing should work as hard as you do you know what I tell people I had a manager meeting and I said we're magicians you don't realize it because every day we're in the middle of the grind you walk in the magician himself knows he's not actually sawing the woman in half right he sees it every day he knows what she's going to do it doesn't feel like magic to him right and you may be in a little bit of this right now because this is our daily life this isn't very interesting every guest that walks through that door knows absolutely none of that and they're walking into a magic show where the magician all day long is dealing with magic he knows how the he knows how the the sausage is made so to speak your guests are the same way and I always say the easiest magic trick is like position points not auctioning off food and walking up saying sir you had the tamales and ma'am you had the enchiladas enchiladas trying to say this right it's terrible working on it how'd you know that's what I had like oh we have position points this is it's the easiest magic trick we do we've got to execute on those things

58:11but when you step out of your building and you come in as a guest like you guys should take a night off and eat there as a guest walk in and say we're coming in to eat don't do anything I just we want to feel the magic yeah and go eat at your own restaurant and then look around at people and you'll hear the people next to you talking and you're like did you see and they'll know what they're talking about and it's not because you're the owner walking by right you get to really watch the magic show happen and you go oh people love this and it's not only reinvigorating for you but also every time you share something on social media you're sharing a little bit of that behind the scenes of the magic show that's been really nice when I've when I've taken tables like if somebody's sick and I'm like well I'm serving tonight then I really get to experience it and I'll tell Josh like oh like I was overhearing like you know so-and-so section they were talking about this and I heard this word like four times tonight like that's that's going really well yeah how are your reviews are people reviewing you well online yeah very strong on that very proud of that yeah I mean in the bad reviews some of them are just irrational some of them are like yeah fucked up that day like if we served cold food or something then that's like oh we definitely got to know about that but just some of them are like were you at our restaurant that's crazy once in a while but it's mostly positive and it's mostly because of the team they do a really good job mm-hmm it's uh yeah we have a really good team I didn't think we'd ever like well I thought we would but I am very surprised how quickly we got a really good team together everybody cares that's the key yeah we were very stressed about that when we when we were like we didn't have our doors open or and we hadn't when we first started hiring it was like how are we gonna find this many people that we can like trust to take care of our baby every day you know when I was at husk the kitchen was filled with so much

01:00:12talent everybody was fast everybody had passion and I realized I don't think they knew what they had at the time because they didn't like really treat us that well and it's like when I opened a restaurant I was like I want to make sure our staff knows that we appreciate them and that we have a good team that they're talented and that we appreciate all their passion because at husk was like I like good I wish I had like I remember like thinking like I hope we get a team like we had at husk when I was like there you know as a line cook because those guys could crank out perhaps that seemed impossible they would they had a what's it called like doing the right thing even if no one's watching integrity integrity yeah yeah if they burn something they wouldn't try to like use it anyways they would just throw it away everybody just had like that's my favorite when I hear like an employee correct another employee like hey don't do that man I'm like yes yeah yeah I worked in a few restaurants for hours like that don't forget that perspective has a timeline yeah something will get there I said he goes as you move up through the ranks you forget what it was like and remembering what you felt when you were at husk and lack of attaboys or whatever it was going we have a really good team they hope they appreciate this and now that you've got that team don't forget that don't forget because as an owner you there's gonna be a point to where you're doing other things you have other stresses that they don't have that they don't recognize and you start to forget their experience I know you're in there working with them but like don't forget to say and this is really good take you know do whatever you do I just say perspective has a timeline and I think it has to be honest I think the back of house did feel unappreciated because I they were like they were just they I could just tell you know well guys we're

01:02:21almost at an hour that's how fast this goes it's crazy yeah very fast you guys get to do the Gordon food service final thought this is the final thought though whatever you guys you've done this before so you you were totally prepared for this right Josh yeah actually I have a good thought there you go I have a plug whatever you want it to be Josh we'll start with you with your thought Gordon food service final thought Josh cook my final thought is restaurant opening restaurant is extremely hard sometimes it feels like there's no way you can win but I've realized I felt that like ten times and we've always pushed through and we've always been able to make it happen it's like you're so close to every time you're just so close to finishing and getting through that like that bad part you just got to keep pushing stay positive and it'll get through and having people like Anna who always helps me because I'm a doomer so she always helps me push through if you keep pushing keep your head down don't let the bad times knock you down you'll push through I love it that was beautiful Anna yes what is your Gordon food service final thought oh um I want all the industry people to know about our industry hour that we do every night so Tuesday through Sunday are the nights that were open and from 9 to 10 our back bar is half off and we do the Latin classic cocktails half off wine and beer half off so we think that's from 9 to 10 some people are off of work and can come try the food and have a discounted awesome bev so come see us if you haven't I love it that was perfect and I want you guys to come to the NARA winter social January 13th it's a Tuesday four to seven it's at paren bakery on Sidco Drive it's in Berry Hill bunch of restaurant tours gonna be there

01:04:24we'd love to have you guys there mixing and mingling and talking so if you've loved it you're here and you want to come meet them you guys you're gonna come right I got it I have classes every Tuesday but maybe I'll take January off oh like a dry January thing just not doing it I guess you miss one class I can try I can try I'm I'm because I wanted to have the flexibility to be a working actor so that's kind of my origin story I guess and I still do acting like I still am represented but that industry is also slow and weird right now so I just stay in class so my skills can stay sharp and I'm in that community too I have to schedule our part-time CDC we have a friend TJ that's been helping us with the business kind of from Henry James I love him a lot he any time we're in a bind and he's worked all around the restaurants and like a babysitter yeah he's like one of our closest friends he was our roommate when we opened so he was like he would see it all and we'd come home and tell him about how he needed to help us grand concrete the next day and he was like yeah I'll come home that's like one of those friendships I mean what TJ we've only known for like three or four years yeah it's like one of those friendships that just really blossomed but yeah we call him a part-time CDC because he'll come in and just save the day work you know not even work a full shift for like four hours and just go have a drink at the bar yeah just watch watch the house while we're gone make sure nothing goes up in place that's amazing we're a great person to have yeah thank you guys both for making the trip out here and meeting in studio and and being so vulnerable oh my god I spilled my tea all over my computers that we've had thank you guys much for

01:06:25coming it's always a pleasure to see you and I wish you nothing but the best and you'll see me in the restaurant because I'm I'm not in my restaurants anymore so I'm out and about seeing people so I'll be so excited to want just you know how it is we just talked about it like oh we're open all these days like when you work all the time like you can't go out all the time and so now I'm actually able to get out go see people eat at restaurants go do the thing so I'm I'm pretty damn excited so you'll be seeing me more good yes I can't I got to try the tamales and the grandmother's enchiladas yeah to see everything with Nara wish you guys the best of the holiday season and a wonderful 2026 thank you me too on the the Nara blowing up thing I'd love to see it hopefully we can help a lot of people thank you it's been fun well thank you guys so much for listening to this lost episode with Josh cook and Anna Aguilar I want to send out an official formal apology to them as I go back and edit and look over this thing I'm like man we talked about so much how much they need this information to be out there for the end of December in January in February I even said I'm gonna get this out there right away which is why I thought that I already did lot was happening then in a lot of episodes and I missed it this one's on me I raised my hand on Josh I am so sorry that I did not get this out there in time but it is out there now please go support them they're amazing people they're amazing restaurateurs and their food is amazing it's just so it's such a great such a great restaurant you should go do it Happy Valentine's to everybody out there hopefully this Saturday Valentine's netted you a whole bunch of business next year Valentine's Day is also on Super Bowl Sunday thank you NFL hopefully well I'm curious to see I'm

01:08:27really curious next year if you plan on staying open that night if you're gonna be going out on Super Bowl Sunday who's gonna go out to dinner that night it's gonna be really interesting to see what creativity comes around that Super Bowl Sunday also Valentine's Day all right guys thank you for listening and as always we hope that you are being safe out there love you guys bye