Brian Baxter

00:00Hey guys, I want to start this episode out telling you about what chefs want. More specifically, I want to take you to Instagram and I want you to follow what chefs want because if you were, you'd know that they had bunches of kombuchas and fun mocktail type drinks that you can get for dry January. You can get them for that zero proof side of your menu seven days a week from what chefs want. If you're looking to spice up your Valentine's menu, they're talking about it on their Instagram page January the 5th. They're way ahead of the game and they have everything you're going to need. Also fun tips for National Milk Day and did you know that the holes in Swiss cheese are called eyes? Fun facts on their Instagram page, but you know everything they do inside your restaurant, but let them partner with you with all the cool information they share on the socials. So give them a follow. And if you need to learn more or want to learn more about what chefs want, visit them at whatchefswant.com.

01:06Welcome 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 are powered by Gordon Food Service and we are coming to you on a Sunday today. The show is coming out Sunday a little bit early because Snowmageddon is coming. Are you ready? Do you have everything that you need? Do you have all of the milk? Do you have all of the bread? Do you have the ice, the salt that melts the ice? Do you have boots, galoshes, all of the things because they are sold out. This town is ready. And I love snow. I am a big fan of the snow, but it is really messing up my week this week.

02:07So we're going to get this episode out early. Here it is a Sunday, excited to have you here. We are going to be speaking with Brian Baxter today. He is the executive chef over at the Catbird Seat. This is a super cool episode because I went to the Catbird Seat and had dinner the night before this interview. And it was my first time ever eating there so I was kind of blown away, really excited about talking to him the next day and we really just go over the menu. And as we go over the menu, we just take side turns left and right and all over the place and it was a lot of fun. I really enjoyed his candor and just talking about what's going on and his creative mind and how it works and just an amazing guy. Just so much fun. I hope you enjoy. This is a long one. It's an hour and 45 minutes. So sit back and relax and enjoy. I figured I'd get this out here before the snow hits. You could enjoy it by the fireplace. Sure. Why not? The Fantasy Football League that we did, the Nashville Restaurant Radio Fantasy Football League has come to an end.

03:12The winner is Max Goldberg. There it is. Max took out Hal Holdenbache of Loughlin Table to take the prize. And for his prize, he gets to be on the show next week. He is the guest of the podcast next week, Max Goldberg. So congratulate, if you see him this week, make sure to congratulate him on his win. There will be a trophy presentation and all kinds of fun things. And excited to get into the rest of the year. Maybe next year we'll do this again. This was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed talking some smack with all these guys and gals. So thank you guys. We did this for the Giving Kitchen. This was a whole thing we wanted to raise awareness around, the Giving Kitchen. And the Giving Kitchen is an organization that helps restaurant workers. They do it nationwide. They're based out of Atlanta. There's a Nashville location, like where they actually have people, boots on the ground, and then Charlotte they've just launched.

04:15But they help anywhere in the country. So if you know somebody who needs help and you're a restaurant worker, you'd help paying your bills, whatever it is, because you've been in an accident, you've had a diagnosis of something, you're going to rehab, whatever it might be, check them out at givingkitchen.org and maybe they can help you. Maybe you listening to this is the answer you needed to go, oh my gosh, this is what I need. I need help right now. givingkitchen.org So with that being said, I want to tell you that Fat Bottom Brewery is releasing their Daisy Hazy IPA. This is a 6.4% alcohol by volume beer. I used to love Daisy, not Daisy, but Hazy IPA. It's a New England style IPA and they are doing it just in time, just in time for dry January to end and the weather to start changing, kind of a spring beer. I feel like I'm at, I feel like I'm a Costco right now because you go to Costco and they already have like Easter stuff that's up and I'm, we're right in the middle of January and I'm already talking about beer for the spring.

05:23You got to think ahead and this is out in just like another week and a half, you'd be able to buy the Daisy Hazy IPA and I imagine from everything I hear, it's amazing. People get very excited about this release. So if you want that, you can get it through debt distributing or you can head right over to the nations to their tasting room and you'll be able to drink that. They're going to tap it and you can have a good time with it. I also want to say that if you want to pick up that hop fizz, it is delicious. Everybody in our restaurants is loving it so far and everybody at the dry January market loved it. It is as well from that zero calorie, zero sugar, zero carbs, hop fizz at get it over at debt. Okay. So here's the pro tip. If you're listening to this, go to Instagram at Nashville underscore restaurant underscore radio, find the post that has a picture of Brian Baxter, me and Brian, and then scroll to the side because all the pictures that you're going to see are the dishes that we are talking about in this interview.

06:24You can kind of follow along and you hear me talk about a pink ice looking thing. You're going to see the pictures. They're not the best pictures. I wasn't planning on doing it like this, but I think it's going to work out better this way. So go to our Instagram page and hey, while you're there, click that follow button. We'd love to have you following us and like the post that has the Brian Baxter. I'm curious to see how many people actually go and look at the pictures and listen to it simultaneously with the show. If you go find that post, hit the like comment on what you think about the interview, whatever you like. I'd love to know. This was a good one for me. I loved it. Hope you guys are staying safe out there in this snow. Stay home, stay cozy and enjoy this one with Brian Baxter. Super excited today to welcome back to the show, Brian Baxter, executive chef at the Catbird Seat. How you doing, man?

07:24Doing well. Thanks for having me. It's been two years. Seems like. I went back to listen because I was like, I wonder what we talked about two years ago and I hate listening to my old interviews. Just as the sound quality, all the little things, it's just really obnoxious. But it was the last show of two thousand twenty one. That's awesome. And here you are. This will come out in January. But this is the last week of two thousand twenty two. So literally or twenty three, two years later, here we are. Times travel. I don't know. I don't know if it feels like it was longer or if it's I, you know, this is a very quick Christmas came and it did. I think people say, you know, with kids and you have kids, you had a nine month old and a two and a half year old last time we talked. You probably have a almost three year old and a four and a half year old now. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, just the days are super long, but the years go by so fast.

08:25It's like, God, it was a long week. But then you look back and you're like, I was nothing. Yeah. And the days off are also very fast. But they think they're very fast. How many days a week do you get off? We're off Sunday, Monday and then Tuesday is a prep day for us. So I usually it's usually a much shorter day for me, depending on the week than it is for the guys. That way I can be there to pick up the kids on Tuesdays as well and have like family time those nights. My wife's a teacher, so she's only home on Sundays. Are you still in Spring Hill? Yeah. Nice. Well, thanks for making the trip up here to do this today. I had dinner last night at the Capard seat. So this is kind of surreal for me. And this is kind of a fun moment for me. I feel like I got to go see one of my favorite bands last night and then I get to interview the band the next day. Does that make sense? Yeah, I guess so. I wouldn't say I'm a favorite band, but what I mean, I'm a food.

09:27I love I love awe and wonder and I love stepping outside of my comfort zone and my comfort zone is pizza with my kids. I know I'm going to like that. And yesterday I was driving home and I went, we get to go have dinner at the catbird seat tonight and I've never eaten at the catbird seat tonight. Like I've never done this since it's open. I've lived here 30. Actually, but every time that I've wanted to go, I haven't been able to get a reservation, but we got this reservation and I was giddy, was giddy because I had no idea what to expect. I knew that I was going to be challenged culinary. I knew that when I came, like I was going to step outside my comfort zone and try foods. I didn't know what they were. And I was so pleasantly like everything was perfect, like you guys crushed it. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Every day you do this.

10:27There is eight as the woman, every course that we got, we got new silverware with every course and they never looked the same. Like every course has a different silver that paired exactly with what that I didn't get spoons if I didn't need a spoon. And there was a moment where I had you just use your hands and you set these little tablets in front of us and you poured water on them and then they expanded into napkins. And I was like, what, what is going on here? Do you think who thinks of that stuff? Well some things we think of some things we picked up along the way, just dining out, you know, I had like the little magic towels. We had those growing up as a kid, but they were usually like bath towels, washcloths like we're talking about. But I have a friend and we were going through so many hand rolled towels, having to like do laundry so often a week because, you know, we greet you with a warm towel.

11:30And then which was lovely, you know, you might get one or two more towels throughout the meal depending on what we're serving. So we were just like going through so many towels and it was we needed to find like a better option. And I had a buddy who was using those, you know, those same little towels. And thankfully he told me where he sourced them. So it was it's made it much easier on the front of the house staff to not have to go do laundry, you know, two or three times a week, just just once a week. Yeah, I can imagine. So I look, I could talk to you about so many things. I took pictures of almost every dish last night. I'm sitting there and I'm thinking because I operate three restaurants and what you're doing is a completely different sport. And it's hard not to compare because we're humans. Right. And it's not a better or worse.

12:32I'm constantly thinking about operations. I'm constantly thinking about the vision behind an execution of all of these things. I have a two hundred and sixty one seat restaurant at Maribol. That's a mansion. And a lot of times we fill that thing up and it's it's it's a beast when it's rolling. It's a it's a monster. And it's so different from that experience. But I want people to have a I want them to have that on wonder and that that joy of being there. It's just completely different. And I thought if you've never eaten at the catbird seat, I'd like to walk through that meal and kind of get your take on where you source some of these products, what the idea was behind it and pick your brain about it, because I wouldn't in a million years be able to do one of those dishes. It's not as hard as you think. Well, that's what I want to get into. That's what I want to get into.

13:33First of all, I want to talk about your team. You had five chefs with you last night. The guy that was the chef that was directing for me, I think his name was Connor. Yeah, he's my sous chef. He's your sous chef. Yeah. Guy was amazing, like just talking with him in his history. Tell me a little bit about the people that were working last night and what their roles are. Yeah, so. Connor, like says, my sous chef, he he worked for me back at Husk. I don't remember when he started when I was there, but 2016, 2015 at some point. Um, to the left of him, your right would have been Tristan. So he was actually our intern. He's from Louisiana, the younger looking kid with the hat on. He was so polite, but he looked like he fit in. He was very humble. Yeah. So we hired him on once his internship ended. OK, I think it's like the first, definitely the first restaurant.

14:40You know, like this that he's worked at. So it was. How does he got the opening? He's he learns a lot of lessons every week. You know, how does a guy like Tristan have the opportunity to come and intern with you? Well, we actually like lucky enough for him, had the space for an intern at the time that he applied and we had had other people apply since. But unfortunately, we don't, you know, such a small team. There's not a lot of room around that move. But yeah, so he I think he must have emailed me or called me right place, right time and actually need somebody in. Great. Let's go. Yep. Jalen on the opposite side, who was kind of standing next to me with the dreads. Yeah, he's fantastic. He's working a linear. He was finishing school in Wisconsin and. I think he wrote me a letter and emailed me. Or maybe he emailed me a letter and then wrote me on Instagram.

15:45I can't remember. So we let him come in and he starts with us for a couple of days and then we ended up offering him a position because we had another kid who was leaving, who was actually also from Wisconsin. So he came and took his place. Costa, the older gentleman with no hair. He and I have been friends for a long time. So I met him 2000. Trying to think now, 2008 or 2009, maybe he was friends with the chef I was working for and used to come down and spend time with us. So he and Connor, the only two currently that have been with me since I took over in June 2020. OK, so you have him and Connor. You've been there since 2020. The others have kind of come in. But I mean, that's it. I don't think that that makes sense that you're bringing people in that are writing letters and want to work in that environment.

16:50You don't have to teach them a lot of about culture because they're really excited to be in the room. Right. And they will. Yes, chef, I'm in. The opportunity to work at a place like the catbird seat is everything to them. Yeah. So we've been lucky and. You know, it's hard because we do get so many just the company, you know, the company in general, strategic, it's a lot of emails and stuff. But I can imagine with such a small team and very little turnover, it's hard. We'll see. Brennan, skinnier dude with the longer hair. He worked at ASCA in New York and then was at worked at Mama Fuku Co. and was in Belgium for a bit. He and his wife moved here, so we were able to bring him on. And then Shivam is from New Delhi, India. When he he's working at ASCA as well, and he kind of spent the last few months of his visa with us after he finished school and moved from New York.

17:53And then went back to Delhi, and then it took us a while, but we finally got a visa. Nice. He's been back, I think, since January and on the front of the house side, there was some really the the women who were serving us were the kind that they were so it was amazing how unintrusive they were. I would sit down and look down and I'd be like, oh, my gosh, like all the plates were gone. My glasses were refilled every time. And then there was new silverware. And I didn't even see them do it 80 percent of the time because I'm watching. And I'm just, I'm like, oh, my gosh, I'm like, oh, my gosh, I'm like, oh, my gosh. And I'm just inspired by watching what you guys are doing and even notice that they were doing all this and they're seamlessly around the room. Who were the people that were serving us last night on the front of the house side? You have Genevieve, who is our, you know, made her D. She takes care of all the reservations, contacts with the guests. The one who met us downstairs. Mm hmm. She's responsible for printing all the menus, updating all of our allergy allergy sheets.

18:56She does like all the front of the house, kind of office stuff. Sarah is our beverage director. She was amazing. So she does a really good job with everything from like non-alcoholic to she already knew that I didn't drink. And she offered I know that you don't drink, but this is my non-alcoholic offerings. And we had a couple of like non-alcoholic wines that were that were house made. I don't think they were. Yeah, from a bottle, I think those were that were made in house. They were delicious. Yeah, she does all but two of them, I think. And don't quote me on that, but I know our old beverage director, he and his partner. She's a chef, so she works kind of in the culinary side and they have a business in Atlanta. And then I know he makes like the red wine and something maybe like a rosé or something for us. So he's kind of starting his own non-alcoholic bottled beverage program down there.

19:57So we still to support him, get a couple of things from him. And then she does the rest. I thought that was so thoughtful that not only I didn't say it, but they knew it. And then there was that non-alcoholic pairing. So if you're thinking about going to the Cappard Sea, but you're intimidated by a wine pairing or any of this other stuff. I did not feel one bit like, oh, you don't drink. Fine. Like it was, of course, these are not. And it was it was just it was very comforting, very intentional. And I love that. And then the person who greeted you upstairs, Kayla, she kind of does a lot of behind the scenes, a lot of polishing and things like that. But she she does a lot of kind of back weight touches, you know, getting all the silverware set up and filling in pretty much wherever we need. She was the one I was talking about that was like a ninja. Yeah, I turn around and I was like, where did this where did she go? And all of a sudden, everything is set up for the next course. I was like, that's that's so amazing how she would do that.

21:00All right. So let's walk people through this. And we're going to and if we get off on rabbit holes, it's fine. OK, I don't know what your time looks like today, but I'm going to show pictures. So you walk into the Cappard Sea, they take you in and you sit down at a table at this big bar. There's a bar. It's a U shaped horseshoe, U shaped bar in the middle is where they where you guys are cooking. They sit down and they give you some hot towels, kind of get your hands. And then you start off with your first course. They get drinks and things. But your first course. And this was a pretty hefty first course because there was one, two, three, four, five, six, seven components to the first course. And. I think I loved each one more and more, and it was it kind of set the tone to do seven different things on the first course. Is there an intentionality behind that? We used to do three snacks to start when I first took over. And it would be kind of. You know. To set the tone of like the season, not intentionally like a caseki restaurant would, but very similar or like, you know, the first season I took over and was summer.

22:14So we did three bites of tomato. And. As I got more comfortable in the restaurant and things evolved, I wanted, you know, it was like, I really just want to cook seafood mostly, you know, so. I have too many ideas, so the best way to get some of these different flavors presented to people without having like 30, 40 courses was to do them as bites and do more like a fruit amer, but like a less traditional fruit amer. And so hence the the snacks that we start you with. So, you know, Sarah will pour the tea, drop the beverage. We do talk to you about tea also. Yeah. And then while people are thinking about it, it allows us to get some food for them as they're figuring out what they're going to do for beverages that night. So. It evolves, it started with three on the second term, we do 18 to 20 courses, and sometimes we'll pop some extra bites on there, too.

23:18So you might have eight, nine, ten things on there. It just depends on what we have available. If there's something really special that comes in the season for a short time, we might throw it on there. So I want to talk about a couple of these items. First of all, you had oysters and I don't I don't like oysters. If there's anything, you know, as I don't I I will eat an oyster all the time because I feel like one day I'm going to eat an oyster that I like. I loved I told him I could eat a dozen of these. I don't know what you've done to the oyster, but it's delicious. Is there anything you special do or is just a very high quality oyster? I think it was from Delaware. Really nice oysters from North Carolina, North Carolina, the Dukes of Topsill Sound. So they're from Wilmington. OK, that Wilmington. That's what it was. I was thinking Wilmington and as. They kind of evolved throughout the year, but now their gills begin to turn green just from, you know, what they what they filter.

24:21So they're super flavorful right now. We do we steam them just to set them for a minute. So they're not kind of the loose raw oyster texture. That must be it. But then we grill them. So, OK, they're warm. So they're not going to a lot of people think oysters are slimy or whatever. So that's why you're not having that textural issue that a lot of people have. Now, there was as as the chef set this down, explained to every single thing. This was a corner that explained every single thing. So if you're wondering, like, I don't know what this stuff is. And by the way, if you're listening to this, you can go to our Instagram page at Nashville Restaurant Radio and on the post where I talk about this episode being live, there's going to be several pictures. You just swipe to the side. You can see the pictures of these dishes. I'm going to put them on there. So you can now if you want to know what we're talking about, you can go to that Instagram page and you can look at that picture right now and kind of go, OK, that's where we're at. Now, if you're looking at that picture on the bottom, there's this these little cups. We they just he described it was in that cup.

25:24And I think it was yellowfin. I think was one of the blue blue bluefin. Yeah, there was I knew there was a bluefin and there was some sort of a fin. But it was so fast and it was loud. And I was trying to take in the first three things that he said. There are so many components that that was one of the most delicious things I ever put in my mouth. Can you describe what that is, that little cup? It looks like there's a like something fried on top of it, like tiny little strings. Yeah. So this is a toro. So fatty tuna belly. This this whole side of tuna gets aged for 18 days. And we're getting we get this from a gentleman named Leeway out of Los Angeles, who has a like a fish butchery called The Joint Seafood. OK, so this and it's flown in. Yeah. So this is he gets almost all of our fishes from either Japan or New Zealand. We do bring some stuff from Pacific Coast of the U.S.

26:26of California down through Mexico and then. Norway, France, so it just depends. Wow. Spain, Portugal. So you don't use any local seafood. I mean, it's we do we do for some things, but it's tough because we do a lot of northeast stuff, too, but we found that we can get fresher fish from overseas than we can from. You know, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, sure, North, you know, certain places in North Carolina, just because there's not a lot of dayboats down in the Gulf. So you could get a dayboat fish that's brought into the market from Japan. It's kept alive until you order it and then they will kill it right there and pack it and send it. So sometimes it gets here and still in rigor mortis. And it's, you know, halfway around the world. Wow. Um, yeah, anyway, so bluefin belly.

27:29Yeah, bluefin belly, aged, aged and then smoked eel coming from American Unagi in Maine. We dress those with misumi. So like a condiment, it's like a roasted like sake mirin dashi. And then we have fresh medjool dates that get grilled until they begin to like blister and caramelized from the natural sugars. We toss those in a smoked onion oil. And that all gets filled inside the sourdough crostade. So we take when we feed our sourdough, we take the half of it out. That's going to get discarded and we make a batter out of that. And then we form that into those cups and then just finish it with a little fried leek. How did you think of that? Like, this is what I'm talking about, like just the the dashi you're talking about and aging these products and pulling the medjool date in the end. Is this because you've eaten this at home? Did you find this somewhere else?

28:30Did you were you driving down the road and you were like, if I got bluefin belly and I made these and marinated these things together and I moved this, I wonder what that would taste like. And you just tried it one day or like, how does that work? That's a good question. I think probably for this one, it was more thinking of like like a smoky country ham, like a Benton's country ham. And we've done different like fish hams in the past, but we we didn't have one. We just had this really nice, super fatty belly. So it was like, you know, ham goes really well. With, you know, you think of like a chipped gravy or something. Yeah. You know, like what elements can you serve this with? You know, like something that's super savory. But also like ham goes well, like on a charcuterie plate with a preserve or a jelly, you know, so kind of.

29:30Is that where the date comes in? Don't have. Yeah. So we don't have ham, but we can get smokiness from the eel, which is also fatty. So we almost do them like a tartar because the tuna is raw. We dress it at a little fresh chive for like fresh allium flavor. You have the smoked allium flavor, the smoked eel. So to kind of bring in that, like almost meatiness from the smoke, if you will. And then the date's going to bring some more richness. And the misumi has a little bit of vinegar, so it it will bring some acid. So I try to in every dish, balance every like flavor compound. So, you know, like there will always be sweet, salty, acidic, bitter and like a new mommy element. But it just depends on which direction. Like one dish like we'll get there, but like desserts are sweet. Well, the banana caviar things in it, right?

30:32So I was going to say, have you seen the new Wonka movie? Haven't yet. No. OK, we went saw the new Wonka movie the other day, and it is wonderful and whimsical and exciting. And one of those he this isn't really a spoiler, but I want to give a spoiler if you haven't seen the new Wonka movie. It's young Wonka as he was getting started, but he was making these chocolates. They aren't just milk chocolate here. It's not candy bars. He's blending 10, 15 different ingredients into a special cocoa bean that was from a far off land. And as people would eat this chocolate, they would go, oh, my gosh, I taste all these different things. And some some of them, he would put a fizzy lifting gas to reference the first movie where they would eat the chocolate and they would float away or like there's properties of this. And my wife said this, I feel like I'm in that Wonka movie because I take a bite of this and it's like, oh, there's the tuna.

31:34But oh, no, there there's a new mommy. Oh, but it's crunchy. But then there's sweet on the fan. But then it was like the dishes just kept going. And I hit every sense. We talked about this. And then on the way home last night, every car light that we passed, like, why are the lights so bright on cars? I think I'm so sensitive to light. And I was like, I'll bet there was something in one of those dishes that like the Wonka chocolate that made me sensitive to light, because there was so many. And I know that's not a thing. But maybe because as a whole, I'm not used to that. Could be how dim it is in there, too, with the lights, you know. But that's that's what I felt. Like every dish you'd eat, then you'd be like, what is that? Wow. And it just kept going. It was layered and it's structured and everyone worked. So that gives me some some background on that in the middle of this dish. And the one next to it, we just described that one, the one next to that dish, the little cup. Yeah. Which I think had some Bear Creek beef fat that was drizzled and some different things.

32:39What do we have going on here? So. We had a bunch of leftover grits we fermented with some yeast and sugar, and we cooked that down into like a real thick porridge afterwards to cook the alcohol off, fry it up like a grit cake. So it gets mixed into a batter, steamed, fried on top. You have a cured beef fat from Bear Creek farm. So cured like country ham. OK. But with. Little fenugreek, so it almost takes on like a little bit of a sweetness, like maple syrup. And then on top is squid that gets sliced super thin and then just very gently warmed on a piece of parchment paper in a cast iron. Dressed with squid garum sauce that we make with like a squid garum and then what's the squid? What is the squid? It's like a fish sauce that we make from squid. OK. And that gets cooked down with sake, mirin, a bunch of things and kind of cooked down until it's like a syrup. And then is it like a standard recipe for making that?

33:42Is that like that? This is how you make the squid garum and you put these things in it? Or is that stuff like a sauce that you made that you just played with until it tasted great? It's almost like a like an oyster sauce. Like, you know, the idea of like a Chinese oyster sauce. Just we make it with different things. So we used to do a dish with spiny lobster and we made a garum from the heads the year before. So we have like a spiny lobster, you know, oyster sauce, essentially. So it's like thick, sweet, but also like kind of salty and just kind of reinforces the flavor of whatever ingredient we're trying to highlight. Got it. And then we finish it with furikake, which is Japanese rice seasoning. Like different toasted things, seaweed, nori, sesame. Delicious. Thank you. I want to know what's in the middle, too, because that had the caviar. That's a buluga. You have the menu right here.

34:42Yes, that's a Kaluga caviar. That was the pistachio bisque. I was thinking about the Kaluga caviar and. These are the claws from blue lobsters from Brittany, France. OK, local broccoli and then house made feta cheese. And the feta gets brined in a leftover brine that we make. So we save all of our dill stems and we pack up like capers to use in sauces. And then we take that lobsters and we put them in the sauce. And then we put them in the sauce. And then we pack up like capers to use in sauces. And then we take that liquid that's left over. So you have this like intensely dill flavored. Super salty, acidic brine, essentially. Do you throw anything away? I try not to. I mean, because in the hood, you have these things hanging in the hood. And I'm like, what is so that in the middle of the kitchen, they have this little stove that's got coals that you're cooking everything over.

35:44And then it creates smoke. And there's a hood above there. But you have all these things hanging from the hood. And there's like bones and like a look like a neck kind of a thing. I asked you what it was and you said it was the bloodline of a fish. And then was it wasn't turbo. What was the fish? Yes, the fish is booty. So it's an amberjack amberjack from Japan. And then the bones were the turbo bones. OK, the turbo bones. What do you do with those? So we both of those go into a sauce that we use later on. We also use we use like the fish bones sometimes in sauces instead of adding like bonito, like Japanese bonito. So if you're making a dashi or something. So just trying to minimize waste the best we can and not everything successful that we try to utilize. But, you know, we'll try it. May I just think about what I do and I watch my guys in a place where we're anticipating New Year's Eve to do 500 covers, you know, and it's a four course meal, four course meal.

36:53That's an entree. And they're cutting all these rib eyes and all these steaks. And there's just waste when they're just there's just a trash can. They're cutting all the salmon and there's just these little lines and they cut it and it just goes in the trash. It's gone. I'm like, we could be probably doing a ton with that stuff. Like, you don't do that, do you? No. I mean, I would love to take it even further with compost and stuff. I'm just we're not able to in our our space that we have, you know. It's tiny. But yeah, I mean, I feel like there's. You know, we have to we have to try to figure out how to get the most out of really everything that we have. And, you know, like I said, with that, the burry, the the guts were the only thing that went into the trash. We were serving. So we aged them. We made a sauce from the livers, almost like you would like monkfish liver. And we were serving the grilled loins with that sauce.

37:56The bellies went into a tartar for the foot of mayor. The heads in any trim get cooked down in butter with tons of aromatics and then cooked down to like all the moisture. That was a sauce on the turbo. Well, the the when we grill our fish, we brush it with butter. OK, and that's what it was. And then once the fish comes off, we brush it again before we season it and put it on there. So, you know, just still trying to add more flavor any way we can. So we do the same thing with. You know, beef trim will render down the fat, the tallow and use it for different things. Sometimes we use it in a tart shell or, you know, we might brush beef with it. Like the beef gets a sauce, which we can talk about later, but gets a sauce utilizing any beef that's left over at the end of the night. We char it until there's no moisture left in it and then dehydrate it and then age it in soy sauce.

39:03And then that soy sauce becomes the base of the sauce for the beef. And then the rendered beef fat gets brushed on there as well. So do you have another prep kitchen somewhere that like, where do you store all this stuff? Because I didn't see I saw some reach in cool. Do you have a huge walk in in the back that looks like a laboratory walking downstairs? And I wouldn't say it quite looks like a laboratory, but it's it's it's not ideal for how much stuff we preserve, but we get creative on, you know, how to store things. Do you have an inventory of this stuff? You know what everything is and where it is? I have. We do have an inventory. It changes very often. So we'll we'll kind of update it once every couple months. But how much of these are your ideas and how much of do you have a culture where you have everybody who works there is incredibly talented. I mean, they're chefs in their own rights. Do they come to you a lot with, hey, I learned this one time.

40:04If I do this with the dill stems, I can make these pack them like capers is going to create a sauce. And you're like, yeah, do it. Or are these all your ideas? How often does that happen? You know, it's an open space for everybody to bring ideas. Um, some people bring more than others. You know, I. Do you prefer that? I'm OK with everybody bringing ideas because I'd rather them try to be creative than. You know, just, you know, juice butternut squash and then just throw all the pulp away. You know, so everybody, a lot of them worked in different kitchens. Everybody has different ideas that they bring. But I think it's it's important for them to think on their own a little bit. It doesn't mean that it's going to go on the menu or it's going to be successful. But I prefer them to come with ideas. Yeah, always doesn't mean always work.

41:05But I mean, it could be that there could there's something there in that idea that might work. Yeah. I mean, and then, you know, it's a lot of times when young cooks have ideas, they have all these ideas and they want you to order stuff in for them to play with. And it's like. There's so much stuff around here. You know, like, what do we have an excess of that we need to try to utilize? Turn that into something. Yeah, you know, so it's also. In that sense, almost it helps with food costs. But like, if you're going to run a business one day, if you're just constantly bringing new things in. It's expensive. Yeah, eventually, you know, you're going to be like, you know. Well, it's every, you know, every time you get a new bar manager in my world, you get a new bar manager, they want to change the house wines and they want to bring in all the well, I picked up absolute vodka because they said they give me seven flavored vodkas for a dollar each. And now we have eight different flavored vodkas behind that. You're like, don't know.

42:05Just stop, stop, stop, stop. No, we're not doing that. But that's a entry position for us where they're moving into being a bar manager. That's not a some who's first time doing that. I mean, yeah, I mean, so yeah, it's it's important. Like kind of where this started. I mean, we've been doing it since I was at McCready's. You know, we we had a guy making soy sauces from every grain that Sean could get his hands on from Anson Mills at the time. You know, but I think I took over during COVID and we had a lot of purveyors. I was coming back to town and a lot of purveyors that I had relationships from Husk and from Bastion, you know, and they're like, can you just take have so much? I had to throw away so much a couple of months ago because no restaurants were open. And it's like, I just I don't know what to do with all this. So we just started taking on as much as we can to help, you know, them out. Yeah. And then it's like, what are we going to do with 20 flats of tomatoes?

43:08So, you know, we we made a party. Yeah, exactly. We make like a tomato bouillon. We juice and ferment a bunch of the tomato. We took all the pulp and made a tomato andouille for like our vegetarian option for one of the tomato. But, you know, so we just started doing all these things. And then I started using the all these different ferments that we had going in place of or with wines and like traditional sauces. So like, why can't I cook down? Why does it have to be a beurre blanc made with vermouth? And this isn't like not new, I'm sure. It's been done before, but it's like, why can't I use like fermented green tomato juice instead of vermouth in this sauce? Or champagne mixed with, you know, rose vinegar, you know, just whatever. So that's the process. You have something and then you there's a traditional way to do it. And you go, well, if I throw tradition to the side and try something different.

44:09And then you was the last time you tried something that was like, that does not work. Like, that is disgusting. Probably more recent than I remember. I probably tried to block it. There was something we did. I can't remember exactly what it was. Probably in the summertime. I feel like there was something like, oh, I feel like this would work and Connor and I tasted it. We're like, yeah, we'll just scratch that idea. Okay, let's get back to the dinner last night because there's this one is, I think that if you're listening to this, hopefully you would just start understanding that this isn't your average steak and potato kind of a dinner. I mean, there's a lot of thought and a lot of intentionality to every single course. This one is a fun one because if you're following along, this has a pink, it's a white bowl and it looks like there's pink. It looks like from the picture, Himalayan sea salt or something on top, but it's not. That is a frozen apple. So tell me about this dish because this one did that.

45:11You took a bite of it and it was cold, but then it was sweet, but then it was savory. Then I think there, I got a little bit of umami. I don't know what it, what is Ake Ebe? So it's, yeah, it's a red shrimp from Hawaii. It was raw. Raw. So they're kind of prized for their texture because it's so creamy. We served a lot of different shrimp and prawns raw at the restaurant, but the texture of this is amazing because it's like so rich. It was incredible. You wouldn't expect it because it's like it's a piece of shrimp. So we just add, you know, I say sashimi style, even though it's like little kind of diced pieces of the shrimp, but we get fresh wasabi in from Japan. And then the ice is mountain rose apples. So we just, they're just juiced. Um, and then we made an extract from some locally grown Belgian chrysanthemum flowers. And then we infused that.

46:12So this, this dish actually came from an idea that I had at McCready's. So we used to do project nights at McCready's on Wednesday nights or something. I can't remember, but you could sign up for a project night and then create your own dish after service. Everybody cleaned the kitchen and then five or six people would make a dish. We'd taste it. And then, you know, the chef, Jeremiah and, uh, Dano, they would go over every dish with everybody and usually like kind of rip it apart, but every once in a while you'd have one that they enjoyed, you know, and this one get ripped apart. Uh, no, I think it needed work. This one, like I served with like cooked shrimp with granny Smith, apple that had celery juice and chrysanthemum extract in it. Radish, radish. It was like just a bunch of stuff. Well, so this is finally, I've been thinking about this dish since that, you know, since 2010 and it's finally, I've found like the correct way to present it to someone.

47:17How many dishes like that are living in your brain right now? Too many thousands. Too many. I mean, like, that's why I paint is too many. Uh, I have to turn it off eventually at some point. So that's what you do. You do watercolor paintings. Yeah. It just, it gives me like, it gives me a creative outlet that isn't, um, food focused. Yeah. And then I found at husk, I used to keep a notebook next to next to my bed, cause I would get home and read cookbooks and stuff, try to go to sleep and then wake up and have like an idea. And not that I sleep any better now, but I don't, I try not to think about food after like once service ends, I'm not watching or thinking about anything food related anymore. You know, you've got like a four and a half year old and a three year old at home. I mean, you know, those, those things are pretty good to take your mind off of it, but sometimes having the capacity to get back down there with them is difficult. If you don't turn it off first, is that ever a challenge for you? Yeah, definitely. I mean, there's, there are times too where it's like, all right, I know like a new season's coming up and we want to start changing some things and I need to sit down and like focus on, all right, I need to build out a little order sheet.

48:27What do I need to, to get in? And I do most of those orders on Sundays. So it's like a little hectic in the mornings. Do you have like a space in your house that you go to? That's like, it's like the kitchen table and there's kids running around. Yeah, my desk is kind of in our, when you walk into our house, there's like a playroom and then my desk is in there and like our, all of our books. Um, but it's, you know, I have just art stuff like in toys everywhere. So I usually just do them at the, at the dining room table, you know, but it's still like, it's kind of hectic. And I, I'd want to like, I had a guest that came in a couple of years ago and they're like, you know, the most important thing is like when you're home, be home with your kids. And, you know, the first two years it was tough because, you know, I was not, I don't want to say I was more involved with the restaurant, but I had smaller staff. I had much more like responsibility to that. I was keeping on and since, you know, I've let, you know, kind of pass that on.

49:35But, uh, well, you've got, now you've got Connor who's been there since you've been there and you've got these people that you trust. There's a trust you have in your team and that over time you build that. That's amazing. I had, I had this epiphany a little while ago. I don't, I don't know if this is going to make any sense to you, but I live in a very adult world and everything that I do is all adult shit, so to speak. And when I get home, I've got, my boys are eight and 10 now, but they're kids. They live in a very kid world where they play and they have no clue what I've dealt with through the day. They don't know anything about leadership or any of the things that I'm trying to drive in this company. I come home and they know, I like Fortnite, I like to play basketball. Let's go play soccer. And I have a difficult time transitioning from adult to, to kid dad. And that's a, there's a moment there that I need a few minutes to go, okay, I'm not an adult anymore.

50:40I've got to come down to their world and be kid dad. And it's, it's, it takes me a minute and I have to be very intentional with it. Otherwise I become frustrated because I'm not a kid. Do you ever feel that? Yeah. And I feel it a lot in the mornings. My wife, she's a teacher, so she's not there. You know, like usually towards the end of the week, like Thursday, Friday, you know, only five hours, four hours of sleep. And then it's like, kids aren't listening or they're just like, you know, want to play instead of get ready for school. And it's, you know, like I've, I've learned patience, but that is something I'm constantly working on. Um, you know, it's like one of the hardest things, but I think it's helped transition a little bit into the restaurant. Um, with how I, with how I deal with certain things. Um, You feel like you have more patience now than you would have? Yeah, I think so. Um, or just like how I'll react to a situation now than how I would have 10 years ago, you know, so.

51:48But I think there's, there are times where it's like, you know, sometimes you have to go back a little bit and let the old come out because, you know, like, I don't like repeating myself. So I don't think anybody does seven times. I live by this theory with my leadership team and I say seven times, you got to tell somebody something seven times before they understand it. Because what's obvious to me is obvious to me. That phrase is a, is a Will Gadara phrase. What's obvious to me is obvious to me. I can walk around the restaurant and go, why are all these things happening? And I can feel a type of way about stuff, but unless I communicate that effectively to everybody, what's obvious to me is obvious to me is not obvious to you. And it needs to be obvious to you too. So I'm constantly just over explaining. And my biggest thing is like, you've already told me that twice. And I'm like, good, four more times. And you're in like four more times, seven times. I'm going to tell you these things. And then it will.

52:49And it kind of works. Like people know, oh, this is what's obvious to him. Now it's obvious to me. And it's a first six times. Yeah, I'm like, by time three, I'm over it. Yeah. Yeah, more than I got. Yeah. Well, I've a lot more people. The movie. I love that movie Wonka. And I love, did you see the second iteration of Mary Poppins? Did you watch that? The new Mary Poppins? I couldn't talk after that movie ended for like an hour. I was just in my head because we as adults just get into this very serious world. And I felt like I was brought back to that place last night. Whimsical, awe and wonder. You know, because that's the thing that if you, we did Santa Claus at our restaurant. We brought Santa Claus in and, and he's sitting at a table or at a chair and kids would walk in and their eyes would light up so big.

53:55And they would like grab their parents and start yanking on their coat and like, Santa's right there. And just like that awe and wonder is inspiring to me. Like I, I never want to lose that. I want to feel that in some way every day. If I can, if it's driving down the street and looking at a farm pasture and being like, God, that's beautiful. You know, just, just stopping and smelling the roses kind of a thing. But last night I got to sit down there and I was able to put away like my restaurant hat, my interview hat for a minute and really just be turned on to some really amazing food. So thank you for that. And I look back to those movies as a, they bring me back to it. They center me like a, hey, why so serious? It's okay. Like have fun out there. And it seems like you guys were doing that with this chrysanthemum. In Wasabi Hawaiian shrimp, which is what we were talking about before we went on this long.

54:56Like I said, we're going to do this. It's okay. So that one had the ice with the apple and then that shrimp with the perfect creaminess. That I was a little nervous and like raw shrimp. What are we doing here? But it was, it was, I mean, it was a home run. The next dish was a pistachio bisque with the Brittany lobster, beluga caviar and Kiwi. This one right here. Tim, what's going on there? Cause it was just, it was like a bunch of different colors. And you can, if you're following along, this is the one with the clear plate. You see the caviar in the middle and you kind of say, I think you dropped this one off to us. Said it was with a spoon and you said dig deep in. Cause there's a cream in that one. Or was that, that was the next, that was this one. Yeah, that was this one. Okay. Sorry. So tell me about this dish. So we're going to take this opportunity to hear a couple words from our sponsor. First off, I want to tell you about Robin's insurance. Yes. It's a new year and you should be looking at exactly who your insurance partner is.

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57:59Hey, and my last one here today is, of course, we're talking about SuperSource. These guys, Jason Ellis. How long have you been hearing his name on this show? More and more, I still continue to have guests come in here and say, dude, that Jason Ellis guy is the best I heard about on your show. That's music to my ears. And I would love for Jason to have more of those stories. You can call Jason. You can call Jason Ellis right now. His number is 770-337-1143. Look, just call him and say, hey, man, I heard about you on Nashville Restaurant Radio. Brandon says you can come down and check out my whole system. It doesn't cost me anything and that you'll tell me if you can help me or not. There's long contracts you might be in. He might not be able to do anything, but he can come in and tell you what they're doing so you can go back and stop hemorrhaging money now. He will work as a consultant to help you save money with your current vendor now.

59:03That's not just, hey, I'll sell you a dish machine and some chemicals. He really wants you to succeed. And then if you have time and if you can change and get out of your contract and you will go over to SuperSource, well, guess what? He will not make you sign another contract. Again, 770-337-1143. Absolutely recommend Jason Ellis and SuperSource Nashville. Okay, so that one had the ice with the apple and then that shrimp with the perfect creaminess. I was a little nervous. I'm like, raw shrimp? What are we doing here? But it was, I mean, it was a home run. The next dish was a pistachio bisque with the Brittany lobster, beluga caviar, and kiwi. This one right here. Tell me what's going on there because it was like a bunch of different colors. And if you're following along, this is the one with the clear plate. You see the caviar in the middle and you kind of said, I think you dropped this one off too. I said it was with the spoon and you said, dig deep in because there's a cream in that one or was that?

01:00:04That was the next. That was this one. Yeah. That was this one. Okay, sorry. So tell me about this dish. So I don't know how I came up with this. I have done kiwi in the past. One time we did, we actually were getting these blue prawns from France called crystal blue prawns and we were serving them raw with caviar and dressing them in a little fermented kiwi. And then underneath, we had some celery. I was like, it needs a creaminess. But I, you know, I don't want to just put like mayonnaise or something on there. So to add the creaminess to those shrimp, because they're more like that kind of, I don't want to say chewy shrimp texture, but more of what you would expect a raw prawn texture to be. We cook celery root down, strain it, and then puree it and then add a cupy mayo to it.

01:01:09It was like a Japanese mayonnaise instead of butter or cream. So it gave it the acidity that you would get from mayonnaise, but also like kind of that umami you get from cupy mayo and then the vegetalness of the celery root. So it was like, you know, instead of using celery with shrimp, like a pickled shrimp or something, doing that. So anyways, I wanted to do something with these lobsters and I was like, I don't really want to do a soup because I don't think we have enough room for like a soup, soup on the menu, obviously. So cook celery root down into a bisque with just leeks, celery root, milk and cream. And then when we puree it, we add a bunch of Sicilian pistachio paste to it instead of butter. So it's going to add like some nuttiness and richness because I think kiwi and pistachio go well together.

01:02:09So then we have this really nice pistachio oil from France that we put like a healthy amount on top. And then the kiwi is fresh kiwi coming from California. And then that's just kind of macerated in like clarified fermented kiwi juice. Just to add some more clarified fermented kiwi juice. Yeah, so we've juiced it for like, pretty much puree it and ferment it and then let it pass through a coffee filter. And then that's going to add like a different kind of saltiness to it in the bisques, a little like acid, some kind of like almost a new mommy from the lactic acid from fermenting it. And then you have sweetness from the fresh kiwi. And like I said, I try to balance everything. So then to add more like of an intense salt, we use this Beluga hybrid caviar, which is much saltier than the other two caviar that we're serving right now.

01:03:14Where do you find Brittany lobster from France? Like is that just, does somebody call you from your seafood company overseas and say, hey, we pulled some blue lobster out or whatever the Brittany lobster, it's beautiful when I've got 10 pounds of it or how does that work? We use, we have, I mean, we're lucky enough that specialty purveyors reach out to us, you know, but. Because they want to be featured on the menu or they want to sell their product, you know, but this guy used to be in the industry in the kitchen. He worked at a three star in San Francisco and then left and started this company called Dorsha Provisions. So we get a lot of really nice produce from California from him. Dorship Provisions. Dorsha. Dorsha. Dorsha. Okay. Kind of like a movie American Psycho. Provisions. So obviously growing up in Florida, tropical fruit is like something I really enjoy.

01:04:22So we're lucky to get a lot of things from California. We've also gotten nice, we get squab and different things from there, but he also has access to like a lot of the stuff on the Pacific Coast. So spot prawns, crab, different things. And then he's the guy will buy stuff from France, from the market there. So he's bringing in these Brittany lobsters because we were doing this with spinies at first from Florida, which I do. I like the Florida spinies. I think they're a little sweeter than like the really large ones you can get from Australia. So for this dish, they made a little more sense, but then some of that weather a month or so ago kind of made it difficult to get the spinies for a couple of weeks. So we brought in some of these and they're like five times the price, but I think they're flavor wise. Oh, it was delicious. They're really nice. So we bring these in and there's like two bites on this dish.

01:05:24I mean, you look at this caviar, the lobster, everything else. I mean, the cost on this dish, does that something that you have to look at? I mean, is that not even an option for you? Are you looking at this going, I'm just trying to make the best flavors possible. Cost is not an option. We will charge what we need to charge. Our guests understand that this is the North Star. It's just got the flavors got to be there. I don't care what it is. Um, I start with the flavors and what I want to serve and then we'll adjust other dishes kind of around certain dishes. So, I mean, let's be honest, this, this menu, if we were in any other major city would be three hundred and eighty five dollars a person probably. Right. So we're at least two ninety five. And then our second course would be up in the three hundreds. If we've had two or three Michelin stars and no one would blink at it. But I think here, easy. And we're not, we're not up charging you for the truffle, the white truffle. We're not up charging you for the black truffle.

01:06:25You know, you know, on the second menu, we give you three different kinds of caviar and we're using all the same ingredients. But I'm also running a business. So I have to pay attention to the food cost and what it is. Because at the end of the day, if I'm running a 50 percent food cost, Ben and Max aren't going to be happy just because everybody says, like, the food's amazing. Well, no, I mean, it is a business at the end of the day. But you're creating something that you can't get anywhere. I mean, the exclusivity of what you're doing in the, in the what I'm I went, I went last night when I got home and I went on Yelp and I didn't leave a review like I'm happy to go do so. But I just I was looking at like, who could write this out like a one star? And there's like two or three one star. We all have one star reviews. Yeah. But I'm like, what the hell is wrong with people in 99 percent of them are. This is the greatest meeting experience I've ever had. But somebody like this is, you know, it's too expensive or this.

01:07:28That's like, guys, like you have no idea. Yeah. I mean, you know, like anything we ship from, you know, like the cheapest shipping from the stuff we're getting from California is like a hundred dollars a box. So if we're getting two orders in a week, it's just two hundred dollars just in shipping per box. So if it's a big order, you know, like the shipping is expensive on it. And then you're bringing in these products for like, are you might pay twelve fifty a pound for a fish from the Gulf where I'm paying anywhere up to ninety five dollars a pound. You know, we were getting in, you know, we use Bear Creek Beef for a little bit there. It was it was hard for us to get the cut we wanted. We were having to use one hundred and ten, one hundred and twenty dollar a pound Wagyu because, you know, like people also like if they're paying a certain price or expecting a certain price, you know, so people, you know, and it's not a dig on them, but like I don't think if somebody just Googles best restaurants in Nashville and they book the first five on the list, they don't really know what they're getting themselves into.

01:08:34And the person next to them is somebody that travels just to dine at restaurants like this. They're going to have two different ideas and maybe experiences. And then there are some that don't know what they're getting into and are like really surprised. But there's also people that come in, have a lot of restrictions because they don't like eating certain things. And then it's not going to be as enjoyable. Well, we we we touched on that in our last interview. The couple next to me, the loveliest people, they were so nice. I loved getting to talk to them, but they were in from Nebraska and they said they Googled best restaurants in Nashville and this came up. So they made a reservation and they I don't think they knew they were just like, no, we just Google this. We made a reservation. We're here for three days. We had a couple of small kids and this was like a getaway for their 10 year wedding anniversary, loveliest couple. But I don't think they had any idea the level of I mean, maybe they did. I don't I don't. But it was just a we just Googled this and saw this and made a reservation and here we are.

01:09:37Do you get a lot of I mean, I'm expecting to see, you know, people dressed up and there were. But then there was a guy wearing a hoodie, you know, and it's like. Do you just get a lot of tourists who don't understand what this is? And they're like, oh, I didn't know was just this intimate kind of a deal there. Well, I think the people that come in the hoodies probably dine at these restaurants more than the people that don't, you know, I remember years ago, I asked Renee Redzepi, like, do you guys don't have a dress code? You guys don't have a dress code because I got to dine at the first Noma before it closed because we were there cooking for Mad Symposium. And it was like me, Matty Matheson, my buddy Morgan, a couple of the guys that worked for him and then like Ivan Rahman and someone else is with us. And Matty was in like a Toronto Blue Jays jersey and like, I swear, like camo pants or something, you know, and I had like a nice because I asked, like, is there a dress code?

01:10:49You know, Morgan's like, no, no, just whatever you want, mate. So I had on like, you know, like a nice shirt and khakis or whatever. Sure. And I asked him, I was like, you guys don't have a dress code. And he's like, it's hard for us to have a dress code if someone sails their boat up in the summertime, parks it right there and it's coming in to eat. Like, we can't tell them to put on a suit. He's like, but we also want them to be comfortable when they're dining. So I don't like having to, you know, go eat at restaurants where they like require a jacket. I'll wear a jacket to a restaurant if I feel like dressing up, but I don't like dining at restaurants where I'm required to dress a certain way because it's not who I am. I can't, I don't like, I shouldn't have to portray something. I'm not for you to serve me, you know, so I want people to come in however they want. I, I, I totally understand that. I am a full on look good, feel good respect. You know, you're, you have spent so much time and energy and passion to, to create this and you're so intentional with everything.

01:11:59My kind of take is I want to dress well because I respect what you're doing and I want to show you that respect. Plus when I'm eating food like that, if I look good, I feel good and I'm confident and going into eating food that I've never eaten before, or I'm trying something brand new, I want to feel confident. I don't want to feel like I'm laying on the couch eating ice cream and, you know, I don't hope nobody sees me. I want that confidence and I also want to show the respect to the chef and the team that I value what you do. But that's me and anybody else in the world can do whatever they want. Like I'm, I'm not in our restaurants. I don't have any kind of a dress code. I don't care. Just be comfortable. Whatever you want to do. Dress codes are a thing of the past. I think so for sure. Okay. Thank you for doing this. I don't know what our, we're, we're at an hour. I don't know what your time is. Let's go through. I have a couple more. We're going to fast forward to a couple more.

01:13:03Two, maybe three. I don't know because everything was, it was almost like every dish was my favorite dish. Each one that came out, I was like, I think this is better than the last one. A lot of people say that. I get that. It's like it built its way up. This is the one you said there was a custard on the bottom. Yeah. Make sure you get the whole thing together. And this was the butternut squash and amaretto. Okay. So this is a carabinero. Is that how you say it? Carbonaro. I say carbonaro, but. Well, it's, it's spelled cara, car. It's not spelled like Italian carbon. It's Spanish. Spanish. Carabinero. Carabinero. Okay. So it's a carbonaro prawn, butternut squash and amaretto. Tell me about that. So this is actually some flavors that, uh, one of the first chefs I worked for after culinary school, we did a pasta one time and it was butternut squash, Agnelotti, and it just was like tossed in Burmante with lemon juice and it got amaretti cookie in it and on top.

01:14:11And I was like, you know, that those flavors just kind of stuck with me because the sweetness worked really well with butternut squash. So this dish is kind of, this is like the third iteration over the last few years and it has evolved. But anybody that's had all of them, they kind of say this is their favorite. So the custard we served before is a chawanmushi. So a steamed custard, an egg based custard. This one is cream and it's set with carrageenan, which is like a gelling agent, um, derived from seaweed. So, uh, we take all the tops of the butternut squash, get juiced and fermented. We fill the bases with amaretto and like a huge knob of butter and roast it at a high temperature until all the alcohol is cooked off. The squash is super soft and very caramelized. Scoop that out of the skin and then cook it down in cream with kombu and then a condiment called shiradashi.

01:15:14It has like a lot of umami and then we just kind of let that steep for about 30 minutes. It gets pureed, strained and then we set that with the carrageenan and set it into the little custards. Um, the carbonara prawns, texturally, are much different than the the um, the aca ebi, you know. So a little more chew to them. So it's nice since there's really, texturally, there's not much to this one because you have the custard on the bottom. Um, those get dressed in reduced amaretto. So we cook that down to like a syrup. So all the alcohol is off of that. But that flavor, it's almost like it's like if you reduce Dr. Pepper. And then we brown butter. Once it's brown, we pull it off and we kind of like in and out dip sage a bunch of times. So it slowly fries but doesn't like turn dark and burn. And you get this kind of like infusion of like toasted sage.

01:16:18Um, that gets dressed over there and then, uh, we finish that with a reduction of that fermented butternut squash juice. So we add a little bit of sugar, like a percentage of sugar to it and then slowly reduce it over a couple days until it's a syrup. So you have this like very- Over a couple days? Yeah, because you don't want the bubble because if it bubbles at all, the sugars can begin to caramelize and it'll change the flavor of the reduction. How do you reduce it over days? Uh, so it just goes on the, you know, the in a whatever appropriate size pot and it slowly goes and then it gets transferred into smaller pots as it goes down and cool it. And then you do it the next day. So we do it- Okay, so it's not like overnight cooking. Well, sometimes if it's a big batch, we'll let it go overnight on really low heat. Okay. Um, but yeah, so it's just like another way you could do it is if you have enough the hydrator space. You could pretty much put in a gastro train into hydrator and let it slowly reduce at a temperature like that.

01:17:22So it won't burn that way. But you get a lot of like salty umami from that, a little bit of chive in there as well. And then the amoretti cookies just crushed up for a little crunch too. It was absolutely delicious. Thank you. Absolutely delicious. We're going to skip ahead. There was a scallop foie gras red cabbage in Quince Kogi. I'm not, I'm not the biggest foie gras guy, but I looked at my wife and I was like, that's the best damn foie gras I've ever had. It's cooked perfectly. And it was just the texture, the flavor. I've never eaten foie gras that had that flavor. And I think it was everything was paired with it was kind of like the oyster. Like with all the stuff with the oyster, it really accentuated that it was, it wasn't necessarily the star of the dish. It wasn't like any of these individual proteins was, had to be the star. It was all the things around it made the star look brighter. Does that make sense? Yeah. And that's commitment.

01:18:23That's what was going on there. There was a grilled turbo with bay scallops and a shellfish cream. And then there was a, there was a palate cleanser that was a, was a kumquat with juniper berry. Yeah. So am I remembering that right? Cedar berry, fresh cedar berries. But yeah, and the juniper family. Oh, they were dead. I could have had a bowl of that sitting on my couch because that's what I do now. And then I don't drink. The Bear Creek Farms ribeye with a Bonita sweet potato and shaved white truffles atop of it. We're not going to go into that a whole lot. It was delicious. It was amazing. That's when we did the kumquat buttermilk, fresh juniper berries, the foie gras, pineapple guava sage. This guy right here was, we talked in our last interview about your plating in your presentation.

01:19:27And some people take a plate and they'll, it'll look like a murder scene. They'll just put little splatches here and a smear there and dots of things all over the place. And then the food is in the middle and you kind of have to move them all together. And you're not a fan of doing plates like that because you're like, that doesn't make it easy to eat. I think you described yourself as being a stackable. I'd rather stack everything on top so that you just, and you've said many times, this is to be eaten in one bite. Like don't slowly eat this. All these flavors need to go at one time. And I loved that. But that's, this seemed like the personification of all of those things. I'm going to mix so many ingredients. It's going to be a stack. Eat the whole thing and then let all of those flavors. Have you seen the movie Ratatouille? There's a meal, his brother comes to Bustos and he's like, a meal. And he's like, I'll get you some food. And he gets him like some berries and some cheese.

01:20:27And he goes, no, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. He goes, eat the cheese. And he eats the cheese and like the little music notes go. And he goes, now eat the berry. And he eats the berry, now the music notes go. And he goes, now eat them together. And like, it just was like this cacophony of the sound. Like that's what I felt like every dish was. Was that each one of these individual ingredients could be very cool. But you blend them all together and eat them in one bite. And you get this just magical experience. That's what this piece right here was because it had like a puff. I don't know what the bottom was. It was like a... So we... Explain this one. Yeah, so we take beef tendons from Bear Creek Farms. Cook them for a very long time until they're tender. And then press them and freeze them. And then we shave those blocks over sheets of nori and let them dehydrate. And then when we fry them, the beef tendon puffs. So you have the nori cracker with the puff beef tendon.

01:21:28It's almost like a chicharron. But it's beef tendon? Yeah. It's wild that you can do that. It's incredible to me. So that's the bottom part. That's the base. And then tartar. So the muscle, the deco muscle from the ribeye, we remove that. So it's the muscle underneath that fat cap. And then it's just ground right at the beginning. Right before you guys sit down, we grind it. And then it marinates in a tare. So tare, traditionally used for yakitori made with chicken and different aromatics cooked on soy sauce and stuff. This one, we take that beef soy sauce I was talking about earlier. Dress it in a bit of that. Beef soy sauce with that on the sample plate? Well, no, saving any leftover beef because we give everybody a slice of ribeye and everyone's like, well, what do you do with the rest of it?

01:22:37It gets sliced super thin and then charred really hard so we can infuse all that flavor into soy sauce. And you dehydrate it so there's none left and then that's what you... Yeah, so that gets charred. That soy sauce gets brushed on the beef and then we also marinate the tartare in it. Gets a little bit of chive. And then on top you have the same tare but made into almost like a fluid gel. So it adds texturally a little bit more of a creaminess. And then a puree made from cooked egg yolks and Japanese mustard, which is like really spicy. Hokkaido sea urchin, last night was Hokkaido sea urchin, just like a tongue of sea urchin on the top. And then any of the little trims that fall off the white truffle, we just microplane over the top. How often do you change the menu? That was incredible. You said last night we used sea urchin.

01:23:38How often do you have to call audibles? Well, we've been using Maine uni, so the buffoon uni, very similar. Um, this week we just were able to get it. So we got the uni from Hokkaido. But we change anywhere from one to three dishes a week. And then, you know, like every week we might have to tweak something. Like maybe turbo didn't come in and we have to do... Like that dish started with this flounder we were getting from a guy in like Virginia, North Carolina area. He was, you know, like killing them on the boat, bleeding them out on the boat. They were showing up in rigor mortis and they kind of get aged for a few days. And then we grill them. But that season ended, so now we're getting, you know, the turbo. But, you know, like the set may be similar or like instead of frise, we might have to use escarole, you know, whatever.

01:24:40Things are changing. But then, like I said, every week we're changing a dish or two or... Well, so New Year's is coming up and you let us try. You were very generous and you said, hey, we're playing with this squab recipe here. Here's a couple bites too much thing. Well, you didn't even say too much thing. You just said, I don't know if it's going to be good or not, but here, enjoy. Yeah. And, um, it was, it was a little interesting for me. Okay. I mean, there's, if you look on, I'm going to post this on there too. If you're following, it looks like there's two arms and they are, uh, and there's like the whole claw of this bird, which I thought was super cool. But then as I was eating it, I was like, that's like the claw of a bird right there. Like I'm not a get the whole tilapia at the Mexican restaurant and like cut through it and eat it. Maybe I just need to do that more. First time for me eating something with a claw still on it. That was like a bird.

01:25:41So that's it. That's just a thing. Yeah. It's just that I, that's my only feedback. That flavors were incredible. That's all right. I would brought you out of your comfort zone a little bit. You a hundred percent did. I tried it and, uh, I liked it, but that's my only feeling is it took me a second to kind of go, I'm holding the claw of a bird right now and I'm eating the other end of it. I feel like when cappered open, Josh and Eric were serving a squab dish and they might've even served something out of the, the claw of the squab. He had like a something in the claw. Yeah. That you would like pick up and eat. Well, hell yeah. Uh, last thing, you know, I, I could do this all day cause there's so many dishes. I thought this was so unique and you, this wasn't on the, this was on the later tasting menu. I think you, you hooked us up with this. Thank you again. Bananas and caviar. There's a place down the street that was called banana and caviar, bananas and caviar, but this is a bananas and caviar.

01:26:42Tell me cause it was absolutely delicious and I wouldn't think those two things would go together. Yeah. So, I mean, the idea of sweet and salty, you know, in my head worked. I think you got to find the right, like the right caviar. This caviar is nice. It's a, it's an older fish. The eggs are really firm. They don't put a lot of salt on it. Um, so it gets aged for a few months before we receive it. Um, this dish has evolved over the last few years. I think I put it on in 2021 and originally it was, we were like to order would burn bananas in the coals and then, you know, cut them out. Like it was like you're doing bananas, bananas, foster tables. Literally like throw the whole thing, the whole thing with the peel on everything in the cold in the cold and let it, let the skin like completely burn. Yeah. And the banana would roast inside and get really soft. Okay.

01:27:43And then we would dress it in a dashi made with black truffle, but then we added a bunch of the black walnut toffee to it. So it was like sweet salty. There was a lot of umami in it and then we just hammered it with caviar. The next version was, uh, my grandma always made like a banana nut bread at the house and she would put a ton of, uh, margarine on it, but it was like the best like to get fresh warm and she would just put like a thick layer of fake butter on there, you know? So we had this really nice butter we get from animal farm creamery in Vermont. And we were doing the banana bread soaked in that same dashi. So it was like start to be soft, but it was warm. And then on top you would have, uh, like a canal of the butter with the caviar. And then actually, sorry, we poured that sauce over the top of that. So it kind of all begin to melt. And then I finally settled on like the banana cream pie.

01:28:47So it's the same burnt bananas made into a custard. Underneath that is the black walnut toffee. Um, but the toasted marshmallow and then the caviar. So just, just a one biter. It's a one biter. And it was all those things. You start chewing and you're like, all of these things are, and you get the different textures because the, the, the base, like the crust is crunchy, but then, and the actual top was somewhat crunch was hard, but not too hard. But then the middle was soft and then you get that caviar. And then it, it's just one of those things that just all works together. And I'm sitting there eating this going, I never would have thought of this. Like this guy is, is a damn genius. Like he's so crazy. So there you go. There's, there's, there were several other plates, uh, to walk you through what dinner was like at the cav. You've never been, or if you've been, and you were wondering the same things, I was wondering what kind of the dishes were like, um, that was a fun thing to do.

01:29:51Like I said, you get to talk to the band after the show and kind of go, when you played that song, remember when you played that song, that was cool. Like the, the Chris Farley interview on Saturday Night Live. Have you seen that? Oh yeah, that was awesome. That was awesome. That was cool, man. What's next? What's in your brain right now? Are you working on anything? Cause there's gotta be a lot of pressure. You got new years coming up and then you got a new year and constantly adding menu items. Where do you find inspiration? It's usually just from the, like the ingredients. I'll look and see what's, what's coming into season. Kind of look at what we have, um, you know, in our larder, I guess. Sometimes, you know, like I, I just have a phone full of probably a thousand ideas. Sometimes I'll find an ingredient that's in season and let's search my notes and see if there's any ideas that I don't think sound too insane.

01:30:54And sometimes go that way. Sometimes it's just from like the foie gras dish with the guava was, you know, like I tasted. That was the foie gras dish that I was like, I love the foie gras because that was the dish that I was like, the foie gras delicious in this. Sorry. Yeah, no, you're good. Um, so it was like, I ate a piece of guava and it was like, it's kind of tastes like it would be good with sage. And, um, I, you know, we had the fermented guava reduction. So I tasted them all together and I was like, we should do this with foie gras, but it's hard to like, just serve people a chunk of foie gras. So that's why we, we brew label sides with sugar. So you kind of have that's what it was. That's what it is. There was a textural thing to it and stuff too. So it's salty and the texture is, you know, once it warmed by the torch, it's creamy, but it's not like, it's, it's matured a few days.

01:31:59So it's not going to be like so fatty, but then the, whatever fat melts off of it kind of forms the sauce in the bottom with the fermented guava. So it's, you know. How do you know if something tastes good? Do you just go strictly on your taste or do you go, hey, taste this. Tell me if I'm crazy. These two things go together. Do you, do you ask other people? I'll do that. And then if some, sometimes if someone disagrees, I'll be like, oh, like think of it this way. And then sometimes they're like, yeah. But, uh, give me an example of something that's too insane. Here's, I think of things that are not too insane. What's something that you would like to do, but it's too insane. Oh gosh, I don't know. We did, we were getting these. So Wiley Dufresne years ago had restaurant WD 50 in New York and he was doing this, did like a foie gras and anchovy dish. And there's this, there's opinionated about dining, which rates restaurants. And the owner hated it. It's like one of the least favorite things he's ever eaten. And then there's a documentary and they're going back and forth about this dish.

01:33:00And I was like, oh, I had, I had a good meal at WD 50, but we were getting these really nice, like Spanish anchovies. And, and they were so rich and creamy. They almost like tasted like foie gras. And, you know, we tried them together on like, we had like house-made brioche. So we like let the foie gras, I think we just like toasted the brioche, put the slight thin slice of like the cured foie gras on there and like put it in the oven for a second. And then the anchovy over the top and ate it. Like, all like, no, no, this isn't the, that might work, but that version is not the version we're going to give the people. Because of the presentation? Just the, the flavors just didn't, I mean that like anchovy really takes over. Okay. Yeah. Well, it's, um, but the anchovies, we were serving the anchovies on their own, just dressed in, um, what was the oil? Maybe lemon oil and then, uh, elderberry capers and a little bit of like the brine from elderberry capers.

01:34:02It's like the anchovies on their own are amazing. And they're, they're not like too intense, but something about with the foie gras really, like the fishiness almost was pronounced, you know, so, um, yeah, we kind of tossed that idea. I don't know. We'll see. I have a nice drive in and out of town each night. So it's kind of where I do most of my thinking. And then Sunday night, once the kids go to bed, my, sometimes my brain goes a little crazy. So I try to shut it off. I, I have to go like my wife goes to bed, everybody goes to bed, then I go downstairs. Like I have to like, uh, I'm up. I'm going to go to, if I go to sleep before midnight, I'll wake up at three 30 in the morning. Me too. So I can't say I like stay up late, even though knowing like, I could get like 10 hours of sleep, but like realistically it would never happen. No, no. If I try to get, I woke up this morning at four 30. So I went to bed normal time, like we got home, put the kids to bed and we went to bed and I have four 30 this morning.

01:35:03Just like, here I go. Yeah. Like I'm six out of six hours is a full night for me. Like I'm good with six. That's a weird, it's a weird thing that I have to, I have to have a little bit of alone time because I'm constantly boom, boom. And my car is fine. Usually listening to a book or I'm on a phone, I'm calling people back, but I'm like, once everybody's in bed and the house is quiet, I like to go downstairs and I get an hour of just, if I just play candy crush on my phone, I don't know, but it's like, I need an hour of quiet to calm, to calm my brain. And then I can, I almost to where I'm like ready to fall asleep. And then I go get in bed. I can't just get in bed and be like, all right, let's go to bed now. Like, oh no, no, no, no. My, that's like putting the car in the garage with the engine on. Oh yeah. Like you don't do that. Yeah. You got to turn the engine off first and then you can close the garage door and do the whole thing. Yeah, exactly. All right, man. What have I missed? I mean, we've nothing really. What do you want?

01:36:05Is there anything you want to talk about? Anything you know? I mean, we haven't said much about it publicly, but there's Chef's going to introduce us to something cool right after these words from our sponsor. Cytex, Cytex. Yeah, so I just wrote a song for Cytex too. Cytex is your trusted linen and tablecloth company. They do uniforms. They do first aid kits. They do so much. They can do the scratcher mats at the front door. They do all your mats in the restaurant, your custom logo mat when you walk in the front door and they keep them and they clean them and they take good care of them and they take good care of you. That is what they do over at Cytex. And let me tell you, you need to give Ross Chandler a call because that's how you do it. That's the first step. Some would say, Brandon, I would like to learn more about Cytex, but I just don't know where to start.

01:37:11What should I do? You should call Ross Chandler and I'm going to give his number right now. You see, it's 270-823-2468. And then when you call him, you can say, hey, man, my linen company, I'm not real sure they're doing the best things for me and I'd like to learn about what you guys have to offer. Could you come by some time and talk to me? And then he will. And he'll say, who are you currently using? Let me check it out. Let me see how we can help you. Let me see where your pain points are. Is it a delivery window? Is it that the linen company keeps coming in and they're saying, hey, we don't have enough. We'll come back later on and deliver the rest. And then you never really know when they come back and deliver the rest. Did they deliver the rest? I mean, who knows? I don't think they did. Anyhow, if that's going on with you, you need to check out Cytex because they're amazing. I trust them and I think you should too. 270-823-2468. That is Ross Chandler. Do it now. You know, I don't always talk about Gordon Food Service.

01:38:13Okay, I do always talk about Gordon Food Service. They are our amazing title sponsor. You hear that this show is powered by them and they are somebody who is powering our local restaurant community. And I want to tell you about my buddy Paul, Paul Hunter. You can follow Paul on Instagram. He is PaulHunterJujitsu and he has a dog. His dog is WrigleyTheBulldog and WrigleyTheBulldog has his own Instagram page. And what Paul does is he takes Wrigley and he shows you how to do different jujitsu poses with the dog and it is amazing. And Paul is also the new business manager over at GFS. And so if you want to learn a little bit about Paul, go find him on Instagram. You can see who he is. You can kind of see he's kind of Instagram famous and he will come and talk to you about partnership, partnering with Gordon Food Service in all of the ways that they can help your restaurant succeed.

01:39:15Just some really, he's just an amazing guy. I've known him for a long time. And I just, I love hanging out with him. I see him all the time at my local restaurants out there in Bellevue. He's a Bellevuean just like me. And I think that you should give him a call and learn about what GFS has to offer right now. You can call him directly 615-945-6753 but go check him out on Instagram and follow him because he's amazing. All right, man. What have I missed? I mean, we've nothing really. What do you want? Is there anything you want to talk about? Anything you know? I mean, we haven't said much about it publicly but there's kind of documented everything over the last couple of years since I took over. It'll be going into a book. Really? Which we won't announce for a couple months but in the spring, hopefully, we'll have a little more kind of information about that.

01:40:23That was with my buddy, Mike Wolf, who used to be the bar manager at Husk. We worked together. So he kind of presented the idea to me and just been, I mean, I record almost all of my recipes anyway. So we've been. Will this be a cookbook? Yeah. So it's going to be, I mean, honestly, be more of like a coffee table book but if you are interested in the kind of what goes into how I thought of each dish over this first two years, this will be the... So if you enjoyed this interview, there's a lot more of that coming out in a book. When is the book going to be released? I'm not 100% sure but I think next fall. Next fall. Okay, so we got a little bit of time. Yeah. Okay. So hopefully, we'll have an announcement at some point. Like I said, early to late spring. Somewhere in the spring window. I love it. Man, I've kept you here an hour and a half.

01:41:28I could keep here another hour and a half. I could talk about so many things. I just want to say thanks again for your time. I know this is a busy time of year and dinner last night was lovely. Thank you for your service and what you're doing here in this community is really special. And final thing we do is the Gordon Food Service final thought. Okay. So you get to take us out. Whatever you want to say kind of your last final thoughts going and this could be an end of the year final thought going into 2024 because this is New Year's time. We can make this an annual thing. Yeah. Last show of the year is going to be with Brian Baxter. I mean besides New Year's Eve, the one thing really on my brain right now is the Buccaneers winning the NFC Championship Sunday, but I won't be able to watch. Well, I talked to the team about it. I said, do I have the game on during the day or do I wait to watch it after work? You have the game on during the day. But that might just put me in the worst mood if I lose.

01:42:31But you're a pro. But you know what's going to happen is you're going to be sitting there cooking and somebody is going to go, can you believe the Bucs got beat today? And you're going to go, mother and that's going to be worse watching it real time. At least you get the emotions while it's happening to feel it. And you know, at least then you know there's an anxiety of I can't find out. Nobody tell me you're at a place where everybody's eating dinner talking about this stuff. That's true. You're going to find out and then it's going to ruin you're watching it when you get home because you're going to know the answer. Well, if I know the answer, then I don't have to stay up till three in the morning watching it. So that's the that's the only positive there. Just watch it. Yeah. Just watch it. I'm a big, big hockey guy. So when the lightning are in the playoffs, most of the games are nights I'm working. So last year, thankfully, I didn't watch them all. I used to watch them all after work in Europe. You know, the worst thing was like losing an overtime at 330 in the morning and then having to try to go to bed. But watching hockey when it's recorded is pretty magical.

01:43:35It gets really gets your heart rate up, too. But you can watch a whole game in like an hour and 10 minutes. That's true. Because you just you can fast forward. You just fast forward to the commercials. You fast forward to the intermission. And it's like, oh, it's three 20 minute periods. Like and you just and it just sails. And you're like, oh, like an hour and 10 minutes. I'm done. Whole thing. I always love watching the Preds because I'm a big Preds fan. I've gotten into soccer. Me too. I've been into soccer. Do you go to any of the Nashville SC games? Yeah. So when I had surgery back at Husk in 2017, that ankle surgery, I went to every single USL under 21 match at Vanderbilt Stadium. So supported them. And then my next door neighbor, he was the color commentator for them the first year. But he actually played for Orlando City years ago in the USL when they won two championships.

01:44:35So I was I was in Orlando when that team was started. So I'm actually an Orlando City fan. And it worked out during the COVID year because they were East and West. And then now they're back in the East. So it's it's a little tougher. So I went to went to the home opener in the new stadium. And then I went to both Orlando games, which thankfully we won. And then then we we almost made it at least Orlando lost to the champions. So but yes, I'm a big soccer fan. And then Leeds United, which unfortunately is in the championship this year and not Premier League. But I do watch a lot of sports. So it's you know. But I'm glad soccer's here. I'm sure my son's favorite color is yellow. So I'm sure eventually he's going to start moving over from all of my teams to the prez with the yellow jerseys. You got prez and the Nashville SC. Yeah, which Nashville, I don't mind as much the prez. That's the tough one, because I'm a pretty big Lightning fan.

01:45:36So I knew absolutely nothing about soccer and on a whim bought season tickets. My kids play soccer, right? So they're eight and ten. I'm like tickets for like 20 bucks a ticket. I mean, you can get season tickets for Nashville SC really cheap. Oh, yeah. And there's not a bad seat in the place. I mean, it's an amazing stadium. But the most unexpected thing happened. We started going to these games and I was like, oh, this is great. There's no commercial timeouts. I mean, people phantom Lee get hurt all the time, which is like their version of timeouts. And I get that people get tired and you get water and they are Michael. You know, it's a thing which most people cannot handle. But it's it's part of the game. They're going to change it next year. Are they? No more flopping. If you if you go down for more than 10 seconds, I think you have to leave the game for two minutes or adjusting some rules. So well, that would make it better. Yeah, that would be really interesting. The two 45 minute haves are fantastic. But I fell in love with it. And then I went to that game with when Messi was in town.

01:46:38Like I went to all of the the cup games leading up to it and had my tickets to go to it. God, the excitement in that building was like the Super Bowl. I bet it was so exciting. And I was like, I guess I'm a soccer fan now. Shit, I didn't want to be a soccer fan. I can't afford to be a soccer fan. I'm already got Titans and the Preds and now we're going to get baseball. Do you have a baseball team? I'm a Rays fan. So I was, you know, I thought if anybody was getting, if they were going to go anywhere, I would have preferred to have been here. Are they? It's hard to are they going somewhere? No, they they say they're going to build them a stadium. So we'll see what happens. But I don't know, the no salary cap thing for me makes it hard to watch, because I mean, you know, the Dodgers, whether they're spending a billion dollars for the next two years or not, like it's still a billion dollar between two people. It doesn't matter how long the time is like the Rays aren't going to spend, you know, a billion dollars on a team, let alone.

01:47:39Well, that's what I saw. The Shohei deal was like his 700 million is is more than the entire payroll for like nine MLB teams. Yeah, it's insane. Like the whole team doesn't make like what he makes in a year. And it was like the so 70 million a year for 10 years. Yeah, like whole teams that don't have a 70 million dollar payroll. Yeah, and his is like heavily backloaded. So when he leaves California, he's going to he won't have to pay those taxes. But I think that's why I would assume that's why he did it. Because you're going to lose like first 10 years, he makes 20 million dollars. And then after that, he gets paid the other 680 after his 10 year span is over. It's insane. Like, how is he going to live? Well, how would you live? 20 million dollars over 10 years. How are you going to live on 2 million dollars a year? 50% of that gets taxed. How are you going to live off 340 million a year? You know, it's insane. I get it. I mean, it makes complete sense. Makes complete sense. Hey, last thing, fantasy football. Yeah. We were in a league this year.

01:48:40I know. Did you? I think I was I haven't checked in a while. I think I did well in the loser bracket. In the loser bracket. I'm going to I'm pulling it up right now. We'll see if you're. That's what I get for not drafting. I had auto draft, but. You are not in last place. I'll take that. You are in seventh place right now. Seven out of 10. I mean, I'm tied for last place with Alex Ballou. But I just beat Alex Ballou in the losers brackets, and now I'm playing Pat Martin for and he had somebody go last night. Oh, shit. My whole team is like hurt. And I had a Mario Cooper on I'm not playing it. What am I doing here? All right. Let's see who you have. The championship this week is Max Goldberg versus how Holden Beach and he had David and Joku and Cleveland's defense last night, which did well. So Team Goldberg is projected to win in week one. This is a two week championship.

01:49:40Oh, OK. So it's going to go two weeks. So that's your that's your championship game. Third place game is Alyssa Ganjeri and Tandy Wilson. You are in the fifth place game right now. All right. Which is with Tony Galzin and you. Yeah, you're you're. You have. Do you had like not. I don't even think I set my line. Your kicker, your kicker did not play and played last night. OK. And so you got zero points for your kicker. So he is projected to beat you. But I'm hoping for a big week from Mike Evans and Rashad White. We'll see. See what happens here. Well, that's me, too. For you. Titans aren't going to be anywhere. I'll root for the Bucks. Appreciate it. But like whatever juju I have. Now, my teams always lose. So maybe I should not do that. But this bad thing going towards you. Oh, man. What's it like going out to eat with you? I was to go out to eat with you.

01:50:41Are you are you able to just chill or do you? I I enjoy eating. I it's hard to go out to eat with like. This has happened a few times, but you go eat with like another chef and. They're like thinking about each dish so much or like this needed more salt. This needed more acid. This is like I think consistently of a meal. You're like nothing was seasoned well, like that's a thing. But I think, you know, if you're going to a tasting mini restaurant, like. More times than not, it's like. I think how the chef. Thinks everything should be seasoned, you know, so like. I season things the way I think they should be seasoned and that's how we serve them. And I think as. As I've gotten older. I just I don't get to go out to eat like that that much like I just enjoy the time doing it. Because it can be exhausting. Yeah, and I don't want to like I want to go enjoy myself.

01:51:42I'm not going to analyze now if I go if I'm like traveling and I go to a Michelin restaurant, I'm underwhelmed and I'll be pissed off last night. I was there for a dining. It was all about the food last night. I mean, and obviously spending time with my wife, but like it was about the food. Just going out to dinner. Can you go to like an Applebee's? Chili's. I eat at Chili's every year for my birthday. Except this last year. I didn't eat at Locust, but that's an upgrade. But then they gave me they gave me some Southwest egg rolls to go. So it was nice. Oh, there you go. Made me feel feel good. But you can like go eat like just regular food. And Buffalo wings are my favorite food. OK, I'm not above anything. And I probably Martin's anywhere from one to three times a week because there's one right by the house in Spring Hill. And it's easy because like I count my macros. So it's like, all right. What's your go to there? I usually get the the brisket tray with fries and green beans, devil's nectar and Alabama white sauce. OK, there's him.

01:52:43He might get mad if I tell him this is how you need to order your wings. But do it. How do you do it? So I get muddy. So I get the dry rub with the sweet Dixie and you have them toss them in that. And then you get the the Alabama white sauce on the side. Like if you're dipping it in ranch. Yeah, that's this. That's all the flavors in one that's the wings. I think that's what everybody in the entire episode today is like, well, it's really interesting. And now everybody is like, holy shit, he's just unlocked the cheat code. Yeah, this is it. It's the best. Best wings thought and maybe I just haven't been to the right place. I haven't found a place in Nashville where I'm like, these are amazing Buffalo wings. And I'm a Buffalo wing guy. So I mean, like grew up eating Buffalo wings. There is there's also a place called Nickel City in Pinellas Park, Florida. So close to where I grew up and it was a Buffalo bar, but they did really good Buffalo wings since closed.

01:53:46But I got the place for you. OK, the Germantown Pub. OK, have you been to the Germantown Pub? No, the Germantown Pub is around the corner of Monroe and Rosa Parks. OK. And they make a trifecta wing and they smoke them all there that their whole they're kind of known for their ribs. But it's best ribs in Nashville or not. That's chicken wings, chicken wings in Nashville. They make these chicken wings, different flavors, but the trifecta wings at Germantown Pub from everybody I know is kind of the wing to eat. OK, is it Buffalo based or is it barbecue based? I think it's Buffalo based. OK, I'll give it a try. I mean, they have Buffalo wings there, too. Yeah, I mean, trifecta wing. I'll try. I'll eat wings. I got Buffalo wings on the specials list this week, this month at Green Hills Grill. There you go. It's a brand new. We do monthly specials, but we're doing Buffalo wings this month. And they're selling like it's just crazy how many people are like, oh, Buffalo wings.

01:54:47Let's go. That's awesome. And it's a thing. I love wings. There's a they make the tiny little Frenched Buffalo wings. I love those. Do you know what I'm talking about? I think Joyce Farms makes them. And it's just like a little Frenched little. Yeah, no claw attached. You know what I like. All right. Well, I don't think I had a very good end of the year thought, but I just hope everybody has a good 2024. Happy New Year to everybody wishing you a wonderful 2024. Do people call you Brian or Chef or Baxter? It depends. My family calls me Brian. My friends call me Baxter. Some of my but you can call me. They call me Chef when I'm depending on how the conversation is going. Probably. I love it. Well, man, have a wonderful rest of your. Thank you for making the trip here to do this. And happy New Year to you. Happy New Year. Thank you. All right. OK, thank you very much to Chef Brian Baxter for joining us here in studio.

01:55:50You you might have noticed in this episode that Caroline Galzin, the amazing co-host of the show, was not present in this interview. She was ready to come in. We were ready to do this thing. And I got a text message very early in the morning and said, hey, look, I'm just not feeling well. And we were heading into New Year's right at this interview. And she was like, I just I don't feel like coming in. And I can't I don't want to get anybody sick. I really want to be respectful of everybody who's coming in. So she opted out on this one because of that. And it was already scheduled and I had gone in. And so I said, look, I will do it. I'll do it alone. But she was sorely missed. She had so much to this show. And I missed having her here in the studio because it was a lot of fun. And she's better now. We're rocking and rolling. And it is snowing. I just looked. I just opened the door to the studio and it's dark. And there's snow coming down, which means I should probably get going.

01:56:52So I hope you are being safe out there. I'm going to try and go and be safe. Love you guys. Bye.