218: André Hueston Mack

24:45It's still, it's the best ham in the world. It's only 50 bucks. I feel like we don't realize that like these are like the best hams in the world. Correct. Well, and I think a lot of people attach price and it's like, oh, yeah. Or are they going with a mindset of like, oh, taking it down? Like the idea is like to allow yourself to be open to it. And so we don't, we don't have any$50 hams, but I do feel like we do have some of the best hams. you know our hams rival any ham you know i mean we're dealing with a small producer dwight is called dakota it's from like nancy tennessee of course his name is dwight i love that and ships it to us and the pillowcase in which it hangs from the rafters nice as as as people did back in the day yeah you know our first couple of hams you know they're 42 months old wow you know i mean that's outside any regulation that you could find in italy and you know so just making you know these really amazing remarkable hams and i think it's funny and i wanted to give you know us a showcase to do it you know it's a it's a it's a common thing to go to a country and all they have is things made from that country here in america it's always different where somehow we're not a real restaurant if we don't have a more international take and i think it's like no i want to show you all the really great small things that are happening here uh and that we all should be champion i think it's changing and and i want to segue and talk about burpin Because as a culture, we're obsessed with timestamp bourbon, bourbon with bottles with numbers on the label.

26:11And I want to get your take on the current status of Pappy because, you know, Stitzel Weller, this mythic distillery, was making the juice, the bourbon that is in Pappy Van Winkle. Now, that is a finite amount. Stitzel Weller has been closed for 25 years maybe. Pappy is going to run out at some point. Is that correct assumption? Well, no. They're still continuing to make, right? Like, so Weller, it's so funny. I did not know in anything. I was introduced to Weller back in like 1995. Right. 96. I was going to college in Oklahoma. A friend of mine, I got into gambling. I was booking. This is probably where we flash up the 1-800 number or something.

26:52Right? If you have a problem with gambling. But anyways. Cautionary tale here for Andre. I used to, you know, sports gambling, sports book. Let me guess you're not gambling anymore. No, no, no. I'm good. But, like, I'm not addicted to anything. So, like, I feel very comfortable walking away. You're talking about it. Yeah. No, so we, but, yeah, so a friend of mine, he was a bookie. Yeah. Or was a friend of the bookie. And anytime we would go somewhere, he's like, you guys have Weller? Yeah. And then they would say no. And he was like, all right, we're leaving, guys. And I'm like, what do you mean?

27:23Why are we leaving? They're like, because they don't have Weller. So, you know, that's the stuff I used to drink a long time ago. You know, not knowing, you know, of its type. Why it would become. Yeah, or whatever it is. And, you know, and I think, you know, that's just a side that that's happening with inside of the meteorite rise of of American whiskey, which is like just been turned upside down on its head. And, you know, and it's really interesting. They are making a lot of offshoots of like, you know, it's like like vintage. Right. Yeah. But yeah. So like like I don't think they're ever going to run out of that kind of stuff because they're still aging it.

28:00But people are obsessed with bourbon, and it seems really – it was just wild to me. I just recently got in. We started making a little bit of rye whiskey from Kentucky. Very cool. You're making your own. That's great. Yeah, and it was a really fun process. Speaking of per se, a fellow co-worker there, we remained friends, and he started one of the first kind of whiskey Ford restaurants in America, which happened to be in Brooklyn. It was called Char No. 4. Of course, Smith Street. I was like, this has to be Char 4. Yeah, yeah, yeah. R.I.P. Char 4 was the best. Yeah, it really was. And you could get like Black Maple Hill for like$6 at one point, which is like impossible.

28:45It's nothing anymore, you know? Well, you know what was funny? I think the first time I ever seen Lanell was a woman who had out in Red Hook. Of course. She had a little shop. We know Linnell. And Linnell made her own. Yeah. And I remember it being there on the show. The first place I ever saw it was at Char No. 4. And now fast forward. I'm in Kentucky last year. And I see it in a shop. And it's$26 ,000 a bottle. For one of Linnell's batches? Yes. What? I couldn't believe it. I was like on the, I was, I like fell to the floor. I remember when Linnell was just out there in Redbook making that stuff, and it was delicious.

29:27Yeah, so it's just been interesting. To me, I like to tell that story because it tells you how far it's come. It has. And I guess, is it a net positive? I think it's a great thing. Too much of anything could be a bad thing, and I think we'll see some repercussions of that and some dips in the market because of that. But not so much that it deterred me from not getting involved. right I end up doing a collaboration series a friend of mine who owned Pinhook Char No. 4 started a company called Pinhook and we worked on a collaboration series which was really fun and amazing and then we just got to thinking you know what would it be like if we did something that was a little bit more approachable you know this you know I was blending 10 barrels of 10 year old Wyoming whiskey you know that in the resale market those bottles got up pretty quick to 700 bucks a bottle.

30:21Um, and I wanted to do something different, you know, Rye to me was always the underdog. Oh yeah. Um, and you know, Rittenhouse, you know, for years was the, was the guy, you know, I felt, I feel like. Well, even at Char, I think you could get Rittenhouse for a buck a shot. Yeah. You know what I mean? Hilarious. Definitely. And so, you know, Rye to me, you know, was something that I wanted to champion and which I found myself drinking quite a bit of. Uh, and as we got to talking, we were like, yeah, let's, let's do it. So I ended up starting a new company with the owners of Pinhook called Rye & Sons.

30:53And, you know, it's really about rye for all. It's about putting craft in the well. And so it's just been a really fun thing to kind of see. Craft in the well, smart. Yeah. You know what I mean. Yeah, of course. You want your mixed drinks to have good quality domestic product that doesn't, you know, kill the price. And I think price point, we can get there. What do you age it at then? Two years. Yeah. So this is like two and a half years. But I've always felt rye is very giving young, youthful, right, where bourbon isn't. And I kind of even make those analogies when I talk to people about bourbon is more akin to like California Cabernet.

31:34And rye is similar to Pinot Noir, complex, gives a lot in its youth. Are these standard barrel sizes too for two years? Yeah, you're not doing any of those tricks throwing wood in there. No, no, no, no, no. So just straight up. You know, and what's interesting about the whiskey business is, you know, it is, it's about to, you know, it's not a lot of, there's only a small amount of distillers. Like there's not a lot of people distilling. And I think that might change over the years. um you know when what i realize is like what makes you know anything different or what makes the product your anyone's product unique uh is you know how you blend and how you finish absolutely agree it's a capital heavy business it takes six years for often to get certification right in bourbon or five years whatever it is and that's so capital heavy intensive but yeah i agree blending and finishing is not talked about as much as like what's in the barrel but you finishing is essential right because what you feel like what you realize is like oh there's only like five real distillers like and yeah most of it comes from that but it's like how you how you how you end up blending you know like rye and sons you know we didn't go to the traditional route of being like 90 95 rye you know to me i like more you know our mash bills more like 60 and then 20 barley 20 corn and what's interesting is the barley and all of that you know that's the most expensive Right.

33:03And so we're putting a little bit more in that. And so I think that like it really works well in cocktails. It kind of harnesses a little bit of that, that spiciness that you tend to associate with with rye. I've asked Janice Robinson, Alice Firing, Talia Biocchi, Jordan Michaelman, many in wine. This question, and I want to know, Andre, your take. Natural wine. It's quite a topic. There's just so much to talk about with natural wine. I feel like it's a meme. It's also a product that is the future. It's also maybe not even the future. It's more than that. Jon Bonet and I talked about it recently.

33:37What is your take on this natural wine universe we live in? I'm part of the good wine movement. If it's good, I want to drink it. Preach. And so I think what's interesting about that topic is if you applied it and said the wine world. Within the wine world, there's people who make really great wine. There's people who make really crappy wine. In the natural wine world, I think the same thing can be applied. And I think some of the bad examples, you know, people use that against them. And there's some really great examples. And so it's very polarizing in a lot of ways. And my thing is that I just want to be part of the good wine movement.

34:17I want to support things that I think are great. I think even within that, like just like you have in the regular wine world, you have, you know, people who use it as a marketing term and some people who it's really a way of life. The fiber of their being. And so I think there's a lot of that. I think some days I have a problem with how the wine is made supersedes like any sense of terroir of the wine. Right. So, you know, if you're blind tasting me on something and I can tell you that it's made, it's natural, right? That's air quotes there. Yeah. But I wouldn't be able to tell. Yeah, no terroir.

34:56It's all been stripped from all of that. And so I think it will all start to play out. I think what you're starting to see now is that, you know, it's starting to level itself out. You know, if you look about like YouTube early, when it early started, it was a lot of cat videos. Yeah. Right? That were getting the most views. Keyboard cat. Shout out. Right? Yeah. And then now what you're having is level-headed, professional. It's a real platform that, you know, that real companies are putting real money into production, that kind of stuff. Right? And I think that's what's really happening within that industry.

35:29even some of the younger people coming to it like calling bullshit on some stuff but like you know for me I will always champion anything that brings more people to wine and I get it you know the way it's presented it's presented with a lot of pretense but on the other hand some days you know it is just another level of elitism in wine that's well said I think you're going to hear different opinions from all the folks I mentioned. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. You've really— I know them. You know them all. And honestly, it's why wine is so fascinating and such a rich text for writing and talking and why I think, Andre, you will make the first great wine television show.

36:12We'll see. Let's get there. Because I think just back to that, I just feel like there's a way to educate and have fun. And a lot of times when you're like stroking grapes in a vineyard, it's not fun. No, it's not. You know, and I think, you know, it's real work is I think what most people don't understand. It takes a lot of work. And when you've been there, you visit it, you understand all the blood, sweat and tears that go into it. It makes it hard for you to talk shit or to panic. But I think you have a different level of appreciation for it. As I mentioned, coffee is a micro topic on here and we've covered so much in beverage.

36:49Do you mess with coffee? Are you in that world? I do. I drink a lot of cold brew. We do have a cold brew on tap in our office. Your own coffee or from who? No, no. We use Parler. Yeah, Parler is your guide. Yeah, so that's kind of been our go-to of late. Right, right, right. Actually, probably really one of the first people I got to hang around and like roast with them, like them showing me the steps and just really kind of really starting to understand coffee in that way. you know and so it's funny because I think some people don't like parlor the way I think it like leaves some people hanging in some ways but like I like parlor yeah I've always enjoyed it and the idea of like you know just like you know they're different mixes but yeah we do we do a lot of cold burn I like East One too shout out to East One that's my Brooklyn roaster but back to like just coffee as a topic to research and as something to really think deeply about as you have with so many elements in beverage.

37:47Is it something that you want to learn more about? Is it something that you're maybe not going to do quite yet? I mean, it seems like it's... Oh, no. I mean, I am, you know, I, uh, you know, I'm working on a couple of TV shows that basically is that, right? It's like, you know, hanging out with people that, um, that allow me to be able to appreciate the thing that they do at the level I do with wine, if that kind of makes sense. Absolutely. Like a connoisseur. Yeah, so like somebody like teaching me how to appreciate something that they're very passionate in the way that I am about wine. Yeah.

38:21And so coffee is definitely one of those things, you know, going to see it. Like also like not knowing that it could be dangerous, right? You know what I mean? Like that part like, you know, it's so wild to me. It's grown in places with conflict, places with human rights violations. And obviously from the farm to your cup, there's so many steps like wine that people lose money and people are not paid fairly. It's a huge problem. No. So I'm anxious to learn as more. Like I said, I'm a very curious person by nature. And I think those are always really great qualities to have when you're thinking about learning something or pursuing something.

39:03Let's talk about 99 bottles. I've not had a chance to read much of it, but it is such a remarkable book. Thank you. You're welcome. It's been recognized in the industry. It's got voice. You designed it, it looks like. I mean, you had a lot of the – you come from an art direction background. If a listener, you haven't even checked that out. Like, Andre's actually runs a design agency, too, on top of all of this. Yeah, yeah. And I was self-taught. So, you know, I never knew that, you know, that that was something that I was good at. You know, it was, you know, it was at per se at those meetings where we had the back of the lineup that I designed.

39:36I used to design the layout. It used to take like 30 minutes a day and design the layout like a magazine layout. Cool. And that's how we taught them, you know, and did things. And so it was like, did you go to school for that? And I was like, this? Like, no. Were you using just like InDesign? No, it wasn't even. I was using, I was doing it in Word. Yeah. Wow. Right? Like trying to drop pictures in it. So now when I go back, if I didn't save it in a PDF, then the format's all messed up. But 99 Bottles is, you know, a very personal and fun, you know, book for me. You know, it tells my wine life story through 99 Bottles.

40:10You know, whether, you know, mainly wine, but alcohol, water. You know, I've always believed that wine is a placeholder of time. Yeah. The reason why that bottle tastes so good is because you were on vacation in Portugal by the water. It was three euros, right? You've been trying to track down that wine ever since you came back to the States, couldn't find it. Then you finally get it, you taste it, and you're like, they must be exporting something of lower quality. And it's not. What you're chasing is everything else that made that bottle special. And it's a placeholder of that time and moment.

40:44So this book is, you know, in these pivotal moments in my life, you know, there was a bottle of wine or something that was around that will always help me tell the story. You know, per se, we opened, I think the first day, the first service that we opened, we shut the restaurant down because it caught on fire. Oh, that's right. Legendary moment in the history of the restaurant. fire but like during that time yeah i was the one that was like it smells like it's so funny because this tells you where i'm from i was like man it smells like somebody smoking crack in here and everybody else looks at me they're like geez yeah how do you like we don't know what crack smells like and i was like oh shit okay well i grew up in trenton during the crack era like you could smell people smoking it on the street but it just smells like burning plastic and i was like i think there might be a fire and then smoke started to billow out of the out of the panels on the ceiling.

41:38But all along, I had opened up this bottle of 1985 Chateau Reyes, Chateau Neuf-de-Papeau table. And so I remember just working on that and working through the whole conversation. At that moment when the restaurant was burning down? So right before that. And then I remember, you know, they didn't finish the bottle of wine. Lunch service is over. We're doing the crossover where the dinner crew's coming in. And, you know, they said, hey, well, you know, take what's left in the decanter and, you know, you share it with the rest of the staff. And so I'm taking the decanter back. Oh my gosh. Right. And then I realized that's when I was like, Oh dude, this smells like an electrical fire.

42:12You know, it was like, before I was like, this smells like crack was missing around. And then smoke started to billow out. The alarm started to go off and we never got to drink the wine with the staff. Then they evacuated the building. And so I tell all of these stories. So like, you know, this is one of the bottles that are, that's in, um, you know, that's in the book, you know, I think we start off with, uh, old English malt liquor and, you know, I talk a lot about, you know, you know, I was a kid that was raised by hip hop, fell in love with punk rock and skateboarding and all of, and all of those things.

42:45But like rap music, you know, taught me what to drink, how to hold it. Right. You know what I mean? Like all of those things, like what kind of music, I mean, even like in this weird way, like how to spend money that you didn't have but when you got it like and actually who to even be attracted to yeah right so it was like this weird weird thing and so that's where i started you know talking about it's i'd write a check for a case of think about that right like a case of of of 40 ounces was like 13 dollars like well yeah 12.98 yep and i was writing checks for them right you know what i mean so it was just like different those kind of things so like you know and that's where the book starts and you You think about a kid from that to, like, tasting some of the best wines in the world, working in the best restaurant in the world.

43:33Question. Is it orange juice and gin or is it apple juice and gin, to quote hip-hop, gin and juice? It's OJ. It's definitely OJ. It's OJ. It's no apple juice. Because as a child, I was, like, looking at it. I'm like, is it apple or is it orange juice? Yep. There's a lot of beverage in hip-hop. No, there is. There is, you know, I mean, but like also in a weird way, which we don't talk about a lot of times is maybe as a coping mechanism. Yeah. Right. You know what I mean? Like, you know, like to forget where you where you're from, to forget where you're at. Also, maybe it's a cup of courage to. Yeah.

44:11To to push you forward. It is. It's you know, it's liquid courage. It's ambition. Yeah. So, you know, it's interesting. So but like but it was a really fun book. And I think along the way, you learn a lot about who I am, not only just who I am as a person and through my stories, but you learn a lot about the wine business and behind the scenes and how things work. And then it's set up to look like a faux wine guide. So it's— I love the illustration, the art direction. It has—I mean, there's a lot of different concepts that are just executed brilliantly in this book. I love it. You're welcome. Yeah, it's really fun.

44:45And, like, each wine has, you know, on the page is, you know, illustrated as a trading card. Yeah. You know, which is something I was into. Then we have, like, a lot of these inlets, like what's Chateauneuf-du-Pape? You know, so it actually gives you real knowledge of those regions and, like, what they are. I got to hang a telegraph one time. Yeah. Back in Avignon, yeah, with some weird French guys. Yeah. Some weird guys, man. Yeah, everybody's weird, but in a good way. But yeah, so I think by the book, not only do you get to know me a little bit better, you definitely get to know a lot about wine.

45:19And, you know, I've always felt like the definitive books on wine have already been written. You know what I mean? Like this is like to jumpstart you, to get you interested. Yeah. If you are, I'm just telling you, not everybody has the same journey. We don't all get here the same way. But the fact that I got here coming from where I came from, that a lot of people can get here. I love it. Andre, so what are you researching? right now. I feel like we've talked about television. We've talked about maybe other future book projects in the works. I feel like. Yeah, no, there's quite a few book projects.

45:50Like, I mean, it's one of those things like what is not in the works? You know, shopping a couple of television shows, working on the next book, which will be probably more of a guide. Yeah. Then like this, like more memoir. And then memoirish. Lots of different things. Wine Club is coming for me. So, you know, I think a lot of people that know me now know me through YouTube, through that medium. Yeah, through BA, yeah. And everybody's asking me, you know, what to drink, what they should drink. And I felt like this is a better way to can do that conversation with them offline is, you know, having a wine club where people can buy.

46:27Put the bottles in their hands. Yep. And then we can taste together. I don't know if a live event, but, like, there's definitely video involved in it. So that said, you know, I mean, expanding. You know, I think we have like six or seven businesses on Rogers Avenue, but looking to move forward and expand. You know, I think I said no to Rock Center. I didn't pursue that. You know, I really wanted to concentrate on my neighborhood. And, you know, and it's about community. Important distinction. I think, Andre, thank you for sharing that because we talked about Rock Center a couple times. And, you know, there was a lot of money flowing, a lot of checks we got.

47:00But you are keeping focused on your neighborhood. Now, where are you located so our listeners can know where they can find you? So we're in Brooklyn. We're in a neighborhood called Prospect Leverage Garden, so right, you know, just south of the park. Yep. On the other side of the park from Park Slope. Very beautiful. And, yeah, and it's just this one street, you know, that I, you know, my house is on. It abuts to the street called Rogers Avenue. We've always, I think all of our neighbors, we've always kind of believed in this and that street. You know, maybe it'd be more of a merchant road. You know, it's not as wide as these like Flatbush or Nostrand, but it's a very quiet and quaint.

47:40And, you know, this is where I decided that like I'm going to do my thing here. And, you know, it's something for everybody. Right. But if it's not, there's plenty of other places. Yeah. You know, in that neighborhood for you to get to do things. And so it's just been a really fun and like, you know, me and my wife, we always have said, like, what can we do to contribute to a changing narrative? of this neighborhood. We lived there for 15 years. What do we know how to do? You know, we met at Per Se, right? She was a captain. She ended up writing a New York Times book about working there. And this is where we feel most comfortable is entertaining.

48:17And a lot of these places are really just extensions of our living room. You know, to anything, to one of our children, you know, starting a compost, they call it the compost boys. They pick up the compost, you know they were only taking ours to the community garden and now they take everybody else's oh that's agreeable yeah so it's always just like this you know what could we do uh to contribute to this like you know like we're past the point you know i'm sure people are like you know you have some people that come in and say well i don't want to do anything because i don't want to feel like i'm gentrifying the neighborhood like like that's something like i get it but at some point you know change is going to happen whether it's going to be you or not yeah and And that's what I always felt like.

48:58Andre Wells said, I mean, that's a tricky topic to cover. It's hard. It's hard. It's hard, you know, and even me, you know, it's like, but it comes up a lot of things. Like, you know, you know, I think for a lot of people, they think when you say black owned that, like, every single one of your employees has to be black or look like me. Yeah. And that's not true. You know what I mean? That's not true. And then also, like, you know, does that mean am I not a gentrifier? Right. Because because I don't. Some. Absolutely. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. No, absolutely. Absolutely, but there's some not. But then also, you know, you find, you know, and this is all community politics.

49:31You find, you know, you find newcomers championing a cause for something, for someone who's been there for a long time that doesn't understand that. You know, there's tons of people that I didn't know come up to me. You know, older woman comes up to me, Caribbean lady, been living there for years. And she says, you know, I just want to tell you thank you. And I said, for what? You know, I thought she was going to complain about, like, you know, parking or maybe some of my employees. And she's like, I know from reading about you that you can open your place anywhere in the world. And the fact that you decided to open here in our neighborhood makes us very proud.

50:04I love that. And the thing for me was that that's all I ever wanted. I just wanted to put something out in the world, specifically my neighborhood, my community, that people could be proud of. You said you had six concepts, six on the street? Yeah. Six. That's remarkable. So you're staying there. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, and not to say that we won't expand, but, like, I was leaving my neighborhood to go purchase very similar things. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, and I always wanted a wine bar. If I wasn't traveling, this is where you could find me. And that started it all. Yeah. That was Ann Sons. And then, you know, opened in 2020.

50:40And then. Many more. Yeah, many more. Do you still work at Ann Sons? Do you still work the bar sometimes? You could find me there, you know, at a lot of them. You know, I think, you know, I always tell my staff, it's like, you know, I can't be pulling out the seats if I'm responsible for putting asses in the seats. So there's other stuff I have to do. Right. You know what I mean? Like there's other things that I have to do. Trust me. You know, it's back to those days that per se, where do I feel most comfortable? On the floor. Yeah. Right. But in order for us to grow, I have to put myself in a lot more uncomfortable situations.

51:10Excel. Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah. Well, but, but also like, like, and not even, I'm very comfortable here. Right. I'm very comfortable doing this. I've done these for years. But the idea is that, you know, this is part of putting asses in the seats, right, is telling the story, talking to people. And it's always funny because I think people recognize me from Bon Appetit videos on YouTube, but most of them don't know that I own restaurants. Yes, I own quite a few restaurants. I make wine. I do a lot of stuff. I've done a lot of stuff before I was on, you know, YouTube. Yeah. Yeah. But, you know, case in point, normally what happens is I'll walk into one of my places.

51:50I think one time I was in the bathroom, I came out and someone said, oh, my God, that's the YouTube guy. And then someone says and then they say, what do you like here? Like, what are you eating? And if you were a guest. Yeah. A lot of times I think a lot of those people think that I'm a guest here. Yeah. Or like or like you're walking by and like you'll see somebody like I'll see my picture on their phone. so I think people are starting to get it but like you know I understand that they you know you're like oh we didn't even know let alone that this was your place that's like a real mind fuck just having had 20 years of experience and now getting recognized because of one thing correct well you know and I think you know that's something that you know that has to grow on me like you know like it was difficult at the beginning you know I didn't even know how to handle it I think a lot of stories happen like when I come back from the bathroom The Sullivan Street one?

52:40Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I come back from the bathroom. Our server has changed. The one before is going home. And they're like, hey, do you mind? And I'm like, no, not in mind at all. And the gentleman says, oh, my God, I'm such a huge fan. I love your videos. And I was like, oh, and this was at the beginning. And for me, it's all about deflection. Like, I just want to eat and have a good time. And because we were, he's industry, I kind of gave my real opinion about it. where it was like, ah, you know what? I don't really have fun shooting them. You know, it's kind of a disconnect. You know, I'm trying to explain it to him.

53:14And then he stops me and he says, well, you're kind of ruining it for me. And that changed everything for me where I was like, oh, I can't, you can't always be honest. And, you know, and to be honest, I don't watch one of the moments. I never watched the videos. Yeah. You cut them. It's almost like never meet your idols. Correct. You never want to meet. That's because they always say something. They always disappoint you or whatever. So, like, you know, it's like we watch, you know, I shoot the videos. It's like giving a staff training at a restaurant. Like, you got to check the pulse. Nobody laughs at my jokes.

53:48It's in full of an empty room, right? Right? And then I never watch them. And then somehow, you know, they'll send me something like, oh, this video hit a million. This video hit three million. I mean, breaking news, they're really good. Yeah. No, no, they are. No, they are. I mean. They're really entertaining. I hear that. I get that. And I would have to say that like, but like, so it's not real when you film it. It's not real when I see the views because I can't fathom people are actually watching them, right? And what makes it real is those moments where people come up to you. And those moments that you know that you impacted this person's life.

54:25So much out of the way that they actually come up and say something to you. This is what I tell. I was telling my kids, it's like, oh, no, people recognize me. it takes a certain person to actually walk up to you and say something. And, you know, and I love those moments. I think they're great. You know, besides the moment where someone wakes me up, I'm sleeping on the airplane to ask me if I'm the YouTube guy. Oh, that's not good. But I think it's just a testament of how it's touched people and how great it is. And I had to get used to that in a way to say, okay, like I'm okay with it. I just got to figure out the other part.

55:03Yep. Thanks for being honest with that. No, it's really cool. Andrea, we asked all guests in the Taste podcast, if you could write a cookbook or food culture book without the burden of time, meaning you have no deadline or the burden of budget, meaning you have all the money in the world to execute the book. I know you're working on some, but you probably have that dream project. What would that book be? I think, you know, I'm starting on that deep dive in the country ham. Yeah. I think there's a lot to it, you know, a guide in a way of like, you know, In order to really understand country ham, I think you have to travel to other countries to understand ham culture.

55:35And then talk about our own and talk about, you know, shed some light on some of the greatest to do it. Yeah, I know that sounds really nerdy. People are like, if you could do anything, I'm like, that's kind of it. But I'm all over the place. Actually, to be honest, and it has nothing to do with food. No, let's go. I wanted to do a 30 for 30 on the Chicago Bears. Yeah. So like in like 85 when they had that run, there were only two games that they didn't cover the spread. Wow. And there was a cab driver. Conspiracy theories. Yeah, yeah. So they didn't. So it was only two games. And I say that to say that there was a taxi cab driver, him and his friend, that bet on every single game.

56:16And they won most of the time. He bet the cover. Yeah, so they won. And with that, he didn't buy a new house or anything. He bought whiskey. and it became one of the largest whiskey collections. And so— He didn't just buy any whiskey. He bought the whiskeys he's finding in Indiana and Kentucky. Yeah, well, I mean, he just bought all whiskeys, like scotch, whiskeys from all over the world, American, just all over the world. And Jack Rose bought his collection. Wow. So, like, you know, so, like, I like—you know, so, like, that kind of food, kind of beverage, but, like, but it's, like, those kinds of things that I'm interested in.

56:54and it fits perfectly for 30 for 30. You know how they tell two stories. Oh, yeah, definitely. The duality of sports and culture. Andre, I could talk to you forever. This is such a great – thank you for joining the Taste Podcast. Thank you for having me, man. I appreciate it.

57:17Liza, three things. Let's do it. Let's do it. I'd like to start with you. What is one of your three things? My first thing is a public service announcement for other New Yorkers, which is that after years of going to Long Island Bar and begging and praying that there would be a dessert on the menu, when I went in this past weekend, cheesecake was on the menu. Wow. And I freaked out. I immediately turned to the server. I said, how long has this been on the menu? Because I was there a couple of weeks ago and there was no cheesecake on the menu. And he said, oh, it's only been on for a week. It's a cheesecake from Court Pastry Shop, which is that old school Sicilian place.

57:52In my old neighborhood. I love it. It's been open since the late 40s. I was so excited about it. And then I didn't order it, actually, because I was going to a Shy Girl concert. Yeah, you don't want to have dairy before a Shy Girl concert. I feel like you need to, like, represent correctly. Yeah, there were, you know, there were, like, stripper poles at the concert. So I think I, like, had to make some decisions. But it was really shameful to be so excited about the dessert and then not ordering it. And the server told me, oh, you know, we might not keep it on the menu if not enough people order it.

58:19So I'm obviously going back soon, but I hope that if anyone listens to this in the near future, they will also be galvanized to go order this. So backing up, Long Island Bar, on Atlantic Avenue, Toby Cicchini, his spot, he invented the Cosmo famously. Is Toby still there attending bar? I haven't been to Long Island. I don't really hang there. No, I mean, I was there at 5 p.m. on a Tuesday, so I didn't see him. But, you know. Fun place, though, right? Long Island Bar. One of my favorite spots, one of the best, I think, booths to sit in and have a nice Negroni and a burger. And I really think it is a place that should have dessert on the menu.

58:51So I'm really excited about that. That's nice. Now, if you could pick a dessert, would it be cheesecake? Does that work well with the food that they're serving there? It would be cheesecake. Cheesecake is one of my favorite desserts in general. No shit. I didn't know that about you. Like probably my all time. But I mean, I think like an ice cream sundae would be good on that menu too. A chocolate cake. Something simple that they don't have to do in that way. I love that. So once Anna, Tatiana, and I took a field trip to the Cheesecake Factory in Queens, for a story. Oh, my God. And then Anna, on this very podcast, interviewed the executive chef of the Cheesecake Factory.

59:26Wow, that's such a dream interview. I love that idea. I'm going to link to it in the show notes. It's definitely required listening if you like cheesecake. Yeah, well, so I'm going to go back for that. What's your first thing? So last night I was at Sofray in Prospect. No, it's in Park Slope. What am I saying? It's on the border. Border. It's on the Calb. So for a well-established, adored Persian restaurant run by the chef Nassim Alkhani. And, you know, Nassim is going to be on the podcast. She has a cookbook coming out, and I can't wait to talk to her about that. Also, James Beard, finalist for New York State.

1:00:02So exciting. It's a great place, and I'd never been. And honestly, a real highlight was this roasted meitake mushroom dish. Ooh, I feel like that's been kind of a little moment on restaurant menus. Is it a whole mitake kind of? It's a whole mitake kind of cut into two or three pieces with fried sunchokes, chips. Wow. With a really nice yogurt-y kind of, it's called a yogurt whey. So it's like a little bit of a looser sauce, but with the acidity of yogurt. And I thought it was like chef's kiss, the best thing I've had in a long time. Delicious. That sounds so great. And it's such a beautiful dining room also.

1:00:36It really is. You've been there then. I've been there a while ago. I'd like to go back. I really love Persian food. and I feel like it's something that isn't as widely available here in New York than when I grew up in L.A. Oh, my gosh, yeah. But I also am not seeking it out, so I need to go do that, I think. Yeah, it's so cool. Like, so-fraig, definitely worth checking out. And I think the flavor profile, they do a tadig. So the flavor profile for me is, like, a little more sour and acidic, which I love. But the tadig, they did, like, the small side of tadig, which was, like, of the burnt rice, but then it had, like, a small flatbread that had been deeply fried.

1:01:07So it was, like, a very rich fried little pita chip. that sounds so good with this like sauce that was extremely like almost like fruity forward really good what's your next one my next thing is that i made a fennel frond pesto recently inspired by a recipe in hedy mckinnon's new book tender heart that's coming out in the u.s very soon i interviewed her on the podcast a couple weeks ago and she posted an instagram reel of her making this dish her dish is a fennel i think it's a gnocchi actually yeah it's frond pesto but I had just never thought about making a fennel frond pesto before and I'm really into like a whole vegetable preparation so I made a shaved fennel salad yeah and then blitzed the fronds with some pepitas like she does in the recipe and then I also added uh so rice vinegar a little bit of miso and a lot of red pepper flakes and olive oil it was so good all of my friends that I served it to are really into it and I just am planning on making it a lot more well that's a cool dish I I wonder, the fronds, do they bring like that licorice, anise flavor profile to the pesto?

1:02:07They do. It's almost like a dill kind of grassiness as well. And I think it's fun to be able to say this is a full fennel. My idea of fun is saying this is a full fennel dish. A full fennel dish. And fennel is polarizing. Shouts to my wife, Tamara, who hates it. And we never actually, I never really make it because I try to appease people in my life. But I love fennel. I'll bring you some. I love it. We can do it, you know, offline. Now, I want to ask you about pesto because we are in this rut where we Ligurian pesto is what we think of pesto, right? This like basil forward Italian dish. But pesto can be many things, thus this dish.

1:02:43Yeah, you know, I say fennel frond pesto. Pesto is maybe a loose interpretation. I'm not Italian, so I don't think I would venture to say what is or isn't a pesto. But I do think, you know, even when I was talking about this with somebody, they said, oh, I make an arugula pesto all the time, which I thought was a cool idea. if you have, you know, arugula that's about to go bad. Yeah, I mean, pesto, it's totally correct. I don't think pesto needs to be from Liguria and be the basil forward by nothing. It can be many things. I think it's nice that we can, you know, free pesto from basil. Free pesto.

1:03:14Free pesto, for sure. Let's put it in a shirt. Yeah. I think we should do shirts. We haven't really done that at taste. Free pesto. That's the first one. That would be, I don't know if I'd rock a free pesto. I mean, it'd be like, what are you talking about? Is there a guy, you know, pesto? No, I'm really passionate about everyone getting served pesto for free. I love it. That's cool. What's your next thing? I'm going to stick with cooking and I'm going to give you a lot of credit right now. You really sent me on my path for Passover and you were like short ribs. And I'm like, yes, please. So we hosted Passover.

1:03:43I, for my house rules, I was like no brisket in my house. I don't like brisket at home at all. It's not good. I like it in like the hill country of Texas, but I don't really like it as a food. It's just not good. Yeah. I think I said short rib to you because a couple of years ago, my Seder didn't get our act together in time to order a brisket in Brooklyn, which those go very fast. So short rib was born out of necessity. But I did think it was a very delicious main meat to be serving. It's a beautiful dish. It worked out so well. It was an Allison Roman recipe from the New York Times. I love it.

1:04:16It actually, the braising liquid was cool. and it's more of a citrus forward, acidic forward short rib. So braising liquid, a key in this dish was, of course, there's a liquid, so I use chicken stock, but you can use any stock, but it had honey, apple vinegar, soy sauce, and thyme. Beautiful braise there. The key, I think, is once you pull after three hours, let it rest a bit, you shower it with lemon zest and lemon juice. So you're leaning into the acidity with the vinegar and then of course the end with the citrus and fan favorite. I love that. Did you have any leftovers? And if so, what did you make with them?

1:04:54I wish I had leftovers. We had a pretty big house and I think everyone, I think there might've been one little bit of leftover and I like, I snuck it the next morning. Chef's treat. That was me. Yeah, it was a chef's treat. And I got these beautiful short ribs that were very marbled and they were really like big boys. I was like super stoked about that. Yeah. What's your last one? My last one, I'm bringing us back to dessert. I went to Jack's on Bond recently. Nice. which is the new restaurant from the Wilder Contra team here. And I've been lusting after this creamsicle pie on Instagram since they've just been teasing the restaurant.

1:05:25So I finally got to eat it. And it's just like a cartoon idea of a pie. The ratio of whipped topping to this like orange creamsicle filling is basically one-to-one, which I didn't realize was quite what I wanted out of a pie until I had that. But it was a very just lush, dreamy, satisfying bite. What's the ratio that you typically go for? I mean, I will eat whatever is served to me. I think that most of the time there's kind of a two-thirds filling to one-third whip situation. This is a graham cracker crust, then this very orange creamsicle-esque filling, which really does taste like a melted popsicle, and then an equal amount of whipped cream on top.

1:06:07Matt, what's your last thing? Okay, so Korean duck albi. Do you know what this, have you heard of that dish at all, duck kalbi? I don't know. Tell me about it. So duck kalbi is, I think, kind of slept on. It's not really thought of a lot in the U.S. It's really common in Seoul and in Korea. It's basically barbecue chicken. It's grilled chicken that is like placed on a grill similar to traditional beef kalbi or samjibsal pork belly. and I think it's one of, it's like one of my favorite Korean dishes now and since doing the book, Korea World. And I feel like I found a spot in New York that does it really well.

1:06:47Ooh, okay. What is it? I want to know. It's called Hong Chun Chun Duck Galbi. It's on 32nd Street, second floor, like a little hidden. I've talked to a few folks. Some folks know it, some folks don't. And I wanted to shout it out because what this is, is it's chicken that's been marinated in a gojujan or gojugaru forward spicy mix that's usually a blend of honey or rice syrup. So it's like a sweet and hot kind of fiery chicken, but you lay it out on a grill and you put vegetables and you grill it and you wrap it in sam. So in perilla leaves, lettuce, you serve it with radish, kimchi, and it's one of these styles of barbecue that I think is less respected here.

1:07:31It sounds so good. It makes me want to eat that for lunch right now. I think that spicy sweet as a combination is something that is so appealing. For Korean food, I think it's one of the real strengths. There's a stew called duck doritang that's basically this version in soup, and it's definitely a favorite, and we have it in our first book. It had a lot of honey powder in it, so that was the main ingredient. But this is like taking duck doritang, DDT, and putting it under the grill. You drink some beers with it, and it's really fun. And this restaurant is, it's very like fast and easy to navigate.

1:08:04And if you're not feeling like beef and you want some chicken, hit it up. Let's go. Let's go right now. Yeah, let's go right now. Eliza, thank you for sharing your three things. Anytime.

1:08:17The Taste Podcast is hosted by Eliza Abarbanel and me, Matt Rodbar. The show is produced by Shalia Harris and Pat Stango and edited by Clayton Gumber. Theme music by Steve Rydell. Visit Taste Online at tastecooking.com and make sure to subscribe to our newsletter for updates on all cool things that are happening.