228: Smallhold

29:34But it's been good. Like we're also in a bunch of other retailers there now as well. But Centromarco was the first customer there. And then Los Angeles, I love LA, sure. But it also had the largest increase in mushroom demand in the country during COVID. And so a lot of people are eating a lot of mushrooms in Los Angeles. And so we thought that that was a good place for us to go. So that's the demand side. But also there's a supply side as well where we were talking about the freshness of mushrooms. Most of the mushrooms in the country are grown actually on this side of the country, although there are large farms everywhere.

30:11But most of those are button mushroom farms, which is actually a totally different kind of mushroom to grow. So we grow on basically the mushrooms that we grow, you would find growing on trees. And they have a shorter shelf life than button mushrooms, which are basically like the iceberg lettuce of the mushroom world in the grocery store. It's hard to ship a blue oyster from New York to Los Angeles and still have it be good on the shelf. And so because of that, you have to farm locally, which is kind of cool, or at least more locally. And that's what we wound up doing is moving the facility to the space.

30:47And then what we had to do was make a national supply chain for specialty mushrooms, which, you know, looking back on it is ridiculous and very stressful. But also I think it gave us a lot of first mover advantage when we decided to sort of go national like we did. and also give us the support network as we continue to grow. Yeah, you're kind of blowing my mind right now. I've always wondered why button mushrooms are the only mushroom you can find in some places. Are you saying it's because they're the easiest to ship? So a lot of produce in the country is like this. If you really think about it, the supermarket back in the 80s, right, the 90s, the heyday of the massive supermarket, you know, purchasing habits and everything like that.

31:38we conformed a lot of the food to fit into that box literally and the highway system. So if you can imagine like back in the day, like you could go to the supermarket and you could get, there's three kinds of apples. There's red, there's green, and there was yellow, right? Or you can get like, you know, spinach and maybe romaine and iceberg. Now you have this plethora of greens. you have this plethora of apples to choose from in any market you go up or down market and so we saw that coming from mushrooms and yeah so button mushrooms the they they have a similar sort of profile in my head at least to iceberg lettuce in that it's good on a pizza topping it's not a bad mushroom uh they have a there you can make lots of them but they're really easy to ship they have a great shelf life just like a beefsteak tomato no taste right but it ships good and it looks good on a shelf.

32:34And so that's what those are for. Okay. That makes a lot of sense. I feel like it's something I never really questioned. I was always like the least excited about that mushroom and it was the one that was the easiest to find. So we're talking about growing mushrooms. We're talking about logistics and distribution a little bit. I'm curious, you know, you've done so much different work with small hold. What's a part of your job right now that is like the most surprising, that would have been the most surprising to you if you were telling yourself five years ago or 10 years ago about your job? The thing that I think is the craziest thing, which I think a lot of business owners talk about is like people management and it's hard to manage people, but just sort of like building relationships and building the team and talking to people.

33:16And, you know, we're almost 100 people at this point. And so it's a lot of personalities and thoughts about how we should run the business. And we try to hear everyone out and try to incorporate all of that. And it's, it's a lot. And I did not go to business school. I like spent my whole career before this, like growing plants and managing some teams, but like, I'm like the science guy and I'm getting better at helping at manage people, managing people, but that I did not see coming until, you know, we started really bringing on a lot of people. What about you? Yeah. So this is not my background at all.

33:56working with mushrooms is the surprise yeah working with mushrooms generally um no i i built mushroom farms that's like a thing that i never thought i would say um uh you know building one mushroom farm is crazy building two building i don't know how many we've built you know up big and small uh that's a that's a whole thing um but the surprising thing about today i guess that my my job, my day in, day out is like, I get to learn like deeply about the flavor and history and culture of mushrooms, which it's just so fun. Like to be able to continuously dig deep on a subject that's so expansive and to never find the bottom is like, what else could you wish for in a profession?

34:45Yeah, it is an endless pit. I feel like once you start digging into mushrooms, There are so many different interesting parts about how cultures have held on to them and uplifted them in different ways. And it makes me want to ask you about like if you were stranded on a desert island, you could only have one mushroom. What would your mushroom be? Mine? Yeah, I'll tell you mine also last. Well, so singularly or can I have one type of mushroom? I just want to make sure. Not only one single mushroom, but one type of mushroom. That would be the jack-o'-lantern mushroom. It's a bioluminescent, and I would write SOS in the sand with it.

35:22Ooh, okay. Tricky. Wow, that was a tricky one. I would say like blue oyster mushroom because it's probably one of the easier ones to grow, and so you could propagate it. I mean, I guess if there are—it depends how you define a desert island mushroom. If there's tons of it, then I would still take a blue oyster, but it would allow me to be a little more sufficient, I would think. Yeah, I think in this fantasy concept, it would be plentiful regardless of how easy it is to grow. but I appreciate that you're being practical. I'll still take blue oyster. It's still a good one. That's a solid one. I think I would do psilocybin because I would probably get bored on the desert island.

35:56Yeah. But if not that, then probably shiitake because I think those are so much, they're so delicious, you know? Yeah. Yeah, I'm obsessed with them right now. Right now? Yeah. I was just in Japan. Yeah. Were you, tell me about your trip to Japan a little bit and the mushrooms that you saw there. I saw a lot of shiitake. Yeah. Um, yeah. So, uh, we, we farm mushrooms, uh, and we farm a lot of them. Just, I think it's important to recognize where they come from a lot of them. And so like a yellow oyster mushroom for years, we were growing them and, um, they're beautiful and they're amazing mushrooms.

36:34Uh, and I was entirely just, I assumed they were from Russia, but I went to Hokkaido and they're like, no what we're trying to do is mimic a hokkaido summer with our environment and i was like why they're like well because that's where they come from and so you know i'm literally going to the place where all of the mushrooms that we've been growing for all these years are are from like shiitake are from china actually um but uh they were you know they have like sort of a colonial name that's a japanese name um but uh to understand you know how people have been growing these for you know, a couple centuries and the practices that they've developed to develop the flavor and the genetics that they've been working on is insane.

37:18So you learn where umami like really comes from, like where the people have been selecting for umaminess in fungi for literally hundreds of years. That's like profound because I've been trying to grow them for forever, but I really didn't understand it. Yeah. Did you learn anything that made you think about examining the way you grow mushrooms differently? Well, there's lots of things, and we still have to discuss some of them. I mean, you should talk about forest-grown shiitake. Well, forest-grown shiitake is a beautiful thing, and it's quickly becoming a thing of the past. Are you saying forest-grown or forest-grown?

37:58Forest. Forest, like with trees. Both, actually. They do force the fruiting of the shiitake with cold water. Cool. And that's part of the sort of practice. but yeah there's agroforestry in Japan if you think about land management and being on a series of small islands you become really good at it really quickly because you have a growing population or at least this is my theory somebody can correct me but essentially you learn to quickly you know reinforce your soil and your forests and shiitake grow on fallen logs and so practicing sustainable forestry actually becomes a part of growing shiitakes.

38:36You know, it's not, majority of the shiitakes grown in Japan and China and the United States are not grown this way because it's very labor intensive now. So I met one of like the last five of a hundred growers in this part of Japan that I was in. And he showed me how he does it. And it's a really interesting practice. He is one man with a tractor and he grows 3 ,000 pounds of shiitake a month. and he just cuts his own trees, plugs them, lugs them over to the farm, puts them in there. He burns the old logs for heat for the farm and it's been doing it for, this is a third generation farm. So patience is what I learned.

39:18I like that because I think that a lot of the conversation around mushrooms in this moment is talking about them as a future of food or a way that we can be feeding the new world, but they obviously have been around for such a long time and they're from the past also. There is a god in China. There is a shiitake god. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so you got like people like multiple townships are centered around just shiitake production. Yeah. And this is going back, you know, a couple thousand years. Yeah. And also isn't like one of the pagan rituals that is one of the predecessors to Santa Claus and Christianity, doesn't that have to do with a mushroom also?

39:54The amanita? Yeah. Amanita. a mushroom yeah i mean that's there's definitely a theory around that wait that santa is a mushroom santa is a mushroom that's yeah there's a lot of people that think that that it's like he's like a symbol for amanita mushrooms and also the other thing is that reindeer eat amanita and then you can drink their urine and you can hallucinate if you drink it and just to connect the dots amanita is a red and white mushroom yeah it's the emoji right so it's not that santa is an embodied mushroom but that his colors are mushrooms so people think that that yeah it's it's he's representative of the mushroom itself so the reindeer uh-huh they they pee the hallucinogen yes that you would imbibe and then oftentimes um i forget the whole thing but basically santo's red and white um and uh that's not because of coca-cola uh people really think that he's a Mass hallucination, I think, is what it was.

40:52Or he's like a guy that drank a bunch of the ranger urine. I mean, I'm not sure. Someone correct us. I mean, I don't, yeah, I don't celebrate Christmas, so I don't know. But this sounds exciting to me. Well, you know, there's always a first if you want to go to Scandinavia and meet Santa. Yeah. I mean, you can get Ammanita. Yeah, you can, you know, find Ammanita all over the place. And it's not a, I mean, there's more and more people that are figuring out different ways to consume it, but it's not something that you should just eat in the woods. No. I'm going to need to check you on that. Sorry.

41:32We're going to have to edit out that pun. It's too bad. I'm sure people ask you this all the time, but obviously we're on the precipice of psychedelic mushroom legalization in the United States or at least like loosening around that. Is that an area that Smallhold would ever venture into? I mean, it's not part of the plan at all. I think that it would take a lot of change to allow us to kind of participate in that. We have a lot of knowledge on how to grow mushrooms. We have some pretty crazy equipment that we invented that could grow a really, maybe you can make amazing operation out of it. And so we definitely pay attention.

42:11But, you know, we're in a lot of ways, we think that the food industry is a lot bigger of a problem and a bigger market, you know, to get more mushrooms into people's hands than than that. Not to say it's not important. We're all believers at Smallhold of more and more people seeing the power of psychedelic mushrooms. But we don't have to be growing and selling all mushrooms. Yeah. There's more money in food, to be honest. I mean, just take a step back and think about how—I'm not sure how often or how much mushrooms you might consume that aren't psychedelic. But I have to assume it's not lots frequently and they're not that expensive.

43:03And so if you could just sort of go upwards from there, people consume lots more food mushrooms. It's not like, you know, you would be growing marijuana. Actually, people there's daily consumers. But with psychedelics, you know, the application is a little bit more limited than with. That makes sense. And also, you know, we've talked a little bit about this, but so many people are looking to mushrooms as a way of feeding people at scale and as this kind of future solution to the problems that we have with our current food system. And I'm curious if you could tell me a little bit about the way that you see that, like mushrooms in general as a future of food and then maybe smallhold specifically.

43:45Yeah, I mean, there are so many reasons to like mushrooms. I mean, as far as the future is concerned, you don't use a lot of resources to grow them. Pretty much all mushrooms are grown on some form of a waste stream. Ours are grown on sawdust from the timber industry. Button mushrooms are grown on compost. You can train mycelium to grow on all sorts of different things. I mean, yeah, you can grow on most trash, actually, if you really wanted to. and then the waste that you produce can go to big compost projects and at the same time this food is high in fiber it's nutritious it tastes good it's fun to eat there is some protein in it it's not like a massive amount of protein but there's an argument that people might not need as much protein as they think they do and so I think there's just so many benefits to it I mean we did a lot of work to understand the impact of our production and our mushrooms and um we couldn't find really much food that used less water than our operation um and the carbon impact is less than other mushroom producers but that is like a fraction of all that all protein and all all meat stuff and then that is already a fraction of the meat industry um i don't i don't think that we should expect everyone to be eating one thing.

45:13The future that I hope for is a future where we can eat all sorts of different things and have a ton of different options. That's what I see as sustainability is more like being able to imitate what we're currently doing in a way that is, you know, that can last rather than how we're kind of currently doing it, which is not necessarily sustainable as far as society is concerned. What do you think, Adam? No, he put it very well. Um, I, the only thing that I would add is that somebody eating mushrooms thinks more about their environment. And so when you're talking about trends, there's a big trend right now around regenerative agriculture, whatever that means, right.

45:56And, and circular economies, whatever that means. Um, and I think those are really, really good things to be promoting and paying attention to and, uh, supporting as a food company or an agriculture company. but ultimately like the thing that you know for for better or for worse that people care about when they're shopping you're an animal right like you're going into this environment with lots of colors and sales and an overabundance of food in a way they care about flavor and if you can find a way that makes people interested in those things through food then I think that you've really you've hit something magical um and it it can be good for the environment and it could be good for people and also mushrooms are center of the plate so it can actually be very filling uh and they have umami which is like a it's sechi it makes you feel full and satisfied so i think they're very helpful in that respect yeah i think to me mushrooms are a comfort food almost when you think about like a mushroom soup or a mushroom pasta like there's something about that that's really soul satisfying in that way which makes a lot of sense same um i know that like we're talking about all the different variety of mushrooms that are out there and you introduced dried mushrooms recently which i've never seen dried mushrooms that are not a shiitake before maybe just because of my own grocery shopping so why did you decide to introduce the dried mushrooms and how do they fit into the rest of your whole system so um when you grow anything when you're a farmer, you have off cuts or waste, right?

47:30So we, as we were growing smallhold, would have significant amounts of poundage sometimes that you might have a bout of, it's called blotch, which causes a discoloration on the mushrooms. And again, getting back to the grocery store, especially being a human animal in that store, you're going to look and you're going to see a white mushroom versus a brown mushroom. You're going to take the white mushroom because it looks fresher, even though it's just the same. and so we have to do something with those and we dry them uh we also take all the trimming uh from when we pack in our clamshells uh and that's a way to you know save money right we're saving stuff that we would otherwise throw away or compost actually um and then it's also a way to to have a shelf stable product to be yeah and what are the mushrooms that y 'all currently have dried We have oyster, royal trumpet, lion's mane.

48:20Those are the main ones? Those are the main ones, yeah. And we don't do the shiitake. Although when you dehydrate a mushroom and you reconstitute it, what you're actually doing is you're actually enhancing the flavor of the mushroom, which is a crazy thing. You're not removing the flavor. It makes the umami more umami. Wow. Yeah. Yeah, like there's definitely a use case for the dried mushrooms. I find that when you're making soups or putting them in rice or something like that, you end up, a lot of, like, fresh mushrooms are great to include in that. But using dehydrated mushrooms, even hydrating them with something that's, like, a flavorful, like a broth or just, you know, obviously cooking in a soup, then you can have a different experience than you would have with a fresh mushroom.

49:10And so it's not just that it's, you know, scrap mushrooms and you should eat them because they're extra for small hold. There's definitely other ways that you can use it as a consumer. Yeah, I've just been using them in stock recently, but I think, you know, soup season is kind of coming to a close here in New York and now I'm excited to be thinking about what else I should be putting them in instead. I don't know if you have any suggestions for me. I was thinking quesadillas. What do you think about that? Of course. Sure. Right? Yeah, anything quesadilla or taco. Yeah, or you could like hydrate them and then blend them up and make like a pate or something.

49:47Risotto. Ooh. You know, I almost made a vegan chopped liver for Passover with the mushrooms, and then I just ran out of time. But I was excited about that idea, I would say. A big part of what we're doing right now is taking all the waste products that we generate. That's actually my job right now. And turning it into my team's job. Your job is to single-handedly eat all of the waste mushrooms. It's a big job, but somebody has to do it. It's going to be you. But no, we take all that. And so anything that we have hopefully is going to be saved, stored, and sold as dehydrated mushrooms. Or we're actually taking those and then turning them into value-added products that then expose people to mushrooms in new ways.

50:33So not everybody likes to buy a lion's mane in the grocery store because they don't know what it is. And so putting that into another product and exposing them through that lens and merchandising it next to the fresh product then exposes people to that mushroom and gives them like a window into how it might be when they cook with it. And that's sort of our master plan. And then same with the compost products. We take our compost from our blocks and we're making vermicompost with that. So vermicompost is basically worm castings. And so long story around that one. But basically we feed the blocks with food waste to worms and then they poop it out.

51:11And then that's really nutritious for your soil. And so literally if we can close all those loops as much as possible. Andrew made the point to me about the vermicompost because most of the vermicompost that's not sold in a consumer channel gets sold to marijuana farmers in Oklahoma. Whoa. I made the point that it's not closed loop because people ultimately smoke it. But we're getting there. Yeah. I mean, down the line. That's so fun. I wanted to ask you about what it's like working together and like how you, to me, it seems like you have a really good relationship as co-founders. I'm curious what the secret is behind that.

51:49You're going to laugh and say you don't like each other? Anybody else that's small? No. I mean, the thing about it. and tell us anything. Yeah, so Adam and I have known each other for a really long time. You know, for backstory, we were roommates all throughout college years and years ago. We were roommates in Brooklyn and then we started a business together. And I think... And I moved onto your couch. Yeah, yeah, we lived on my couch for a while. And I think that it's definitely been hard in the past. I'm not going to beat around the bush there, but I do think that the relationship allows you to be more direct than if you had a more professional relationship.

52:39We do have a professional relationship, but if you didn't know someone that well, then you aren't able to be direct. Sometimes that's hard. Those are hard conversations to have, but then also I think it's allowed us to move a lot faster than if we didn't have that relationship. And so I think that that's one of the benefits of it. Yeah. And oftentimes I know when Andrew's not going to like a thing that I'm doing. But you keep doing it?

53:10That's good. I don't know. You know, I do this magazine, Cake Scene, with a really good friend of mine. And we are always talking about our lives and then also talking about business together. And I had to like put us on Slack in part so that our text threads could just be us hanging out or me asking to like borrow her shoes or something like that. But I think that knowing someone and trusting someone in that way is an asset in a business sense, you know? Sure. Small Holds has grown pretty quickly. And I think a big part of that is not having to have those discussions that are basic building blocks of other founder relationships that you kind of have to get out of the way at one point or another.

53:48So for instance, you know, starting the company, like what's the equity split? We were able to come to an agreement very quickly, right? Things like that because we know each other and have insight into each other's lives. And also just generally, you know, know each other's tolerances in different ways, I think. Yeah, that makes sense. Well, I normally ask people a question that I'm going to ask you, but I'll ask you the question, then I'll give you a clarification on it. which is if you could have a signature menu item named after you, what would it be? And for the context of this question, I don't mean like a small hold sandwich somewhere.

54:25I mean like the Andrew, the Adam at an ice cream shop, at a bar, at a sandwich shop. What would that signature item be? I can name one for Andrew. You could do it for each other. That would be cute. Is it mayonnaise? It's mayonnaise. It's just mayonnaise. It's just mayonnaise.

54:45Andrew's mayonnaise. Yeah. Yeah, I like mayonnaise. Andrew's mayo and avocado sandwich. Mayonnaise sandwich. A mayo sandwich? Sure. I mean, mayonnaise and avocado sandwich, sure. Mostly mayonnaise. Okay, what's the bread? Is it toasted? Actually, we did make a sandwich once. Definitely toasted. I would say like a sourdough, homemade sourdough bread, toasted, mayonnaise on both sides, full, like a whole avocado, maybe some microgreens. Do you want to throw in a mushroom or no? I mean, we could use mushroom mayonnaise, actually. Well, what is that? Mushrooms and mayonnaise. Chopped up, mixed in.

55:25You can make a sauce out of the mushrooms and then mix it in with the mayonnaise. Okay. Think of like a mushroom pesto. Yeah. Yeah, and then you mix that like a pesto mayonnaise. Yeah, guys, this is a food podcast. I want all the details about what's on the sandwich. Well, do you know about mushroom ketchup? Do you know the history of that? No, tell me the brief history. the apparently ketchup the first ketchup was a mushroom ketchup tomato ketchup like was later in the game the first the first ketchups were a bunch of different types people were just using different materials but the most popular one was i believe in uh in england was the mushroom ketchup this podcast episode is just like potential true facts about mushrooms i know i don't want to That's a real fact.

56:08That's definitely a real fact. I'm not sure the region, but I'm pretty sure it's from there. But you can find random recipes of it online. But it makes sense, too, if you think about it. Like mushrooms, umami, tomato, umami, and you're making a sauce out of it. Yeah, I buy that. Okay, what's your menu item?

56:27I mean, I have this dream for a restaurant called Fritters. So it would be just Adam's Fritters, and it could mean anything. Okay. What would your fritter be? Is it a mushroom fritter? It could definitely be a mushroom fritter. You know, anything in fritter form would really apply. But yeah, a mushroom fritter would be good. Like a really good lion's mane tempura would actually be great. Tempura lion's mane. Yeah. I feel like you'd have like a secret fritter, like a hot dog. You'd say it's a mushroom fritter, but it's actually hot dogs. Yeah. It's always actually hot dogs. With some mushroom ketchup for dipping.

57:05Yeah, mushroom ketchup sauce. Yeah, fridgers are not the most exciting food, but I feel like they're the menu item that nobody won't order. A safe bet. Well, this was bizarre and very fun. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Thank you for having us. Yeah, likewise.

57:33Abby Endler, welcome to today's podcast. Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be here. So we're going to talk about the world of crime and fiction and how maybe food plays in a role in fiction and crimes. But first, I want to hear about Criminal Types, the new podcast that you're launching soon or have launched already when this airs. Yes, I'm so excited. So Criminal Types is a podcast that's going to be going behind the scenes, kind of exploring what keeps the writers of our favorite scary stories up at night. We're really excited. We have an incredible season of some bestselling authors and some kind of rising stars in the genre.

58:05as well. It's going to be a ton of fun. So the show is like interviews with crime authors. Yes, exactly. So who do you have lined up? Do you have some good guests? We have an incredible array of guests. I'm obviously very biased here, but we have everyone from John Grisham. Oh yeah, heard of him. Yeah, you might have heard of him. Sure. John Grisham, Lisa Gardner, Riley Sager, Simone St. James. Truly an incredible lineup. Wait, you got Grisham like season one? Grisham is season one, episode one. Wait, how do you do like an arc if you're starting with Grisham? Listen, the idea here is to really, well, we've got to lure people in with the big names, obviously.

58:39But the idea is to give people the behind-the-scenes scoop on some of their favorite authors, but also to introduce them to new voices as well. So we have kind of, you know, the first two episodes are going to be Grisham and then this amazing debut author, Isabel Cagnes, who's written a super incredible kind of gothic horror story. So I think it's going to be a great kind of flow to the season. Oh, yeah. I'm watching Yellow Jackets. Do you know what? I still haven't seen Yellow Jackets. That's like gothic horror at a great level. I know I would be obsessed with it. My problem is that I just spend so much time reading that I can't keep up with new shows.

59:08I really can't do it. But I've heard amazing things about Yellow Jackets. No, it's cool. But we're going to talk about books. But, you know, Abby, what draws you to crime fiction? Like this genre that, you know, many of our listeners may not read for whatever reason, but it's actually one of the most popular genres out there. It is. I mean, you know, I think there's nothing better than an irresistible puzzle. I love the experience of reading a book that lets me, you know, just sink into the story and try to figure it out alongside the characters. It'll really surprise me, keep me hooked. I think there's something so satisfying about that.

59:41And I think that's obviously been the case for, you know, decades upon decades upon decades. So what makes a great crime thriller? I feel like right now I can think about a few that I've read over the years. But, you know, Formula is sometimes a blessing in disguise because we know where we're going. But what makes it good in your words? Yeah, I mean, you know, I think an author said to me once that they think one of the reasons this genre has been so appealing for so long is the fact that you do go from that chaos to order at the end. And, you know, life, we don't always see justice served at the end, right?

1:00:13Like there's a lot of life that's really messy. But in a crime novel, you get that satisfaction of solving the puzzle. You get the answer at the end of the book. And that's something I always love. I also think, you know, these stories just give us incredible characters. You think about like Agatha Christie's detectives or Sherlock Holmes or some of the contemporary psychological thriller protagonists who have these wild stories that we just love to follow. For me, I think that's what makes a really great crime story. So when you're talking to Grisham in episode one, and I'll link to it in the show notes, what exactly are you guys talking about?

1:00:42So we're getting into everything. I mean, he told some incredible stories about how his career got started. There is one story he told about how he literally had to hand sell copies of his first novel from the trunk of his car because people just, you know, they weren't rushing to buy the new John Grisham. He was an unknown quantity back then. So we talk about everything from his backstory to his new book, The Boys from Biloxi, which is inspired by this kind of crime, unorganized crime gang called the Dixie Mafia that I'd never heard of before. It's fascinating stuff. Dixie Mafia, man, sounds like a rich text to mine from.

1:01:14It really was, honestly, and it was just so cool to have the opportunity to speak with someone like him who's been in this business for so long, literally one of the best-selling thriller authors right now. Definitely. Now, let me ask you about Anthony Bourdain because Anthony Bourdain to many is Anthony Bourdain. He's the guy who was on television or wrote Kitchen Confidential. But to some, he's actually one of the better crime writers. Have you ever read any of Bourdain? You know what? I'm going to confess to you. I didn't even know that he was writing crime, that he wrote crime fiction until I was prepping for this interview.

1:01:46I had no idea. Yeah. So Bone in the Throat, I know, is probably his most famous crime novel. But he's I think he wrote three or four. And there's a great article in Eater that I'll link to in the show notes that covers his history with his fiction. But, you know, I think he also, like you, is just drawn to chaos and maybe figuring out the chaos at the end. I never really thought about that. but there's something very satisfying about it and I think when you look at crime novels across all different subgenres you can see that as kind of a through line so in the work that you uh do on instagram to crime by the book is your instagram you have like a large following so like you're talking to crime authors all the time is there like a type you know honestly it sounds strange crime so you mean is there a type of crime novel that I love or crime novelist that I love or is I mean person it's a great follow-up I mean your podcast host you're following up here I feel like I'm wondering if it's like a type of person who writes crime fiction for a living.

1:02:45You know what? I'm going to say they are – the type is like just kind. They are the kindest people I've ever talked to, which you would not expect. And it's been something – I think when I told my parents that I was kind of like, you know, starting down this whole rabbit hole, this crime fiction universe, they were sort of like, who are the people you're going to be talking with and spending your time with? They are the nicest people. And I have a working theory that it's because they're able to get all of their aggression out on the page. You know, they're so kind. And I think they're also curious.

1:03:10I think when I talk with crime writers, there are people who are very inquisitive. They look at a situation and they just start to wonder, what if? You know, I'm always amazed by their imagination and the way that they can kind of run wild with the most ordinary scenarios. Yeah, I think that's a good call. I think you have to have a certain level of interest in plot and also just be inquisitive about the world to make up these cases and not make them total boilerplate. Well, and smart, too. I mean, when you think about it, I've sometimes thought, like, should I try writing a crime novel? And I'm honestly just not sure I could make, like, the puzzle work.

1:03:43You know, I think that takes a ton of planning and plotting and just being able to see all the red herrings and the clues you're leaving for readers. It's a complicated genre. Abby, you can do it. You think so? Yeah, I know. I know for a fact. I know that you read enough of it. It just, like, is osmosis at the least. Well, thank you. Let me let's talk about food. I want to know, is there any crime fiction that you've read or read about that has food at the center of it that our listeners should be checking out? A hundred percent. OK, so major confession. Probably the number one thing that I love aside from crime novels is The Great British Bake Off.

1:04:14OK. And there is an incredible book that came out earlier this spring called The Golden Spoon by Jessa Maxwell. And it is a whodunit mystery that is centered around a reality TV baking competition. And the book is structured. If you're a Great British Bake Off fan, you're going to completely recognize this. But it's structured like there's like bread week and cake week and all this stuff. It's so good. It's so good. So demented. I love it. It's twisted. It's the perfect mashup of like Clue and Bake Off. I love that. Oh, my God. And what can be baked into the pies? Oh, my God. This isn't Sweeney Todd here.

1:04:47I mean, it feels a little Sweeney. I feel like there's definitely like a way to put or put like a weapon that's like hidden inside a souffle. I love that. I love it. No, it's fantastic. I would highly recommend that one. Let's talk about film, too. I mean, I know there's a crossover and this is in a film podcast you're doing, but do you have a favorite food film? You know, I was actually just talking with our amazing producer, Pat, who we love dearly. Shout out to Pat. I was just talking with him about the menu. Have you seen that? I loved the menu. It was so good. And, you know, thinking about food in crime films, obviously the number one thing that comes to mind is our friend Hannibal Lecter and his chianti and fava beans, right?

1:05:24That's like the iconic scene. But no, I think in terms of favorite food films, the menu would be up there for me. You like the menu? I think that's great. I loved it. We've talked a lot about it on various segments, and we haven't had any of the actors on or the screenwriter. But I think it's said a lot. It was a nice foil to the bear, which was more dripping in reality. And obviously a satire is not. And it was really smartly done. It was so smart. Anya Taylor-Joy is incredible. Yeah, great film. Let me ask you a little bit about your own background. and you went to school in Texas, you're moving back to Houston or moving to Houston.

1:05:58And we were chatting off mic about Houston, but I wanted to save it for the pod. I love this city. I want to talk about it all the time. It's the best, right? Yeah. What are you looking forward to most food-wise? Oh my gosh, everything. I mean, the Tex-Mex. Like I could not get enough. I could just live in a vat of queso. I think I would be a very happy girl. So I'm very excited about that. There's this great restaurant, Hugo's. I don't know if you've ever been. I've been to Hugo's. I got to say Nympha's Navigation is my place. No, I am not. Okay. You are my best friend down there also swears by ninfas.

1:06:25I am not as much of a ninfas. I love this debate. Tell me about Hugo's. No, I loved it. I had like the most. I'm also a vegetarian. So maybe that might inform some of my choices here. That's OK. I had the most incredible. It was like some sort of veggie enchilada. And I'm not a food expert, so I could not tell you all the intricacies of it. But it was pillar. I loved it so much. And I'm already planning when I moved down there the first Friday that I'm down there. You're going to Hugo's? Oh, I'm going to Hugo's. Oh, yeah. So what draws you to. Are you from Texas? No, I'm from Connecticut. I went to, you know, I had kind of like the traditional Connecticut upbringing, like all girls prep school.

1:06:57Yeah, horses involved. Oh, of course. Absolutely. And I really wanted something different for college. So I went to Rice University in Houston and totally fell in love with the city. It's such a great place and it doesn't get enough recognition. I think it's kind of like an unsung hero of Texas. I agree. I love it down there. I'm trying to get to Austin and Houston this summer, which is funny because it's summer. But ultimately, one of my favorite food cities, I also got to shout out the Alabama Ice House. Yep. How do you know about all of this? What's your connection? I've written about Houston.

1:07:26I've been a bunch of times over the years at an event down there for a cookbook I wrote. And I think Chris Shepard is one of our greatest chefs in America. And honestly, it's just a really cool city. I love it there. So what would you recommend? What needs to be on my list restaurant-wise? You know what? I think if you're going to get great food in Houston, you know, the Korean community and the Vietnamese communities are really prominent. And I know it's a sprawling city. It's like a lot of driving. And when you pop into like a K-Town or a Viettown, I can't remember the names offhand, but I've had some of the best pho in my life, including in Vietnam, in Houston.

1:08:03Wow. And then it's Chris Shepard, as I mentioned. Great chef. You should check him out. Thank you so much for the recommendations. I mean, I'm down to talk about Houston and whatever. So, okay, so you've got Grisham. Where does this go? I mean, are you going to always be talking to authors? Are you going to talk to fans of crime fiction? That's a great question. I'm really excited because actually later this week, we're recording kind of a special episode that will be the finale to season one. We're going to be talking with Jennifer Barth, who's one of our editors at Knopf, and she kind of specializes in crime fiction.

1:08:29So I would love to bring in, you know, fans of the genre, people who've devoted their careers to the genre as well, and just kind of get their perspectives too. I love that. Yeah. Okay, we can't leave without a couple more picks, favorite books that are maybe coming out. Let's go there because I know you cover this extensively. All right. Absolutely. So I'm going to say I'm looking ahead to the summer. One of my favorite authors, Riley Sager, who's going to be a guest on the podcast. He has this incredible gothic thriller coming out called The Only One Left. It's inspired by Lizzie Borden. So it's all about what would it be like if Lizzie Borden was, you know, an older woman and had this home health aide coming to take care of her.

1:09:02And the home health aide starts to figure out that there might be more to the story than what we actually think happened. The home health aide is solving the mystery. She is. She absolutely. So that's a great one. and I'm also excited. One of my favorite authors, Joe Nesbo, big Norwegian kind of rock star thriller writer. He has a new book out in late May called Killing Moon that's really good as well. Yeah, big Joe fan here. You are? Yeah, definitely. I've read some books. You know what's funny? I'm thinking back. I think the first crime fiction I ever read was Peppermints in the Parlor. Did you ever read this book?

1:09:28No, what is this? It's like I was in like fourth or fifth grade. Yeah. Yeah, I remember it being extremely like very British and very like I was like stunned. I love it. Do you read any like I know I mean, there's a whole world out there of like food inspired cozy mysteries. Have you ever read any of those? No, I don't really read too many mysteries. I feel like it's more genre like I'm blanking right now. But I think if I'll dip into a Joe book once in a while. Yeah. But yeah, I don't really read a cozy mystery. I like that term. Yeah. Well, you have to read The Golden Spoon. You got to give that one try because it is so much fun.

1:10:07I'm super down. Abby, will you come back to the Taste Pocket to talk more about fiction maybe in the fall? We can talk about some of the up and coming titles. I would so love to. And I hope you'll give me a shout if you're in Houston this summer. Absolutely enjoy it. Thanks, Abby Inler. Appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me.

1:10:25The Taste Podcast is hosted by Matt Rodbard and me, Eliza Abarbanel. The show is produced by Shalia Harris and Pat Stango and edited by Clayton Gumbert. 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 happening.