392: New Spring Cookbooks with Tiffy Cooks & Vegan Mob

22:48authentic. Like, I don't think anything matches it. And the reason why I say that, I don't say it in an arrogant way, but I say it because it's really a mixture of who I am, where I come from, and what raised me. And meaning that is my grandmother came from the South, from Houston, moved to San Francisco um my grandfather owned a my other grandfather on my on my father's side who um which is the father that raised me not my biological but the one who raised me um was French Moroccan had a French restaurant and um and then I grew up on a bunch of like Asian cuisine and just different type of foods in San Francisco so I kind of just blended it all in there and just put things that I really liked and that I grew up on.

23:47And that's why I say it's unmatched because it's me and it's not anyone else, you know? And so it just really, really, just really, like, explains who I am and what I love, you know? And that's what the book's about. It's all about history, like food. I believe food is history. and it's just that I made it in plant-based form because I didn't grow up on plant-based food, but I decided to change my lifestyle and that's how that came about. And the way you use meat substitutes is super smart. There's some plant-based cooking where it's no meat substitutes, but you like to use them and refer to brands.

24:31So I want to hear about that and maybe some favorite products you cook with because I like that point of view a lot. So some products I use are Better Chew, which is a local vendor out of Vallejo. Well, he's really from D.C., but he moved to Vallejo and created this product out here in the Bay Area. And I use a lot of Impossible for like my burgers and for my spaghetti sauce and things like that. And I like Impossible because it just has a real beefy taste and it does something well to the recipes. And Better Chew, I use him for my brisket. He makes a steak and I smoke that brisket and I season it like brisket, put a rub on it.

25:22And I use his fried chicken and I batter it up, you know, with my seasonings just like I would if I was just making chicken. like what I used to make chicken. And so, and I really like bee leaf shrimp as well. Bee leaf shrimp, they have a good type of pea protein, potato starch shrimp that just has a real nice texture to it. And I match it up with my batter and it just, it's amazing, you know? So those are like my top three. I saw that. And, you know, for a po 'boy or for anything else, I feel like you definitely have um this shrimp product that seems to be really excellent oh yeah man it i you know what i did it goes back to how i created these recipes it's like my favorite vegan restaurants um i will say after mine and before mine before i started vegan mob were the asian vegan restaurants And one of my my favorite things on their menu was the shrimp.

26:33And so I sourced that shrimp because it tastes like shrimp. And it just really was like, oh, my God, it's like shrimp without the super seafood taste, just wonderful textures. And then I figured it out and I was like, I'm going to add my own, you know, southern, you know, California flavor to it. and that's how that came about. So I just really like took some of my favorites and figured it like that's how, you know, that's just really how Vegan Mob, what explains Vegan Mob really. I mean, it's so well said about Chinese and Asian vegan restaurants. I grew up going to a spot in Philly called Kingdom of Vegetarians that was so good with the vegan shrimp and Zen Palate in New York in the 90s.

27:23I just love that you are channeling these meat substitutes. Oh, man, thank you. I mean, they're the originators of the vegan, vegetarian, you know, cuisine, I think, from, you know, before it got popular, before everybody started to eat it. These places were the ones that were doing it. And they cook it. The way they cook it is just like just any Chinese food, you know, any Vietnamese food. Like, you know, because I know because I just started to be vegan in 2018. And so I know what the food tastes like. And that's what turned me vegan. I was like, OK, I can eat this. This food, I told my wife, I was like, well, we can be vegan.

28:16Like this food right here is great. And so it actually helped me become vegan because some of my favorite cuisine is Asian food and they just did it like they didn't they weren't missing with the flavors and the textures. Before you went vegan, did you have a restaurant business and were you a working chef using non-plant based products? Not at all. Not at all. So I, I, my grandfather owned a restaurant when I was a kid. I grew up in a restaurant, but I always wanted to be like I'm a rapper and food and rap are my passions. And so I always love to cook. Like I went to a culinary. A culinary academy out here, the Le Cordon Bleu.

29:07And I didn't graduate. I didn't graduate. not because I wasn't handling my business, but because I just was at a part of my life where things were not in order. And so I wasn't able to graduate. I didn't finish the school, but I always wanted to be a chef. And in that school, it was crazy. I was going to all these special extracurriculum, extra credit, you know, classes after school. And I remember one of the guys were like, the chefs, and he said, you, he said, everybody wants to be a celebrity chef. He said, but it's highly unlikely. And I was in the back of that class and I was like, well, I don't know what he talking about.

30:03but but i tried to work at restaurants and i was talking about this last night and i was like honestly when i worked at these restaurants i was like this ain't for me i was like i don't think this is for me and then i ended up opening my own restaurant like i was like oh man this is because i love to cook but at that time like being the sushi they kicked me the dishwasher because i wasn't you know i wasn't seasoned in the in a professional kitchen You know, and so when I when I just took in, took it in as my passion and like just did what I did at home. That's when things started to take off for me.

30:40It's so cool that you say that. And I think it's such a well said point. I mean, you know, some people are built to be famous. Some people aren't. And you clearly are built. And have you linked up with Bun B at all down in Houston? He's got his his takeout place, which I think is amazing. By the way, I visited. I don't know. What's the thing about rap and restaurants that work so well? Man, it's crazy because Bun B is one of my favorite artists, and I got to link up with Bun. Trio Burgers. I mean, I've seen that, and I was like, whoa, like, I feel like— I don't know if he saw me because I'm not as, you know, he's a whole other legend.

31:21You know what I mean? And I'm trying to get there, right? I don't know if you saw me or not, but I feel like, you know, I have, I'm one of the guys that kicked it off in the hip hop game. Cause I started in 2019 and I feel like, I don't know what, I think it's art. You know, we just love, it's art. I always, you know, when I went to, they call it culinary arts, and they always, like, responded, well, referred to it as a different type of art, right? But I never, I always put it in the same category as an artist. Like, I'm an artist. I do music. I graffiti. You know, I tagged and did graffiti when I was a kid.

32:08You know, I'm hip-hop. Like I feel like cooking is a part of expressing yourself and artists like rap artists. One thing that we like to do if you listen to music and especially in the in the in the time period I came up in is what do rappers like to do? Brag. Right. And so I feel like food and cooking is a form of bragging to like an impressing, like in showboating, like you want to you want to brag and impress. Like I got my wife by cooking, you know, uh, when she saw my food, her, her mouth dropped, you know, and I, you know, and that's how I got my wife and I always used to like cook. That's really, really, really fun.

32:52Yeah. Let me ask you about a signature from the, from the cookbook. Is there a signature recipe that you feel is like your signature? Mm. The gumbo, the gumbo, definitely the gumbo. Um, Yeah, the gumbo, the macaroni, and definitely the mob sauce. The mob sauce. Yeah. So let's talk about Korsha Wilson. I'm a huge fan of Korsha. I know her. She's written for taste, and I think she's such a fine writer. And you guys collaborated on this book. I'd like to hear a little bit about that collaboration. Korsha, Korsha, not only just a great writer and a great person to work with, she was like a real partner.

33:41Like she made she kept me on my toes, you know, she she went above and beyond. I don't think she had to do what she did. Like she was almost like an assistant in a way to like, she was like, Toriano, you know, this time and then we need to meet this time. And then, you know, just really, really because I was really busy with the restaurant and I just started Vegan Mob. And so like. Just she related to every even though what I was afraid of is that she is from the East Coast. right and the the the cultural differences as far as like the regions i didn't think would um match all the way right that's where i will not match all the way but i feel like that was gonna be a little bit of challenge right but she just we just connected like we just matched and and everything was awesome um she understood me um every she didn't have to try hard.

34:42And it was just, I couldn't choose another person, honestly. And she got a good, she has a good taste for a tongue. So when I, when I, when she tasted my recipes and she told me what was going on, I trusted her. Well said. I appreciate the tribute to Korsha. I think she's just such a terrific writer and we sometimes don't talk about collaborators on the show and I'm glad you gave her the tribute she deserves. And I gotta ask you, outside of your restaurant, I'd love to hear your take on the Bay Area right now? Are there any restaurant or chefs that you just love, you want to shout a little bit?

35:16Oh, yeah, yeah. You know, a restaurant that I love, that I just went to, I just took people to Nature's Vegetarian. That's a Chinese vegan restaurant. But I want to shout out Chef Smelly. You know, he's not a vegan restaurant. And I eat vegan so obviously you don't go to a restaurant but his food looks amazing everybody talks about him it's my brother um it's much love um you know i want to give a shout out to um to um cooking and style he's he's like a out the truck chef you know he's he's he's um he's not in a restaurant or anything he's he's he's selling plates um another another chef chef green uh Keith Lee just came out here and went to go see Chef Green and highlighted him.

36:13Smoking Woods, another barbecue restaurant. I don't have once again, I haven't eaten it full, but it looks amazing. He's a he's a great guy. Everybody loves this spot. These people inspire me, too, you know, because I'm inspired by more of non-vegan stuff. And then I and then I go ahead and say, hey, I'm gonna turn this vegan. you know um and another what else do we got somebody else that I know it's somebody I'm missing I want to definitely give love I want to shout out Chef Chu because Chef Chu definitely gave me some game um growing up I mean not growing up but growing up in this game like when I first started he he he you know he he had been in the vegan game he had been in the restaurant game.

36:57He gave me my proteins. He, he helped me, um, with funding. He got me into the farmer's markets. Um, he did a lot and I got to give a shout out to Evan Kadera from a senior seasick. He, he, he's the one who got me into the beginning, into the building. Um, I grew up with him. He gave me a lot of game and he's a popular restaurant. He's actually a, um, Filipino fusion restaurant. And so those are some of the names. If I got any forgot anybody, man, it's my bad, but I got love for all of y 'all. But really, really. You shouted out a lot of people there. Well, because that's how I am. I just, you know, I got love for everybody, you know, in the area culture, like.

37:39It's out the trunk, it's hustle, you know, and I feel like the food game kind of like out here kind of kind of mirrors that. That's why the food in a rap game is so. Yeah. And let's give a shout out to E42. Forget it. The goon with a spoon, man. He got his cookbook out too. Shout out 40-wise. Lumpia Chef too. All right, I'm done. I'm done.

38:04Good shouts. It's like the end of an album. You got to give all the credit. Right, right, right. But I got love for all of those people, man. They out here grinding and they're making us look good out here. Toriano, on This Is Taste, we ask guests about their discerning taste. So to close this interview, here's a little rapid fire, fast and furious taste check. Are you ready? Let's go. The best fruit. The best fruit. Mango. The worst vegetable. Let's go with turnips. It's come up a lot. Poor turnips taking L's left and right.

38:47The best dessert. The best dessert. Cheesecake. A cuisine you would like to learn more about. Mm, Indian. Last one, your favorite sandwich. My favorite sandwich is a turkey sandwich. And I can't get that right now, but I love turkey sandwiches on Dutch Crutch. Do they got Dutch Crutch out there? I don't think so. I don't know the brand, but I'm going to look it up. Yeah, Dutch Crutch is a Bay Area thing, actually. somebody from I think Dutch came to California and they made this bread out here when they came to like San Francisco shout out to Ike's sandwiches I don't he's not I don't think he's on the east coast yet but he will be he's a he's a chain he's he's doing amazing things and yeah you got good sandwiches going on Toriyama Gordon thank you so much for joining this is taste it's been a lot of fun.

39:46Right on, Matt. I appreciate you. Thanks for having me. This has been fun, too. I love it. Have me again, man. I would love to come back home.

40:02Liza, what's up? How are you? I'm good. We're in our new studio. How do you feel? We've just started. I think we're week three here. It feels kind of like home. Yeah, I think the new studio is like my if we were going to do three things, which we're about to do, it would be my bonus fourth thing. The fourth thing would be like we actually have padded chairs instead of chairs that give us arthritis. Yeah. And like we're not in front of a kitchen where people are talking about what they want to have for lunch in the background. Listener in December recorded a series of podcasts during a holiday party that the audio department, which we share a floor with, they were doing like a 2 p.m.

40:37like wine o 'clock hour. It was getting loud. Oh, I mean, they had their absolute right, and we've made it through, and now we are in our whole new studio. Yeah, speaking of festive, we're going to talk about three festive things. What's your first festive thing? My first thing is this salad that I've been making every weekend that I just wanted to tell you and other people about. It's kind of a riff on a nissoir salad, except for it doesn't have eggs because I don't like eggs. But I do, like, really beautiful blanched green beans, big fat chunks of avocado, like big pieces, not little ones, and like flaked smoked trout or sardine, some kind of fish, and then like a really mustardy, acidic dressing.

41:15It's really good. I've been making it a lot for a brunch sort of meal. And I feel like going into springtime, like I don't have really good spring produce yet. So you got to do something to transform the green beans a little bit with the blanche, but I feel like it's that kind of green, fresh taste that's getting me excited for when other things do arrive at the market it's like the bridge season salad yes that's a great way to to call it i like it and i like that you're getting your omegas like hardcore with the avocado and the tinned fish yeah and also the all the olive oil olive oil that salad dress sounds amazing i'm really inspired how do you blanch is it just like shock or two two minutes boil in shock or even less yeah i kind of i'm going off of eye i would say and then maybe plucking out a green bean and nibbling on it i want it to be sweeter and have still some structural integrity not so floppy i do love like a hard-cooked green bean but these have they're like an al dente green bean totally great call and i like that you're making a lot of other choices and adding more texture and actually foundation so it's not just the beans you've got like this great like trout or smoked salmon or whatever and then you've got of course the avo yeah that's my first thing what's So good.

42:28On the opposite end of eating in a more balanced and helpful way, I went to Hamburger America last night, and I got to try the first of many signature monthly burger drops. It's like the kith. It's like the supreme of hamburgers. They're doing these limited edition drops. Okay, I like this. Is it like seasonal produce or a collab? What makes it a drop? Seasonal produce in the Hamburger America world doesn't really— No, it's fun. It's a good question. I don't know. It could be like, I don't know, ramps into cheeseburgers. No, no, it's cool. It's actually more in the style of George Motes, who runs the place.

43:05It's more about the history of American hamburgering or hamburger culture. And so each month he's inviting a classic stand from America. He flies them in and they're doing burgers. That's so cool. It's real cool. So he had Glenn Fieber from Solly's Grill in Glendale, which is a neighborhood of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. he was in there um yesterday and the day before and he was doing classic wisconsin butter burgers okay tell me more because i've never had one before so butter burgers are are kind of an institution in wisconsin and i grew up in michigan i never heard of them until i went to college in wisconsin essentially it says speaks for itself it's basically a flat top burger um bun glenn does his with uh with not caramelized onions but cooked onions and then a really healthy slathering of butter and he and glenn brought in wisconsin butter for it i've had you know culver's is a pretty famous chain that is known for a butter burger but when you have it you're kind of just getting a buttered bun and getting like you know a little maybe a little butter on the patty they're putting like literally a quarter inch of butter across the you know the bun and the guy sitting next to me.

44:17He was a nice guy. He was like looking at me. He's like, you're really going to eat that? You can't just ask somebody that. You're a restaurant. Of course you're going to eat that. He was implying that. I shouldn't slam the man. He didn't say that, but his face said that. You felt the vibe. I felt the vibe. And really, we were all having a great time. It was nice hanging out with George. In a future month, he's going to be having the green olive burger from Michigan there. And we will report back on that. Okay, let's go i want to try it what is your second thing my second thing is i have been on this quest to get a good chopped cheese lately that has been repeatedly foiled by the universe i don't know if it's because mercury is in retrograde or what but twice i've gone to farmer in the deli which is a very well respected yeah chopped cheese deli by where i live um and they have not been doing chopped cheeses the first was uh at like an hour i won't say late at night late and i thought Two twos?

45:113.30. Oh, wow. Yeah. And they weren't doing chopped cheeses. And I just left the whole deli because I couldn't deal with the stress of thinking about what I wanted instead. And then I returned on the day of the solar eclipse to get my chopped cheese to watch the eclipse with. And they also were not doing chopped cheeses. I think they are like the whole hot area is out of commission for another week. So I basically have to go back. But what I got instead was they do a chopped cold cut sandwich with basically all of the deli cold cuts. chopped up. I've never had anything quite like it before. And it was just like a very strange and fun sandwich to have while watching the eclipse.

45:49I loved it. I saw some photos from the eclipse and a lot of folks here were eating lots of different picnic lunches during the eclipse. It was a great time to do that. Yeah, it was very sweet. I live close to Fort Greene Park, so I just popped over to watch it there. Yeah, I staked out a spot and then just had all my neighborhood friends come by to watch the eclipse. And then they all left right after we reached peak totality, which I thought was crazy because the eclipse was a whole, you know, three hour block of time. And we were having a beautiful day in New York. Yeah. I tried to, you know, you may have noticed I was not on Slack.

46:19I was charging my tarot cards by the sun and just sitting and vibing with my chopped sandwich. It's so great. And on the note of chopped cheese, if you're in Los Angeles, there's a place on Sunset on the east side called Bodega Park. And they they're owned by a couple of great Korean couple. And they do some really nice Korean sandwiches. They do like a desi kolbi sandwich which with mayonnaise it's amazing but they do a chopped cheese there. So Los Angeles has a great chopped cheese place and it's called Bodega Park. Wow, I love to hear it and I'm gonna return to Farmer in the Deli again in another week hopefully and I will report back.

46:52Step it up guys. What's your next one? My next one is I have to give special recognition and shouts to New York Magazine's Who Ate Where package. It was their cover story. They do an annual throwback issue every year. And this year was all dedicated to restaurants of yesteryear, but done in such a great way. Did you get a chance to check out this package? Yeah, this is one of my many open tabs on my computer. I started reading it, but I haven't made it all the way through. But I love New York history and obviously New York dining. So it's such a fun combination. It was so well done. And we're having Alan Sitsimov, the editor, the food editor of New York Magazine, on the show soon to talk about it and other things.

47:31And I just can't wait to catch up with him. But really what this package did was it really went through the eras of New York. It was from around the early 19th century, we'll say like 1890s, all the way into 2007. And honestly, so many names were covered and done in like the New York Magazine style. These like really brisk voice-driven essays. And they covered restaurants like Florent, which is that legendary meatpacking district, like All Night Cafe that was really an epicenter of queer life downtown in the 80s and 90s, to Maxwell's Plum, which I need to find out more about. Maxwell's Plum was a restaurant in the 70s that also had a lot of orgies in there, which I think is part of dining history.

48:19They have pieces on Ratner's, Max's Kansas City, Da Silvano. I mean, it's a really great list of restaurants that I want to know more about. I did not get to the Maxwell's Plum section. Get to it. I'm very curious about what they were serving at that establishment. I have an eBay alert set for this vintage cookbook that I really want for my collection, but it literally sells for$1 ,000. But the title is Cooking for Orgies and Other Large Parties, which I'm so obsessed with. Wow. Well, if you ever find it in a used bookstore, think of me. I will. I mean, you got to get your Abe alert. Are you doing Abe or are you doing just eBay?

48:52I should do that for Abe. I mean, really, it's like it was very rarely printed in the 70s and it seems to be a collector's item. So I'm hoping I have an alert set for like a slight misspelling of the title and hopes that like someone else will not do that. Anyways, eBay sniper actions there. I love that. What's your last one? My last one is that I went to Mala Project recently and had their hot and sour soup, which I had never had before. And it was maybe my favorite hot and sour soup that I've ever had. It was so wonderful. It had a lot of the mala spices in it and like really chewy noodles. And it just was like the perfect still kind of cold weather in New York soup.

49:31So I wanted to give it some love. You know, I love a mala soup. And Mala Project is a place I haven't been to in a couple of years. It's a great reminder. They just opened a second location in Greenpoint. Oh, cool. Which actually I was at the original in the East Village. But the Greenpoint location looks quite beautiful. It's up by McCarran Park. And, you know, hot pot, you know, you can have it in the summer. That's the thing. I think people think of it as only a winter dish. You can have it in the summer. It'll cool you down. Yeah, I feel like a lot of people ascribe to the eating hot things when it's hot out to cool down at school.

50:02What's your last thing? Special shout out to you and your colleague, Tanya Bush. Happy two years of the cake scene. I have to acknowledge it. I went last night to your amazing, your reading. and you had Nikolai Ripps there, Lexi Smith, Adam Dalva, many others gave these beautiful readings and just the work you and Tanya are doing when you just hear it. I've read all the issues and I have them at home. Sometimes we'll pop in here and there when I'm having coffee at my coffee table. But to hear them read by the authors, it was special. Yeah, it was really special for me too because I spend so much time in the Google Docs or on the print files because we're a print magazine working with these stories, but to hear them read aloud, especially the poetry, I thought really like takes on a whole other life when it's read aloud.

50:50Or Ali Dunbrunchai's story, The True Life of a Cookie Cam Girl. Love that one. About eating cookies on camera on like sex chat sites was just so funny. And just getting to watch the audience engage in that way was special. Yeah, she was terrific. I think there was like everybody who read, I think there was some poetry that was really powerful. would you give a shout out to the poet? Oh yeah, to Makaysha Tolbert, read a poem from Wicked Cake, which was our second issue about kind of the dark side of desserts about Ursula Granger, who was an enslaved pastry cook and also ran many other aspects of the Thomas Jefferson family estate.

51:27And she wrote a poem about just the experience of her pastry program and literally having to get the key to open the door to where the sugar was being kept in the kitchen. I know. And that moment was just powerful. And hearing about how, you know, this dichotomy of pastry, but also being enslaved. I mean, it was extremely powerful. And I know it's part of a larger collection that she's working on. And I hope to read that one day. I really just such a fan of her work. Yeah, I am as well. And they're actually doing a poetry anthology is going to be coming out, I think, in the next year. So I'll keep everyone posted on that.

52:05And let's talk about the pastries. Lauren Schofield, I'd seen her on Instagram. She did Andy Baragani's wedding like shouts. But I got to try this amazing, you can describe it was like black forest with cherries, maybe. Unbelievable. And I just really liked the way, Eliza, you and your crew executed pastry and you were raising money. And I thought it was just a beautiful event. Yeah, it was really fun to get to. We had recipes from the first four issues that had been cooked and were available for purchase at the event. And I had actually never tried Lauren's before because that was for the Wicked Cake issue as well.

52:40That's why it was a Hansel and Gretel theme on the Black Forest cake. We shot them all in an abandoned church that was really falling apart. We were all masking the whole time to avoid the asbestos that I'm sure was everywhere. So we actually didn't get to eat any of the cakes from that shoot because it just didn't feel safe after they've been hanging out in this abandoned church for so long. So last night was the first time I got to try that one also. It was so good. So good. Well, thanks for sharing your three things. Yeah. Thanks for talking with me and thanks for coming to the party. Sure.

53:12This is Taste is hosted by Eliza Abarbanel and me, Matt Rodbar. 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 that are happening.