"You Can Still Open": Matt Rodbard On What New York Operators Are Getting Wrong

0:00You can still open in New York. So I hope that's like a headline from it. Like you can still actually open a restaurant here. Some operators move and they're just like so focused on opening and doing the getting the menu right and concept right that they don't think about the community. And especially the hotshots who maybe have great press and really have extraordinary food fail because they're not ingratiating themselves in the community.

0:24I'm Conor Sheridan and this is What's Cooking. the show for operators running hospitality businesses at scale. Every guest we have had on this show runs restaurants, sites, a payroll, a profit and loss account, and a read on the industry shaped by the particular rooms that they are responsible for. Today is deliberately different. Opening a restaurant in New York now costs something like three times what it costs in any other American city. A number that large does more than make life difficult. It decides who's allowed to try it all. When the only groups who can get a door open are the ones with serious backing behind them, the range of what opens gets narrower, and the operator with one strong site and no outside money has a much harder route to the second site than they had 10 years ago.

1:09That is a story about a market. My guest today covers the American food world for a living. He is the founding editor-in-chief of Taste, which he launched with Crown at the Penguin Random House, which has won two James Beard Journalism Awards. This podcast, This Is Taste, is past its 100th episode. Three books, including Koreatown and Koreaworld, and reporting for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and GQ. That is Matt Robbant. And he talks to people in every one of these cities every week. That's a vantage point none of us have from inside our own business. That's why I wanted him to join me on this podcast.

1:49Matt, welcome to What's Cooking. Great to have you on the show. It's great to be here, Connor. I'm excited to talk about New York, your new hometown. Yeah, 100%. I was about to say, our first episode fell in from New York after making the move over from London. So it's a privilege to have you on as a first guest and couldn't have asked for a better first guest. I'm excited to talk to you about what you think, like fresh eyes on the New York scene. You live in Williamsburg now. Yeah, it's definitely a change from London. Yeah. Oh, it's amazing, right? There's so much energy in the city, both Manhattan where we are now and in Brooklyn as well.

2:21the food scene is incredible and I think we were just saying off camera it gives it gives independent vibes but also which is cool right I think like New York which we're going to get to is known to be an expensive city to operate CapEx, OpEx wise so it's definitely cool to see like the vibe retaining in the borough in terms of a lot of independence spinning up great concepts I mean you can definitely ball on a budget here too like I mean I know we're going to talk about costs and there's like they are everywhere. Like they're rising everywhere. But you can still open in New York. So I hope that's like a headline from it.

2:57Like you can still actually open a restaurant here. Yeah, and there's a lot of creativity, right? We hosted an operator dinner recently with a bunch of folks, some who are a couple of hundred outlets or locations, some with one or two. And the formats are changing. I see new operators do a lot with smaller formats, a bit more creative ways of operating. So that's definitely cool. We got straight into it, but before we get any further, it'd be cool for those listening just to hear a little bit about your background and and a bit on taste absolutely i uh i started the podcast this is taste uh about eight years ago so i spent a lot of time doing what you're doing right now and talking to chefs and book book authors and journalists of the food world and we publish a few episodes a week um but i also uh run taste which is a online good publication then uh we're we turn 10 next year congratulations thanks buddy Yeah, we've had a great run with reported stories and we've won three James Beard Awards.

3:53So over the course of the time, we've been honored by our peers and with some of our reporting. And really, we're in a cool part of inflection point for food media right now. I think it's really exciting. I know there's been a lot of closure and changes happening, and that's been not as exciting. But the folks who are still around right now, there's some exciting things happening. and the way we cover not just restaurants and chefs, but, you know, grocery and CPG and all sorts of things. Yeah, content and media has never been more important in the restaurant game, right? Definitely. You can nail that.

4:27It feels like you're giving yourself such an accelerant to be successful. Yeah, absolutely. I think having a really strong sense with the media and like a media strategy as an operator is important. It can be from a PR agency and being professionally honed, or it can just be you and your TikTok and doing authentic and cool, but you have to play in that sandbox. The longer the days when a chef can just be a chef and head down doing service and that's it. Like, no way. It does not work today. How do you see people doing it right? Do you see, like, in terms of that approach, you've switched on a couple of mediums, Pure, TikTok.

5:04How do you see people bringing that strategy together? Any examples? I mean, I think with social media, there's lots of ways to do it right you can have like reels as like you do video you can actually you can put up your specials like i was looking at e cavallini's instagram account it's great restaurant brooklyn nick cook for toll is the chef and you know nick they don't post a lot but they post the most important information like menus and specials and once in a while nick will do a day in the life of a chef put a put a camera on like a gopro and do like a time lapse of him cooking so i think that's really clever and that's that's like a low frequency type of social media plan um i mean i think the guys uh like jeremiah and fabian those guys are amazing like uh they they are always on social doing cool things and and presenting their work um and then there's like restaurant and and chefs who are are like in podcast world i think david chang's the best example while he isn't obviously every day at his restaurants he still is a chef and an operator he still has plenty of restaurants and he has a media company based around podcasts and video and so i think like there's like different flavors of media for for chefs and operators to play in but you have to do something you can't ignore it i have to stay front of mind yeah 100 percent we're only chatting to the team in the office and uh one of them was just scrolling through tiktok to find where they wanted to go for dinner oh interesting and i'm probably showing my age a bit and i was like what are you doing so this is how i find my restaurants yeah i only go to tiktok only tiktok for restaurant discovery interesting so that is an energy right yeah that is an energy i i i think i mean i was gonna say belly if you're like gen z like you're going there which is also an energy yeah like listen i i love that god these tiktok creators are showing the world of food in unique ways and very you know telling great stories and um i personally wouldn't make my directs via TikTok, but hey, man, if the dish looks great and you're hungry, go find it.

7:03Go there. Yeah, I'm an advocate for that. Yeah. So we're here to talk a bit more holistically about New York and operating in New York, long known as the best restaurant city in the world. Woo! Yeah. Big claim, right? I think there's maybe a bit of rivalry between London, where I just came from right now. Yeah. We were talking about it off camera that potentially London's lower cost of entry, So you're seeing a lot of interesting concepts or maybe more open up because of the cost to play is a little bit lower. But how do you think about New York's status as the restaurant city in the world? Is it under threat?

7:37Is it still number one? Well, I would say it's a great, great topic. We can go all day on this. I think in America, the best food city is Los Angeles by far in terms of like just diversity of cuisine and really cool neighborhoods that have like really like concentrated like five or six restaurants. like it may be in the South Bay and be like Oaxacan cuisine. It might be Koreatown. It might be a little Japan. But definitely New York is the best restaurant city in America. The world, that's, you know, I haven't been to every city, so I don't know. But I think we as New Yorkers, we understand some of the major tenets of hospitality and restaurants.

8:18So like great cuisine, great space, like that has mood and vibe. You know, of course, like having service that makes sense. I think we're very impatient when service does not make sense as New Yorkers and and restaurant and operators, restaurants, operators will be told that very quickly by New Yorkers. we have history too obviously now a lot of history has gone away in the past decade so that's one thing that we don't have anymore plenty of classic places have gone away but we have we know where this pizza was basically invented you know we have an incredible chinatown in three boroughs we have koreatown and you know we have like some old school places that just are one of ones in the world um but then you look at places like uh like london that i think in terms of creativity because of costs of of of operation operating costs it's it's there's more creativity happening in london it's obvious you know you look at menus in new york and you're seeing like a seared fish and a um you know a hard seared fish in a in a like a herby sauce you're seeing like you know steak steak for one steak for two you're seeing a lot of the same things whole fish perhaps like depending on the cuisine.

9:31And of course, chicken, you're seeing lots of roast chicken. So like, there's just like a lot of like uniformity with the menu structures in New York that you're probably not seeing as much in London. Interesting. And do you think that is solely down to the price of entry? I think anecdotally we talking outside and somewhere around the region, it's the OPEX where the costs operate in New York anecdotally versus elsewhere in the US and potentially in London. Does that mean that the risk is so high? failure at the risk of failure so high financially that you need to move a little bit more in the middle in terms of uniformity 100 i think like new york is not the only city i mean san francisco but up x cost are massive as well and that's mostly because of real estate you know our we're over a hundred dollars per square foot here in manhattan and it's really different from a lot of other cities so you you've got that real estate cost we got labor costs are higher here $70 in wage.

10:29Plus, you've got taxes here, payroll taxes that you can't ignore in parts of Europe and around the world. They don't have, you know, you don't have quite the payroll, the tax structure. But I think it is required that you put butts in seats and you sell food, right? So you have to do crop pleasers. Absolutely agree. And a lot of chefs just find pressure to do these certain crop pleasers And, you know, to vary results. Sometimes those crowd pleasers work extremely well. And you're going to get people coming back for those, like, the steaks and the proteins. And, you know, like, pastas for 40, 42 and, like, what you have to charge.

11:10And, you know, sometimes it works. But, like, in terms of creativity, maybe broadly it's not as creative as other cities. Yeah. Interesting. I'm originally from Dublin, New England. Yeah. I think like the, you have a bunch of restaurants there, right, operating and the cost per square foot for us still today is maybe$60. So you're talking 40 % cheaper. Obviously the density of folks is one end to Manhattan, right? It's a good end account for sure. It's definitely, and the structural advantages of that, having it as like, say sub 70 % of your P &L gives you more breathing room to take bets on different locations, right?

11:51but what I'm seeing you asked around my experience here is definitely seeing a lot more creativity here in smaller spaces maybe that's the cost per square foot and maybe that's time spaces the only things you can afford yeah yeah but they're turning out some amazing food and amazing concepts and hues around the block yes they're doing some interesting stuff so you've been to Hasdak Biat obviously it feels like you're just like explaining one of our better restaurants like you're just you're saying it as a tiny little space. And they have a house bistro, which is three times the size, but they're doing brilliant work in a small space.

12:27Yeah, you see that a lot in New York. Sometimes when you have these constraints structurally, it just forces creativity of a whole new different type. I think even, and to go back to that example of Dublin, hub culture used to be the big thing. People would go and buy and open bars and they became priced out because it's e-figures to open a bar and the next generation couldn't afford that. So yeah, I think cafe culture and small entrepreneurs went to smaller and every horse box in arlem was shop right so you tend to find some creativity yeah yeah totally and so if you look at you touched on some of the the opex are there any cities or any states doing it differently in the u.s today that you're seeing folks maybe migrate opening new restaurant concepts too so if new york is expensive is there your answer to that i mean i i just had an amazing meal in chicago at a restaurant called feld which i really loved and that was a tasting menu.

13:18They won the James Beard Award. So they're, like, really well regarded now. But they're operating, you know, on the near north side. It's not in, you know, it's not in, like, the loop or, like, in a high-rent neighborhood. And I think what they're doing is an example of in Chicago, you can get, like, a really, like, you can get a black box with, like, a little backyard and, like, pay, like, a tenth of rent is what you pay in even Brooklyn and do, like, an extraordinary tasting menu. So I think, like, Chicago is cool. Like right now, I've been back a couple times this year, and I think that that is a city that, you know, they love restaurants in Chicago.

13:54Like they have a really well-paying, supportive community there. And it gets forgotten sometimes, and the weather can be challenging for some people to move there. But there's just, like, great restaurants in Chicago. Like off the top of my head, that's one city. I think, like, Phoenix, Arizona, I've heard it has some really interesting opportunities there. you've got like obviously a lot of summer or winter you know snowbirds coming down to the older population but i think there's some like real movements happening within like the younger generation in phoenix i didn't think i was going to talk about phoenix today actually this is like totally unexpected i mean you think around for new york operators listening if they're going if they're looking at expanding into phoenix or chicago what travels what doesn't what do they need to be cognizant of when bringing concepts from city to city?

14:44I mean, certainly know your market. So like you can't just like pop up in a city and expect people to come because of your press in New York. And I mean, it's certainly is not going to happen. Another city that comes to mind is actually better than Phoenix is I live in the Hudson Valley now, the lower Hudson Valley, and there's a city of Kingston. It's about a two hour drive from New York City. And that's a really interesting city for for a lot of people to look at and there's definitely a community there who support the new restaurants and i think a lot of people from the city are are moving up there full-time or part-time and understanding that like there's like a real culture and community that goes back you know 50 years 100 in in kingston and then of course all these new people too yeah so i think like when moving up from new york to kingston like hypothetically you obviously you need to like get to know the community it's so important like you have to like go and it's not just going to the community board but it's like like understanding where like the nearest school is even if it's not a concept that that appeals to children just like know where the school is and like know where like the the annual community events like they happen all the time and i think some operators move and they're just like so focused on opening and doing the getting the menu right and concept right that they don't think about the community and especially the hot shots who maybe have great press and really have extraordinary food fail because they're not ingratiating themselves a community it's interesting right so and do you see that as like a to generate more reach to to for people to feel like you're putting roots down you want to be part of the the area or like do you have any like tactical advice yeah i mean if you're known as like a standoffish like big city chef coming into a smaller town even if it's like going from new york to chicago people talk you know there's gossip you know there's people you want to be known as like someone who's like very open to the community no one wants like a big city chef coming in and being like close-minded about the people who are you're gonna serve so i think it's a little bit of that happening um okay yeah i mean also like you know when you when you're moving from city to city it's like what have you learned from your from york that you can bring to this new city that might excite the community there so if there's like nostalgia from new york and you're bringing new york slice shop to los angeles for example like bring a little bit of that new york attitude and and use it as like a strength yeah that's great advice and rolling back to New York, you said previously that maybe five, ten years ago, it was a hard city to penetrate as an international concept or maybe a chef-driven concept from London, right?

17:32So, but now it's becoming maybe a little bit softer to enter or the market's more receptive. You've seen concepts like Hawksmoor or Junkana. Yeah. These things land in from London specifically and do pretty well. What's driving that? I mean, I was going to use those examples too. like Hawksmore is a great example of like an import that just took off in Brooklyn and it just did so well and I think that was like just getting your operations really in check and understanding the market and doing some of the things I've previously said which was like know your market get to know the community so Ambassadors Club Clubhouse that's like the hot place right now and I think there's like a lot of like oh like what what like a mystique around it and I think when you're coming from overseas or even moving from LA to New York, which has been really challenging in the past.

18:19Like now the brand equity of some of these places are so strong that you can't deny it in certain cities. I mean, Carbone is a great example. They are great operators too. And like, I love, I went to Carbone in Las Vegas last year and it was really good. Like it was probably better than Carbone here in many ways. So you have to nail like the simple stuff, like be sure the food is really good and like your service is really trained. but I think like as the generations have gotten like the younger generation or like perhaps is like a pet theory a little more open-minded to brands coming in as opposed to maybe 20 years ago when there was like a lot of like the out-of-town chef is not welcome here Okay, makes sense and for someone like yourself for these brands, you must be first port-a-call, right?

19:06We talked about content or how to get reach people to know So the who's who of food scene listening to your podcast, reading your stuff, do you see a lot of international brands looking to engage in a content strategy with you or reach out to you and your team or people like, like yourself? Absolutely. I, we, we get pitched a lot. You know, my inbox is, is crazy with people wanting to come on the show and it's super flattering. So we, we definitely get, um, chefs from overseas who want to make a statement in the States and come on our show. And sometimes they're like thinking about new concepts and they're just on book tour, but like they definitely need to, get in touch with the local media right and understand and that's why you hire an agency perhaps uh and there's like a lot of value in hiring a media agency um it's not for every operator um to have to carry that retainer fee through a year or more uh because like the media has changed so much it's so like the roi is hard to to kind of figure out these days with so few media outlets um but thinking about like social strategy too of course and agencies can help with that.

20:08But yeah, we get engaged all the time from out-of-town chefs. Okay. Beyond the podcast, you mentioned obviously some book writing. You have to mention that New York Times best-selling books as well, right? Thanks for mentioning that. Appreciate that. You have a lot of expertise to get to this next point. See a lot of concepts, produce their own books, their own chef-driven books, recipe books, just cooking lifestyle. How do you think about that as a strategy for brand building and building advocacy? Do you think it's a good strategy? Like any examples of when it's done well? You don't need to give examples when it's not, but maybe.

20:48I mean, so, you know, taste is part of Penguin Random House. So I work in book publishing. So I'm very qualified to answer this. And I think, like, where I work, Tens B Press and Clarkson Potter, I work closely with those two imprints. And a long history of publishing restaurant cookbooks, particularly you know at 10 speed press like i mean i think of like books like uh manresa you know like that just like pops in the head pock pock uh these these books that i mean jerusalem premier de malolonghi you know we published all those books and like i i think like not every restaurant should have a cookbook but if you engage with an agent and the agent believes in your story that is your first step typically and if that agent believes that you have an ability to tell a story and perhaps sell books uh it is so worthwhile it is so it is like many of you use the term like saying it's like the most expensive business card you'll ever produce but that's like so true uh you're you have you heard that before yeah yeah that's like definitely what a lot of people will say because you know the economics of a restaurant cookbooks you know you're you're putting a lot of your advance into the actual book and we're all hoping that it sells and some sell really well and some sell more modestly but like they still sell and like they get into the homes of people and you know the cookbook industry is interesting it's not uh strictly uh an object that you're gonna like cook from right like a cookbook can be many things it can be in the kitchen it can be on the nightstand it can be on your coffee table and buyers and we're selling you know cookbooks are doing well people love cookbooks and and they're for a lot of reasons And, you know, with a restaurant book, you have the opportunity to really think about your story, particularly if you're a restaurant group that's been around for some time and wants to tell that heritage.

22:39Or if you're a chef at a restaurant, you have a really great sense with like recipe development and concept. You know, there's there's great ways that you can, you know, you can be the chef at the restaurant, but can be more of a lifestyle book. There's ways to do that. But I really I think the process is is it's tough. it's not an easy process multi-year a lot of work it's it's a lot of a lot of restaurants and a lot of chefs like in the end they look at the book they get the book sent to them at the end like wow i did that and they feel a lot of pride and like we know chefs have a ton of pride in their work you know day to day in the kitchen and when you have a book it's it's it's an extension of that yeah nice it's very cool um it can definitely be it's almost obviously it can be um for folks to be using as a formula to produce great food for their families but it's also a representation of their personalities their lifestyle their own personal aesthetic to so many ways you can resonate with people oh even though my coffee table there's lots of books i think i'd fail out every recipe but they look cool right they look cool they they're they're well written you You know, they tell a story.

23:49And also, like, when you put out a book, there's ultimately going to be a media cycle around the book. And you're going to be able to go on tour, perhaps, and do some events with your friends in the industry. And it's just a great way to get into the media cycle and, like, talk about your restaurant in a cool way. Yeah, that's very cool. Coming back to New York a little bit, if you look forward from now, what changes would you hope to see or like to see to keep the progress in the city from a food and beverage point of view? I think a couple of years down the line, what do you think we need to see to maintain the vigor and the virality of the concepts?

24:25I mean, we need to fix our payroll tax. I mean, explicitly I'll say it. Like, it's too high, it's unfair, and operators are struggling to make rent with this tax in place. And I think, you know, one solution, and Camilla Marcus has presented this. It's her idea and I'll share it. I'll paraphrase it. It's like, you know, take two thirds of that payroll tax you pay every month and give it back to the restaurant. Don't give it back to the operator. It's not going to be profit. But let them do something with that payroll tax. Like let them invest and use that savings towards PTO and benefits for their staff.

25:05Let them reinvest it. Because, you know, we know restaurants are people intensive. You need a lot of people to operate a restaurant in that same, you know, 2 ,500 square foot space. Think about that. The staff at a restaurant and the staff next door at like a watch store or at a Verizon store. It's like a 50th, you know. You can have like 75 employees and you can have like four employees. You're paying the same rate of payroll tax. You're paying the same rate. You're paying much less, obviously. with fewer employees. So I think the cities need to realize that payroll taxes is detrimental to restaurants' growth.

25:48And we need restaurants to be open in communities. We need these restaurants to be operating in neighborhoods that without a restaurant there or a cafe or bar, et cetera, they're dead at night. And that's a public safety issue. You need street traffic. You need foot traffic. You need operating restaurants. It keeps neighborhoods safe. and so there's a lot of civic I would say obligation from governments to help restaurants survive and pretty simple ways to adjust the tax structure so that's like one example that I think in five years in New York City I would hope that there's been some adjustments who knows if it will happen though Well said I'll vote for you if you're running right Right, right I would say check out Camilla Marcus's work and and many chefs and operators who really dedicate a lot of time to changing tax policy.

26:46No, it's really smart. It's really well put. I think we were also talking outside, like you talked about a civic responsibility for safety in neighborhoods and diffusion of like absolutely careers and jobs. But equally, we were talking around for the next generation of kids growing up, like the chance to be a loneliness epidemic if they're stuck at home doom scrolling because there's nowhere to go in real life from hang and have a coffee or get a slice of pizza or just sit around. So yeah, I think there's a lot of reasons that you need some intervention to make sure that doesn't become the case.

27:17I like that point you brought up, Connor. I think it's super on point. Like we are in the middle of a loneliness epidemic. I think that people are glued to their phones, myself included. Like I, you know, I take the full responsibility for that too and um you know at some point doctors are going to say you you have to like leave your phone at home and go to a restaurant go to a cafe go to a live comedy show and and not be on your phone it's just like for public health and this is a great reason why we need these third spaces to be open in communities um and we all love restaurants for many different reasons but i think one reason we all really love restaurants is that it's a place that we'd see people interacting bumping up against each other celebrating maybe just having a boring salad you know rice bowl like but still you're like interacting with humans as opposed to you know people who are working from home remotely getting that that seamless order you know and not talking to anyone for the day like that that can't be good no definitely not yeah we're going to move on to the next segment, which is the quick turn.

28:24Oh, I love it. I'm ready for it. I'm ready for it. So it's rapid fire questions. First one up, New York, Los Angeles or London, where would you open your restaurant right now? I mean, I would say 100 % Los Angeles. I think like the media is thriving there. I think that there is a great opportunity in neighborhoods to bring cool concepts to the Los Angelinos who who maybe are underserved. I think it's a very, very cool city. I think that they have similar problems with New York City tax structure and it's very expensive to operate. You have to take that into account. London's a close second. As I mentioned before, creativity is at its highest there.

29:07And New York came in third. You got to really have some stones to open in New York these days. Yeah, for sure. What are your top tips for finding a new restaurant to eat in when you're visiting a new city? It's like I have to go back and say like journalists are doing their job and it's reading local writers, be it at the local paper or a great sub stack or a podcast or people who are like actually writing about the food. you notice i'm excluding influencers and tiktok folks and creators i i love them and i think you can find great food through them but i think going back to like the if it's like washington dc go to the washington post look at their top 40 restaurants and just like read that and those are like those are the people that i go to first nice um and then i just like walk around i think like if you come from a city and you understand restaurants and your audience understands restaurants is like you have an instinct and there's just like a really great opportunity for serendipity.

30:08It doesn't have to be like the best meal you're ever going to have, but it's really fun to like walk around the neighborhood and just like find a place and just like try it out. Yeah, they're often, they feel the best, right? Because there's no expectation. There's no preconceived notion and you just, it hits the spot. It hits the spot sometimes. Yeah. And you can tell like, if it's like full and you know, the menu looks cool and like that you like the vibe and the wine list looks cool on the, you know, look in the window. The menu, it's like, just go check it out. Yeah. Great advice. Any other thing should do that.

30:40Copenhagen is the best place to do that. I feel like Copenhagen, you just walk around and find some cool spots there. Yeah, well-known, well-revered for its food quality, right? Absolutely. It's a great city. What did you believe about this industry five years ago that you don't believe today? so i would say five years ago i thought that influencers while entertaining would were still maybe second-class citizens in in the ranking of of what mattered to put butts in the seats five years ago this is like where is this 21 it's like pandemic so i would say like five seven years ago maybe 19 i'm like so yes like creators they weren't even called that then And, you know, they're really fun.

31:22But, like, I'm still, like, the New York Times Review, Los Angeles Times Review, Eater, Infatuation, like, the journalist doing the job. Those would be the most important voices. It's flipped, obviously. And we were talking about that before. It's, like, influencers have so much importance now. And, like, they really do put butts in the seats. And people really do follow TikTok to get that dining recommendation. Definitely wouldn't have predicted that five years ago. yeah same i think like in 21 there was even not pushback but there was like um there was some chatter and representing things as ads or not being ads and when was it a recommendation versus an advertisement and it was getting a bit of noise but now it seems to have blown past that right i think now i think the audiences are more discerning for who they follow who they trust and there's like many of many creators meaning they don't work for a publication who have like used journalistic integrity and standards and like never pay for or never take free meals and pay pay their way and like because they they see the value like if they're especially if they're popular and they're getting money from other streams they don't need to take money from the restaurants to do their job and be good at it so i think there's like a little bit more discernment from the audience towards creators now what is the best run restaurant not the best food best run restaurant you've eaten in recently and why i mean i i've gone to penny and claude uh in the past i've been there a number of times but i've been recently to both on separate occasions like extremely well-run restaurants i think that they're they're busy but i think like front of house back house understands like that like weave that you have to do they're smaller spaces um i really love those restaurants I think Borgo is a very well-run restaurant.

33:09I think that's in kind of a – it's Murray Hill. Have you had the pleasure of going to Borgo? No. You should go. Andrew Tarlow, he started a restaurant diner in Brooklyn in 1999. He is one of my favorite restaurant folks in New York. And I think just in terms of like I've sat at the bar, I've had a meal in the dining room, and I just love it. I love the menu development. I love the service. There's real pros working the floor. Great wine list. It's a terrific restaurant. Really nice. I'll check it out. One more, actually. Yeah, go for it. Ari Ari. East Village, small Korean restaurant. It's one of my favorites.

33:45I've written two books about Korean food, so I'm on top of most of what's happening in New York, though it's always changing. That's a place that the owner is always there. He's a great guy. Wonderful front-of-house staff. They're so on it and really helpful. It's very, very popular. It's on Resi. You can book it. should um i love that restaurant some serious wrecks yeah trying trying to bring it yeah you're a game trying to bring the a game okay so the last one would be we've i've asked you which is the best city to open up as an operator but what's your favorite city globally to to eat in or for restaurants hands down it's soul it's soul and and i'm not trying to be the guy who's been to seoul and wants to talk about so but i've been there like 10 times i've been very lucky to go there a lot and um i've been lucky to go with friends i've done work there and for me it's so exciting to visit seoul first off like the dollar is very strong it's the won right now um and so it's definitely a a trip that i think your dollar goes goes far like korean people operators and restaurants and just korean people are extremely cool and gracious and and want i would say want to have like new yorkers and folks from london in their restaurants i feel there's a stigma that is a little bit of a closed society i think that that has been smashed the globalization of korean culture has really helped and um i think that like in that city uh there's a lot of things happening uh there's traditional restaurants like like a stew shop or kimbap or like korean barbecue of course you can have all that all day but then they have like vuaniserie and pastries incredible like amazing places pizza is getting better and i think the cocktail scene is really strong as well and like japan gets a lot of press still and like the tourists in japan is a wonderful place but i i would i would really recommend going to seoul first and visiting all of korea to be honest because seoul is a hub you can take the trains down to most of the countryside and these other cities it's such a wonderful place so easily sold nice uh good diversity of recommendations very cool yeah and before we wrap you mentioned that you're you guys are are launching your first new pod in yeah in almost 10 years or eight years sorry yeah you can talk to us a bit on what it's called love it well you know what i haven't ever actually said anything publicly but i'll certainly i'll say it you know um it's called eye level uh this is taste is run for eight years and we're We're going to keep doing that.

36:22We're going to get to 1 ,000 shows probably by next year. But we want to do a show about the grocery industry, about CPG, and really have influential founders come on the show and talk about the modern day of groceries. So not how I built this. Many of the folks we've talked to have done that show. It's a great show. We don't need to go back and hear the journey. We want to hear about what they're thinking about today and working with retail. We have retailers on. So we have the CEO of Whole Foods on, the founder of Athletic Brewing. uh peter rail is coming on from rx bar and david protein luna and waters founders coming on so we have like some really cool guests coming up and and really um i think for your audience for like the restaurant industry you know cpg is so fascinating for chefs right now because i think it's like yet another revenue stream uh that is there's like a potential for revenue stream i think the big caveat is is like cpg is like impossible to succeed in like truly it's so hard but when you hit it you hit it and it's um it's really gratifying and it's all food we're all like talking about food and we're all obsessed with it in the same way but um i think the grocery store too is like a place of pure entertainment these days and i think a lot of people are going shopping especially when retail is getting so exciting like we hear about airwam we hear about pop-up grocer and happier grocer and going to these places is a true entertainment moment in your life like Like shopping is fun.

37:47And when you see all these digital brands that you see on your feed come to life in a retail space, I think a lot of people enjoy that. Even if your basket, it's like a hundred bucks. They're like, wow, I just spent a hundred dollars. Well, you come home and you're like, oh man, these are some cool things happening. Great products. So this show is like really about the pop culture elements around the grocery store as well as founders. That's awesome. Thank you for asking me about that show. No, that sounds absolutely awesome. I'm definitely going to be listening and watching. Yeah. Can I ask you one question?

38:15kind of like flip it quickly I was going to finish on a compliment just to say no dad it's going to be a huge success like everything you've done but now you can ask thanks buddy that's nice of you well I have to say you're the chicken sandwich king of Ireland and impressive to hear about that do you have opinions about chicken sandwiches in New York do you have like one that you like do you still eat them I know you're a chef and operator and you love this food this item um i don't have big uh notions we call it in our own or opinions about them i think they're great i think like i don't have a particular favorite yeah yeah over here i think you can get them to specific brands that just do it right there's yeah famous if it's dave's or raisin canes or chick-fil-a or yeah sweet chick or these kind of things and then there's other people that just serve up awesome sandwiches in a bar right and because it's part of the menu so and the answer I don't have a favorite.

39:15That's cool. But if you've got recommendations that I can take offline to go check them out. I could give you one offline. I could give you one online. I got, yeah, there's some great chicken soup. Where should I be going? Well, you know, there's a place that I really like that's over in a food hall. It's the James Beard Food Hall platform. I think it's Pier 57. It's called Besou. Okay. B-E-S-S-O-U. B-E-S-S-O-U. Two S. They do karage. Beautiful. But they do it in a sandwich form too. And it's a Japanese style fried chicken. Um, that's amazing. They also have this popcorn they sell there. This, this miso caramel corn.

39:48Oh, wow. Oh, it's so good. It's like a really cool restaurant. It's kind of like, it is in this food hall. And that's, that's my, that's my chicken rack. I'll go back to you with a feedback. Yeah. Awesome. Well, look, thanks so much for joining. It's been What's Cooking. It's been great to have you on the show. Thanks, buddy. It's been an honor to chat with you. Thank you so much. Thanks.

40:10That's a wrap. Our first episode in New York. and what a first guest to have. Matt was phenomenal. Some of the best restaurant recommendations you can get if you're a New Yorker or someone visiting. So check out that list. It'll be in the show notes below. Matt covered such a wide range of topics. The cost to play in New York is enormous. So the risk is huge and that can narrow a lot of the offerings that we're seeing in the city. On the flip side, a huge amount of creativity persists and still one of the best food cities in the world. Matt also covered the importance of content, social and pure for restaurants.

40:43You have to be involved. The game has changed. Five to seven years ago, influencers, TikTok, all of these things were just coming onto the scene. Today, they are a huge part of how traffic, volume, and search happens. Restauranteurs need a strategy and a plan and need to know how to execute. Phenomenal episode end to end. Really want to say thanks to Matt for joining us. Until next time, I'll see you then.

41:13Daddy!