Chef Mary Attea , currently turning out exceptional food at The Musket Room in New York City, initially set her sights on a career in the dark world of criminal psychology. But a series of restaurant jobs drew her first to the industry, and eventually to the pro kitchen. After training at the Institute of Culinary Education in New York City, Mary landed an externship at the fabled West Village restaurant Annisa, where she eventually ascended to the position of chef de cuisine, which she held unt...
May 27, 2021•1 hr 58 min•Ep. 165
Andrew recently sat down with the accomplished chef and restaurateur Alex Raij, who owns and operates a number of the most personal, specific, and successfully realized Spanish restaurants ( La Vara , Saint Julivert Fisherie , El Quinto Pino , Txikito ) in New York City, all in collaboration with her husband Eder Montero. Alex opens up about the genesis of her restaurant concepts, her food-focused Minneapolis childhood, and dream projects that linger in her imagination. And in The Line-Up, our w...
May 20, 2021•1 hr 42 min•Ep. 164
On the day after his newish Francie was awarded a Michelin star, Chris Cipollone sat down with Andrew to discuss the road to his success at his prior restaurant Piora, and now at Francie, as well as his training in Westchester, NY, restaurants, and the formative New York City chef positions he held along the way. And in The Line-Up, our weekly news and commentary segment, three festival and conference organizers call into the pod to discuss their current thinking for when and how to bring their ...
May 13, 2021•2 hr 18 min•Ep. 163
Scott Alves Barton came up as a cook, then chef, in New York City restaurants, including almost ten years working with the late, great Patrick Clark. In midlife, Scott made a shift to academia, earning a PhD in food studies from New York University, and is now a leading culinary educator, teaching at multiple institutions and participating in myriad projects and articles, much of it with a focus on race, ethnicity, and related subjects. (Regular listeners will remember that Scott guest produced ...
May 05, 2021•2 hr 26 min•Ep. 162
Damarr Brown, chef de cuisine of Chicago's acclaimed Virtue restaurant , has spent most of his young life and career in the same city. For several years, he cooked for Virtue's executive chef-owner Erick Williams at MK, then spent time in the kitchen at Alinea Group's Roister, and since the inception of Virtue has been back in collaboration with Chef Williams. On this episode, Damarr discusses his early life and first interest in food and cooking, the decisions he's made on the path to his curre...
Apr 28, 2021•1 hr 39 min•Ep. 161
On today's episode, Harold Dieterle catches us up on his current endeavors. The onetime chef-restaurateur behind Perilla, Kin Shop, and The Marrow in New York City, and author of Harold Dieterle's Kitchen Notebook (written in collaboration with Andrew) discusses his formative days; the adventure that led to his appearing on and winning the inaugural season of television's Top Chef ; and his current life as a food and beverage consultant and developer of a line of cannabis edibles. And in our wee...
Apr 20, 2021•1 hr 44 min•Ep. 160
One of Andrew's favorite recent meals in NYC was a dinner at Kimika , a newly opened restaurant in lower Manhattan, where chef Christine Lau serves up a distinct and very flavorful mashup of Italian and Japanese influences. Christine sat down with Andrew to discuss her path to the kitchen, which ran through stints as a high school and college athlete and myriad other professions, before committing to her very successful career. And in our weekly news and commentary segment, The Line-Up, chef Rus...
Apr 14, 2021•2 hr 15 min•Ep. 159
Johnny Ortiz , currently a chef-in-residence at Stone Barns Center for Food & Agriculture , has made a fascinating journey from his original home in New Mexico to the pinnacle of fine dining at Alinea and Saison, and back to New Mexico, where he stages intimate, deeply personal Shed Project dinners . Andrew caught up with him at Stone Barns to discuss his young life and career, and the experience of serving his signature food in a different state and setting. And in The Line-Up, our weekly n...
Apr 07, 2021•2 hr 7 min•Ep. 158
With a number of restaurants to his name, and a company (Unapologetic Foods) devoted to bringing authentic Indian cuisine to the United States, chef Chintan Pandya is on a bit of a roll, even in the aftermath of COVID. HIs recently launched Dhamaka on the Lower East Side of Manhattan is the latest in a string of successful concepts including Rahi and Adda , that he and business partner Roni Mazumdar have created. In one of our first in-person interviews in months, Chintan sits down with Andrew o...
Mar 30, 2021•1 hr 52 min•Ep. 157
She may not be a household name, but Lisabet Summa has led a storied career in the profession she loves as much today as when she first set foot in a professional kitchen. After coming up alongside such luminaries as Norman Van Aken and Charlie Trotter in Chicago, Lisabet moved to South Florida, eventually becoming executive culinary director of the prolific Big Time Restaurant Group . Lisabet takes us through her journey from acting to cooking to her current role overseeing 15 restaurants as we...
Mar 23, 2021•2 hr•Ep. 156
In an interview recorded in-person, pre-pandemic, legendary American chef David Burke sits down with Andrew at David Burke Tavern to discuss his life and career, including how he first discovered professional cooking, and his lifelong gift for outside-the-box thinking. We also share a portion of a conversation with Omar Tate of Philadelphia's Honeysuckle Provisions recorded at Stone Barns Center for Food & Agriculture where he was recently in residence . (Please consider supporting the GoFun...
Mar 17, 2021•2 hr 6 min•Ep. 155
Julia Turshen joins Andrew to discuss her new book Simply Julia: 110 Easy Recipes for Healthy Comfort Foo d , as well as her life and career as a food writer, podcaster, and activist. And in The Line-Up, our weekly news and commentary segment, Rebecca Mason of Houston, Texas' Fluff Bake Bar discusses the governor's lifting of mask mandates and what it means for restaurateurs and foodservice owners. Andrew Talks to Chefs is sponsored in part by meez; please check out this revolutionary new intera...
Mar 09, 2021•1 hr 53 min•Ep. 154
Chicago's chef Beverly Kim ( Parachute and Wherewithal ) joins Andrew to discuss a wide array of subjects, from her personal journey to chefdom to the challenges of being a woman and Korean-American in the pro kitchen, to the coming restaurant reset. And in The Line-Up, our weekly news and commentary segment, designer Glen Coben helps us imagine what restaurants might look like post COVID. Andrew Talks to Chefs is sponsored in part by meez; please check out this revolutionary new interactive rec...
Mar 02, 2021•2 hr 26 min•Ep. 153
For four decades Jesse Cool has owned and operated the beloved Menlo Park restaurant Flea Street Cafe , and been a devoted proponent of organic cooking and dining. She joins Andrew to discuss her road from Pennsylvania to California, the ups and downs of running a restaurant over such a long timespan, and her dislike of the word chef , among myriad other subjects. ( Listen to Jesse's earlier appearance on the pod .) And a trio of experts from Brad Metzger Restaurant Solutions , a Southern Califo...
Feb 22, 2021•1 hr 27 min•Ep. 152
The great Chicago chef Rick Bayless (Frontera Grill, Topolobampo, et. al.) recently wrote a deeply personal essay for Medium about the roller coaster of personal and professional milestones that comprise his year of coping with the human and economic costs of COVID. On this week's show, Rick expands on the universal themes and observations of the piece in an unscripted, unguarded conversation with Andrew. We think this will be a very cathartic listen, whether or not you are in the industry. Here...
Feb 08, 2021•1 hr 19 min•Ep. 151
This is the shortest month of the year, so we're packing as much as we can into each episode! Our headline guest this week is Wylie Dufresne, in our opinion one of the most influential American chefs of the past few decades. He shares what he's been up to during the pandemic (including the pizza experiments that have dominated his Instagram feed ), opens up about the future; and kicks around the historical context of "modernist cuisine." We are also thrilled to welcome back Mashama Bailey of The...
Feb 01, 2021•2 hr 27 min•Ep. 150
It's Inauguration Day in the United States, and we open this week's episode with a moving conversation with Aquavit chef and Swedish native Emma Bengtsson, who became a US citizen on January 6, 2021, the day of the horrific insurrection at the US Capitol in Washington, DC. Emma shares the mix of emotions she felt on that day, and where her subsequent soul-searching led her. And our feature interview this week is with Helene Henderson, another Swedish woman (we swear this is a coincidence), who f...
Jan 20, 2021•1 hr 30 min•Ep. 149
We're kicking off 2021 with two new features: A current events segment at the top of every episode, and an accompanying blog post on our site. Today, we celebrate the new Summerlong Supper Club with founder/director Vinay Gupta, and forecast food trends to look for in 2021 with Food Network Magazine's founding editor in chief Maile Carpenter. Then, we're delighted to present a full-length biographical interview with Terrance Brennan--formerly of the influential NYC restaurants Picholine and Arti...
Jan 14, 2021•2 hr 11 min•Ep. 148
We're closing out 2020 in style, with three hours of entertainment to keep you busy until we return in January. First, a quartet of our favorite guests--Dan Kluger, Allison and Matt Robicelli; and Erick Williams--check in from their respective home bases. Dan discusses his great new cookbook Chasing Flavor ; Allison & Matt join Andrew for the first Shelter en Place review since the summer--a look at the holiday classic Christmas in Connecticut; and Erick phones in from his Virtue Restaurant ...
Dec 24, 2020•3 hr 5 min•Ep. 147
Legendary chef and restaurateur Charlie Palmer (Aureole, et.al) joins Andrew from his home in Northern California to discuss how he and his team have been adapting during the COVID crisis, and his thoughts on where the industry goes from here. Please consider supporting Andrew Talks to Chefs via our Patreon page –pledge $10 or more per month and gain access to bonus, patron-only episodes, blog posts, polls, and more. Andrew Talks to Chefs is a fully independent podcast and no longer affiliated w...
Dec 23, 2020•50 min•Ep. 146
Joshua Smith took a long and winding road to his current role as Director of Culinary Innovation for Alltown Fresh . A tumultuous home life led him to move out at age 16; he spent 8 years as a vagabonding cook, traveling the United States in search of new influences and experiences; and a passion for charcuterie drove him to found his former businesses, New England Charcuterie and Moody's Delicatessen & Provisions. A fascinating and very personal dialogue with a chef who's forged his own, si...
Dec 23, 2020•1 hr 14 min•Ep. 145
Zod Arifai has been a darling of TriState food cognoscenti for decades. The self-taught culinary wizard behind such popular New Jersey successes as Juniper, Ten Square, and Blu, first attempted a New York move way back in 1999 with a well-received but painfully short-lived restaurant in Brooklyn. Twenty-one years later, he was poised to try it again in Greenwich Village, Manhattan, but the pandemic intervened with his plans for a tasting-menu format at his new Wicked Jane . In July, Zod decided ...
Dec 17, 2020•1 hr 22 min•Ep. 144
One of our favorite recurring guests, Chef Bo Bech, returns from his home in Denmark to discuss his beautiful new book The Relation Between Us . The book combines Bo's stunning photographs from around the world with his notes on travel and simple, adaptable recipes inspired by the book's images and the memories they evoke. Andrew and Bo talk over his burgeoning interest in photography, how he integrates it into his life, his approach to sharing cooking wisdom, and myriad other subjects. Listen t...
Dec 16, 2020•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 143
Deborah Madison has been a beloved figure in the American food scene for decades, first making her mark as chef of the seminal vegetarian restaurant Greens in San Francisco, and as author of such classic cookbooks as The Greens Cookbook and Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone . In her new memoir An Onion in My Pocket , Deborah shares stories and reflections on her life and career to-date. It's a wonderful, evocative book that also tracks the American food revolution. For a rewarding way to support r...
Dec 15, 2020•56 min•Ep. 142
In 2019, Aaron Bludorn left a prime gig as chef of Cafe Boulud in New York City to move to Houston, Texas, and open his first restaurant as chef-proprietor, Bludorn . Aaron recently called in to talk to Andrew about his Seattle childhood, teenage years as member of a rock band with professional aspirations, his shift to the kitchen, years under the auspices of Daniel Boulud, and what it's been like to open a new restaurant in the midst of a pandemic. (Many listeners might also know Aaron as one ...
Dec 02, 2020•1 hr 17 min•Ep. 141
It's Thanksgiving week in the United States and this episode is designed for listening as you prep and cook your respective holiday dinners, in restaurants or in homes. Fellow podcasters Greg and Darin Bresnitz discuss their new book Snacky Tunes , based on their show about the intersection of chefs and music; former guest Hong Thaimee discusses her new popup Thaimee Love , which just launched for a planned 6-month run in New York City; and Kate Heddings talks about her new book Hungry Games . W...
Nov 24, 2020•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 140
It was no small feat for Esquire magazine to identify a class of 2020 for its Best New Restaurant List in the midst of a global pandemic. But Jeff Gordinier, in collaboration with his colleague Kevin Sintumuang, managed to pull it off in style with a celebration of what's new in American restaurants that launches today. Jeff sat down with Andrew to discuss why Esquire decided to produce a list this year, how he and Kevin pulled it off, and what they were seeking in restaurants and chefs to trump...
Nov 17, 2020•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 139
In New York City, Rezdora restaurant has quickly become synonymous with great pasta. Today, the chef behind Rezdora, Stefano Secchi, joins us to share his story, which begins with his family's restaurant in Texas, took him to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY, and eventually to gigs in a number of acclaimed restaurants in Italy including Massimo Bottura's Osteria Francescana. Rezdora is also participating in S.Pellegrino’s (our promotional partner) inaugural Destination Dining s...
Nov 16, 2020•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 138
Last year, Magnus Nilsson closed his world-acclaimed restaurant Fäviken, a decision he was able to make on his own terms and timing. This week, Phaidon published Magnus's new book F ä viken: 4015 Days, Beginning to End , which documents the restaurant's life via catalogues of dishes; painstakingly detailed recipes; essays; and beautiful photographs. From his home in Sweden, Magnus joins us to talk with Andrew about the value of memorializing a restaurant after its closing, what he's doing now, w...
Nov 12, 2020•43 min•Ep. 137
The Korean steakhouse Cote, in New York City, has been a stylish highlight of Manhattan's dining scene since opening a few years ago. The restaurant's chef, David Shim, guested on the pod in 2019, and now we're delighted to welcome Cote's charismatic impresario, restaurateur Simon Kim. From an outdoor table at Cote, Simon shares his story, from a childhood in South Korea to immigrating to the United States to working in Las Vegas hotels, to discovering a love of restaurants and learning to run t...
Nov 09, 2020•1 hr 34 min•Ep. 136
