Welcome back to Hungary for History. We have a special episode today because I think, as many of you know, Mike and I both live here in Los Angeles, so we have been moving around, evacuated back in our home, volunteering. It's kind of been a crazy way to start a new year, twenty twenty five totally, and so we have a special episode. We wanted to talk once again about Food for Good. We have a really great guest coming on, but I just want to check in with you first.
Might they have what's what's been happening? How have you been surviving this moment here in Los Angeles.
I feel extremely grateful that we're okay, but there's a lot of grief mixed with the gratitude. So it's definitely something that I've never quite experienced so intensely. So, you know, and it's like, Okay, what can we do?
What can I do? What can I do? What can I do?
You know, I don't have a lot to donate, you know, but at a certain point it's like, Okay, I want to donate my time.
I want to be boots on the ground.
So when I saw you volunteering, I was like, Eve, I tell me where where do I go. It's like, you know, just to help, yeah, for the long for the long game.
I mean I felt the same way, so grateful that you know, my house didn't burn down, that my family was safe, that you know, the fires were east of US and west of US and north of us, like we were surrounded, but like it never jumped over the freeway, never came this way, and so super grateful, And then a little survivor's guilt of like, okay, okay, okay, since I'm one of the Lucuans, what can I do? And
you know, I donated money, I donated my time. I donated you know, a pot of chili to my fire station. Because I was just like you're in that moment of like, oh, I cleaned up my closet, I cleaned out my fridge. I cleaned up my fridge, I cleaned out my closet. I was like, here's coats, here's I mean, it was
anything I could do. And then finally when we got to volunteer at the Pasadena Job Center and physically cleaning up the street, getting out, getting the debris out of a dangerous position so that you know, the more fires aren't started, and like you know, sweeping and cutting down trees and filling up trash bags of leaves, Like it felt so good to like you said, I don't know what to do. I have two hands. I can cook a meal, I can pick up some trash. Uh you know,
do you want this jacket off my back? Like I just felt that like helpless for a moment, and then you just kick into action.
Yeah, And you were amazing, Eva, because you always step up, you always bring it, You're always out there and you're you have this huge platform and you are really truly honestly helping.
So I think I think it's very commendable.
I'm proud to be friends with you and that you're doing because it.
Really look look, I am that person. I'm that person in everybody's life where if something's happening, I'm like, how do we fix it? What do we do?
We do?
What are we doing? Let's are we are we packing a bag? Are we moving?
Do you know?
Do you need me to pick you up? Like that's just my nature. So when something this this big and traumatic happens, it requires a bigger response. And so I think, you know, you and I always talk about food history on this show, but We've talked about issues that but bump against food, and so I'm so excited to talk about food for good, like you know, making sure, no matter what is happening in the world, people have a hot meal. And so I'm really excited to talk with
our guest today. Yes, me too, So.
We're going to talk to Antonio Es. He's a good friend of mine. He's an Emmy Award winning and James Beard Award nominated filmmaker. He's a founder of Life and Time publication that.
Highlights life and life and time or time.
It gets us time, and so they highlight food, culture and social issues.
They're you know, amazing.
I've used to write for them, you know, for for many many years I would write for Life and.
Time, Fine Time, Time.
And so he's also directed and produced a PBS documentary shows such as Rebel Kitchens of Southern California, or he focuses on really young chefs doing super cutting edge, unique things, The Migrant Kitchen, which is with amazing chefs talking about immigration through food. And also he did a series called Broken Bread with Roy Choi. He's Mexican roots are for Mexico, but he says that his true identity reflects the city of La where he was born and raised. So super excited to welcome Antonio.
My name is Evil Longoria and I am Myra, and welcome to Hungry for History, a podcast that explores our past and present through food.
On every episode, we'll talk about the history of some of our favorite dishes, ingredients, and beverages from our culture.
So make yourself at home. When Nice to Meet.
You on Nice to Meet You, I have such a pleasure.
You guys know each other.
Oh my gosh, we've known each other for a long time, through life and time.
I feel like a decade.
Probably it's been a while, it's been a minute. Antonio is one of my favorite people, one of my favorite people in La, one of my people in the world. He's amazing, and so I'm so happy to connect the two of you because you both of you are such community builders and connectors, and I've met so many amazing people through both of you, and you do such good in the world.
So just seeing you both your little faces on this little screen.
Makes me so happy.
Might they put up the bat signal and I was like, I'm there. I canceled everything. I will do anything. I know.
She's pretty awesome. I know, I'm so happy to finally meet you and and know learn more about the work you've been doing. You know, as we know we've all been through the fires here in Los Angeles, and you know I have followed you a bit. You kind of have always been at the forefront of food journalism, and as Mike and I've been doing this podcast, we've felt
that so many issues bump up against food. You know, if we're talking about, oh, let's do a fun episode about street food, you can't help but talk about undocumented workers. We were like, oh, let's talk about coffee, and we're like, oh, wait, there's so much slavery in the world today that still you know, uh, farm this coffee. We're like, so it's like we always feel I feel, you know, Mike and I have really branched out and when you talk about the history of food, you just it touches so many
other issues, and we wanted to talk to you. We know you've been on the ground after these fires and you've been doing some incredible work. Tell me about it.
Tell me about how.
Like when this happened, what was your first thought about? This is what I can do, This is how I can help.
My circle of friends are mostly people that work in and around the food industry, chefs, cooks, or creatives that are creating content for food. So my little ecosystem. As soon as I see anything happening online, I see their perspective. And with nearly every single crisis that happens the food industry, the restaurant community and chefs are always the first ones
to be there on the ground feeding people. You know, we've seen that with Jose and this is World Central Kitchen, but we're seeing it with all sorts of different independent restaurants too. I've been running Life in Time for twelve years. We built many relationships with the industry, so I could start just texting, texting friends, texting chefs like hey, what
can we do? What can we do to help? And we saw the need to get food to fire stations and to shelters, and chefs and restaurants were willing to support and donate as much food as they possibly can, but there needed to be like a messenger, someone that could connect them their meals. Because they're producing fifty to hundreds of meals, they need someone to help them get those meals to the right people. That's where you know, I kind of mobilize and I hit up the Independent
Hospitality Coalition. So they're an incredible, incredible organization here in Los Angeles that they help restaurants with food policy, with issues with the city. They're advocating for change for restaurants for the better, and they also mobilize the immediately feeding people on the ground. So I connected with them and I told them like, listen, I have a network of restaurants that are willing to support you have access to
shelters and fire stations. Let's work to together. And in a span of a week and a half, we delivered over fifteen hundred meals. I was running basically a Postmates for a week and a half and still am.
You know, I have your drivers.
Every single day. Yeah, Invite was one of my drivers. Every single day we were delivering. We're making like anywhere between three to five food drops all around Los Angeles, trying to support these shelters and fire stations.
Right, what was that like?
Oh my gosh, it was it was really powerful.
I went Antonia was like, hey, can you pick up at three o'clock? Like yes, and then it's like, oh three fifteen, I'm running late, Like always so I went to the window and I said, I'm picking up for stations twenty nine and thirty five, and they were like, hold on, they give me these bags of warm burgers, and then I just got in my car. I've never been in a fire station before, and I was really nervous. I was nervous that the burgers were going to get
cold because it was a really cold day. And they opened the door and I've since delivered, you know, to various fire it's always three firefighters that come out, and they were just in awe. They were shocked and so incredibly appreciative, and I I just couldn't believe it, Like it's such a small gesture, right, but it's everything. It's they're exhausted, they're stressed, they're they're just beyond right, and then all of a sudden, they get some warm food.
Restaurants in general are like little families, but the restaurant industry is close knit, like you know, Antonio, as you were saying, like you've been part of this community for so long. They're usually the first to react in humanitarian crisis.
You know, it's ingrained in who they are as a chef to feed people, like it's part of their DNA that they have to feed people in times of celebration or in times of crisis. And it's like, I love this city so much because the restaurant community bands together. And he gave me so much hope and inspiration for
the future of LA. Yeah, to see this community come together and support each other, not just the chefs and the restaurants, but even like Mida or so many of my friends that were reaching out and asking, Okay, I will deliver whatever meals you need. So there it became
like a network of organizers working with shelters. I'm over here running my postmate's spreadsheet, and then I had like an army of drivers delivering these meals across LA And then we had the restaurants in the chef So it was this beautiful village just coming together just to feed and support one another. While these restaurants are also facing a financial crisis in staying afloat staying open. It's ridiculously expensive to run a restaurant nowadays here in Los Angeles.
Yet they're donating and giving away so much, so much product and their labor. They're trying to keep the doors open. Yet they're still helping and they're still feeding people.
They've already been impacted by the pandemic. Just starting to come out of that.
And then and then this happened, not only you know, in La specifically that obviously the pandemic really hurt the restaurant industry. Then we were on a strike. We had
a huge writer strike which shut down the industry. And we don't realize how many restaurant workers, food workers are impacted by Hollywood, all the caterers, all the restaurants, all the ordering in, all the eating out, all the you know, you know when you when you shoot a movie or a show, I forget the financial impact, but it's those small business owners. And so the strike happened.
Uh.
And then we're coming out of COVID and the strikes and the industry is trying to bounce back and no more runaway productions outside of La and then this happened.
Right there's I think there's a perception of La outside of La that La is is a very rich It's like we're everyone is rich. There are all celebrities, nothing to worry about the there's money growing on trees. It's such a fragile city and it's becoming much more expensive to live in it. You walk outside, it's already one
hundred bucks just to breathe the air. It's it's so it's so expensive for anyone who's a working class citizen here, and especially for restaurants, Like you said, they're interconnected with Hollywood, the entertainment business. So if the entertainment business is suffering, it kind of trickles down to all sorts of other industries that get affected. And this city has not. We haven't had a good break for the for the restaurant community. Yeah, COVID, Yes,
you know it was. It was a huge blow. The strikes and now the fires.
No, and now now now risk of deportations. Yeah, right, Like that's another obstacle that's about to come and hit us, is that the restaurant industry, like construction, like landscaping, like housekeeping, like nannies, like you know, so many industry lark farm workers are completely dependent on undocumented labor. And so I feel like, once we're going to get out of these fires, it's going to be another hurdle of like what are
these undocumented workers going to face? You know, an additional burden of fear and uncertainty, and these are your dishwashers, your waiters, your cooks, your bussers, you know your you know drivers. What what do you think is to come and how does this new threat really affect what you're doing.
I mean, the best that we could at least we could do Life and Time is to shed light on these important stories and issues. You know, when it comes to the restaurant community and the food industry, it operates in the shadow industry. So many people don't realize the economics that are at play in this industry. They operate completely different than other industries. Like you said, many of the people that work in it are undocumented, their immigrants.
They're either picking our fruit and vegetables from the fields, or they're washing or dishes or cooking or food. The pay wage is so much lower, yet the price of what we're paying for food is not enough, Like we're just not paying enough for our food. So there's so many factors at play. So the best that we could do is take a journalistic approach and shed light on these issues, these important issues, and that's what that's been the mission for Life and Time for the past twelve years.
Use the beauty of food as a trojan horse to really dive into important topics about humanity, about social issues. Nearly every issue that plagues humanity one way or another that has a connection back to food. Whether it's the climate crisis, immigration, whatever it is, there is a connection
back to food. And that is what we're trying to do with our work, at least through telling stories, doing documentaries, hosting events in person, getting the community to get together to at least inform people about the value of the people that are making our food.
The undocumented workers are such a backbone of the city, right and also during pandemic, there were organizations like Know Us Without You. I learned about them through You Antonio, through life and time, and they were feeding undocumented workers that all of a sudden we're out of a job. And it just makes me worried, and I wonder, like, how how you see the role of a restaurant in a community.
They're pivotal, you know, they're pivotal in a community, and they're the places where we go to celebrate. They're the place where we get to converse and where all forms of people could you know, kind of mingle and come together. All people of all classes are clashing together into this this one space, and I think we sometimes take that for granted, We take we take it for granted for the fact that we're not necessarily thinking about these people and the lives that they that they have and how
fragile this industry really is. So I think the you know, the role of a restaurant in in a place like La. You're seeing it, uh, you're seeing it come to life in the time of crisis. You're seeing it through these fires where they're coming and feeding people and doing whatever it takes. But I also think that this is also the the the restaurant industry here in La. It really
represents the cuisine of this of this state. You know, we have so many beautiful uh produce and and and uh ingredients that are coming from the fields and and it's primarily Asian and Latino produce and ingredients, and it's contributing to the you know, to the cuisine of the city and in the cuisine of this of the states. So I think, you know, it's it's to me like a restaurant and in this communities everything, it really represents all of our cultures.
Right, it represents something bigger than just bigger than.
Us, right, Yeah, food.
And security in general has been around for ever and obviously disproportionately affects Hispanic and Black communities. But I will say food and cooking, Like when all this happened, I was like, I'm gonna make a big pot of chili and take it to the fire state. Like I feel like when you know how to cook, it's the I want to use my hands, you know, it's like all hands on deck. And I do think food is a specifically for Hispanic communities. Everybody is like I'll make my rosco,
I'm gonna make my tamales. I'm gonna take it down, you know, And that's that to me is probably one of the most things about our community.
You're so right. Yesterday we made we did a food drop of ninety meals to the firefighting maintenance crew. They're the ones that are fixing all the engines and all the equipment that's getting damaged by the firefighters. And this is like the from the hierarchy. They're the ones that just like they're at the bottom just fixing things. And we've we sent ninety meals from Dunsmore, one of the best restaurants here in Los Angeles. Yeah, so it made me what I love about the work that we've been
doing with these restaurants. These are the best restaurants in Los Angeles feeding people. They're not like, you know, we're not getting meals from from fast food. We had a delivery drop from Cato, who is this is like one they have a Mission Star. They're one of the best restaurants in Los Angeles and we work with them to deliver one hundred and twenty or one hundred and thirty meals.
Wow.
And these chefs are creating like the most delicious, nourishing meals that you would find in a Michelin star restaurant, but they're being made a mass scale to feed the people because they also deserve a quality meal that tastes incredible. And I just found it so beautiful that some of the best chefs are making these meals for people.
That's wonderful.
You also talk about sponsoring a restaurant. How does that work?
Yeah, because I was going to ask that my day. It's just also like what's next, because like you said, this is like this problem, We're going to be playing whack a mole for a long time of like you know, what's what crisis is next? So like, how can people get involve, how do they continue to support and help?
You know, this amazing and I think, you know it is like our current crisis. But I think this is gonna be when it comes to these wildfires, this is such a long term problem. These people might not see a house or a home for a very long time. So I think we're only at the very beginning of helping these people. And there's gonna be people are gonna forget about the wildfires sooner or later, and they're gonna move on to the next thing that's happening in the news.
So I think it's very important to continue to help these shelters and these places to feed people or at least, you know, support to people in need. So one major thing that we realized is that having restaurants and chefs donate food is completely unsustainable. It works for a little bit, and it works for some of the best restaurants that are fine. They could maybe do it one or two, maybe three drops out of their own pocket, but after
that they just cannot support it. I mean a restaurant, even the best ones there were like one bad week from going out of business, Like that's how difficult it is to run a restaurant. So the other thing that's happening right now is people not going out to eat. We almost we're almost like going back to COVID times, Like people are just not going out and that's a huge problem for a restaurant. So I encourage people to go out. You shouldn't feel guilty to go out and
support these restaurants and have a meal. So that's number one, Like you should really just support your local restaurants and just make it an effort to at least go out every once in a while to support these restaurants and eat or order take out from these independent restaurants. If you're willing and you have the means, you can also
sponsor a restaurant. So we've been working. We've been working with a few different donors, incredible donors that are just sending money that go straight to the restaurant to help them feed people at scale. And that's one way that you could support these restaurants for them to just continue to pump out meals. And there's different organizations you could you could donate to, or you could even just you know, donate to to Life and Time and we directly support
the restaurants. We've been doing that for a few different restaurants, especially now that they're not able to donate so many meals at this point. So there are ways to support these restaurants in order to continue this type of work.
So we will put Life in Time linked below. That way, if anybody needs more information, they know where to go. Thank you so much to Antonio for you know, chatting with us, and thanks to you guys for listening.
Thank you for joining us, and see you all next week.
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