Pod Insights The Sporkful Queer Eye’s Antoni Porowski Is An Emotional Eater About this episode Antoni Porowski wasn’t the obvious choice to be the food expert on Queer Eye — he’s not a chef and he has no formal culinary training. When the show debuted in 2018, many people asked, “Can this guy actually cook?” Not the most reassuring reaction for Antoni, who already struggled with impostor syndrome.
Transcript Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
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1:03 Speaker 01 Sirius XM Podcasts.
1:11 Dan Pashman? This episode contains explicit language.
1:15 Dan Pashman? Anthony, so I feel like you, you strike me as a person who's very kind, thoughtful, sensitive, but I also have a theory about you. I think that maybe underlying that kind-hearted Canadian is also a person who has very strong opinions about food.
1:37 Speaker 02 I do.
1:41 Dan Pashman? So let me hit you with a few quick Anthony hot takes here, okay?
1:45 Speaker 02 Sure.
1:45 Dan Pashman? You grew up in Montreal, which is famous for its bagels. What is the best bagel place in Montreal?
1:51 Speaker 02 Saint-Vietor, Saint-Vietor Bagels. After Polish school every Saturday, my dad would go and get a dozen sesame seed bagels and I would get like the 13th and it would always be warm and perfect and I would dip it in this, it's like a smoked salmon spread that was just fantastic.
2:10 Dan Pashman? And you're not a poppy person.
2:12 Speaker 02 I am in desserts, but for bagels, I just, I love the, there's something about like the sweetness and the crunch of sesame seeds that I just, I much prefer.
2:21 Dan Pashman? A poppy seed doesn't bring much to a bagel.
2:23 Speaker 02 It doesn't.
2:25 Dan Pashman? I've heard you say that you never order chicken in a restaurant.
2:28 Speaker 02 That's a lie. I did say that. I did say that.
2:31 Dan Pashman? Okay.
2:32 Speaker 02 But that's a lie.
2:33 Dan Pashman? Okay.
2:34 Speaker 02 As soon as you said that, I got the image of someone from the kitchen at Nomad here in New York, and they serve the greatest chicken I've ever had in my life. It's deconstructed chicken. So the chicken breast, in between the skin and the breast, there's, it's like a truffle brioche spread.
2:53 Dan Pashman? Oh, my word.
2:54 Speaker 02 And then the chicken thighs, the chicken thighs are removed from the bone and tossed in like a, like a nice citrusy aioli with some like Supremes of like grapefruits and stuff, but that one changes every time. And then the chicken wings, I don't know how the hell they do this, but they remove it fully from the bone and it's kind of like a panko crust and they're just beautifully crispy. But 95% of the time, chicken's for home.
3:19 Dan Pashman? This is the Sporkful. It's not for foodies, it's for eaters. I'm Dan Pashman. Each week on our show, we obsess about food to learn more about people. And before we get to the show, exciting news for those of you in Massachusetts and Southern New Hampshire, I'm going to be at a Salem Lit Fest in Salem, Mass. on September 6th at 11:30 a.m. I'll be on a panel called Cooking the Books, Cookbook Authors from Concept to Cookbook. It's hosted by Adam Cowett of America's Test Kitchen. We'll be joined by two more authors, Maggie Pearson from Feast and Fettle and Tammy Dunro Inman. And even more exciting, all the events at the Salem Lit Fest are free. So come on down. Go to salemlitfest.org for info. All right, let's get into it. Anthony Porowski is one of the stars of Queer Eye, the Netflix reboot of the early
4:03 Dan Pashman? 2000s show Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. The premise, a group of five queer experts does a full lifestyle makeover for someone who needs it. Each of the Fab Five focuses on one aspect of this hero's life: clothing, grooming, interior design, culture, and of course, food, which is where Anthony comes in. His job is to help the subject of each episode learn to cook something and to help them use food as a way to connect. There's the episode with John, whose 10-year-old daughter sees him as a man-child. When Anthony finds out John's daughter often makes her own breakfast, he teaches John to make pancakes for her. Then there's an episode with Tyreek, a young man who'd been homeless and estranged from the woman who raised him. Anthony shows him how to make crab boil for her.
4:47 Speaker 02 I want Tyreek to have a fun experience, something that gets him connected to food. Crab boil is something that's very emotional to him. It ties him to family. It's not the most technical recipe. It's actually really simple.
5:00 Dan Pashman? In July, the show announced it would come to a close after next season. It's 10th, which will take place in Washington DC. Before Queer Eye, Anthony was an actor, and he worked as a gallerist and personal assistant. In college, he studied psychology. But wherever he was, good food was always close by. Like when he worked in restaurants as a waiter and bussler. One of those jobs was at an Italian spot in Montreal.
5:21 Speaker 02 We had, like, Monday nights, almost nobody would work, because that was like the least busy day. And so we would do like a potluck. And I became obsessed with risotto, because I was broke, and I wanted to make something nice, and people who work in restaurants, like, no good food. And so I would get like a bottle or two of Prosecco, some arborio rice, a bunch of lemons, a big hunk of parm, and some like really good chicken broth that either I made my own, or I had some from like a market or whatever. And I would just make a perfect risotto. And everyone would bring like a bottle of wine, and then we would all go out afterwards. It was the first time that I'd actually made food for other people. Like, growing up, food was so incredibly important in my home. But my mother is a
6:05 Speaker 02 lot like me in many ways, like, didn't want anyone in the kitchen helping her. So I sat on the other end of the kitchen table, and I just like stared and watched. And I was just kind of like transfixed, and like taking it all in and like learning. So when it came time, when I had my own life, in my own apartment, and I was able to do that, I already kind of like had some of those tools. And then I understood, because I always judged her for it. I was always like, why won't you let me help you? Because I never cut the onions right. I never cut the carrots right. And I had like such a resentment. And then I understood, and I was like... Like, oh, no, it feels really good to like be able to like do the whole thing yourself. It's hard for me to ask for help in the kitchen.
6:40 Dan Pashman? Yeah, I'm the same way. You know, I, I, I want to be the kind of person who's like, hey, you, you do this, you do that. Hey, everyone's gonna help. I was at a friend's house last night and she was like, hey, can you help put these orders together? You chop the dates, you do, you do the spread. And I was like, it's so nice. And you know, it gives everyone something to do. But I'm still like, but they might not chop it just right.
6:58 Speaker 02 Right. But then, but then if you watch like salt, fat, acid, heat, and you see Sami, and I forget what it was that she was doing. But she had a friend over and she had them partake in making this dish.
7:11 Speaker 02 And they were so excited to eat it afterwards because they felt empowered and she got to teach them something in, in, in the process. There's an element of like making it something that's inclusive there. I'm really trying to be that person. It's very hard.
7:23 Dan Pashman? Yeah, yeah.
7:24 Speaker 02 I wish, I wish I could do more of that.
7:25 Dan Pashman? You and me both someday. That love of food, though, and how you felt it was so important, but was that something that your parents instilled in you?
7:33 Speaker 02 Totally. I mean, growing up, like my most cherished memories as a kid were breakfast and dinner. Breakfast was always a massive spread with like a fresh cut open papaya with lime juice and a bit of salt. Any type of like fresh berries. And because we're Polish, we just had a shit ton of charcuterie everywhere from the Polish deli. And rye bread and like good cold butter and eggs and like for dinner, it was always a production. My parents traveled a lot and whenever we would travel with them, it was always about like, where are we gonna eat? When we're having breakfast, we're thinking about like, where are we going for dinner? Which market are we going to?
8:10 Dan Pashman? But so, so I think kind of part of what I'm driving at here, Anthony, i- is that it seems like food really matters to you. Like in a way beyond just sort of like, look, we love to eat. It's delicious. Some people care more about every meal than others. You're someone who cares a lot about eating delicious food. But like, it seems like it matters to you beyond that.
8:30 Speaker 02 It's incredibly important to me. I think it's honestly, like even if I get ground turkey and some carrots and celery. And I do a nice little mix for my dog. I know that she's like just a dog, but like it just, it makes me feel so good knowing that like I made something for her. Or even like scrambled eggs on a Saturday morning after like a workout. And like watching the joy in their faces when you made something successfully, when it's like really good. Or when people try something for the first time and you got to be there for that. It's everything.
9:03 Dan Pashman? Anthony was not the obvious choice for Queer Eye's food expert. As much as he loves food, he's not a professional chef. He has no formal culinary training. And he was going up for the job against lots of people who were chefs. He says he struggled with imposter syndrome. But Queer Eye picked him anyway. The show was a big hit right off the bat when it debuted in 2018. And it made Anthony a food celebrity overnight. But food celebrity was not a title he ever expected to have.
9:29 Speaker 02 Food for me has always been something that's been really intimate and kind of private. And I think until Queer Eye came out, I've always been a very compartmentalized person when it comes to my sexuality and food in particular. And Queer Eye is something that just ripped those two compartments and just shoved them in with everything else in the public space.
9:53 Dan Pashman? The reaction to the Queer Eye reboot was overwhelmingly positive. It's a feel-good reality show where the goal is to find people who've experienced hardship and help them improve their lives. But a lot of people found fault with Anthony and the way he cooked. His critics didn't like that he put Greek yogurt in guacamole. They said the dishes he made were too simple. A website called Junkie said maybe Anthony was, quote, "an incredibly handsome person hired to act like a food expert." Eater suggested the main reason he got the gig was that he knew chopped host Ted Allen, who was the food expert on the original Queer Eye. It was crazy to me, looking back, when Queer Eye first came out, how many of the stories about you started with like, but can this guy actually cook?
10:35 Speaker 02 Right.
10:36 Dan Pashman? And, you know, I would imagine that was a tough thing to deal with if you're someone who's already kind of like tends towards imposter syndrome.
10:45 Speaker 02 It's literally the worst thing you could possibly hear when you're already thinking that about yourself and then you have people who are saying that. And all you see, like, all I saw was that. I took out all of the good and I just like focused in on all of the bad and it made me miserable. You know, my therapist told me this when the show came out, she was saying... She's like, well, for someone like you who like so needs to be loved by everybody. She's like, that's impossible now. You're like a public person. The numbers game just like increased exponentially and there are going to be a lot more people who like you, but there are also going to be a lot more people who like don't like you or don't like what you do or are critical for valid or invalid reasons, whatever the case may be.
11:25 Dan Pashman? Despite that advice, Anthony still felt compelled to win over as many people as he could.
11:30 Speaker 02 It motivated me to write a first cookbook so that I can, you know, prove to people that I could actually cook because people, I think a lot of people thought that, you know, the dishes that I was preparing on Queer Eye for the Heroes were a reflection of my own knowledge, which they are. But there are a lot of plenty of other things that I know how to do.
11:48 Dan Pashman? You said that sort of you feel like part of why you got the job was that you're accessible, that you're a great communicator, was more about that than it was about culinary expertise. And I wonder like, do you think that being very good looking ever sometimes works against you? Like people think that if you're good looking, that's why you got a certain opportunity?
12:10 Speaker 02 Totally.
12:13 Speaker 02 Absolutely. And I've, I've, I've spoken to people who have kind of like, had to kind of like fight against that. I think, I'm not going to say everybody, but I think that for certain people, it's hard to imagine that somebody can be more than one thing. They struggled with me during the casting process of Queer Eye because I think there was this assumption that it was like, oh no, he's like a struggling actor who's coming in and like wants to be on a show. So this is going to be his thing. And near the end of, of casting, I made a comment. We were in one of the show creators' homes and I was like, oh, you have a really cool Roger Springer table in your living room. And Roger Springer was this like designer in the sixties or seventies.
12:56 Speaker 02 And I'm like obsessed with vintage furniture and like post-war art. And they all kind of looked at me like, how the fuck, like what? How did you know that? And I was like, oh, well, that's like another one of my passions. And like they get me really excited and they were like, oh, so you like that kind of stuff too? And I feel like then they started to realize, oh no, like he's more than just like this one thing. But I see that as like, it's like a fun challenge because you get to kind of like prove people wrong.
13:20 Dan Pashman? Do you feel pressure to maintain a certain body image?
13:24 Speaker 02 Yes.
13:24 Dan Pashman? Especially since you're more in the public eye?
13:26 Speaker 02 Hundred percent. Um, I think. In particular with, you know, the first time that I saw my scenes in Queer Eye, I would notice like certain mannerisms that I have and the same went for kind of like what my appearance was. I think that has more to do with self-imposed comparison, mainly Instagram, which is like, get me on the, you know, the wrong day. And if I open up Instagram and I see my explore page and then suddenly it's like, I'm gonna have juices and salad today. And for the next three days, I'm not gonna have like any carbs. And I know that a lot of that is self-imposed. And um, that happens on days usually when like I wake up and I'm not feeling super confident. When I'm like, there's a relationship with that and the imposter syndrome and all of that,
14:10 Speaker 02 because then I fall into compare and despair. Where I don't criticize other people, I really make up for it with myself. Like I can be my own worst critic. And that's a tricky balance as well, because I, I do love to eat healthy. Um, I do love to work out and to be very active and go on hikes and do all kinds of activities and box and, and do all that kind of stuff. But at, at one point, it's kind of like, okay, am I doing this to like feel better? Am I doing this because I'm trying to attain some kind of like an unrealistic ideal?
14:38 Dan Pashman? Right. Or, or, or are you doing it to sort of like punish yourself for something you shouldn't be punishing yourself for?
14:43 Speaker 02 Totally.
14:45 Dan Pashman? You describe yourself as an emotional eater. That seems to be like, it must be a difficult thing to navigate, which is like a lot of pressure to maintain a certain body image, but also food as a way to deal with certain feelings. And I, I don't think, I personally think like emotional eating in moderation is fine. Like once in a while, you treat yourself, have a, have a, have a giant ice cream sundae, have a pizza.
15:08 Speaker 02 Absolutely.
15:08 Dan Pashman? But I wonder like how, how you navigate those two uh, it seemed like possible contrasting extremes.
15:17 Speaker 02 Yeah, and I am, I am definitely a person of extremes. If I like take something on, I do it a million percent. With the emotional eating part, it's like I try to just check in. And this is like a daily thing for me that I kind of like check in on. The ice cream sundae, if it starts to happen where it's only happening on really shitty days, that's a sign. If it's only happening on really good days, that's a sign as well.
15:43 Dan Pashman? It's not a sign of what?
15:45 Speaker 02 A sign that I'm kind of like, am I trying to get out of my feelings? If I reward myself for something, that's one thing. And sometimes you're just having a really bad day. And all I want is like a vat of mac and cheese or like a whole entire pizza to myself. And that's fine, but I just try to make sure that I don't do that consistently and try to and and develop like habits or patterns with that. Same goes with punishing myself. Um, punishing is a strong word, but kind of like being very careful about what I eat and only eating like really healthy food. It's like everything in moderation, even moderation.
16:26 Dan Pashman? Coming up, Anthony and I talk about the principles of great salads. And he nearly collapses at the mere mention of one of his favorite dishes. Plus, we find out if writing a cookbook as a way of proving yourself actually works. Stick around.
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20:08 Dan Pashman? Welcome back to The Sporkful. I'm Dan Pashman. Last week on the show, we opened the phone lines. I was joined by cookbook author Dan Pelosi and comedian and podcast host Nagin Farsad to take your calls. We tried to settle some food disputes, including one between a married couple about how to reheat leftovers. Tyler, do you acknowledge that some foods are better reheated in the microwave than other methods?
20:30 Speaker 05 I don't know if I would be willing to acknowledge that. I mean, I certainly agree it's more convenient, but I really like using our cast iron skillet. And I don't know if I would be willing to admit that anything is better in the microwave.
20:44 Dan Pashman? It is always fun when we take calls from Sporkful listeners. Check this one out. It's up now. Okay, back to my conversation with Anthony Porowski. After that first season of Queer Eye, Anthony continued to work through his imposter syndrome with the help of a therapist. The second season of the show aired the same year, and there were two more in 2019. Then Anthony published his first cookbook, Anthony in the Kitchen. You know, the one he said he wrote in response to people saying he didn't know how to cook. So I wondered, did writing a cookbook to prove his haters wrong actually work?
21:17 Speaker 02 Yes and no. I don't know. Actually, I don't know if it worked. But I think once it started, I definitely, if I'm like being 100% honest, I went in wanting to prove myself. And I did have ideas that were like a lot more ambitious and things that I wanted to make. But I remember when I had my first meeting with, um, with Rux Martin, my editor at Houghton. We were talking about the perfect bite. And the perfect bite for me is a majule date or a rutab date, but they're a lot harder to find. With a marcona almond, a little bit of blue cheese wrapped in like prosciutto or bacon.
21:59 Speaker 02 And it's salty, sweet, sticky, crunchy. It just like checks all the boxes for me. And she was like, stop, like, just keep it simple. I want that to be, that's going to be a recipe in your book, by the way, and just kind of like take it from there. And I kind of like lost myself in it. And then I kind of forgot. That my intention was trying to prove myself to people. And I just kind of got really excited by being like, oh, my gosh, like, there was a raspberry mousse stone that my mother used to make for like literally every single special occasion and every Christmas. Tobegos, which is like this hunter stew and like stuff that I ate when I was a student, when I was like really broke and like cannellini beans with tomato paste and a bit of like fresh oregano and lemon juice and put a can of uh of uh olive oil soaked tuna in there.
22:44 Speaker 02 And it was like, wow, like I remember eating that all the time when I was um broken in school. And then I just kind of like forgot about my original intention. Thank goodness, because I was able to just get the hell out of my own head and trying to prove myself and just fell in love with the process of recipe developing and remembering all of these food memories.
23:01 Dan Pashman? So so you you ended up with something that was true to you and something you were proud of?
23:06 Speaker 02 Yes.
23:07 Dan Pashman? And so in in that sense, it it did solve the problem just in a different way than what you anticipated.
23:13 Speaker 02 Not at all the way that I thought it would, which is usually how life turns out.
23:17 Dan Pashman? Like instead, instead of proving something to other people, you convinced yourself.
23:23 Speaker 02 Yes, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. I never actually thought of that, but yeah. That's pretty cool.
23:33 Dan Pashman? Yeah, I think you should feel good about that.
23:37 Speaker 02 Hmm. Yeah.
23:43 Dan Pashman? This has been a big breakthrough, Anthony.
23:45 Speaker 02 I've had a few breakthroughs with you today, actually.
23:52 Dan Pashman? Two years after Anthony's first cookbook came out and with nearly 50 episodes of Queer Eye under his belt, he published a second cookbook called Let's Do Dinner. He wrote it with his co-author Mindy Fox. In the intro, he outlines his approach to dinner. Eat plant-based early in the week, then progress to some heartier dishes as the week goes on, then cross over into comfort food on the weekend. I want to I want to highlight a couple of the recipes in the new cookbook, in particular, roasted cabbage steaks. I and I love cabbage. I love that you write cabbage is having a moment, which means that by default Poland is too.
24:27 Speaker 02 So I hated cabbage as a kid. There was something about the smell and the preparation. Like, my mother is an excellent home cook, but there are certain things that she was taught, probably by her mother, that Polish mothers have been making all the time. And they would just boil the shit out of cabbage, just like they would Brussels sprouts, and they would be mushy and brown, and they would add a little bit of cumin, and that was it. The cabbage steak is like, it's such a symbol for... I felt okay being Polish when I was growing up, and then I moved to a rural community in West Virginia, where there wasn't that much diversity. And suddenly, my name was weird. The fact that I spoke different languages was weird. I had a weird accent. My lunches were even weirder.
25:12 Speaker 02 And I suddenly got, had this like shame for who I was, and I wanted nothing to do with being Polish. I actually forgot Polish. In a matter of two years, my parents were pissed. Sent me back to Montreal. I had a Polish-French tutor, because I forgot French as well. I started working in a Polish restaurant. It used to be owned by my auntie, where my dad was a waiter, where my sisters both worked. It's like the rite of passage in Montreal to work at Stash Cafe. It still exists. It's awesome. They make the best progi's. The grandmas make them in the basement. I referenced it in the first book, and it's just so awesome. And the best cabbage rolls ever.
25:42 Dan Pashman? Okay.
25:43 Speaker 02 With a nice little paprika tomato sauce, not with the creamy mushroom sauce like they do in Veselka. Veselka's great in New York, but I'm not crazy about that one.
25:51 Dan Pashman? I knew you had strong opinions about food.
25:53 Speaker 02 I do, I do, I do, I do. You got it out of me. You got it out of me. But I started working at this restaurant, so then I was like, oh, cool. Like, young Polish people who are actually proud to be Polish, and like, that's actually okay. And so here's this like cabbage steak thing that, for me, was inspired by like, I tried to think like, what would ABCV come up with? One of my favorite restaurants in New York. And it's just like giving like life and like really highlighting beautiful vegetables that are just like bright and colorful and coming up with like a really nice applesauce that's just like really creamy and some like raisins for like a nice little tart bite to it. And getting like that char on the cabbage. And it's like, now I freaking love cabbage.
26:33 Dan Pashman? Yeah, I'm excited to cook that one, because I love cabbage too. You have an array of salads in the book. Is there like a, a blueprint for a good salad? Like, what are the basic elements that any good salad has to have?
26:47 Speaker 02 One of the most important things is definitely which greens you're gonna use. If you have baby arugula or spinach, you have to kind of eat them the day of. Kale will actually, like, a mature kale will still be pretty good the next day. It just softens up really nicely, but it's also knowing how to treat the greens as well and knowing what kind of vinaigrette to put. The only thing worse than an underdressed salad is like an overdressed salad, where it's just like swimming in, in, in dressing or vinaigrette or whatever it is that you're putting on it. Having a crunch element. If it's not gonna be, if it's not gonna be a crouton that's soaked in like a really nice vinaigrette just to soften it up a little bit, I love using nuts.
27:29 Dan Pashman? I feel like for salads, texture, a variety of textures is key. You need something acidic and something fatty together, and that needs to be in the right balance.
27:39 Speaker 02 Totally, with the vinaigrette, yeah.
27:40 Dan Pashman? Yes, to me, one of the most under-considered part of salad composition is that it needs to be forkable. The, the different pieces, you need to be able to get them together into a bite. I, I, I love nuts in a salad, but like, I, I feel like you, you need something for the nuts to stick to.
27:59 Speaker 02 They gotta cling.
28:00 Dan Pashman? I, I also like, like the Caesar salad where it's like a gigantic half loaf of romaine lettuce that they serve with a steak knife in a restaurant? Like, what the fuck am I supposed to do with that?
28:10 Speaker 02 I know.
28:10 Dan Pashman? You know, like, it's just so irritating. It looks great, you know, but it's, it's form over function.
28:15 Speaker 02 One thing I will say, and this was, uh, something I learned from the great Alice Waters. I was having a meal with her once at Via Corota, and we were having their famous insalata verde with that awesome vinaigrette. She was eating the salad, and she just started picking it up with her fingers. And she was like, salad tastes really good when you eat it with your hands. And I was like, that's crazy. And then I did it, and I was like, you are absolutely right.
28:40 Dan Pashman? Yes, part of the reason why eating a salad with your hands, it, it works is like, it is just kind of fun. But also, again, bite composition. You have better control over bite composition, where you can like fold a leaf over with your fingertips and get it all in your mouth. If I could, if it was long leaves of romaine, and I, if I can pick them up with my hands and just hold the heart, the, the stem end. That I can get behind.
29:02 Speaker 02 So then you'll you'll really enjoy. Um, we have little, uh, romaine rafts with, uh, Turkish meatballs and, uh, grilled eggplant in the book as well. That's like really nice, which is like that. That's how I like to eat during the week because it's like so textural. It's crunchy. You have like a nice, perfect meatball and then the chewiness of your eggplant that's seasoned just right.
29:23 Dan Pashman? You, you, I mean, that sounds fantastic. You remind me, I've, I've been on a big larb kick. The Thai dish, Anthony just collapsed on his couch.
29:32 Speaker 02 I fucking love larbs so much.
29:35 Dan Pashman? Good. The ground meat and just you get all those different flavors together and the fish sauce and the lime and the crunch and the greens.
29:41 Speaker 02 Tons of lemon. I put tons of lemongrass in there. I put in the cilantro stems. All of it. It's so good. It's healthy. It's packed with so much flavor. You need a nice aggressive hit of lime at the end. You get some beautiful Fresno chilies in there or some nice little like Thai birds, like really thinly sliced that just kind of like hit you. And then that fish sauce. It's one of my favorite things.
30:04 Dan Pashman? Would you describe yourself as a perfectionist in the kitchen?
30:07 Speaker 02 If, if I make a mistake, like I used to really beat myself up for it, especially, I was very good at like sitting down and being like, okay, so this like pasta that I made, like it's, it's just slightly overcooked because I took it out when it was al dente, but it sat in the sauce too long. And then I would kind of like beat myself up over it before people had even the opportunity to enjoy a dish. Now I'm just kind of like, I just don't take it as seriously anymore where it's sort of like, oh, well, if I made a mistake now, like I won't make it next time, hopefully, and I'll learn from it.
30:35 Dan Pashman? What changed?
30:39 Speaker 02 Wow. These are really good questions, by the way.
30:42 Dan Pashman? Oh, thanks.
30:43 Speaker 02 I'm really glad I'm very caffeinated. Um,
30:48 Speaker 02 what's changed? I think the more that I, you know what it is? Like, I just stopped caring about trying to be perfect because it's actually impossible. And it kind of makes me think a little bit about queer eye as being in like, living in the public space now. And imposter syndrome certainly makes its way. Like I just have some days where I wake up and I'm just like, I'm a fraud. And then I have other days where it's just not really there. And now I'm at a stage, I think, in my life where I've kind of accepted the fact that it's there and I don't try to like push it away or fight against it. And I just accept it as a thing. And if I wake up and I'm feeling 60%, I'm just gonna do like 100% of that 60%.
31:33 Speaker 02 And there's a freedom that came with that where my shoulders just kind of dropped. And I was like, I'm just gonna be me and I'm gonna continue to be inherently curious and obsessive over food and try to be better for myself and for whoever has to put my food in their mouth.
31:54 Dan Pashman? That's Anthony Porowski, food and wine expert on Queer Eye. You can find his cookbook, Let's Do Dinner, wherever books are sold. And you can watch the series he hosted with Nat Geo called No Taste Like Home. It's on Disney Plus. Next week on the show, I head to my friend Irene Yu's bar in Brooklyn so she can school me in Korean drinking culture. We also invite Peter Kim along to share some of his recipes for a classic drunk food, ramen. But it's not any old ramen. It's new twists on ramen from Peter's new cookbook. All that is next week. While you wait for that one, check out our call in show with Dan Pelosi and Nagin Farsad. It's a ton of fun. It's up now. This episode was produced by me along with managing producer. Emma Morgenstern. And senior producer.
32:33 Speaker 06 Andres O'Hara.
32:34 Dan Pashman? This episode was edited by Tracy Samuelson. Our engineer is. Jared O'Connell. Music help from Black Label Music. The Sporkful is a production of Sirius XM Podcasts. Our executive producer is Camille Stanley. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.
32:46 Speaker 03 And I'm Laura Lynn Hildebrand from Winnipeg, Canada, reminding you to eat more, eat better, and eat more butter.
33:03 Speaker 07 Hey, this is Will Arnett, host of Smartless. Smartless is a podcast with myself and Sean Hayes and Jason Bateman where each week one of us reveals a mystery guest of the other two. We dive deep with guests that you love, like Bill Hader, Selena Gomez, Jennifer Aniston, David Beckham, Kristen Stewart, and tons more. So join us for a genuinely improvised and authentic conversation filled with laughter and newfound knowledge to feed the smartless mind. Listen to Smartless now on the Sirius XM app. Download it today.
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