Chef Battle Scars, Eggnog Judgment Day, and the One Question Every Chef Hates!!

It’s the holiday season so Adrienne and Joe are debating the most important questions: Is it time to give up on eggnog? Where does prime rib rank among Christmas meats? And what does Joe serve for Feast of the Seven Fishes. Plus, we discuss: The physical perils of being a chef, including real stories about burns and battle scars One question you should stop asking chefs: what’s your favorite thing to cook? Review Review: The surprising Japanese restaurant review system Joe discovered while on vacation Fork It or Forget It: Adrienne needs to try eggnog again? Walk In Confession: A trip to the emergency room for an injured thumb Follow the show: @chefscutpod Follow Adrienne: @chefadriennecheatham Follow Joe: @insta.flamm

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Adrienne Cheatham?

  On this episode of the chef's cut, we share the one question chefs hate to get.

• 0:06Joe Flamm?

  Such an insane question.

• 0:08Adrienne Cheatham?

  The surprising rating system in Japan.

• 0:10Joe Flamm?

  Nobody gives a five star review because that's absolute perfection.

• 0:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  We share the physical perils of being a chef. That fryer oil melted my shirt to the back of my arm. And we rate your favorite Christmas foods. I can't get with eggnog. Let's get into it. Joe, we are back and for everybody watching on YouTube, be sure to hit subscribe for a full length video of every episode of the podcast. So you can see everything that's going on here.

• 0:38Joe Flamm?

  Age to get into it today. I was thinking about the other day, like we're chefs. We get questions all the time, right? People are curious about what we do. There's really good chef questions and there's really, really bad ones. And I am of the opinion, there's a worse chef question out there. I think it's like, just the worst one. And it's probably the most common one as well. We get as chefs, we get as cooks in this industry. So what's your number one? I need your number one, just off the cuff. Somebody meets you on a train, at a party, wherever, and you say, oh, I cook for a living. And their next question is.

• 1:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  What's your favorite thing to cook?

• 1:18Joe Flamm?

  I.

• 1:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  I'm every time. Never fail that. Or the only other one, what's your signature dish?

• 1:25Joe Flamm?

  Oh, yeah, that one's tough. The signature dish one's tough. I feel like it's more like coming from a base place. It's like the favorite thing to cook to me is just one of those ones. And it's like, yeah, if it's like.

• 1:39Adrienne Cheatham?

  The number one question.

• 1:40Joe Flamm?

  It's like, you know, if it's somebody I know, but they ask me that question, like I have no problem like kind of shitting on them and being like, that's a stupid question. Like, you know what I mean? But it's tough when you get that one, when you're like a public setting, right? If you're doing an event or if, you know, for me, if I'm at the restaurant, somebody's like, oh, what's your favorite thing to cook? You can't just, you don't want to be like dismissive. So I'll just be like, oh, pasta. You know what I mean? But it's like, it's such an insane question.

• 2:07Adrienne Cheatham?

  It is. I don't know why people ask that. It's like, what's your favorite memo to write? I don't know. What's your, what's your favorite kind of tree to plant? Like what's, what's your favorite airplane to fly? For chefs, that is the number one question that everybody asks us and everybody I know says the same thing. Like, why are people asking us this all the time?

• 2:27Joe Flamm?

  Right. We love to cook and we don't have like, unless you're like hardcore, old school Japanese where you're just like, I only cook soba. And you're like, obviously, so it's like, oh, okay, that is probably your favorite thing to cook. Or maybe it's not, and that's super weird. Then that would be interesting. If you've run a soba shop for 70 years and you're like, I hate cooking.

• 2:45Adrienne Cheatham?

  And it's not, right?

• 2:47Joe Flamm?

  I would like to kind of hear this, but I mean, for the most part, it's just one of those questions where it's just like, it's bizarre to me. Yeah. Like you said, like any other profession, you know, it's like going up to a firefighter and be like, what's your favorite kind of fire to fight? They're like, what?

• 2:59Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 3:00Joe Flamm?

  Like, why would you ask me that?

• 3:01Adrienne Cheatham?

  Exactly.

• 3:01Joe Flamm?

  I don't, I have no idea. You're right. That's an insane question.

• 3:05Adrienne Cheatham?

  Exactly. So why do people think that it's a normal question to add like, I cook so many different, it depends on the season. It depends on my mood. One day I might love to cook omelets. The next day I might love braising short ribs. Why is that a question that people ask? I like it when people ask me food specific questions like, hey, I've been making these mashed potatoes, but I can't get them quite right. Here's what I'm doing. Help me troubleshoot. That I can get with. But like the esoteric arbitrary question of what's your favorite thing to cook? I'm like, here we go again. Here we go again.

• 3:39Joe Flamm?

  What are you cooking for this? Or how do I, I good one, you know, like, uh, a guy asked me the other day, he was like, how do I get better at? I like cooking, but I'm not really good at it. And I'm like, all right, well, what part of cooking do you like? He's like, I really like. I was like, all right, then that's what you should focus on. Figure out how to grill more things. You mean, focus your dinner around that. Anything that's not going to be very grilled, buy something prepared. So you don't have to do it. You know what I mean? Buy a prepared salad, buy a prepared, you know, whatever potato salad or, you know, buy pre-cut things, whatever you want. So you don't have to do knife work if you don't want to do knife work. Because it's like, if you don't want to get better at knife work, you're probably not going to get better at.

• 4:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 4:22Joe Flamm?

  It takes a lot of time.

• 4:23Adrienne Cheatham?

  Like buy those chopped onions. Why are you, you know, if you're crunched for time and you're doing a ton of things, don't chop the onions like. Buy them.

• 4:32Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, you don't have to be good at slicing onions. You're not buying primals or sub primals of beef at your house. Be like, I gotta get really good at butchering beef shoulders.

• 4:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 4:42Joe Flamm?

  You know, so it's like, for me, it's one of those things, but it's like, that's a really good question, I thought. But it's the what's, what's my favorite thing to cook? It's like, I feel like that's the, if this could be our, our, our public service announcement for all the chefs all over the world, I think we would be doing them a great justice if we could get people to stop, you know, asking them, what's your favorite thing to cook? Maybe ask them, what's the last thing you cooked?

• 5:05Adrienne Cheatham?

  This public service announcement is more for the people who are not chefs so that they can stop asking that question.

• 5:11Joe Flamm?

  We're giving you a better question. They don't know what to ask.

• 5:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 5:13Joe Flamm?

  Hey, listen, I'm not totally shitting on these people. They just don't know what to ask.

• 5:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  What's the last thing you cooked at home?

• 5:18Joe Flamm?

  What's the last thing you cooked?

• 5:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yep.

• 5:20Joe Flamm?

  You know, what ingredient are you most excited about right now in this season?

• 5:25Adrienne Cheatham?

  There you go.

• 5:26Joe Flamm?

  What did you get from the farmer's market the last time you were there?

• 5:29Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 5:29Joe Flamm?

  Great question. You're either like, if you see a chef at a farmer's market, what are you getting today?

• 5:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. It's like, think of every different profession. Like if somebody tells me I'm a lawyer, what's the number one question somebody's probably going to ask them? Oh, where'd you go to law school?

• 5:43Joe Flamm?

  Right.

• 5:43Adrienne Cheatham?

  What kind of law do you practice? Like, think about how you feel when people ask you the same question over and over when they find out your profession. And think about how we feel because we get it so much more because of all the number of people you interact with in a restaurant, on the street, filming television, you know, people are just like walking up to you on the street, like, what's your favorite thing to cook? And that's one of the perils of being a chef, I think, because we get asked that question so much.

• 6:09Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 6:10Adrienne Cheatham?

  And like you said, a lot of times we're in public, so we can't just say like, you got something else, like a little more thoughtful.

• 6:17Joe Flamm?

  Right. It's not like you're, it's not like you're at a press conference. You'd be like, next question. You know what I mean?

• 6:24Adrienne Cheatham?

  That would be awesome.

• 6:25Joe Flamm?

  It would be just hilarious. That to people like, you know, just like, you know.

• 6:30Adrienne Cheatham?

  Nope, not answering that. Next.

• 6:31Joe Flamm?

  Nope, next. You in the back, what do you got? You got a better question about cookbooks or knives that I'd like to answer?

• 6:37Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, exactly. Yeah, dig a little deeper, do a little better. Well, Joe, it is the holiday season, and I think it's time to take it into fork it or forget it, because there are some things that are staples in this holiday season that I can't get with. I'm not a fan. I'm not a fan. I'm gonna see if you can guess what I'm talking about.

• 7:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  It is specific to the holiday season.

• 7:02Joe Flamm?

  Okay.

• 7:04Adrienne Cheatham?

  It is creamy.

• 7:07Joe Flamm?

  Okay.

• 7:08Adrienne Cheatham?

  It is usually spiked with alcohol. It's a beverage.

• 7:13Joe Flamm?

  Oh, a beverage.

• 7:14Adrienne Cheatham?

  A beverage, if you will.

• 7:16Joe Flamm?

  Okay, okay. So we got a boozy creamy beverage.

• 7:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yes, boozy creamy beverage made with eggs.

• 7:25Joe Flamm?

  Uh, is this amazing? This, oh, you're talking, you're, we're talking eggnog now.

• 7:28Adrienne Cheatham?

  We are talking.

• 7:29Joe Flamm?

  I thought maybe you were going the Tom and Jerry route first, getting real niche with it. Uh, but the nog. The great eggnog.

• 7:37Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh.

• 7:39Joe Flamm?

  I mean.

• 7:39Adrienne Cheatham?

  Fork it or forget it, eggnog.

• 7:41Joe Flamm?

  Oh, I, I mean, look at me. Look at me. Do I look like a person who doesn't enjoy eggnog? Is there anything about this robust Midwest frame that says I don't enjoy a glass of eggnog? Like, what about this could possibly say that to you? I mean, what kind of grinch are you that you can't enjoy the simple pleasure of a glass of eggnog?

• 8:04Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay, no, I can't. I can't get with eggnog. I've never been a fan. I don't like it.

• 8:09Joe Flamm?

  Not even when you were a kid, not even when you were a kid.

• 8:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  There are very, especially when I was a kid. This is a holdover from when I was a kid. It was gross to me. I was like, what? You want me to drink an egg? Like, what am I, Arnold Schwarzenegger on Muscle Beach in 1982? No.

• 8:24Joe Flamm?

  This is, yeah, straight gains, straight gains, you know? This is what's holding you back. Uh.

• 8:30Adrienne Cheatham?

  Apparently.

• 8:31Joe Flamm?

  Let me ask you a question.

• 8:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  Mm hmm.

• 8:34Joe Flamm?

  When is the last time you have tried it?

• 8:39Adrienne Cheatham?

  I, I, it's one of those things that when I, when I'm presented with eggnog, I have a visceral reaction.

• 8:44Joe Flamm?

  Answer, answer the question, answer, answer the question, Adrian.

• 8:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  So the last time I tried, I tried it and I drank it?

• 8:52Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 8:52Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, God, I was probably like prepubescent.

• 8:54Joe Flamm?

  This is what I'm saying.

• 8:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  To have been like 11 or 12.

• 8:57Joe Flamm?

  Saying, don't let your.

• 8:59Adrienne Cheatham?

  And I threw up. I vomited.

• 9:01Joe Flamm?

  Don't let your childhood define you, okay? You're not that girl anymore.

• 9:05Adrienne Cheatham?

  Our childhood is what makes us who we are.

• 9:07Joe Flamm?

  You've seen the world. Your, your mind has expanded.

• 9:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  And you know what I haven't seen when I travel the world? Eggnog.

• 9:15Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, you have.

• 9:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  I haven't seen that around the world.

• 9:17Joe Flamm?

  Different ways.

• 9:18Adrienne Cheatham?

  Nope.

• 9:18Joe Flamm?

  Coquito?

• 9:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  Hmm. Coquito does not have eggs. Coquito is no.

• 9:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  Uh, I can't, I can't, I can, I love coquito. I will buy a bottle from everybody making coquito every season, but nope, on the eggnog.

• 9:35Joe Flamm?

  Listen.

• 9:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  Don't come at me with some raw eggs in a bottle and expect me to drink it.

• 9:39Joe Flamm?

  I need you to try some eggnog this holiday season. The people need it, I need it, we need a video of you giving it, giving it, giving it a go.

• 9:50Adrienne Cheatham?

  I like, I kind of want to gag just thinking about, and that's weird, like, I will eat brains. I've eaten anything that like, I travel somewhere, whatever the most rare, I'll try it. I'll give anything a try.

• 10:02Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 10:02Adrienne Cheatham?

  But eggnog, I don't know what it is, I can't get over it. It's a complete forget it for me.

• 10:06Joe Flamm?

  And like, listen, I'm, I'm going to be real with you. It is viscous. It's got some thickness to it. It's got a viscosity to it that is, no joke, it's not a chuggable beverage. You know what I mean? It's like a milkshake that's been in the car not long enough to totally melt.

• 10:24Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh.

• 10:25Joe Flamm?

  You know, but it's like still thick, it's still cold, it's still cold.

• 10:29Adrienne Cheatham?

  You are.

• 10:29Joe Flamm?

  But it's no longer frozen, you know what I mean?

• 10:31Adrienne Cheatham?

  You're really making my case for me here, Joe.

• 10:34Joe Flamm?

  I think you should give it another shot. I think you're, you're closing the door on something that, you know, I'll just be sad to see you miss in your life. A little nog.

• 10:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  There are some joys in this world that I'm okay not knowing.

• 10:49Joe Flamm?

  You know, the, the nephews and nieces for the holidays and they're like, Auntie A, Jeff's a bag nog. And you're like, no, I'm a bridge.

• 10:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  My babies would never.

• 10:56Joe Flamm?

  I'm a bridge, you know, like.

• 10:59Adrienne Cheatham?

  Now my babies might offer me some coquito, but they would never ask me about it.

• 11:05Joe Flamm?

  I think you need, I think you need to do a little, just like a little, just a shot glass, just a little ripper, just a little ripper for the holidays. You know what I mean? I think it'll be good for you.

• 11:15Adrienne Cheatham?

  Joe, we're going to move on to review, review, but before we do, be sure to subscribe to the chef's cut on YouTube or Spotify for full length videos of every episode of the podcast. So Joe, you recently went to Japan, little pre-holiday trip you had, right?

• 11:35Joe Flamm?

  Yes, in Japanese, super good Japanese.

• 11:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  I learned, you're crushing it totally.

• 11:40Joe Flamm?

  Thank you.

• 11:41Adrienne Cheatham?

  I learned something very interesting that I think people would love to hear about because we talk about the review systems here and how they go here, but you learned a new review system. Let's hear about this.

• 11:57Joe Flamm?

  I didn't know about this. And then when I brought it up to people since I got back, I've talked to a lot of people about it. I think it's wildly interesting. So when I was there, my cousin, Ben, he lives in, he lives in Shanghai, but his wife is from Japan. She grew up half of the States, half in Tokyo. So they go to Tokyo all the time. So he was there, we were hanging out and he kept like sending me restaurants. He was like, oh, you should go to this place. It's really good. All these restaurants he was sending me, they're like 3.3, 3.5, 3.6 out of 5, right? And at one point, he finally texts me back and he's like, hey, just so you know, in Japan, if it's over like a 3.5, he's like, it's a fantastic restaurant.

• 12:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  That is crazy.

• 12:41Joe Flamm?

  He's like, five stars is unobtainable. It's unobtainable because like, nobody gives a five star review because that's absolute perfection.

• 12:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Wow.

• 12:49Joe Flamm?

  So you look at these restaurants, so they're all like 3.5, 3.6. I went to this yakitori place, first night I was there, it was called Tojirin Yakitori, right outside of Ginza. And unbelievable meal. Like, I mean, everything was super delicious, really cool. You go downstairs, it's in a basement, it's been there a really long time. It's exactly like what you would picture in your head, right? If I was like, let's go get yakitori in Tokyo, you know, our first night there, you know, it's cold beers, it's, you know, ripping hot skewers. You're just like, this is perfect.

• 13:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  That sounds awesome.

• 13:20Joe Flamm?

  So I just want to read you an excerpt from this review from there. And it says,

• 13:30Joe Flamm?

  First up was the Yakitori. The heart of the gizzard was served with salt. With each bite, the amami burst in my mouth. I quickly washed it down with some sake to enjoy the enhanced flavors and delightful aromas. Next came the chicken wings and sauce. The plump, tender texture, rich meat juices melted my brain, leading me to a state of happiness. I sipped the Oolong tea a couple of times. This goes on like this. This is four paragraphs, all equally, equally as just like, you know, this is a must try. This is a truly unique experience. Just the right amount of saltiness, like comforting home cooking flavor. Even, even they make, even they make a mention of like, oh, I can't believe I was able to

• 14:15Joe Flamm?

  get in at 6pm. They're usually so busy. It was so nice. They squeezed me in. You know, they talk about how cool the place looks. What do you think the rating of this review?

• 14:26Adrienne Cheatham?

  I mean, to me, that sounds like a frickin' five star review. That is glowing. I, and it's like listening to the words. It's so descriptive. I feel like I'm in the place when this person is describing it. I, it sounds to me like a five star review. I know you said that's not a thing, but that's an amazing review. It's gotta be, that's gotta be like, at least four.

• 14:46Joe Flamm?

  There is not a bad word in here. Last line. Uh, it was delicious. It was a great meal. I'll be back for sure.

• 14:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my God. Okay. It's gotta be at least four at the minimum. Cause you said five isn't really a thing.

• 15:03Joe Flamm?

  3.5, 3.5, 3.5 stars.

• 15:07Adrienne Cheatham?

  No. Are you kidding me? That is, oh my gosh. I feel like there's a disconnect.

• 15:15Joe Flamm?

  Review I've ever read. This is the best. If somebody wrote this review about one of my restaurants, I would go to their house and shake their hand. I would give them a hug.

• 15:24Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my God.

• 15:25Joe Flamm?

  Bring him a glass of eggnog for the holidays. You know, like.

• 15:28Adrienne Cheatham?

  I was gonna say send him a bottle of wine.

• 15:30Joe Flamm?

  Uh, but it's like, I mean, this was like such a, it was beautifully written. It was like long. I was like, I've never written a paper that's good in my life, let alone a review. 3.5 stars.

• 15:40Joe Flamm?

  I can't wrap my head around it.

• 15:42Adrienne Cheatham?

  I I'm like, I'm shocked. I mean, it's like, I can't believe it. I can't wrap my mind around this disconnect between that review and that score. I feel like if it's that good, it should at least get a four, right?

• 15:55Joe Flamm?

  Yes. It was that good. It's a, there was nothing wrong with it. So this got me down going to a rabbit hole of Japanese reviews. And I went to, you know, I don't know if I told you this, but I went to a coffee shop while I was there. And they take, you know, like most things in Tokyo, they take coffee very seriously. And so I walked into this place and it was called the Cherry Lab because it's Coffee Laboratory, which I didn't know they meant that like very seriously. And there's all these signs when you walk in that say like, please be quiet to not disturb the coffee making process.

• 16:31Joe Flamm?

  In a coffee shop.

• 16:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  So you have to zip it when you walk in.

• 16:34Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, it's like, hey, if you want coffee, shut the fuck up and get in line. So I walk up to the counter and you know, the first thing the guy tells me, he's like, just so you know, every espresso here is at least $20. And I was like, all right, well, yeah, I'm in. So I order a

• 16:51Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right, I'm here.

• 16:52Joe Flamm?

  $25 double espresso.

• 16:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my goodness.

• 16:57Joe Flamm?

  So they start making it. They're like damn near roasting the beans to order. And like, he doesn't make it. He just stands aside and this woman comes out and she starts making it. It's a whole process and she grinds it down and she's got that little like thing where the, you know what I mean? Airing the ground beans like slowly.

• 17:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my gosh.

• 17:13Joe Flamm?

  And I go to take a picture because I'm like, this is crazy. They like, I mean, old school 1990s celebrity paparazzi freak out style or like, no, no, no, no, no. I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, like, you know, like, sorry, sorry. I like show them my phone and show them that and take a picture.

• 17:30Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my gosh. You can't even take pictures?

• 17:33Joe Flamm?

  I'm so sorry. And so whatever, eventually 11 minutes later, I get a double shot of espresso. That's absolutely fucking delicious. By the way, by the way, it was awesome. It was totally awesome. 10 out of 10.

• 17:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  I'm just.

• 17:47Joe Flamm?

  10 out of 10.

• 17:48Adrienne Cheatham?

  No, I mean.

• 17:48Joe Flamm?

  Double espresso.

• 17:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Four out of 10, four out of 10. If you're following the system.

• 17:52Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, if I'm following the table log Tokyo system, it would have been a 3.2. But it was awesome. But then I was like, I gotta see the reviews of this place. And so I was reading the reviews and the owner of this business, this woman comments on every review, good or bad. The good reviews should be like, thank you for understanding what I'm trying to do here. You know, blah, blah, blah, like long responses, not like, oh, thanks for stopping by. Like paragraph and a half. Somebody said like, oh, it's like so cold, like so sterile in there. And she's like, yes, that's what a lab is. It's supposed to be cold and sterile. This is a laboratory. This is not a.

• 18:26Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, you get it.

• 18:27Joe Flamm?

  And I was like, man, they are really taking this shit literal. It was.

• 18:30Adrienne Cheatham?

  Wow.

• 18:32Joe Flamm?

  Incredible.

• 18:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  I mean, I thought I took myself seriously. Good Lord.

• 18:36Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, blew my mind, man. Blew my mind.

• 18:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  Whoa, that is intense. So one of my biggest regrets is my sister used to live in Japan. And one of my biggest regrets was I never went to visit her when she lived there. But I've always wanted to go. And when you were there recently, you posted to your stories, you tried that fruit and whipped cream sandwich that we talked about with Sam Cass, right?

• 18:58Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 18:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  How was it? I need details. Like, I need details.

• 19:02Joe Flamm?

  You know, it's milk bread. It's whipped cream. It's not too sweet, but it's a little sweet. And then it was like mandar and oranges in it.

• 19:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  So it's like a creamsicle?

• 19:11Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, so it was good. It's really good. It doesn't make you feel good about yourself afterwards, but it's an awesome experience.

• 19:18Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay, so next time I see that, I'm gonna try one. Well, Joe, let's take it to line checks. For line check, I want to talk about how each chef has a literal, physical body of work, right? And I don't mean that in terms of like the menus we've written, the restaurants we've worked at. I'm talking about our bodies and the scars that we have collected over the years.

• 19:48Adrienne Cheatham?

  Because what we do is dangerous, right? There's fire, there's knives, everything is hot, everything is sharp. You're under stress, things are heavy, boiling over, oil flowing out of the fryer. It's a dangerous job.

• 20:02Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 20:02Adrienne Cheatham?

  And, you know, death and liability insurance for chefs is like 20% higher than any other profession.

• 20:10Joe Flamm?

  You know, we've all seen nasty kitchen incidents and I think we've all had our own. And it's like, what we would consider the minor ones.

• 20:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 20:19Joe Flamm?

  You just go, you're like, whatever. You know, remember like, you know, uh, my wife asked me one time, like we were dating. It was, I burnt, uh, like I have the, you know, this tattoo on my arm that's got all the lettering. I burnt the letters off that tattoo. I like burnt my arm so bad, like a line through it that some of the letters were gone.

• 20:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  Wow, you went deep on that one.

• 20:42Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, I did. And they came back.

• 20:45Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay.

• 20:46Joe Flamm?

  Like when you heal, that's crazy thing. I didn't know that. That was, uh, I think that was my first.

• 20:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  I didn't know the tattoos would come back.

• 20:51Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, so, um, you know, when the burn healed, it just, the tattoo was fine.

• 20:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, my God.

• 20:57Joe Flamm?

  It was crazy. Uh, but I remember she asked me, she's like, what did you do when that happened? I'm like, what do you mean? She's like, well, what did you do? I'm like, like, nothing. She was like, did you like scream or like, like cry or like, or anything? I'm like, no, I just like, had to like, keep plating, like we were in the middle of the rush. And I just kinda like, just went on with my day completely.

• 21:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 21:21Joe Flamm?

  She's like, what, that's not like the reaction that a person should have.

• 21:25Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, it is. I mean, when you're in the middle of service.

• 21:28Joe Flamm?

  Right, it's like, that's an after-service problem at best.

• 21:31Adrienne Cheatham?

  Does table 12 want their food? Then it is something that I need to address after service.

• 21:35Joe Flamm?

  That's an after-service problem at best. And I think like, now there's a lot more like safeguards, right? You know what I mean? Like there, now the deep fryers have things where you can hook them in. It'll just, like all my deep fryers have a little nozzle and you pump the oil through a pipe and it just goes out in the alley into the oil bit. Instead of like walking out there in the ice of snow with a giant pot of oil being like, like little steps, little steps, little steps. You know what I mean? Like, or the raid, that was the worst. Taking the fryer oil out in the rain.

• 22:03Adrienne Cheatham?

  In the rain? You better put a sheet tray over that.

• 22:06Joe Flamm?

  Oh, yeah. Oh, there was always somebody who didn't know though, and you like heard it. And you're just like, and you just hear somebody yell, sheet tray, sheet tray.

• 22:14Adrienne Cheatham?

  One of the worst burns I ever got, and I still have a scar. It's on the back. You can maybe see it. So I was in the kitchen one day. I was walking down the line. I was checking. We had two kitchens going. This was that Red Rooster. We had the upstairs kitchen and we had the Jenny's downstairs kitchen open. And downstairs, they were getting crushed. So I left Expo, went down to check on the sous chef down there. And they had an order on the fly. I was like, chef, you stay on the pass. You know, guys, stay here. Stay on your stations. I'll take care of this on the fly order. And I had this cook give me a rondo to get started on whatever this person needed with something super random.

• 22:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  And to try to expedite the process of the heat underneath, I asked the woman next to me to give me some oil from the fryer. Like, give me a ladle full of hot oil to, you know, just kind of make the oil speed up.

• 23:13Joe Flamm?

  That trick.

• 23:14Adrienne Cheatham?

  So she's walking behind me with a, like, I don't know, probably an eight ounce ladle. So a pretty sizable bowl on the ladle. I thought she put all the oil in the pot. She did not. She still had some oil in this hot ladle and the fryers were at like 375. She's walking behind me and I'm checking for a couple ingredients on the line to use for this special order. Grab them. She doesn't say behind you. She doesn't say hot. She doesn't say anything. So I reached to grab this thing I need. I pulled my arm back and she's holding this ladle out in front of her like this.

• 23:54Adrienne Cheatham?

  It hits me in the back of the arm and that fryer oil melted my shirt to the back of my arm. I was dating Steven at the time. Of course, like, yeah, I finished service though, like,

• 24:07Adrienne Cheatham?

  puts a, you know,

• 24:08Joe Flamm?

  Put a fresh, put a fresh coat on.

• 24:10Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, exactly. I was like, well, just roll that sleeve up or actually give me your, your paring knife and just cut that sleeve off for me.

• 24:16Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 24:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  And then I finished service. You know, like I had one of the waiters bring me some burn gel and then Saran wrap my arm, not a big deal. And then after service, we closed out, I was going to meet, Steven and I were dating at the time. I'm gonna go meet him for a drink at the bar. So I meet him at the bar and he gave me a hug and he's like, what's that rustling sound? I'm like, oh, it's just plastic wrap on my arm. He's like, oh, okay. Didn't he, he was just like, y'all do weird shit. I'm gonna stay out of this. Somebody else were talking, having drinks, somebody else like patted me on the arm later in the evening and I was like, ooh. He was like, what, wait, what is up with your arm? And I was like, oh, somebody hit me in the back of the arm with fryer oil tonight.

• 24:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  He was like, what? What did you do? Same thing. I was like, I said, oh. And then I said, get out of my way.

• 25:06Joe Flamm?

  Right. You're like, I reminded myself that I could not, you know, commit violence on this person at work.

• 25:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Exactly.

• 25:13Joe Flamm?

  The first station at work was like a gas wood fired oven. And so the floor's hot. Everything's hot, right? But it had this metal trim around it and it was like real thin and it was just ripping hot. And the oven was just a little bit low. So if you're like my height and you know, my buddy Joe used to work the oven with me, like, so we're the same height. You couldn't see in the oven standing up. So you'd have to like you, you could see the oven standing up, but like I couldn't. So like to get in there, I would have to crouch down.

• 25:47Adrienne Cheatham?

  You and your short jokes. You and your short jokes.

• 25:49Joe Flamm?

  I'm just, it's just real. So you'd have to look at what you wanted to get in the oven. You'd be like, all right, that pan's right there. And you'd be like, all right, go. You put your hand in real quick and you try to grab it and pull it up. Sometimes when you're pulling it out, you'd hit the bottom of the oven.

• 26:06Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. We call that tag.

• 26:08Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 26:08Adrienne Cheatham?

  We used to call that tag.

• 26:09Joe Flamm?

  Yeah. So like the bottom of the oven hurts, but it's not too bad. But the problem is you hit the bottom of the oven and your instant reaction is your arm goes up. And so when your arm went up, you'd hit that metal thing and that metal thing would like burn you, cut you and cauterize you like all in one swing. And just be like, and you're just like.

• 26:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  I know that sound. Oh my God.

• 26:36Joe Flamm?

  Like all of our wrists, all of our forearms from there were just like just so marked up. And I'll tell you how stupid we are. So that was at table 52. That restaurant was open for, I think like 10 or 15 years, maybe. So when it was closing, me, Joe, my other buddy, John, uh, they're chefs of Detroit together. And our old chef de cuisine went back with like some of our friends and we ate there one last night, right before it closed. We all ate there together.

• 27:03Adrienne Cheatham?

  Uh huh.

• 27:04Joe Flamm?

  And then at the end of the night, some drinks may have been had. We were like, we gotta get one more for the road. And we all went up.

• 27:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh no.

• 27:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  What is wrong with you?

• 27:19Joe Flamm?

  And we all went up and burnt ourselves on the oven one last time.

• 27:23Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh God. What is right? Did you go straight for the top or did you do the bottom top?

• 27:29Joe Flamm?

  No, we went straight for the top.

• 27:31Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh God, Joseph. Oh man. I mean, those ovens are crazy though. Working saute stations. I guess that's actually being shorter was an advantage. Because if I'm doing my crouching tiger, hidden dragon to get into the, the ovens, like working saute, we had two side by side ovens. And we had those big French fish pans.

• 27:53Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 27:54Adrienne Cheatham?

  Heavy.

• 27:54Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 27:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  Iron pan.

• 27:56Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, the pans that are only, only used at La Berta Dade.

• 27:59Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. Yeah.

• 28:00Joe Flamm?

  No one, no one else, no one else knows what that pan is because people have only seen those. No one. I, I took over a restaurant and they had those. And I remember the, the owners asked me like, what are these for? I was like, these are for cooking fish at a three Michelin star restaurant. Like you're running a steakhouse.

• 28:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  They're huge. They are massive. They're no, it's a big oval with a 14 inch handle.

• 28:22Joe Flamm?

  Yes.

• 28:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  And the oval itself is probably about 16, 18 inches long.

• 28:27Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, it's like a snow shoe.

• 28:28Adrienne Cheatham?

  Point, maybe eight inches. Yeah. It's huge. These things are so heavy. And so going in and out of the ovens, like I was ripped. You go in and out of the oven so much, you're, you're like scarred up. And I hated like going back around my family around the holiday season because my arms would look so messed up. So I would like, I'd pull all my sweater sleeves down. Like I wouldn't roll my sleeves up for anything because my mom would be like, dear, like what? This is what I told you. This is why I told you not to go to kitchens. But then she would also be like,

• 29:00Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 29:01Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, you're okay. Walk it off. I got a scar recently. Here, I don't know if you can see it.

• 29:06Joe Flamm?

  Mm hmm.

• 29:07Adrienne Cheatham?

  It looked like I was crying hot oil.

• 29:09Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 29:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  I was frying anchovies last week or a couple of weeks ago, and one of them exploded.

• 29:16Joe Flamm?

  Oof.

• 29:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  Like, right as I'm going into the pan.

• 29:18Joe Flamm?

  Yep.

• 29:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  With the little fish spatula to lift them out, I lifted it out of the oil. And that's when it decided to explode and it like splattered.

• 29:28Joe Flamm?

  Like you could see that oil coming at your face and you're like.

• 29:31Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 29:32Joe Flamm?

  This is gonna suck.

• 29:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  It hit me in the right eye. I have a little mark here under my eye. And I like, you know, I just immediately grabbed, I had some vodka bottles in the freezer at work. So I just grabbed a vodka bottle and like held it to my face and then finished taking the anchovies out. But I was like, I made it through almost 20 years in kitchens without leaving a scar on my face. And now I'm doing private work and now I choose to get a scar on my face. Like, come on.

• 29:57Joe Flamm?

  I never had that because it's like, you know, be, I'm not making fun of you for being short, but be taller than you. You're further away from the pan. So it's like all that's just hitting me in like the chest. But the one thing, I remember doing this multiple times when I worked at Girl on the Goat is when you worked saute, you had scallops. And you had to base the scallops.

• 30:18Adrienne Cheatham?

  Hmm.

• 30:19Joe Flamm?

  And doing the move of, I'd be like basting a bunch of scallops. So that spoon is just magma hot, right?

• 30:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  Hot, yeah.

• 30:27Joe Flamm?

  Throw it in the bane for a second. Forget which spoon it was. Go to taste something else. And like burn yourself on your lips, like at two parts from the spoon. And it's like one of those where it's like, you'd feel it and you'd be like, I'm the stupidest person on earth.

• 30:42Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, man.

• 30:43Joe Flamm?

  And then it's like, it looked like you had, it looked like you had like double cold sores because you burnt. And it's like, no, don't worry. I just burnt myself with a spoon because I'm stupid.

• 30:51Adrienne Cheatham?

  I feel like you've told us a lot about your scars, but that doesn't get you off the hook for walk-in confessions. You are up this week, my friend.

• 30:59Joe Flamm?

  I'm going to literally take you to the walk-in for this one.

• 31:03Adrienne Cheatham?

  I gotta hear this.

• 31:05Joe Flamm?

  Back when I was a live cook at Table 52, at one point they moved, I don't know if you've ever worked at a place like this, but they moved the walk-in outside.

• 31:12Adrienne Cheatham?

  No, I never did.

• 31:14Joe Flamm?

  So the back kitchen was so small, they took the walk-in and they moved it outside, like in the parking lot. So it was like a free standing shed, but it was a walk-in, right?

• 31:23Adrienne Cheatham?

  Wow.

• 31:24Joe Flamm?

  So when you went out, you know, and like the back doors of restaurants are like those big, heavy fire doors. So if you go out the back door, the back door opened right to the walk-in. So the walk-in door and the back door of the restaurant kind of met almost like they were so close, which was good. If it was like snowing, you could, you know, I mean, kind of, you know, get out there real quick and, you know, get through and not get snowed on too much or raining or whatever. It's like four o'clock. One day we open at four 30. I'm getting ready for service. I'm running it out. I'm running to the walk-in. My buddy's running into the back door. I have my hand opening the door. He swings the walk-in door open and my right hand and my thumb is in between the fire door and the walk-in door. Just smashes my thumb.

• 32:09Joe Flamm?

  It's one of those instant ones where you're like, oh, like, you know, I mean, like, you feel it in your stomach. You're just like, like, so I'm also like, at this point, like, six months of a cook. So like, I can't even really like, say anything because it's like, kind of my fault. My thumb was in the way. You know, my buddy's like, oh, that sucks. It's like a Saturday night. So work and service, we get killed at work at the oven. My thumb is so swollen by five o'clock that I can't season with my right hand. Like to pick up salt and it hurts. Right. Like it is hurting my thumb just to pick up salt. It's in so much pain. And it is like four times the size. You know what I mean? It's black and

• 32:51Joe Flamm?

  blue already. The thing is huge. So then the whole night, I'm like trying to season with my left hand. And again, I'm six months of cook. I can barely season with my right hand. So now I'm trying to do it with my left hand. I'm doing a shitty job. You know, I'm getting yelled at all night because I'm cooking really slow because my thumb feels like it's going to fall off. It's late. I think I get out of there at like one in the morning. At the time, my mom worked midnight. So sometimes she would pick me up and give me a ride home. So she's like, all right, you know, she's like, I'm not too busy. Maybe I'll meet you at 63rd Street. I was like, okay. Um, I go, um, all right. Yeah, that's good. Um, like, are you pretty, pretty not busy? She's like, yeah, why? I go, do you think he maybe like, I think I might need to go to the hospital, like after you pick me up.

• 33:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. Like, instead of going home, can you take me to a hospital by any chance?

• 33:38Joe Flamm?

  And, you know, you have to understand my mother too. This is a woman who was, you know, a Chicago police lieutenant for 30 years on midnights. She is unflappable.

• 33:48Joe Flamm?

  So her response was, oh yeah, for sure. I know the best one to go to this time of night because they don't do gunshots. So we'll be able to walk right in.

• 33:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, nice. That's good intel.

• 33:59Joe Flamm?

  Very good intel.

• 34:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  Solid.

• 34:01Joe Flamm?

  So picks me up. We cruise to the hospital. Nurse comes back. She's like, yeah, we need to drill a hole in your thumbnail.

• 34:10Adrienne Cheatham?

  What? Oh my God, to release the pressure?

• 34:13Joe Flamm?

  Pressure because like otherwise like your skin's gonna rip. I was like, yeah, do like whatever. So they heat this thing up. It looks like a mini like soldering iron.

• 34:23Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh gee.

• 34:23Joe Flamm?

  Put my thumb down on the table and you know, she like grabs my wrist and just takes the thing and just goes and it goes through it like hot butter and it was insanely painful, but I am not kidding. My thumb was so pressurized, blood shot out two feet in the air and in like a solid stream.

• 34:45Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my.

• 34:46Joe Flamm?

  It was just like, and that was like,

• 34:48Adrienne Cheatham?

  Like Buckingham Fountain.

• 34:50Joe Flamm?

  Crazy, but like that felt so good because the pressure was so intense. And she's just like looking at me like almost disgusted like, why are you okay right now? Like, you know, and it was, it was one of the wildest ones though, but it was just like, oh man, that was a brutal one. That was like one of those ones that it was like, welcome to the kitchen.

• 35:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Everybody watching on YouTube, don't forget to subscribe so you can get the full length video of every episode of the podcast every week. Joe, what the hell do you have?

• 35:20Joe Flamm?

  So, um, are you familiar with, uh, on social media where they do these things where you just rate them one to 10? I just give you things and you rate them one to 10, 10 being the best, one being the least. So we're gonna do holiday meats edition.

• 35:37Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh.

• 35:40Joe Flamm?

  Maybe some, maybe some fish, maybe some fish too.

• 35:43Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay.

• 35:43Joe Flamm?

  And you're just gonna give me one to 10, you can give me a quick note about why it ranks there for you. All right, number one, starting off, I think, holiday ham.

• 35:51Adrienne Cheatham?

  Ooh, holiday ham. I give it an eight, maybe an, maybe a nine.

• 35:56Joe Flamm?

  A nine, I think a nine's too high. Eight, eight I can get on board with, eight, it's a workhorse, it's solid, it's the leftover, it might be the leftover king.

• 36:05Adrienne Cheatham?

  It is, and nothing says holiday like ham. I'm sorry, I love a holiday ham. I'm here for it.

• 36:12Joe Flamm?

  All right, so everybody does turkey for Thanksgiving. What about the Christmas turkey? Where's that one hidden for you?

• 36:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  Let it, let it go. Some families do a dry run for Christmas with Thanksgiving, but I do like to not revisit the turkey. Um, I'm gonna go with ranking that a two.

• 36:34Joe Flamm?

  Two.

• 36:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  A two.

• 36:35Joe Flamm?

  That's a basement.

• 36:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  I don't, I don't want turkey on Christmas. It can be there, it can be there, but like, don't expect me to eat it.

• 36:43Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, no, I'm, I'm.

• 36:44Adrienne Cheatham?

  Ham, I want.

• 36:45Joe Flamm?

  I'm with you. I think it's a little higher than a two. I think a two is harsh. I think you got two into the Japanese review system and, uh.

• 36:51Adrienne Cheatham?

  I'm, I'm totally in, I'm in it now, in that system now.

• 36:55Joe Flamm?

  But yeah, no, I, I agree, it's, leave that, leave that in Thanksgiving.

• 37:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, I thought La Gaya Masan was tough. I'm a, I'm a tough reviewer.

• 37:03Joe Flamm?

  Oh yeah, apparently. All right, what about, you know, you're, you're a fancy New Yorker now. What about a prime rib?

• 37:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, for Christmas? Hell, yeah. I'd say that's, that's getting top billing. That's gonna be a 10.

• 37:21Joe Flamm?

  Oh.

• 37:23Adrienne Cheatham?

  A prime rib roast on the bone. Yeah, that's, that's my number one. Like, nothing says the holidays.

• 37:31Joe Flamm?

  All right, so combo with this then, though. So if that's a 10, what's a beef tenderloin? Whole roast beef tenderloin for Christmas?

• 37:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's a nine.

• 37:38Joe Flamm?

  That's a nine, okay. Nine, 10 in that order.

• 37:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay, so now I have prime rib as one, beef tenderloin, ooh, especially if it's a Wellington, ooh, and then ham after that, yep.

• 37:49Joe Flamm?

  Okay. How do you, all right, uh, last one, this is one served at my family's Christmas every year. The bakalao. Are you familiar with the salt cod?

• 37:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  Brondad style?

• 37:59Joe Flamm?

  We are not.

• 38:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  I am familiar with the salt cod.

• 38:02Joe Flamm?

  What we are doing is we are rehydrating, we are rehydrating that shit.

• 38:08Joe Flamm?

  And then you are dredging it?

• 38:11Joe Flamm?

  And frying it?

• 38:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  No, I thought you guys like cook it into scrambled eggs?

• 38:16Joe Flamm?

  No, hell no, hell no. No, it makes no sense.

• 38:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  What? I've never heard of anybody frying bacalao.

• 38:22Joe Flamm?

  It's big in Italy.

• 38:23Adrienne Cheatham?

  Never.

• 38:23Joe Flamm?

  They fry it. They have places in Rome that only fry bacalao. The bacalao fritti's.

• 38:29Adrienne Cheatham?

  And it's not like a, a mix of something else where you make like a ball and fry it?

• 38:34Joe Flamm?

  Nope.

• 38:34Adrienne Cheatham?

  Like mixed with potato or something?

• 38:36Joe Flamm?

  Nope. How they used to do it, I'm gonna, I'm gonna give you this. Even before you rank it, this is, you wanna hear some like real old school Italian stuff is what they say like, so you know, you gotta, when you do salt cod, like right, you gotta, you rinse it? And then you change the water every day?

• 38:50Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, you gotta soak it to get all that salt out.

• 38:53Joe Flamm?

  So. What my grandma told me is what they used to do back in the day is when they used to have the toilets where the top of the toilet, like the back part with the fresh water was up high.

• 39:05Adrienne Cheatham?

  With that, okay.

• 39:07Joe Flamm?

  They would just put the bacalao in there.

• 39:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my god.

• 39:15Joe Flamm?

  Cause then the fresh water was just going through it. You know what I mean? You're not wasting water. You're not wasting anything.

• 39:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  That is the most, it's the most oddly genius kinda thing that I have ever heard of. And then you're gonna be changing the water anytime someone flushes, it's separate, it's not in the line of fire from anything. Oh my god, right?

• 39:34Joe Flamm?

  It's brilliant, but some brilliance is, is, is not meant to be shared.

• 39:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  I don't know, but like I've never, I can't say I've ever just had straight up bacalao breaded and fried though. I mean, kudos to Grandma Mary for, for that genius rinsing kind of strategy.

• 39:50Joe Flamm?

  It wasn't her invention. It wasn't her invention. That's a, that's a well-known thing. If you talk to.

• 39:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh.

• 39:55Joe Flamm?

  It is, I, cause I've talked to Tony Montuano about it too. He's like, oh yeah, yeah, yeah. He's like, they used to do that.

• 40:02Adrienne Cheatham?

  Whoa, okay. I am today years old. I love learning new things like this. That's incredible.

• 40:06Joe Flamm?

  So you meet any old Italians before Christmas, ask them about it, be like, hey. Let me ask you about, uh, putting dried fish in your toilet.

• 40:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  They'll be like, who told you about that?

• 40:18Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 40:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  So, okay, fried baklava. I don't know. I don't know.

• 40:24Joe Flamm?

  All right, we'll give you an undecided on it. I'll tell you, as somebody who's eaten it every year their whole life, it's like a five. It's right middle of the road. I feel like I have to have it because it's tradition. But it's more tradition than like, it's not like a delicious thing that I'm like, oh yeah, I can't wait to sink my teeth into some baklava.

• 40:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. Well, really quickly then, I want you to score Feast of the Seven Fishes. There's seven dishes that you and your family do every year around Christmas. And that's not something I ever grew up with that tradition. I didn't even hear about Feast of the Seven Fishes until I got older and was a line cook. But what score the seven dishes that you and your family do?

• 41:05Joe Flamm?

  So I would say, we'll start from seven. Baklava is probably the lowest level. And they switch from every family, but this is just what we do. So I would say baklava is seven for me.

• 41:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay.

• 41:17Joe Flamm?

  I'd say after that, the perch, the fried perch is probably six. Then in recent years, this one's really good, but it's not like very exciting to me. It's not like I like super look forward to it, but it's delicious as we've moved into a shrimp cocktail. But that's probably five. Four, I would probably say I do now, one of the new additions as well is a whole grilled salmon.

• 41:42Joe Flamm?

  Which is really good, very popular. But it's not, you know, super exciting to me, just because it's salmon, but everybody loves it. It is delicious.

• 41:55Joe Flamm?

  Three, I'd go with the, with the scallops, seared scallops with like butter and breadcrumbs and garlic and delicious. And then number two would be the clam sauce spaghetti, but it's a red sauce.

• 42:09Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, oh.

• 42:11Joe Flamm?

  So it's like clams, onions, olive oil, tons of black pepper, oregano, cans of tomato. You cook that down, serve it with linguine.

• 42:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  Nice.

• 42:24Joe Flamm?

  Then number one, the real star of the show for me on Feast of the Seven Fishes is the calamari. And you're getting calamari a couple of ways. So one you have like you make the clam red sauce and then you make a calamari red sauce. And then you put the calamari red sauce in conjunction on top of the clam red sauce as like extra meat. You know what I mean? So you get a mixture of like tomato braised squid and clams. Delicious. And then we also I make like as an appetizer, I make a bunch of fried calamari. And just like fried calamari, it just hits. If I think of my grandma's house on Christmas Eve, it's I'm standing in that kitchen.

• 43:07Joe Flamm?

  The windows cracked open a little bit because it's 147 degrees in her kitchen every day of the year. And like I could smell the calamari frying and like taste that first squeeze of lemon on that crispy piece of calamari. That to me is is the one where it's like, can't wait to to have that first bite of calamari. I'm like, yeah, it's Christmas Eve now.

• 43:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  Hell, yeah. Do you? What do you dredge your calamari in? And is it the same that you do the baklava and the perch with?

• 43:34Joe Flamm?

  No. So the calamari I dredge in like a 50 50 AP cornstarch mix.

• 43:41Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay. So you do. So you do all purpose flour cornstarch. That makes a nice crispy crust. And you just toss them in there.

• 43:47Joe Flamm?

  The calamari is wet enough. You know what I mean? A little salt and pepper and then.

• 43:52Joe Flamm?

  The so the for the perch and the baklava, it's like the traditional one my grandma used to do with her mom and it's. Flour with salt and pepper, egg wash, flour.

• 44:03Adrienne Cheatham?

  Okay. No breadcrumbs.

• 44:05Joe Flamm?

  Nope, nothing.

• 44:06Adrienne Cheatham?

  No cornmeal.

• 44:07Joe Flamm?

  Nope. The only one we used to do in cornmeal and.

• 44:12Joe Flamm?

  Sometimes we do it. Sometimes we don't is we get like smelt.

• 44:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, I love smelt.

• 44:18Joe Flamm?

  And I'll soak them in buttermilk and then I'll shake them in cornmeal and then fry them.

• 44:24Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yep.

• 44:25Joe Flamm?

  I love them. Not everybody likes them. You know what I mean? So my grandma's like, nobody likes to smelt that much anymore. You know, you don't have to do it. If I can get the smelt that are like, you know, the leaky ones or somewhere, you know, then I like to do it because I they're I think they're still good.

• 44:40Adrienne Cheatham?

  It's it's worth the the burn on the face to get fried smelt fried anchovies, the little tiny like small sardines fried whole. Oh, I love them so much.

• 44:50Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 44:51Adrienne Cheatham?

  So much.

• 44:51Joe Flamm?

  Or you're just tolerant. It's not an issue. Oh, yeah.

• 44:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  You know, I'll just, I'll just.

• 44:57Joe Flamm?

  Cause you drank enough eggnog as a kid.

• 45:00Adrienne Cheatham?

  I would have been six inches taller. I'd been out of the line of fire from the hot oil.

• 45:04Joe Flamm?

  That's it. You'd be five, you'd be five nine right now.

• 45:10Adrienne Cheatham?

  Ah, that would, if only I could have done that. Joe, thank you so much for kicking it with me pre-Christmas. It is always a joy to hang out.

• 45:19Joe Flamm?

  What a fun one, and I hope you have a great holiday.

• 45:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  Happy holiday, Chef's Cut Nation. For the next two weeks, Joe and I are going to be taking a little holiday break to spend some time with family and friends. But don't worry, we have some very special episodes coming up over the holidays. We're going to throw it all the way back to our very first episodes. So if you don't remember how Joe and I became friends and how this all got started, listen up, I think you will love it. And then we're going to throw it back to our very first guest episode where we had the one and only Kristin Kish, host of Bravo's Top Chef, joining us as our very first guest on the pod. We'll be back January 13th with all new episodes and all new guests, but in the next two weeks, enjoy the encore. Happy holidays from the Chef's Cut.