Chef Buddha Lo on Great Food in Tiny Kitchens, the Best Knives and Top Chef Topped with Caviar

Adrienne and Joe are back with another guest, and this week they’re joined by two-time Top Chef champion Buddha Lo. He fills them in on his latest culinary ambitions following the move of his home restaurant Huso into a bigger space (Michelin star incoming?). Plus, we discuss: Fork It or Forget It: Caviar on Fried Chicken (and the latest in condiment mania) Review Review: restaurant no-shows are a big no-no Picking the right knife: suggestions from all three chefs for what you should buy Mentor Moment: Buddha’s tough-love training as a young chef Walk-In Confession (Top Chef Edition): Buddha tells us how to handle the heat even when your Top Chef dish is burning Follow Buddha: @buddha__lo 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.

• 0:03Adrienne Cheatham?

  Welcome back to the chef's cut. I'm Adrian Cheatham.

• 0:06Joe Flamm?

  And I am Joe Flamm. Age what we got on tap this week?

• 0:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Joe, we have a great guest today, Buddha Low, and we'll get to that in just a second and bring him in. But first, I want to give you an update on the current category in the World Condiment Cup. We're doing sweet and tangy and guess who is winning it all right now?

• 0:28Joe Flamm?

  I think it's my original pick from the jump. I'm guessing barbecue is running the show.

• 0:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  The votes are in. Your heart should be warm and covered in barbecue sauce because barbecue sauce barely, barely eked out the win, but it did.

• 0:42Joe Flamm?

  It's a power condiment. I, you know, I also though, think going back to our mustard and mayo conversation where it's like you use mustard to make mayo, a lot of barbecue sauces use ketchup. So I think ketchup catches a lot of hate.

• 0:54Adrienne Cheatham?

  It does.

• 0:54Joe Flamm?

  Especially from us Chicagoans, but it's a workhorse.

• 0:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  I did have to double check that because I got an angry text from a Frenchman who said, Adrian, you know better. Classic French mayonnaise does not have mustard. I was like, oh shit. Technically in French mayonnaise, it's a flavoring. The egg yolk is the emulsifier. So it's not always used. Sometimes people leave it out completely.

• 1:16Joe Flamm?

  That sounds some like real, I feel like that's some real, real French shit.

• 1:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  I mean, could be, but hey, that mayonnaise is a French thing.

• 1:24Joe Flamm?

  You know, Italians throw a little mustard in there.

• 1:28Adrienne Cheatham?

  But yeah, I mean, barbecue sauce beat out salsa. That was the closest one. Salsa really was going neck and neck for a few days. They're back and forth with barbecue sauce, sweet chili and ketchup. Ketchup took an L.

• 1:42Joe Flamm?

  Barbecue sauce just rules. And I feel like salsa, salsa is a winner because it's like, there's way more branches of it. Even, you know, there's a million kinds of barbecue sauce, right? But there's a million kinds of salsa.

• 1:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah. And I see, I would put salsa on, that's for me, that's a three meal condiment.

• 1:59Joe Flamm?

  I agree.

• 1:59Adrienne Cheatham?

  I would put salsa in everything, every day. Barbecue sauce, not so much.

• 2:03Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, like salsa verde, every meal.

• 2:06Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 2:06Joe Flamm?

  Every meal, everything. It's awesome.

• 2:08Adrienne Cheatham?

  Salsa rojo.

• 2:10Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 2:10Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 2:11Joe Flamm?

  But like really good barbecue sauce is so good.

• 2:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  Did you see he put four spoons on his eggs?

• 2:16Joe Flamm?

  That's it. Somebody there is out there doing it. They're like, oh, they don't know about the eggs and barbecue sauce yet.

• 2:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  I don't want to know about that. I'll forget that one. All right, Joe, we have a great show ahead, so let's bring in our guest. This week, we have Buddha Lo. He is the two-time winner of back-to-back seasons of Top Chef. He is the chef of Who So here in New York. And we're going to talk with Buddha today about Michelin ambitions, favorite knives, Below Deck versus Top Chef, caviar on fried chicken, kitchen no-shows, and some of the biggest Top Chef mistakes that we've seen. You ready?

• 2:52Joe Flamm?

  Let's get it.

• 2:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  Hello, Chef Buddha Lo. Welcome to the Chef's Cut. It is so good to see you.

• 3:02Speaker 02

  Hello. It's so good to see both of you. Thank you.

• 3:04Adrienne Cheatham?

  So Buddha, you are currently taking NYC by storm with your restaurant Who So, which is in its second location now. You're in Tribeca, but before you were on the Upper East Side. It was more like a speakeasy, right? You had, what, 10 seats?

• 3:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, so that was a very wild location. We had four or five tables. I mean, depending on what sort of formations we can do with the tables, you know, we could do up to 12 to 14. But most nights, we just did 10 because, you know, a lot of people came in twos and not groups of four. It literally was just something to hold me, to keep me in New York. It was, I need a visa. I'm Australian. So I found this place under a month and they let me do whatever I want. And that was kind of the thing that really needed me to get my food out there into the New York scene. I took that location and now I've moved into Tribeca. It's not massive either. It's 28 seats upstairs.

• 4:01Speaker 02

  But, you know, the difference between that uptown and downtown is that we also can do two turns. And so we're doing about 50 to 60 people a night. And, um, you know, back then I was only doing 10 people a night.

• 4:13Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's true. So I ate at Who So when it was in the original location and you were executing some of the most flawless, beautiful, and really delicious food, which some people can execute technique, but it's not so delicious. Your food was so amazing and you were using like one portable induction burner and a small countertop combi oven. And don't get me wrong, a combi can do a lot.

• 4:37Speaker 02

  I can do a lot.

• 4:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  Steam, dry. All of that with what you had was insane. So I'm gonna call it Michelin stars this year in the new location.

• 4:47Speaker 02

  Okay. Yeah, well, I mean, that's what that's what we're looking forward. After World All Stars, I kind of asked myself, what am I gonna do? Um, you know, it kind of felt like you've hit the peak, winning back to back. And then it's like, well, I want to go, I want to go get a star. Um, or two, or whatever, how many that we can try and go for. But that was the goal. It's like, I kind of run off that sort of thing of always having a goal. After something's completed, or even a goal before the goal's even completed, like, you know, even before this restaurant was already finished, I was already thinking about my next restaurant. It's something that just keeps driving me. If, you know, it's, it's, it's a mentality that I've always had. That's like, even if it doesn't happen, at least you had the mentality. That's all I care. That's all that matters.

• 5:29Joe Flamm?

  You have to, you know, we always called it like the full set mentality.

• 5:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 5:32Joe Flamm?

  Like, that's it. Like, when I took over Spiaja, I was like, listen, like, you know, I set my sous chefs out. I'm like, if you guys are on board, you want to do this with me, you got to be all in. And I was like, we're either going to fucking crush this, or it's going to be a spectacular disaster. I was like, but there's no middle. Like, we're not going to sit in mediocrity of this. Like, well, you know, and I think that's the world of five ninety. Like, you have to go all in. And that's the world of restaurants, really, right? Like, if you're not full push, full tilt, if you're not thinking, if you're not six months ahead, you're six months behind.

• 6:02Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 6:03Joe Flamm?

  So it's like, everything takes so long. And it's like, it's just, and people like, when you talk to people, you sound crazy. Cause they're like, you haven't even done this yet. You're worried about this. And you're like, yeah, well, if I'm not, it'll never happen.

• 6:14Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 6:14Speaker 02

  Hundred percent. I mean, one of the things was winning Top Chef, and I haven't even applied. So it was like, I watched the Portland season, and I was like, oh, I should definitely do it. And then Top Chef slid into my DMs and I was like, I, I looked at my one worker that was working with me in that uptown location. You know, because of me and a server, that's all we did, you know, for 10 people. The server would do the dishes at the end of the night. I'll do all the prep from, you know, from 10 o'clock in the morning till finish. And I looked at her and I was like, I'm gonna win. She just laughed and I was like,

• 6:50Speaker 02

  but because it was just so funny, they yeah, they slid into my DMs, but I wasn't expecting that because I did apply for Below Deck before.

• 6:59Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my.

• 7:00Speaker 02

  I'd never applied for Top Chef. I actually applied for Below Deck. Because we were just coming out of the pandemic and I was like, oh my God, it'd be so good to be on a beach right now and on a boat. I want to be out of here.

• 7:11Joe Flamm?

  That's insane to me, dude. That is, that is, there's, I've never been in a kitchen and been like, man, I wish this shit was fucking rocking right now. I wish I was floating on a sea during service. Like that to me is bonkers.

• 7:25Adrienne Cheatham?

  Never. I could never. I would be so seasick. I would just be vomiting.

• 7:28Joe Flamm?

  Right. They'd be like, hey, can we have more food? It's like, no, I'm busy throwing up at my shoes right now. Sorry. Give me about 11 minutes.

• 7:35Speaker 02

  You know, I may live in New York City, but I grew up in a very tropical area, tropical paradise in Australia.

• 7:42Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's crazy. I thought you had a Queens accent.

• 7:44Speaker 02

  God, yeah, no, so we basically,

• 7:48Speaker 02

  so we basically would be on a boat almost every second week going to the reef and whatnot.

• 7:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  So Buddha, one quick question before we get into our first segment, because this is something that we're asking a lot of people now. We've talked about our favorite condiments. For me, it's La Gona Chili Crisp. Joe is a big barbecue sauce fan. What is your favorite condiment?

• 8:14Speaker 02

  Oh, I mean, it changes every time. Is caviar a condiment?

• 8:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  I shut up. I said the same thing when I was talking about this.

• 8:25Speaker 02

  Oh dear.

• 8:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  It could be.

• 8:28Speaker 02

  Caviar is always a strong condiment.

• 8:30Joe Flamm?

  You need, you need, you need T-shirts at the restaurant that say that, by the way, bro. Like hats that just say it's caviar a condiment, you know, like.

• 8:38Adrienne Cheatham?

  It is now.

• 8:40Speaker 02

  But yes, caviar would be a condiment that I think would be amazing. I I it's so funny. I never, I don't really like caviar as a main component. You know, I don't like just eating it with leanies and crêpes fresh. I don't like having it as a bump. Like, yeah, I can appreciate it. Good caviar. But like, for me, it it's always best when it's like paired with eggs or fried chicken or, you know, McDonald's hash brown. It's like, oh, like, I I cannot get enough of this. And so, yeah, I mean, other than that, I've, uh, I just did a collab recently with Melissa King. Her chili crisp was banging. So I I have about three quarters of that

• 9:20Speaker 02

  in my walk-in right now, and I always pull that out with pretty much every single family meal. Doesn't matter if it's like Italian, Chinese, Middle Eastern, whatever it is, it's just kind of been you very universal, but it's it's a really beautiful chili crisp.

• 9:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  Is she selling it or is is it something she just makes when she?

• 9:37Speaker 02

  She said that she did sell it, but now it's on a, in the latest cookbook, but I I had I saw the cookbook and we made the recipe together and it was like, it was so good.

• 9:47Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, that's awesome. Well, you, I mean, you fucking stole my fork it or forget it because restaurants like Coco Doc, all these places, I mean, obviously, it's something that's delicious, but it's gained steam so much over the past year or two. I was gonna ask you, fork it or forget it, caviar on fried chicken.

• 10:05Speaker 02

  Oh, my God. I mean, if if you've actually had caviar and fried chicken, you would notice that it's like one of the best combinations in your lifetime.

• 10:14Adrienne Cheatham?

  Absolutely.

• 10:15Speaker 02

  You know, I've I've had birthdays, I've had celebrations. After I won Top Chef for the first time, we got like buckets of fried chicken from Popeyes on a party bus after the cinema, champagne, and it's like, oh, God, like, I cannot think of anything else on this party bus right now. But it was so good. It was just like such an incredible moment to see a kilo of caviar just getting passed around, bucket of fried chicken, champagne. Yeah, I get it. It gets flogged around and whatnot, but it is such a great combination.

• 10:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  It is.

• 10:47Speaker 02

  You know, it's something that, you know, yes, David Chang was. Slogging like ten years ago and everyone was getting amongst it. He was doing this whole fried chicken banquet with, you know, different caviars and then it all of a sudden went viral and you know Rihanna's posting things as chicken nuggets and whatnot. But it is literally that good. Um, and you know, I have this flavor pairing book somewhere in this restaurant. But it's like, it's not an old combination. Chicken and caviar goes back a long, long, long time ago. That combination is not very new. It is something that has been engraved probably dare say maybe over a thousand years ago.

• 11:26Adrienne Cheatham?

  Whoa, that's crazy because it's something that like as chefs, we've all had in our careers. Like somebody's making fried chicken for family meal and it's like, oh, you know, it would be great with this. A little bit of caviar. We've all, you know, and I took that for granted as something that everybody was familiar with. And then when Coco Doc opened up, it was like, oh my God, fried chicken and caviar. I was like, yeah, of course. Like I'll fork the hell out of that. Um, but I forget that other, you know, people who don't work in food may not have known about that. And it was very controversial this past year. It was kind of polarizing for some people. But most people came around to the side of acknowledging how awesome it is. Joe, what is your stance on it? Are you fork it or forget it?

• 12:10Joe Flamm?

  Oh, I'm all for it. As long as you're paying Adrian, I'm all for it. I'm, I'm down anytime. I got, I, I, I got, I got Adrian's black card. I'm gonna run that shit. Run that shit. You know what I mean? Roll that, roll that whole drumming. Cover every inch of that thing and caviar for me. Put it on AG's bill. I'm down. I'm down. So be a second order. Let's go.

• 12:30Speaker 02

  Another, another drench.

• 12:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  Hey, if we can get the Beluga from Marky's Caviar, I mean, I'm here for it.

• 12:37Speaker 02

  That's it. I mean, it literally is one of my favorite combinations still, you know?

• 12:41Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, no, it, I mean, I mean, if Rihanna wants to hang out and eat chicken nuggets and caviar, like I'd be down. You know what I mean?

• 12:48Speaker 02

  I mean, if you, when you talk about food trends, you know, there's so many food trends that shouldn't have existed and it's like, you can't knock something that's just super delicious and just work so well together. You know, we were talking. You know, if we're talking about food trends, there's like a donut with a slice of pizza and a and a and a live fish on top of a milkshake like, I mean, that's a that was a food trend at one stage. And it's like, thank goodness, that's over.

• 13:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 13:11Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 13:12Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 13:13Joe Flamm?

  You know, the ones I feel like that have been around a long time. It's like, there's a reason. There's a reason it's awesome. You know what I mean? It's like, you're saying like, I'm a Trishiana. It's like, yeah, they've been making that shit for hundreds of years. It's like, cause it still slaps.

• 13:25Adrienne Cheatham?

  Cause it's awesome.

• 13:26Joe Flamm?

  Still just like absolutely wrecks like Guanciale and Chili's, you know what I mean? A little bit of tomato, like, oh, hey, baby, let's go.

• 13:33Speaker 02

  Forget about it. Marry me.

• 13:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  The episode of Top Chef that I judged on Buddha's season was the episode he made his Amatriciana, his marry me pasta. And I was like, gosh damn, I'm about to propose to somebody. You won you won that episode too. Like you literally won that episode.

• 13:50Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, I that's all credit to my wife. My wife made that when I when I was like 19 years old. And I was like, oh damn. I'm if if you're not married by the time you're 30, I'm gonna marry you. And yeah, I mean, 15 years later, we're married now. So it's an amazing dish.

• 14:06Adrienne Cheatham?

  I love that. And Buddha, the the thing that I love so much about this too, is that everybody sees you on Top Chef and the world all star season. And the restaurant is so fine dining. So they think that you're like a little stuffier, like they would not picture you on a party bus with buckets of Popeyes fried chicken. Like, I fucking love this. This is Buddha that I know.

• 14:27Joe Flamm?

  You're the guy throwing Cooley on the back of people.

• 14:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:30Joe Flamm?

  You know what I mean? At the end of the day, I don't care how fine dining you are. At some point, you're a filthy little light cook. Get like, you know what I mean?

• 14:38Speaker 02

  Exactly. Everyone's a chef.

• 14:39Joe Flamm?

  That never dies.

• 14:43Joe Flamm?

  So getting into the next thing, this is one of my favorite segments. This is our review review. So, you know, you have you have a restaurant. I have a couple of restaurants in Chicago and, you know, it's the one star reviews from diners. And it's like the legit ones, you know, we respond and you know, you try to figure it out, whatever. But the ones where you're just like, why did you leave the house today?

• 15:03Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 15:04Joe Flamm?

  You know what I mean? Like, just stop going to restaurants. This is our platform to clap back at those. To say the things that we always want to say out of the internet, we can't. So I'm gonna give you one from your restaurant. So this is one.

• 15:17Speaker 02

  This is gonna be funny which one you pick.

• 15:20Joe Flamm?

  It's a one star review. Disappointed in our experience today. Instantly walking in, it smelled like they were cooking seafood.

• 15:28Joe Flamm?

  We hesitated to stay through the service. The smell was so strong, we left and had comments about the smell stayed. This is really not okay for an expensive dining experience. Would recommend due to this, we suggest cooking the food further away from the dining area.

• 15:47Speaker 02

  I mean, I, I, it's hard to clap back at it because it's like, I, I literally cooked in a ventless retail shop.

• 15:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  I saw it. No lies told.

• 16:02Joe Flamm?

  But like going to a restaurant and complaining that it smells like people are cooking is insane, dude. It's insane. I don't care. I don't care how small it is. Maybe it's a little hot.

• 16:12Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. Like, do you want people to cook the food three hours before you get there?

• 16:17Joe Flamm?

  Or like a mile, a mile away?

• 16:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 16:19Joe Flamm?

  Like, you know what I mean? Like, what are we doing here?

• 16:22Speaker 02

  I mean, people need to see this location. I mean, people that have, they'll understand. It's like, it is tight. It is literally, I, it is like, imagine that you're like at the Whole Foods checkout and you have to cook an a la carte lunch and an A course tasting menu behind that counter with a countertop oven and induction. That's literally my day.

• 16:44Adrienne Cheatham?

  That was insane.

• 16:45Joe Flamm?

  There's 10 seats.

• 16:47Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 16:47Joe Flamm?

  How far away from the kitchen can those 10 seats possibly be? You think there's only 10 seats? Cause he was like, I want a really long walk. Like, it's gonna be the kitchen, 150 foot walk, open space. We'll just put a bunch of trees in there. It'll be cute as fuck. And then, like, I just want to make this as financially unfeasible as possible for myself.

• 17:09Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, it's, it's like going to a pizza shop going, it's not a lot of fucking pizza.

• 17:18Joe Flamm?

  You know, go to a concert and be like, I don't know, like it just sounded like there was a band playing the whole time.

• 17:24Speaker 02

  Too loud, too loud.

• 17:25Joe Flamm?

  And I really wish they would have just like turned it down a bit. So it could have been.

• 17:29Speaker 02

  People that are like, oh, it was too crowded at the concert. It's too crowded. It's too many people.

• 17:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, the type of people who will literally find anything to complain about. And so Buddha, if you could review a guest, you've been in restaurants since you were like a kid. You grew up in restaurants, so you've seen some shit, I am sure. So what is, if you could review a guest, what is an instance of one star behavior you've seen?

• 17:52Speaker 02

  One star behavior in this day and age, I don't think we bring it up a lot, but I don't think it's getting through to them is no shows. It is, we bring it up so many times and they still don't understand it. And it's like, I don't, I don't get on, I don't get what you don't understand.

• 18:10Joe Flamm?

  Especially doing fine dining, especially having a limited amount of seats. It's like, you know, I mean, that's a concert ticket. It's a show ticket. And it's like, you're planning your food, your labor, your everything around that. And it's like two people not showing up. It's like, it's a crusher.

• 18:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 18:28Speaker 02

  I mean, especially when I had, you know, I was cooking for 10 people. If the table four didn't show up, that's, that's 40% of my guests.

• 18:34Joe Flamm?

  Right.

• 18:35Speaker 02

  40% of my restaurant is done. I like, I ain't making that money. Like the staffer, good, good produce brought in, stop, throw it all in the bin. Everything's done. So yeah, I mean, no show. They're, they're an instant one star review. It's, it's, you know, I, I, I appreciate calls or, you know, maybe some sort of excuse or whatnot. Email, but straight up, it's eight o'clock, you should be showing up and no one shows up. And it's like, okay.

• 19:03Joe Flamm?

  Right. It's like, at least give you the heads up. Let me try to fill that seat.

• 19:06Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 19:06Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 19:07Joe Flamm?

  Let me let go of that table. Let me, you know what I mean? Even like, you know, there's usually somebody who's like, oh, like if something opens up, text me or whatever, or walks in or, you know, whatever it may be. And you know, and I think in fine dining, it's harder too, because it's like, you don't really get walking.

• 19:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 19:21Joe Flamm?

  What I read in the agenda, like, nobody's walking down the street and just goes, like, I don't know, what do you want to eat? And they're like, I, you want to do, you want to get like, yeah, you want to get a burger? You want to do like a tall corsed tasty.

• 19:32Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, let's see if they can get us in.

• 19:34Joe Flamm?

  Right. Yeah. I either want to spend like 50 or a thousand bucks tonight. I can't decide. I just keep going back and forth. I don't know. I don't know. What do you, what do you feel?

• 19:42Adrienne Cheatham?

  Let's see if they can.

• 19:43Speaker 02

  Yeah, let's see if they can squeeze it in.

• 19:45Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, like pop it. The only people would do that is like chefs because we're maniacs. We should try to walk in here and see if they will see it. And like, I would try to walk in your restaurant. Oh, cool. There's a seat. Yeah, I'll do this right now.

• 19:56Speaker 02

  I've definitely done it.

• 19:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, my event wrapped up early. Let's see if we can hop in here.

• 20:00Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, I did that was I did that with Stefan Fati basically at Masa. You know what I mean? We like last minute resoed Masa.

• 20:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:06Joe Flamm?

  You know what I mean? Like, like nine thirty at night. That was like, this is an unhinged behavior.

• 20:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  That is awesome.

• 20:12Joe Flamm?

  It was the best.

• 20:13Speaker 02

  I waited in front of Nomar for two, two hours.

• 20:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  Whoa.

• 20:16Speaker 02

  And yeah, didn't get a table.

• 20:19Adrienne Cheatham?

  How long ago was that?

• 20:20Speaker 02

  Oh, that was like ten years ago.

• 20:21Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, I was gonna say, uh, now?

• 20:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, that, yeah, definitely not gonna get a table for sure.

• 20:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  But that's great. Like, I get anxious if I'm like stuck in traffic. There's a car accident or the train gets stuck in the tunnel like in New York. If I'm gonna be more than five minutes late to a restaurant, I start to get anxious. I'm like, I have to call them. I have to call them. I have to call them.

• 20:42Joe Flamm?

  Oh, even if I'm gonna be, if I'm gonna be one minute late, I'm like, call them and let them know we could possibly be sixty seconds late for this reservation. I'm such a psycho about it. My wife's like, dude, it's fine. Like, you know, I'm like, we gotta, we gotta let them know. We can't leave them hanging. Can't leave my, can't leave my wingman. Can't leave my wingman.

• 21:01Speaker 02

  It's all of God, Em.

• 21:03Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, you know, she's like, we're, yeah. It's the play pace at Burger King, Joe. Calm down. Want them to know we're coming to the ball pit.

• 21:13Speaker 02

  Is Applebee's? Yeah, I'm ten minutes late. I'm so sorry.

• 21:17Joe Flamm?

  They're like, please stop calling, Joe. Please. Like, we don't care. You don't even have a reservation. We're walking only.

• 21:25Joe Flamm?

  Yes, we still have southwestern egg rolls. Stop asking. You'll always have them. They're just in the freezer. We have infinite amount.

• 21:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  Well, let's get into a question that Joe and I get asked all the time. I know you do too. Joe and I want to talk about knives.

• 21:45Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 21:45Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, I feel like, one, I get all the time. People are like, oh, what knife should I get? What knife should I buy? And, you know, from people who are at-home cooks, you know, diners come in, you know, your cousins, taxi, aunts, whatever, to, you know, professionals. So for me, I think I have a clear, like, delineate of like, you know, and I'm curious about other chefs' opinions of like, you know, like, what is, I'm gonna ask you three, but this is the first one. Because I have a knife where it's like, if somebody who's like a home cook, or they're a cook starting out, they're like, what knife should I get? I'm always like, you just need one. Like, you need one good, in my opinion, like, you need one good, sharp chef's knife that holds an edge well, you can kind of beat up, you can do a lot of shit with, and isn't too hard to sharpen.

• 22:26Joe Flamm?

  So I'd say, what kind of, do you have one that's like, if somebody who's like, home cook, starting out cook, what's your one, your one go-to?

• 22:34Speaker 02

  For me, it's always gonna be straight up Victorinox. FibroX handle, it always stays sharp, it's easy to sharpen, you beat it up, and it's very, very affordable. And I can never recommend anyone some sort of Japanese knife that you have to keep the edge on. You're gonna chip from the first moment that you start slicing something. It's like, if you, if you're literally asking me for knife advice, it would be a Victorinox. Like, I started off with that with my cooking career, and like, it's never let me down. Sometimes it's, even though, you know, with all my Japanese knives in my case, the Victorinox is probably still up there with all the Japanese knives, so.

• 23:17Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's like the workhorse knife?

• 23:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's the workhorse knife. It's the one, it's the go-to.

• 23:21Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 23:22Speaker 02

  But, I mean, any of the FibroX lines, yeah, you can go for it. I mean, I know that all of us have beaten the hell out of a FibroX bread knife in the kitchen, so much that we probably have to replace it maybe three or four times.

• 23:37Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, those Victory Knocks ones too. It's like you could take a like padlock off a locker with it and like and edge back. It's like one of those where it's like, you know, if there was an apocalypse and like they're like, bring one knife. You're like, I'll bring this. If I can like crack coconuts with it, I could figure it the fuck out. You know, that's a great one. That would definitely be up there on my list. I'd say the one I go, I think would touch more like I had is like, I really like, like the eight inch Mac, you know, the mighty Mac with dimples. That's like a point to it. Like that's what I said to people all the time. And I'm like, you know, it's a hundred and 20 bucks.

• 24:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, and it's affordable.

• 24:13Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, it's like a night and it's like nice. It's not like so nice where it's like, you know what I mean? If somebody chips it, you're like, I'm going to fire this person. But like, you know what I mean? It's nice enough where it like, you, you look like at least you're kind of serious.

• 24:26Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right. The, the knife that I would always get, like my first real line cook knife and the one that I recommended to people starting off a lot is a Toge Haru. A Toge Haru Inox steel, easy to sharpen, hard to chip.

• 24:39Joe Flamm?

  That's some Laburna done shit.

• 24:42Speaker 02

  We went high up.

• 24:45Adrienne Cheatham?

  The like 8.2 inch like

• 24:47Joe Flamm?

  You can't buy a Toge Haru for a hundred bucks anymore, man?

• 24:50Adrienne Cheatham?

  I swear to God. I had the Santoko. They have like a long Santoko. That was like I, for everything, vegetables, proteins. That was like my workhorse knife, but that was also, I was in a fancier kitchen, so I felt like I needed an all purpose workhorse. That was still practical though. And that one is easy to sharpen, keeps an edge, hard to chip. Like I've killed lobsters with that thing and it is never chips.

• 25:16Joe Flamm?

  No, those are great knives. I like those a lot. I just think that's a little bit of a

• 25:22Joe Flamm?

  Which leads to the next one. I would say from the Mac, I have like my sous chef level knife is like when my chefs become sous chefs, I usually buy them a knife. And the ones I love, I think for that level is like the, the Suisans. I think like the entry level Suisans are super nice. Like it's a thinner metal. It's a little more delicate. Like you kind of need to know how to sharpen it. You can, you know, I think you could cut vegetables with it and like filet fish with it and like do it all kind of in the same. And it's like, it, it hits that level for me. What's your like next level up when you're going Buddha?

• 25:52Speaker 02

  After that, if I was to buy it for someone else, it'd probably be a Mizono.

• 25:56Joe Flamm?

  Oh yeah, those are

• 25:59Speaker 02

  They're sexy.

• 26:00Joe Flamm?

  They are sexy.

• 26:03Speaker 02

  And um yeah, it's something that's like not your custom Japanese, you know, made a handmade in Kyoto. You know, forged by the Kill Bill fucking blacksmith himself.

• 26:15Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 26:16Speaker 02

  Um, but it's like, it is something that shows that I I love you, but I don't love you that much.

• 26:21Joe Flamm?

  Right, or I love you, but I know you're not gonna work for me forever.

• 26:24Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 26:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly. There we go.

• 26:26Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 26:26Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, like we're dating, we're not married.

• 26:31Speaker 02

  I don't see us having kids in the future.

• 26:33Joe Flamm?

  Right, right, right. This is not, you're the mother of my children.

• 26:39Adrienne Cheatham?

  So then the next level, Joe, what would that be like a splurge?

• 26:42Joe Flamm?

  Well, no, I'm I'm I'm gonna switch it up. I'm gonna say, what's the one knife in your bag that's like you're like your biggest flex knife? Where you're like, yo, this thing's this thing's special. If this thing disappeared, like I would have emotional issues afterwards for a little while.

• 26:56Speaker 02

  I mean, you know, you know, my my dad's passed away, but he's he got me this knife when he was in Kyoto. From this very famous blacksmith. I don't even know the the name, but he's got our family name engraved in it. And so that one stays in our um stays in my knife thing. And it's not like I don't use it. I definitely use it. And I used it a lot when I was on Top Chef. I used like that sort of like spiritual guidance through making sure if there's anything that's like really, really important. If I'm cutting, you know, my fish or my meat in the finale or elimination challenge, I'd pop out that knife. It's like it's it's caliber. And so it's like knives are so different. They vary. They this everyone's got so many different opinions, but I think having something was a personal sentimental value.

• 27:41Speaker 02

  Um, it has that like I don't even I I don't even know the name of the brand. The brand doesn't exist. It's literally just the family name.

• 27:49Joe Flamm?

  Literally like made that the hair stand up on my arm. You're talking about that, man. I'm fired up right now. I was like, that's like, I want to protect this knife.

• 27:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 27:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's beautiful. Joe, what is your flex knife?

• 28:01Joe Flamm?

  I have, uh, it's kind of like Buddha was saying, I have this Nakiri and I don't know the blacksmith, but it was uh my cousin brought back from me from Japan. And it's just, you know, it's really special. It's really cool. It's really sharp. And it's like, yeah, it's like, I don't use it every day. But every once in a while, it's like I bust it out and it's one of those ones where it was like, whoa. But what's that?

• 28:21Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 28:22Joe Flamm?

  It's like, oh, oh, this thing, man, you know, something slight.

• 28:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  No big deal.

• 28:28Joe Flamm?

  But yeah, that's, that's definitely one of, one of my favorites that it's just like, and it's always been, you know, my cousin, he lives in, uh, he lives in Shanghai now and we grew up together on the South Side. So we've always been really close, but so it's cool. It's like every time I bust it out, you know, I think of him and it's, it's, you know, it's special. What about you, H?

• 28:43Adrienne Cheatham?

  Mine would be, so I had three roommates when I was in culinary school and they were finance students. So they pooled money together and they gave me like a thousand dollar gift certificate to Corinne, the like best knife store in New York, Japanese knives, all kinds of stuff. It's just a great place to go check out and geek out over knives. They gave me this gift certificate and I bought a 13.5 inch white steel Yanagi Masahiro.

• 29:11Joe Flamm?

  13.5 inch?

• 29:14Adrienne Cheatham?

  I mean,

• 29:14Joe Flamm?

  dude, that's like your pants inseam, dude. You're like 5'1". You've bought a-

• 29:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  I'm like 5'3".

• 29:21Joe Flamm?

  Dude, out of phone book, like,

• 29:26Joe Flamm?

  holy shit. Do you use that for like home security or like what?

• 29:33Adrienne Cheatham?

  It's, I mean, it's a, it's a serious thing, like it's no joke. And I was, it made perfect sense because I was taking like these kind of learning how to use it from the sushi chef and all that. And I was working at La Bernardine and there were a couple of dishes that I had, especially this like olive oil poached Escalar. And you had to slice it super cleanly and Escalar will flake. If it's, if your knife is not sharp enough, if the blade doesn't, if you have to saw back and forth, it's not going to be this beautiful, even slice. So the Yanagi was like the perfect knife for it. And then one day my CDC had to break off a piece of chine bone from a lamb rack.

• 30:18Adrienne Cheatham?

  What knife is the closest to him? Apparently my Yanagi, I'm picking up a dish. I didn't even see him grab it. I turn around, I'm like, where is my knife? I need to slice this dish to get it on the pass. And I see it over on the butcher station and it had no less than five chips in it.

• 30:33Speaker 02

  Oh my goodness.

• 30:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  Hacked at this chinebone with it. I was like.

• 30:38Joe Flamm?

  That's, that's a friendship under for me. That's.

• 30:41Adrienne Cheatham?

  I, I almost, I, I couldn't curse out my CDC, but I was like, are you kidding me?

• 30:45Speaker 02

  Oh my goodness.

• 30:47Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh my God. It was ridiculous. It took me like two weeks to sharpen out all the chips.

• 30:52Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, I would have at least like thrown a quarter of his means away at some point.

• 30:57Joe Flamm?

  Get back out of this. Like right after you like handpicked a bunch of little time or something. Shit in the trash. Fuck you. Pick that again. Chip my knife.

• 31:05Speaker 02

  Raspberry coolie as you walk past.

• 31:09Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, a little bit of, dude, the sauce on the chef jacket. Wait for it to get lit up by the chef for looking like a slob.

• 31:17Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 31:19Joe Flamm?

  That's sinister Buddha.

• 31:22Joe Flamm?

  That is great, man. That, that is a real picture of the Buddha.

• 31:27Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 31:28Joe Flamm?

  Adrian, but last thing we need at some point for you to put a picture up on social media of you and your samurai sword. Cause people need to realize how big this knife is in comparison to your actual body. And we need to see the umbrella case that you carried it on your back when you walk around with it.

• 31:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  Buddha, we've talked a lot about your career. We've talked about Top Chef. So for the San Pellegrino Young Chefs Academy Mentor Moment, we want to ask you, who is a mentor you've had in your career that had a big impact either on you personally or on your cooking?

• 32:03Speaker 02

  I don't give him a lot of shout outs. It's, it's this guy called Raymond Capote. And basically the protest chef and he's probably worse than Gordon Ramsay. But if you stayed under him and you see through all the hardship and you know, those hard times, literally me and when me and Rebecca worked for him, and that's where we met, the whole kitchen brigade left and it was only us two. And we're like, we're like, no, we're gonna stay, we're gonna stay and see it out. Well, that's what I said. We weren't dating at the time, but I said, I'm gonna stay and she stayed and. And I was gonna see it out and this person was, you know, he had the best of both worlds. He was on a different level in terms of flavor combinations, technique. And then he was just so classical as well at the same time.

• 32:48Speaker 02

  And I learned both things at the same time. He worked at the Dorchester under Antoine Mossman. And all of his stuff, when it came to like classical sauces, it's like getting trained and under like an old school Marco Pierre White video. It's like everything layered with a sauce goes like this. And you can never do it any other way. It has to be done like this. He would make the craziest tasty stocks and sauces that he would never be able to replicate again or try to get us to replicate. But it was so cool, just like being able to watch and see those processes and see how he thinks as well.

• 33:25Speaker 02

  I mean, some things, some dishes were just like wild, where he like braised a banana and coffee syrup and served it with juniper ice cream and lime gel. And I was like, I'm working for like Ferran Adria, but also Paul Becroux at the same time. It's like, cause then he would show me how dude.

• 33:43Joe Flamm?

  Raising bananas is wild.

• 33:44Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 33:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. Raising a banana, yeah, I mean, he's, he's, I just looked on his Instagram, he's still, he's still doing banana shit. Like it's, it's crazy. He, he, he made a banana look like an eel.

• 33:55Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, my God.

• 33:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, he fully filleted like it was like an eel as well. And, and it actually got me thinking, this is an eel.

• 34:03Adrienne Cheatham?

  Whoa.

• 34:03Joe Flamm?

  Also, it's my, in my mind, it's you DMing him like, bro, you still doing banana shit?

• 34:08Speaker 02

  Yeah. Also, old school, you're making it look like an eel? What are you doing? But he, he did have this, another dish called an oyster eaten mess was like, it was fresh oysters with horseradish cream and passion fruit juice and beet meringue. And I was like, this shit sounds crazy. And I tasted it and I was like, you know what? I think I'm the crazy one because this is actually really, really tasty and works. And it's like, but why does it work? And we, you know, I was like thinking, well, duh, it makes a lot of sense. Like, oh, this horseradish chantilly is like, you know, come fresh and like horseradish. To do what have with oysters. And this passion for juice is just another version of lemon. And I'm like,

• 34:51Speaker 02

  well, that kind of just opened my mind a bit more and going, you know what, you could be so far out and it might not, it might just might sound downright crazy. But it has the flavor profiles of very, very classical cooking. And it's like, well, that's what's so beautiful about cooking that you can just relate these things to like history, classic combinations and whatnot and use it. And that's what I use in my cooking. I mean, when I cook for you, Joe, in the um Jurassic Challenge, I mean, I was straight up doing like some sort of Eastern European Olivia salad with like potato and leek soup or something like that. And why that work was because of like, I was linking an alligator with a sturgeon and going,

• 35:34Speaker 02

  these two things lived in the same time as each other and they both have the same sort of meat structure as each other. And so I can make alligator like white sturgeon and turn it out into a white fish salad.

• 35:48Joe Flamm?

  And it like makes sense. It's almost like, you know what I mean? Like people are like, oh, it's such hard. It's like, it's yeah, kind of. But it's almost like math. It's like if this, if this works, like if this, you know, algorithm, whatever works, like if I take it, I put it over here and I switch this number around, like I'm still gonna get the same thing. Right. And yeah, I remember that dish was awesome. And it was, you know, so good. And I thought the funniest thing when I went, I came to judge is after, you know, Tom's comment on the challenge was like, I just can't believe anybody didn't do like a whole alligator. I was like, bro. I was like, he's like, I would have done it. I go, that's, I go, you've never, I go, that's easy for you to say. You've never done it. I go, you would never do that because you don't want to be the guy who got sent home from Top Chef cooking a whole fucking alligator head like an asshole.

• 36:31Joe Flamm?

  And he just bursts out laughing. He's like, maybe you're right. He's like, but it would have been cool. I'm like, yeah, it would have been sick, dude.

• 36:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, I, I, I thought about that. It could have been a good idea, but it was a team challenge. And if I. I'm the one that sunk the team and got so much, oh my goodness.

• 36:44Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, and you had immunity. If you had immunity and you were just like, I'm gonna send it on a whole alligator head. Like, it would have been like, it would have been like, I would have been impressed, but I would be like, that's kind of, that's kind of, it's kind of a dick move, bro.

• 36:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly.

• 36:57Adrienne Cheatham?

  Cool, but you're going home.

• 37:00Speaker 02

  You sent it to the farm. Yeah, I had immunity and that's why I didn't do it.

• 37:04Joe Flamm?

  No, but that dish, it was one of those, it was funny, you know, I've, I've gotten to judge a couple of seasons now, but when I ate your dish there, I was like, oh, this guy's gonna win. You know what I mean? It was so technical, it was so sound, you know, I mean, the flavor profiles were so well thought out, the, the dish itself was so thought, well thought out. You mean, like you were just explaining with the alligator, the sturgeon, I'm like, yeah, that's exactly, like, you've obviously been working your craft for so long. And like Adrian was saying about your food at the restaurant, and it's such a difference of like, you know, the people who do fine dining, who it's like, they understand enough of it to make it look apart. But like, when you eat it, when it's done really well, like, you know, when I get to eat your dish, it's like, oh man, this dude like, he's not just like a fine dining person, but like, he understands cooking.

• 37:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 37:46Joe Flamm?

  There's layers of flavor here and it's delicate, it's beautiful, but it's still really flavorful and delicious. I was like, this guy, this, you know what I mean? I walked out of that one, I got back from Houston, everybody's like, oh, how was it? I was like, it's good. I was like, there's this booty guy, he's gonna win.

• 38:01Joe Flamm?

  And it's funny, because I judged Danny Garcia's season, uh, early on too, and I tried his dish, it was the same thing, and I was like, I was like, oh, this is, this kid's gonna win. You know what I mean? Because it was, you know, he's a really talented chef, but it's funny.

• 38:12Adrienne Cheatham?

  You can, it, there's something like identifiable, when somebody, there's another, like, there's levels to this, and there's good food, there's beautiful food, there's technical food, and it's rare that all those things are combined all the time to be consistent in being able to execute that. And so when you see somebody that like, understands food on that level, and it sounds like your chef Capote in Australia really had a big impact on you, because you have to understand food, you have to work for somebody who understands food, who's not just telling you how to do something, but why you're doing something, and why it works, and explaining it to you. And when I judged that episode, before we even tasted the dish, I was just like,

• 38:56Adrienne Cheatham?

  you see the way people are moving in the kitchen and like i- if it's somebody had been observing our season, I my head was on fire. The whole I was like, what am I doing? I don't know. I have thirty seconds left on the clock. I need to be putting something else on like I it's no, no bueno. But looking at the people in your season, I was like, there's a calmness about this dude. He knows what he's executing. He's not spinning out. He's focused. He's dialed in. I was like, I I don't know. I'm like, but it's amatriciana.

• 39:23Speaker 02

  I was I was low key making that with my wife in the corner.

• 39:26Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, I was like, but he's making amatriciana. You know, let's, you know, it's gonna be good, I'm sure, but like, I was like, yeah, he gets it. Like, yeah, he he's got it.

• 39:36Speaker 02

  Exactly. I mean, there's nothing, nothing really to hide. Is there? It's like, I'm not trying to reinvent the wheel here. I'm just trying to do what exactly what the challenge is. And just cook, cook really tasty food. I mean, I think, you know, when we talk about mentors, you know, I always talk my dad about my dad. So that's why I didn't like, want to bring my dad up. But, you know, Raymond Capaldi is like a dad to me as well. You know, he would drop me off after work after he like, you know, just like yelled at me all ordering service. But it's like, you know, I'm still gonna drop you home no matter what. And he'll wait like two hours until the kitchen's clean and and go, okay, you ready to go? Okay, I'll drop you off at home.

• 40:11Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 40:11Joe Flamm?

  I know I just eviscerated you, but come on, I'll take you for an ice cream.

• 40:14Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, literally, we go, we go for Chinese after he just like fully came me. And um, and and that's like the beauty about it. It's like he he's he's, I it's like that tough love. It's like, you know, what what I did in the kitchen is because I love you. I'm trying to like, show you, but I'm trying to speed you up on things. And yeah, I mean, that's what's great about him being a mentor. It's a, I learned both of those things, but you know, my dad was like the one that really showed me, there's no point in doing food if it's gonna be cold and shit. And it's like, it has to be hot and tasty. If you're gonna serve a hot dish, it has to be hot, has to be tasty. And then you can move on from there. You cannot move on from a dish and go, oh, but it looks good.

• 40:57Speaker 02

  But then we don't worry about, no, it's tasty, the temperature. And then we can start working from there. If it's not tasty, doesn't have the right temperature, well, keep working on it because you're never gonna get a dish or you're never gonna create food. You know, my dad would like, literally as a twelve year old, just not yell at me, but just like, no, cook it again. You're not saying that. You're not saying that. Yeah, I had to have standards. Yeah, he has this twelve year old kid, he's cooking next to him. It could be like one of the most proudest moments ever, but at the end of the day, he's trying to show me standards. And it's like, and customer satisfaction, because if I'm sending out cold food, the customers aren't gonna be happy. They're not gonna come back again. We're not gonna have money. He's not gonna be able to support his family, all this sort of stuff. So I learned a lot of that at a very young age and then,

• 41:43Speaker 02

  you know, adding the different layers of the other people that I worked under is a product of what I'm cooking today.

• 41:49Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, you had like from the ground up, such a great foundation and that's amazing. And we've seen you on Top Chef and I've talked about how calm and cool you were from what I saw. But let's take it to our segment of walk in confessions.

• 42:04Joe Flamm?

  So this is kind of our spot where, you know, you you've obviously done great things. You've won Top Chef twice. You know, you're you're sitting in your beautiful new restaurant.

• 42:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 42:13Joe Flamm?

  But like, we were all cooks, so we're hoping you could share one with us today. Bonus points if you got one from Top Chef where things went sideways. And I don't know if that ever happened to you there, but uh, and you pulled it off anyways.

• 42:25Speaker 02

  Oh, I mean, the Indian challenge where I almost went home, I overcooked the rice. I completely fucked it. I mean, I overcooked it and there was nothing else I can do. There was so many like little dishes. We had to do these like, like this whole Indian platter, which contained about, I know, we had to have minimum eight dishes in each platter. And all of them looked the same and we had to cook for about twelve people. So we're already looking at about a hundred dishes. If you're just putting all the dishes, that's a hundred steps, just putting the dishes in. And then I overcooked the rice. I've got flustered and then I um, and then I didn't even notice that one of the dishes wasn't even in the platter. And that was the curry that I had to make. And that, and obviously they gave that to Padma.

• 43:08Speaker 02

  That was not a fun challenge, especially when you like realize like the main component of the rice was overcooked and it's like you're scattering. So that was probably the biggest like I know there's probably bigger moments and other chefs journey in Top Chef, but that was the biggest for me because I'm usually had everything weighed out on time, ready to go. And I did. And then I completely forgot the rice and then overcooked it. And so you know, you're doing a million different things. And then the one thing that really you need. And so that kind of like trickled on. But there was many a times where I kind of just knew how to not play the game, but just understood. And that's like a real chef

• 43:50Speaker 02

  thing, right? So if you you work on the chefs and you go, they go, what's burning? And you're like, I don't know what's burning.

• 43:58Adrienne Cheatham?

  That's burning.

• 43:59Speaker 02

  You know what's burning. It's like, I remember I put on like a pot of potatoes and everyone's like, which potatoes? These are like, not mine. Because I know what's gonna happen. As soon as I throw my hand up, like, all the cameras are gonna point to me. They want like some sort of reaction of like, oh, what? And then the producers are all going, what happened to your potatoes? Like, I'm like, no, ain't mine, ain't mine.

• 44:22Adrienne Cheatham?

  Then it makes its way into the commentary.

• 44:24Joe Flamm?

  I haven't used potatoes. I'm actually allergic to them. It's weird.

• 44:28Adrienne Cheatham?

  Right.

• 44:30Speaker 02

  Oh, potato. What's that?

• 44:32Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, we didn't even have those in Australia. I've never cooked with those. One of these guys. Look at one of these Midwest dudes. They love fucking potatoes.

• 44:39Speaker 02

  But there was there's plenty of times that just like if something went wrong, I just said, you know, like, I think I totally killed a sauce, like, too much chili in there. And it's like, I have to redo it. And they're like, oh, what are you why getting rid of all the everything in the pot? I'm like, oh, I just need it for stock.

• 44:58Joe Flamm?

  Well, they ask you like, they ask you like, the ominous questions on Top Chef were always the worst too. Where they're like, did you mean for this to be this spicy? And you're like, depends.

• 45:10Adrienne Cheatham?

  What's your threshold for spice?

• 45:12Joe Flamm?

  Like it?

• 45:16Joe Flamm?

  Yeah.

• 45:16Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 45:16Joe Flamm?

  So that's.

• 45:17Speaker 02

  As if they do, you mean, you just say, you know, it's bad.

• 45:20Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 45:20Speaker 02

  Come on, let's be honest.

• 45:21Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, you always went, did you mean to, you know, overcook the rice? And you're like, yeah, traditionally, um, you know, like a lot of Indian food has properly cooked rice. But you know, where I grew up, we, we always overcooked the rice. You know?

• 45:35Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah, if, if you can't explain those things, it's, it's like, they'll catch the camera. If you flag something or make a big reaction, the camera will zoom in on that. The judges or the host will know about what was going on. And then even if you solve that problem, you'll hear about it like, but you burned it. I still taste burnt. It's like, no way I threw away the whole pot and started fresh. No way you tasted something, but it becomes because they caught it on camera.

• 46:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly.

• 46:01Adrienne Cheatham?

  Nope, I'm gonna see here.

• 46:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, you just throw that thing, throw that away.

• 46:06Joe Flamm?

  No, I was just making some potato smoked, uh, you know.

• 46:10Adrienne Cheatham?

  Potato ash.

• 46:11Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, it's just part of the process. You guys wouldn't get it.

• 46:14Adrienne Cheatham?

  Oh, my God. Well, that has been this episode of the chef's cut. Buddha, thank you so much for joining us. It is always a blast hanging out with you.

• 46:23Speaker 02

  Thank you for having me.

• 46:24Joe Flamm?

  Yeah, appreciate your time, man. I know you're a super busy guy. You got twins, you got restaurants, you got everything going on. So for taking the time, hanging out with us, man, it was an absolute blast chopping it up with you, man. I can't wait to come see you in New York.

• 46:36Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yes, hopefully I'll see you at the farmer's market again soon.

• 46:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's a show, probably tomorrow.

• 46:41Joe Flamm?

  If I make a reservation, I promise to show up and be on time.

• 46:44Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, thank you.

• 46:48Adrienne Cheatham?

  Joe, you know, it's always a pleasure hanging out and you know, we do this every week. Episodes come out every Tuesday, so don't forget to subscribe, Apple, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts, subscribe, new ones drop every Tuesday. And so you don't miss out on anything, personal or professional. Joe, where can people find you?

• 47:06Joe Flamm?

  They can find me in real life at Boulevard Il Cartofo and Rosemary, all in Chicago. They can find me at Insaflam, and you can find both of us at the Chef Scott Pod on Instagram.

• 47:17Adrienne Cheatham?

  Yeah.

• 47:17Joe Flamm?

  So make sure to give that a follow, so you can comment on all the things we're doing that are making you upset or making you super happy. Age, how do they find you when you're not in your clandestine operations?

• 47:28Adrienne Cheatham?

  You can find me on IG at Chef Adrian Cheetum. You can check out the Sunday Best Cookbook. Check out all the polls we have on our IG. We'd love to get your opinions on some of these things and these thoughts. Keep it respectful.

• 47:41Joe Flamm?

  All right, for this week, I am Joe Flammen, and for Adrian Cheetum, this has been the Chef Scott.

• 47:46Adrienne Cheatham?

  Life beyond the past.