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Speaker 1: The world of food and hospital Anticipation is building around

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Speaker 1: the presence of the famed Michelin Star Guide, which the

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Speaker 1: government has paid to bring to the country, of course,

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Speaker 1: as part of the tourism drive. Number of Kiwi chefs

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Speaker 1: have tasted Michelin's success, so josh Emmett of course worked

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Speaker 1: with Gordon Ramsay helped him earn four When it comes

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Speaker 1: to owning and running your own restaurant, the durns of

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Speaker 1: Michelin where we've got a couple of those people, Nick Honeyman,

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Speaker 1: he had La Petit Lyon in the south of France.

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Speaker 1: And Matt Lambert who between twenty thirteen twenty twenty had

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Speaker 1: a Michelin Star with his Musket Room in New York.

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Speaker 1: At the time it was the fastest Michelin Star for

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Speaker 1: a new restaurant. Anyway, long story short, Matt Lambert is

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Speaker 1: back home. He's opening a facility called Return and he

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Speaker 1: is with us.

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Speaker 2: Matt, morning to you, good morning.

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Speaker 1: Text for you. Been to the Musket Room twice. What

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Speaker 1: a place to go when in New York. A shame

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Speaker 1: it's no longer there to visit. First time was twenty fourteen.

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Speaker 1: Matt came out, had to beer with him. He's a

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Speaker 1: great westy that sung you up pretty much, does it?

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Speaker 2: Yeah?

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Speaker 3: I guess it does.

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Speaker 1: Go back to the Musket Room as an ex experience.

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Speaker 1: Was it brilliant?

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Speaker 3: I believe so? Yeah it was. Yeah, I believe it

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Speaker 3: was a pretty special place. It is still there, it's

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Speaker 3: just operated a lot differently.

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Speaker 1: How do you well come to what you're trying to

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Speaker 1: do here in this country? But how is there a

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Speaker 1: recipe for Michelin? So in other words, if you set

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Speaker 1: out to chase a Michelin Star, do you have a

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Speaker 1: recipe that goes the furniture must be like this, the

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Speaker 1: soviets must look like that, the food must come out

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Speaker 1: this way, and the service must be at a certain level.

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Speaker 1: In the other words, you can curate the experience.

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Speaker 3: I believe that's pretty hard to do. I think there's

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Speaker 3: some some sort of things that you can take those

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Speaker 3: boxes and get them. Ultimately, it is about the food.

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Speaker 3: That's why you could get a Michelin Star at a

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Speaker 3: middle shop and a food market, or you know, in

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Speaker 3: a sit down restaurant. So sometimes yes and sometimes no.

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Speaker 1: That's my other question around the Michelin Star thing. When

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Speaker 1: governments can pay money for them to come to a

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Speaker 1: country and you can get a noodle bar getting it

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Speaker 1: or a dim sum restaurant and sing is Michelin still Michelin.

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Speaker 3: I believe that it has the kind of integrity where

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Speaker 3: it's not really affected by who bought them there just

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Speaker 3: obviously it costs a lot of money to produce things

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Speaker 3: like that, and if you're going to travel this far

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Speaker 3: around the world, you probably need a bit of a

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Speaker 3: hand to get going. I no, it probably sounds like

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Speaker 3: they don't need a hand, but you know, they weren't

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Speaker 3: here before that, were they?

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Speaker 2: No, they weren't.

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Speaker 1: What's your assessment of what they could do for the

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Speaker 1: culinary scene slash tourism scene in this country once they

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Speaker 1: start playing out stars.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's amazing. It basically tells the rest

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Speaker 3: of the world. We have restaurants as good as the

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Speaker 3: rest of the world.

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Speaker 2: You know what I mean.

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Speaker 3: If you go to a lot of people travel through

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Speaker 3: Europe and they'll just use the guide verbatim to go

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Speaker 3: to all of the restaurants they go to. Now, if

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Speaker 3: they're coming here, it opens the door for a lot

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Speaker 3: of restaurants. And it's not just about the stars. They

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Speaker 3: do have the bibicalmard and recommendations, which a lot of

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Speaker 3: people hit when they're going to the Star restaurants as well.

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Speaker 2: Did you set out to get a upstart do it

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Speaker 2: when originally yeah, I had the musket Room.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, one hundred percent. The goal was to get a

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Speaker 3: start within three years. This is one of the reasons

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Speaker 3: why I moved to New York is because I wanted

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Speaker 3: to work within Michelin Star restaurants and sort of assess

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Speaker 3: where I'm at.

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Speaker 1: With that right and once you got it, were you

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Speaker 1: fulfilled or not?

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Speaker 3: It was kind of like the beginning of a new

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Speaker 3: journey really. But for a couple of days around receiving

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Speaker 3: the Star, yeah, I was elated. It was one of

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Speaker 3: the most special things I'd done in my career because

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Speaker 3: I'd had that sort of vision for a very long

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Speaker 3: time and having the opportunity to be able to achieve

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Speaker 3: a goal like that was a special moment.

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Speaker 1: And is it one of those things I'm sure you've

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Speaker 1: seen the documentaries, you know, the pressure goes on. Do

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Speaker 1: you feel pressure once you've attained that, you know, level

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Speaker 1: of success And.

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Speaker 3: I think a lot of restaurants have inherent pressure, you know,

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Speaker 3: without it, so it wasn't a new thing. I wouldn't say,

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Speaker 3: and not really because I'm pretty I was pretty confident

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Speaker 3: with what we were doing. I felt pressure to do better.

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Speaker 2: Right, So what brought you back here.

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Speaker 3: Covid No, I'm not sure. I came back to work

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Speaker 3: with the Lodge Bar and Roden Gun and help expand

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Speaker 3: that right.

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Speaker 2: And you're enjoying it here?

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Speaker 3: I love it here? Yeah?

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Speaker 2: Yeah?

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Speaker 1: And what would you what would you describe see? Because

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Speaker 1: the media is full of it's full of stories of

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Speaker 1: places closing. So hospit in this country is the services crap.

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Speaker 1: It's too expensive and everything's closing, which of course isn't true,

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Speaker 1: but nevertheless, that's that's that's what's pedaled. What's your observation.

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Speaker 3: Of restaurants closing?

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Speaker 2: No, of the of the hospital, of the hospital scene.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I love the hospital scene. I think it's vibrant.

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Speaker 3: I think it's great. There's a lot of places doing

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Speaker 3: a lot of different things that fit different markets. Like

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Speaker 3: if you want a great smashburger, you can go to BBG.

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Speaker 3: If you want a great fried chicken, you can go

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Speaker 3: to Peaches, you know what I mean. If you want

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Speaker 3: an elevate experience, you can go to Tala. Yeah, there's

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Speaker 3: a lot happening, and it's all pretty good. If you

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Speaker 3: want good pies, they're everywhere, you know. If you want

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Speaker 3: a good examwich from the bakery, we've got those. I say,

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Speaker 3: there is a lot of very negative signaling in some

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Speaker 3: media that makes it seem very doom and gloom, But

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Speaker 3: I don't think it's as dadas as it's projected to be.

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Speaker 2: How does it work in your ears?

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Speaker 1: So you're have you you have an open return yet,

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Speaker 1: or you're about to, or you just have tomorrow? Okay, right,

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Speaker 1: so tomorrow. So I could argue with you if you're

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Speaker 1: opening a restaurant. We're in an economy in a world

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Speaker 1: in the middle of a war. We've all decided we're

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Speaker 1: in a funk again and the recovery is off, et cetera.

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Speaker 1: And yet people still open. What drives you?

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Speaker 3: Well? What am I going to wait for? Do you

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Speaker 3: know what I mean? When would I do it? I'm

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Speaker 3: aware of all the negative things that are going of happening,

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Speaker 3: but you know this is a place of celebration to

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Speaker 3: come and feel good. I feel maybe now more than ever,

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Speaker 3: that's what we need, you know.

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Speaker 1: Is hospit over hospit in this country. Do you think generally,

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Speaker 1: and I'm talking not just top end rested, but everything,

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Speaker 1: you know, just eating food outlets?

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Speaker 2: Are there too many of them?

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Speaker 3: I think potentially that could be a problem.

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Speaker 1: Yes, so it's a buyer job thing. So in other words, migration.

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Speaker 1: You can get a job, get into a restaurant, get

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Speaker 1: into a cafe, and that comes back to bite you.

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Speaker 1: And is that part of where the narrative comes from?

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Speaker 1: In other words, every time a door closed, you go, oh,

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Speaker 1: that can't be good where it's not necessarily the case,

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Speaker 1: We've just got too many of them.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that could be definitely a case. I mean,

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Speaker 3: obviously some good places do end up closing, but I

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Speaker 3: think a lot of the places that do close don't

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Speaker 3: have like a very specific vision or purpose other than

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Speaker 3: to just have some lunch, you know what I mean?

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Speaker 1: How are you going at your place with service? Service

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Speaker 1: is an issue in this country. We don't have a

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Speaker 1: culture of service in this country. It's not like a

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Speaker 1: place like New York and London where people make a

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Speaker 1: living in service.

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Speaker 2: How do you get around that?

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Speaker 3: Like, my wife is the front of house, but she's

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Speaker 3: American and comes from that sort of whole thing. She

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Speaker 3: also ran the front of house side of the Musket Room.

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Speaker 3: So I'm actually very confident with our service.

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Speaker 2: Oh that's good.

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Speaker 1: So is it an issue for you to solve though?

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Speaker 1: Is it a hurdle to get over?

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Speaker 2: No?

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Speaker 3: I don't think so. I think it's a great opportunity

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Speaker 3: to be able to teach people a different way of

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Speaker 3: doing it, or maybe making it more important, because I

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Speaker 3: think it's the most important element of a restaurant.

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Speaker 1: The style of dining, because you mentioned a number of examples.

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Speaker 1: What Michelin Stars normally delivers is fairly high end stuff.

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Speaker 1: We don't seem that high end of this country. We're

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Speaker 1: more casual.

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Speaker 2: Is that fair?

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Speaker 1: And can you do casual really elevated?

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Speaker 3: Yeah? I absolutely believe, sir, And I think it's kind

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Speaker 3: of a perception thing where a lot of people will

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Speaker 3: hear Michelin and go danger sort of fine dining, but

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Speaker 3: often it's not the case. There were pubs. There's a

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Speaker 3: two Michelin Star pub in England, there was one in

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Speaker 3: New York that had a star. My friend Andy had

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Speaker 3: a restaurant called Pop Pop that was a tie place

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Speaker 3: that was very casual that had a star. So what

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Speaker 3: I think we'll see is we'll just appreciate some places

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Speaker 3: we already have a lot more and realize that we

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Speaker 3: are sort of punching above our weight, so to speak.

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Speaker 1: I was going to say, do you reckon? That'll flip

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Speaker 1: the psyche. So, in other words, you might have a

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Speaker 1: restaurant you like, if you give it a Michelin star,

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Speaker 1: suddenly you see it in a different way and go,

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Speaker 1: hang on, that was better than I thought it was.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it can be that. Yeah, it can be that.

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Speaker 3: All of a sudden people will start calling it fine

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Speaker 3: dining too.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly are you chasing a star in your new venture?

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Speaker 1: Is that something you're after or it doesn't matter anymore?

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Speaker 3: I would love to get a Micheline star, but I

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Speaker 3: understand how difficult it is.

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Speaker 2: But you've done it before.

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Speaker 3: I have done it before. But that doesn't mean that

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Speaker 3: it's guaranteed thing, you know what I mean? There's a

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Speaker 3: lot of hard work that goes into it.

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Speaker 2: Indeed, And what about fit out? How's that? So?

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Speaker 1: I've been watching Ramsey on Netflix? Have you seen that lately?

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Speaker 2: Been good?

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Speaker 3: And yeah?

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Speaker 2: Right, So I don't have that much he was he.

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Speaker 1: Was spending twenty million pounds and he went over that,

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Speaker 1: and fit out is always a thing.

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Speaker 2: How much weight do you place on fit out.

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Speaker 3: A lot because you're basically creating the space that will,

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Speaker 3: you know, hold what it is you're doing. So it's

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Speaker 3: very important, you know, and first impressions are meaningful. When

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Speaker 3: you walk into the restaurant, you want to feel good

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Speaker 3: and when you sit down, you want to be comfortable.

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Speaker 3: So yeah, you got to make sure you deliver on

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Speaker 3: those things. Also, you know, we want to have a

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Speaker 3: space that's kind of unique in some sense. And Aubrey

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Speaker 3: Studios have done a really great job of designing what

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Speaker 3: we have.

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Speaker 1: Good on you, well done, good to catch up. I

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Speaker 1: appreciate it very much, and you go well tomorrow. Our

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Speaker 1: returners a restaurant opens tomorrow. Matt Lambert, formerly of the

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Speaker 1: Musket Room, and a nice guy, and we wish them

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Speaker 1: very and a good insight, isn't it too. People just

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Speaker 1: get on with life, you know, forget the news media

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Speaker 1: and forget the headlines and forget the news cycle. People

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Speaker 1: just make decisions every day. They just get on with

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Speaker 1: life because that's the way too, that's the way to

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Speaker 1: deal with life. For more from the Mic Asking Breakfast,

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Speaker 1: Listen live to news talks.

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Speaker 3: It'd be from six am weekdays, or follow the podcast

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Speaker 3: on iHeartRadio