Speaker 1: Today, I've got award winning chef, restaurant tour, best selling author,
Speaker 1: and TV personality Michael Simon. You're gonna hear Michael's great
Speaker 1: stories about growing up in a food and football family,
Speaker 1: how a grizzly wrestling injury changed the path of his life,
Speaker 1: his days is an ultra competitive iron chef, and how
Speaker 1: following his passion and trusting his gut has made him
Speaker 1: one of America's most popular chefs. Well, Michael, I'm really
Speaker 1: looking forward to this. I'm gonna have a blast. I
Speaker 1: hope you do too. We're recording this at cocktail hour
Speaker 1: where you are, so dinner is looming. You're sitting there
Speaker 1: in your kitchen, so the obvious question is what are
Speaker 1: you making for dinner tonight? You know what, It's funny.
Speaker 1: We were going to have some people over for dinner
Speaker 1: tonight and then we had a last minute change of plans.
Speaker 1: And I'm in Long Island, um, which I am most
Speaker 1: summer situations. So we're going to go there's a little
Speaker 1: shower house called boss Wicks. We're gonna go out for
Speaker 1: dinner tonight. I'm probably gonna get some grilled bobster and
Speaker 1: I'll be very happy you made the same thing, Jedi
Speaker 1: maybe made reservations and I were going to eat at
Speaker 1: a bourbon distillery out here in Colorado. But I will
Speaker 1: in your honor order some barbecue or some smoked meat
Speaker 1: or something like that. I've felling you. I love it. Hey,
Speaker 1: food was so important growing up in your house. Food
Speaker 1: in sports, and we'll get into both of them, but
Speaker 1: talk about just being a young kid when when great
Speaker 1: food was being prepared, whether it was the Greek side
Speaker 1: of the Sicilian side, you had it covered. And obviously
Speaker 1: that spoke to you at a young age. Unlike my
Speaker 1: my Irish English background, where we we didn't quite get
Speaker 1: that adventurous in the kitchen. And my family, Chris, most
Speaker 1: of my friends are good amount of my president Irish,
Speaker 1: so needless to say, they ate at our house a lot.
Speaker 1: Not the kids. But you know, my my mother, I
Speaker 1: had a Sicilian mother and and food was just it
Speaker 1: was a big deal in our house. You know. She
Speaker 1: was to stay oh mom until I was in high school. Um,
Speaker 1: and she cooked every single meal. Her mom was a
Speaker 1: great cook. Actually, my Dance side of family two great cooks. Uh.
Speaker 1: So we always we always ate at home. We gatingly
Speaker 1: went out at dinner. Um. And but like what even
Speaker 1: made me more kind of romantic by the whole thing
Speaker 1: is like there were certain things my mom would cook
Speaker 1: when it was when people were coming over or you know,
Speaker 1: was celebratory or a holiday and and you know, so
Speaker 1: those I remember like those of romans, and then I
Speaker 1: remembered like the happiness that have brought those people like
Speaker 1: when they came over. So it was it was a
Speaker 1: big connect for me. And we always I mean we
Speaker 1: had dinner at the kitchen table seven days a week.
Speaker 1: So that was where for me as a kid, like
Speaker 1: all the lessons were learned. You know, I was in sports,
Speaker 1: my sister was in sports, but everything would get discussed
Speaker 1: at that table nightly. Um, you know, whether it was
Speaker 1: school or sports or what's going on in your life
Speaker 1: for you know. So that was it wasn't only like
Speaker 1: the where we ate, but it was it was also
Speaker 1: the landing spot of our family on a daily basis. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's awesome. I mean, your grandparents are important to you.
Speaker 1: Mine were very important to me, but food was not
Speaker 1: important to them. So they might go Swanson's Dinners, chicken
Speaker 1: pot pie, Saahly pound cake. I still loved them. My
Speaker 1: grandmother introduced me to sports. That's the reason I have
Speaker 1: the career I have. But food did not go hand
Speaker 1: in hand with sports as it did in your family.
Speaker 1: You were a family of athletes. I mean, I know
Speaker 1: your uncle was Pete Duranko. If you're an old time
Speaker 1: Notre Dame fan, you know that name. I'm a Broncos fan.
Speaker 1: He was a legend with the Broncos. And get a
Speaker 1: bunch of football players and athletes in the family. So, uh,
Speaker 1: sports and food seems like they were kind of equally important.
Speaker 1: Maybe yeah, they were huge, you know, like I uh
Speaker 1: you My uncle Pete was obviously tremendous athlete, devils that
Speaker 1: The Ranco side of the family, that Eastern European side
Speaker 1: of the family was uh. I mean, there were just
Speaker 1: a lot of great athletes in that side of the family.
Speaker 1: My god, my grandpa was the oldest of eight boys,
Speaker 1: um and he was a pipe fitter. You know, they
Speaker 1: were they He grew up in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, you know,
Speaker 1: Steel Town, but all eight boys terrific athletes. My grandfather
Speaker 1: was a scratch golfer, both taught U sself out of
Speaker 1: golf um and shot his age every year between when
Speaker 1: he was sixty five and nineties six, shot his age
Speaker 1: at least once a year. UM. So if the athletic
Speaker 1: team was was pretty strong in my family, Michael, what
Speaker 1: did the example of your grandfather mean to you as
Speaker 1: a child. I mean, the lessons must have been too
Speaker 1: numerous to name, But what what do you remember most
Speaker 1: from from his example that you've lived with since then? Well,
Speaker 1: you know, he was he was a giant, you know,
Speaker 1: arguably the biggest influence on my life. You know, my
Speaker 1: father worked at for a voter company and worked midnights,
Speaker 1: so my dad basically worked seven days most weeks. And
Speaker 1: I would spend weekends with my grandparents, um, with my
Speaker 1: dad's mom and dad um, and so I was with
Speaker 1: them almost as much as my parents when I was younger.
Speaker 1: And and like from the food, from the food side
Speaker 1: of things, my grandmother worked at Higbie's in downtown Cleveland.
Speaker 1: So close to Higbie's in downtown was the West Side Market.
Speaker 1: So I would go with my grandparents on like Friday night, Saturday, uh,
Speaker 1: like early afternoon, we would go to the West Side Market.
Speaker 1: We'd buy all the food for dinner that night. Then
Speaker 1: we pick up my grandmother at Higbee's and then we
Speaker 1: drive home and they would start cooking. So from a
Speaker 1: food aspect um, it was. It was a tremendous influence.
Speaker 1: And then my my grandfather lived a hundred and three.
Speaker 1: He just passed away a couple of years ago, and
Speaker 1: he was healthy basically the whole time, of mind and body,
Speaker 1: which was incredibly incredible. And like his line he's I
Speaker 1: used always say, Pep, what's your secrets? Like, always take
Speaker 1: the stairs? That was it. He goes elevators, escalator that
Speaker 1: always take this? Do you always take the stairs? Always
Speaker 1: take the stairs? So like you, I travel a lot
Speaker 1: and when I fly in the Vegas like and I
Speaker 1: gotta get up and it's like, you know, it's like
Speaker 1: that really long stairwell up to the terminal, and I like,
Speaker 1: no matter how much fun you about my shoulders, I'm like, God, damnit,
Speaker 1: here we go. Time to take this. And I thought,
Speaker 1: you got some people stay in the thirty floor of
Speaker 1: the hotel. You're taking the stairs. Come on, there's a
Speaker 1: limit to Grandpa's message. I'm in a hotel, I take
Speaker 1: the elevator. I think there's few things in life more
Speaker 1: precious than the love of a grandmother. What about your
Speaker 1: grandmother that you remember most finely, you do you learn
Speaker 1: the most from Well, both of them were great, you know.
Speaker 1: Um my mother's um, my grandmother and my mom's side
Speaker 1: was from sicily. Um. She was very tough, um, I
Speaker 1: mean loving but very strict, very tough, um but like
Speaker 1: the ultimate perfectionist um in insane cook. Uh but like
Speaker 1: when their house, I can't even explain you how clean
Speaker 1: their house was like it was like everything was in
Speaker 1: its place all the time. I mean it was insane.
Speaker 1: So like I think attention to detail like kind of things,
Speaker 1: I really that was from her for certain. Um. And
Speaker 1: my my dad's mom. My grandfather was the oldest of
Speaker 1: eight boys, my grandmother was the youngest of twelve. So
Speaker 1: they came from like, you know, separate worlds in that sense. Um.
Speaker 1: But my my grandmother was always like just one of
Speaker 1: those people that was uh like incredibly kind and warm.
Speaker 1: Like I never heard her say a bad thing about
Speaker 1: like a single human. I I just never never crossed
Speaker 1: her lips. Like she just never had anything bad. She
Speaker 1: could find the good in anything. She was the ultimate optimist. Um.
Speaker 1: And and so I think I really learned, you know,
Speaker 1: optimism and the glass is always you know, half full,
Speaker 1: not had half empty, uh from her. And also that
Speaker 1: side of the family, she was the Duranko. So the
Speaker 1: love of sports comes really from I mean she, my
Speaker 1: grandmother was the biggest die heard football fan you had ever.
Speaker 1: I mean it was insanity, and she could rattle off
Speaker 1: every stat on every team like it was insane. And
Speaker 1: her sisters were like they were all like that, you know.
Speaker 1: So I learned a lot about sports. I mean I
Speaker 1: learned from my dad and my grandparents, But really the
Speaker 1: person that really taught me, like about like the first
Speaker 1: thing that I learned my dad. The first thing he
Speaker 1: always did. The first thing I learned how to read
Speaker 1: was the sports page, Like here's how you read the
Speaker 1: sports page. And but the person that really taught me
Speaker 1: how to like follow stats and like adore the statistics
Speaker 1: of sports was my grandmother. I cannot believe we have
Speaker 1: that exactly in common. My parents went out into sports
Speaker 1: at all. We got dropped up in my grandparents house.
Speaker 1: My mom uh couldn't have cared less. But her mother
Speaker 1: sat in the backyard in a folding chair with the
Speaker 1: transistor radio and a baseball scorebook and scored every single
Speaker 1: Cubs games. So I I learned to embrace sports, stats
Speaker 1: and sports and that's why I wanted to do this
Speaker 1: for a living. Was listening to games on the radio
Speaker 1: with my grandmother. So I will never forget that that
Speaker 1: gift that she gave me, the gift of sports fandom. Hey,
Speaker 1: football and food seem to go together, Michael, you're a
Speaker 1: big fan of both. You're uniquely qualified to talk about it.
Speaker 1: But but why is that? And what we're football Saturdays
Speaker 1: and Sundays like for you growing up? And what are
Speaker 1: they like now? Um? You know is a cute We're
Speaker 1: a very kind of a slightly divided family, um in
Speaker 1: sports because I had you know, my uncle's played for
Speaker 1: Notre Dame and so like half family was a Notre
Speaker 1: Dame family and half the family was Ohio State family. Um.
Speaker 1: And then, like it took me a long time I
Speaker 1: think to kind of pick aside. I just you know,
Speaker 1: when I was younger and then even in high school,
Speaker 1: cheered for both teams um as. And then as I
Speaker 1: got older, I got more and more buck guy, I
Speaker 1: favored the Buckeyes more and more. Um. But you know,
Speaker 1: there was a moment where I thought I was like
Speaker 1: I thought about I wanted to go to Notre Dame
Speaker 1: to wrestle, not to play football. But uh, you know
Speaker 1: so I I really was in love with the whole
Speaker 1: Notre Dame a lord for a long time. But but
Speaker 1: I'm a hardcore buck I fan now. And then the
Speaker 1: food came in, Like me would we usually my parents
Speaker 1: house is usually where we watched all the sports, so
Speaker 1: it was there was always getting cooked. We were always
Speaker 1: around the table. And then as I got older and
Speaker 1: got season tickets and things of that to the Browns games,
Speaker 1: Like you know, tailgating was always a huge thing for
Speaker 1: us at the games. Well, I have ex erience to
Speaker 1: Michael simon cooking in regard to football and that backdrop.
Speaker 1: Uh and I have to tell you that you served
Speaker 1: up some great food in Tallahassee, Florida. But kind of
Speaker 1: a cross promotion when you were co hosted the chew
Speaker 1: we were doing game Day. You were there and and
Speaker 1: smeat was coming off the grill was coming up to
Speaker 1: the set. But all of it, all of it was
Speaker 1: going to Desmond Howard from Cleveland kirk Herb Street X
Speaker 1: Ohio state quarterback. I think I had to say, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, Michael could yeah, you know when when you
Speaker 1: get a chance, you know, when you when you when
Speaker 1: you're done serve in the Ohio Superstars, Can I just
Speaker 1: get a little play of something over here? Eventually got
Speaker 1: around to it. But I haven't forgotten that, I meanfessible,
Speaker 1: I mean I I mean I don't remember that is
Speaker 1: like like desn't I graduated from high school at the
Speaker 1: same time, you know, so like I've known that, Like
Speaker 1: he played football. I like say bad words to high
Speaker 1: school that I went to. In high school my senior
Speaker 1: there was our tenth straight national title and seventeenth straight
Speaker 1: state title. So it was the predominant wrestling program in
Speaker 1: the country. And we had a very good football team too,
Speaker 1: as the Desmond But we used to beat Saint Joe's
Speaker 1: my senior year when they had des An Gerbach. You know. So,
Speaker 1: I mean Desmond was in high school and running back,
Speaker 1: which I know you know all this, you know, but
Speaker 1: he was an elite running back and then when he
Speaker 1: went to Michigan, it was when he became the receiver. Um.
Speaker 1: So you know, we had a running back at our
Speaker 1: school named Chris Williams, who was probably the best running
Speaker 1: back in the state of Ohio at the time, followed
Speaker 1: by Desmond, so there's always a lot of competition between
Speaker 1: those two. And then at college des went to to
Speaker 1: receiver obviously at Michigan and did the Heisman pose against
Speaker 1: Ohio State. I don't even need to get in all
Speaker 1: of that, you know. So he's been uh, you know
Speaker 1: when we were in high school. My high school got
Speaker 1: to break his heart a lot. Once he went to college,
Speaker 1: he just dripped my heart out, like, well, I want
Speaker 1: to talk about your sports background. You mentioned Sant Edwards
Speaker 1: in Cleveland Wrestling Dynasty. To say the least, you were
Speaker 1: a wrestour. I know you played a lot of sports,
Speaker 1: but wrestling seemed to connect with you. There's a dude
Speaker 1: in front of you, go attack him and take him down,
Speaker 1: and that seemed to make sense to to a young
Speaker 1: Michael Simon. I did a show called Scholastic Sports America.
Speaker 1: We went to St Edge and profiled that wrestling program,
Speaker 1: you know, mid eight, right around when you were there.
Speaker 1: I don't know if we crossed paths or if you
Speaker 1: were on that team, but we covered that team and
Speaker 1: if you you got a chance to wrestle for them,
Speaker 1: you were legit. And I know you thought that maybe
Speaker 1: that was gonna be your path to college and who
Speaker 1: knows where before kind of food took over. But that
Speaker 1: wrestling career and it's it's pretty grizzly. Describe it as
Speaker 1: much as you want to about what sort of detoured
Speaker 1: that when I wrestled with saying as our coach was
Speaker 1: a name named a gentleman by the name of Howard
Speaker 1: Ferguson who had a tremendous influence on my life. He
Speaker 1: passed away two years after and graduated, and he also
Speaker 1: wrote a book called The Edge, which you know, a
Speaker 1: lot of young athletes. He put together a book called
Speaker 1: The Edge, which a lot of young athletes looked at
Speaker 1: it that time. He was a tremendous influence on my
Speaker 1: and um, you know, basically, if you went to St. Adds,
Speaker 1: you got a full ride to college. I mean that's
Speaker 1: just if if you were good enough to make the
Speaker 1: Adds team, you you went to college for free. That
Speaker 1: was basically how it worked. And I was a good wrestler.
Speaker 1: You know, Um my junior year in a rustle off
Speaker 1: in the room, Um, I posted out on a cradle
Speaker 1: and my my arm just snapped. So like the basically
Speaker 1: what Joe Tiesman to do his leg. I did to
Speaker 1: my arm. That's the easiest way, man. That's so that's
Speaker 1: called a compound fracture. That means bone through skin, right,
Speaker 1: so like if you form, there's like a little zipper
Speaker 1: there still, but you have the two bones coming out.
Speaker 1: The one compounded fracture that was actually been good break.
Speaker 1: The other break one chattered and I dislocated my elbow
Speaker 1: all in like a fell swoop. So and it was
Speaker 1: in a match. Obviously, the match stopped it from In
Speaker 1: the hospital, I had a got I got put on
Speaker 1: a plate and fourteen screws in my arm. So you know,
Speaker 1: I've been wrestling since I've been six, you know, so
Speaker 1: it was just a way of life for me. And
Speaker 1: and the guy that did my surgery was a very
Speaker 1: famous surgeon who used to do all the Browns at
Speaker 1: the time. And you know, he said, you're probably the
Speaker 1: chances of you wrestling again in high school are very rare.
Speaker 1: It's about halfway through my junior year. Now. Again, my
Speaker 1: dad was I come from a sports family. My father
Speaker 1: worked at Ford, the tough blue collar guy, as was
Speaker 1: my grandfather and stuff. So I'm like, well, you know,
Speaker 1: so I had the cast on for about six months
Speaker 1: and I get the cast off, and you know, I started.
Speaker 1: I was like that it doesn't you know. I started
Speaker 1: lifting again lightly and working out, and I ran when
Speaker 1: I had the cast, I don't all that kind of stuff,
Speaker 1: and and I said that it feels pretty good, you know,
Speaker 1: and he goes, well, you know, start practicing a little
Speaker 1: bit with some of your buddies. See how it feels,
Speaker 1: you know. Don't tell your mother. I'm I'm I'm practicing
Speaker 1: with some of my buddies. About two months before the
Speaker 1: season starts, and I wake up one morning and and
Speaker 1: my dad were midnight. So typically when I was going
Speaker 1: to school in the morning, he was getting home from
Speaker 1: work for the most part, you know, so I'd like
Speaker 1: say hi to him. I go to school, you know.
Speaker 1: He then he would sleep. So I wait, I come downstairs.
Speaker 1: I'm like, damn, my arm feels really weird. He goes,
Speaker 1: let me look at it. I didn't really look at it.
Speaker 1: I was still kind of like half away, and my
Speaker 1: form like, instead of being this thing, was like this thing.
Speaker 1: And he's like, oh, shoot, uh, you know, like I'm
Speaker 1: gonna pick you up after school before I go to work.
Speaker 1: We'll go see Bell who was the doctor. We'll see.
Speaker 1: So I had broken the plate in the wow, so
Speaker 1: they had to go in rebreak a researchly replayed, and
Speaker 1: then I was in a cast for a year and
Speaker 1: six months. So basically over the whole tenor of the thing,
Speaker 1: I was in a cast for about two years. Um,
Speaker 1: And you know, we're a middle class family. My sister
Speaker 1: was an elite gymnast, you know, an Olympic hopeful gymnast.
Speaker 1: And I was a wrestler, you know. My my dad
Speaker 1: I thought we'd both get full rise to college. And um,
Speaker 1: so I'm like, well, I gotta I gotta get a job.
Speaker 1: So I started working in restaurants. My buddy's dad on
Speaker 1: a restaurant. I started working in restaurants when I was
Speaker 1: like sixteen, um, sixteen, seventeen, and just fell in love
Speaker 1: with the business. Now was before Food Network and all
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. And I wasn't a great student.
Speaker 1: You know, Um, do you re select on that though?
Speaker 1: I mean, listen, I've talked to so many athletes whose
Speaker 1: careers have ended out on their terms and it's a heartbreak,
Speaker 1: I mean identity. And then but then if you reflect back,
Speaker 1: now that the way the universe kind of serves up
Speaker 1: these plot twists. Who knows if you're sitting there where
Speaker 1: you are now, had you gone to college interrestling scholarship.
Speaker 1: When I told my father wanted to go to culinary school,
Speaker 1: He's like, no, no, your grandfather was a tradesman. You know,
Speaker 1: Like you're not, You're You're you're going to get an education,
Speaker 1: you know. So um. I went to Cleveland State for
Speaker 1: a semester and I got a point to point Lutarski
Speaker 1: almost of Lutarski GP, and I remember him going like,
Speaker 1: how did you get a point to? And like I
Speaker 1: just didn't want to be there. At the end of
Speaker 1: the day, I'm like, I got a point too because
Speaker 1: I literally didn't go to a single class. I never
Speaker 1: attended a single class, and I got that's how I
Speaker 1: get a point to in college. It's it's it's not
Speaker 1: easy to do. But if you never go to a
Speaker 1: single class, I mean, but I want I want to
Speaker 1: go back to that decision because one of my favorite
Speaker 1: topics is young people trying to forge their own path
Speaker 1: and listen to their gut in their heart. Because even
Speaker 1: though people who love you and who have more wisdom
Speaker 1: than you give you advice, it doesn't necessarily mean that
Speaker 1: they know what is best for you and your inner
Speaker 1: voice told you something else, and and you follow that
Speaker 1: direction to see I had. I think it's powerful because
Speaker 1: so many young people struggle with that. You know, I
Speaker 1: was very fortunately I flunked out of college. Obviously, I
Speaker 1: was still working in restaurants. I still loved it. And
Speaker 1: you know, my dad is like he shrunk a little now,
Speaker 1: but he was like six four and my mother's about
Speaker 1: four eleven. But my mother's and if you come from
Speaker 1: like that family, you understand it a little bit. So
Speaker 1: everyone no one's afraid of my dad really, and everyone's
Speaker 1: toetrified up my mom. You know, she wielded the hammer,
Speaker 1: so she had had enough and she's like he's going
Speaker 1: to culinaries. Listen with the discussions over like it was
Speaker 1: like he's and you know, and I went to see
Speaker 1: I A and I graduated top of my class and
Speaker 1: you know, and like it just worked in for my brain,
Speaker 1: like I'm a d D. So the restaurant business, I
Speaker 1: think that there's probably a lot of chefs. If you
Speaker 1: did a you know, a test, like chefs that have
Speaker 1: attention deficit, I'll bet you be like you threw that
Speaker 1: out there casually, top of your class. C I. A
Speaker 1: is not the central ATTENTIONCE agent if you don't know,
Speaker 1: it killing every intitude of America. And it's kind of
Speaker 1: like the Oxford or the Harvard for cooking, and and
Speaker 1: to go in there after you struggle in college and
Speaker 1: do that well. I mean, first of all, it must
Speaker 1: have been thrilling to connect with something that you found.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it was easy, but it seemed
Speaker 1: much more natural to and then tell me what that
Speaker 1: was like when that that that light bulb came on
Speaker 1: you said, this is for me, I got a text.
Speaker 1: It was easy for me. It was the first time
Speaker 1: I ever went to school. Of like wrestling was easy
Speaker 1: for me, sports were easy for me. School was not
Speaker 1: easy for me. My sister was a graduate, like a
Speaker 1: four four, you know, like school was easy for her.
Speaker 1: It was not easy for me. I hated it. I
Speaker 1: didn't dwell on it, and I just didn't like it,
Speaker 1: you know, quite frankly. I like the social aspect of it,
Speaker 1: but I didn't like the I didn't love going to school.
Speaker 1: And I went to culinary school and I immediately loved it,
Speaker 1: like just loved it and everything made sense, Everything clicked.
Speaker 1: You know, it just was it was easy for me.
Speaker 1: And and you know mainly because like sports that I
Speaker 1: did okay, and it just it was enjoyable. Like I
Speaker 1: loved doing it. You know. It's it's like television. I
Speaker 1: love doing it and I never feel like I can
Speaker 1: go over work ever, you know, so like when I'm
Speaker 1: at the restaurants or I'm on TV, it just doesn't
Speaker 1: feel like work to me. That's beautiful. That that is
Speaker 1: That's the secret to happiness, right then. You know, I
Speaker 1: love what you do, and I think that what's also
Speaker 1: impressed me about you is you've pivoted and you've reinvented
Speaker 1: and reinventioned. Pivoting is one of my favorite topics. Did
Speaker 1: a Whole Pot episode our mutual friend Clinton Kelly, your
Speaker 1: former co host on The Chew, and Eddie George, a
Speaker 1: Buckeye both told their stories about how they dramatically pivoted
Speaker 1: in life and found a new passion. And you did
Speaker 1: that with TV. Yeah, you know, like still chefs still
Speaker 1: have the restaurants, still all that, but it TV, like
Speaker 1: cooking came became relatively natural to me, like you know,
Speaker 1: in in um in ninety eight, I want an award
Speaker 1: from Food and Wine magazine where every year they named
Speaker 1: the top best young chefs in America. So that's when
Speaker 1: I was young and I won that award. So they
Speaker 1: had me Food Network had just started in they had
Speaker 1: me out as a guest of the show called Sara Malton.
Speaker 1: You know, I had a blast that The ratings were
Speaker 1: I guess good and not a lot of people watching
Speaker 1: the number back then, and um, then I was on
Speaker 1: again and again and again and again. And then that
Speaker 1: same year they asked me to host a show called
Speaker 1: The Melting Pot and I did that for two hundred
Speaker 1: episodes and um, and then it just just continued since then.
Speaker 1: And you know, um, you know it's for me. It's funny.
Speaker 1: It's like I often think about like pivotal moments in
Speaker 1: my life and and like and two Like you would say, oh, well,
Speaker 1: breaking your arm got you into cooking, that was like
Speaker 1: the aha moment. But really I think what changed a
Speaker 1: lot for me is when I broke my arm and
Speaker 1: Ford allowed me to coach and I coached the freshman
Speaker 1: and I also coached uh two other teams the year
Speaker 1: after that that we're you know, like graders and and
Speaker 1: teaching and and working with these kids, and like getting
Speaker 1: them to a certain level was like really fulfilling for me.
Speaker 1: And what I quickly learned as I you know, I
Speaker 1: went from a you know, a line cook to a
Speaker 1: sous chef to an executive chef to an owner is
Speaker 1: to to have a successful restaurant, it's you have to
Speaker 1: be able to cook, obviously, but you have to be
Speaker 1: able to teach. Um. And so that just clicked in
Speaker 1: my brain. And then when I'm on television, like the
Speaker 1: one thing that I pride myself in the most is,
Speaker 1: you know, most people that watch our shows, whether it's
Speaker 1: Simon's Dinners were Doing in Our Backyard or the new
Speaker 1: show I'm Doing Barbecue USA. Um, Like when I when
Speaker 1: you like read whatever on social like they always say
Speaker 1: I learned so much from his shows. And that makes
Speaker 1: me so happy because you know, obviously, at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, we need to entertain, Like it's our
Speaker 1: job to entertain the people watching. But if if I
Speaker 1: could give them a skill, a life skill, or they
Speaker 1: could learn like one thing two things, uh, during one
Speaker 1: of those shows, Like that's when I feel like as
Speaker 1: a chef or a person or a teacher or a
Speaker 1: TV personality, Like that's what I feel like for me personally,
Speaker 1: I've succeeded. Yeah, that's a wonderful side of it. Another
Speaker 1: side of it is the competitive side. And we talked
Speaker 1: about how ultra competitive you are. So you go on
Speaker 1: Iron Chef, which is the g cooking competition show. So
Speaker 1: many sprang from that, but it was also like it
Speaker 1: was kind of like the m M A of cooking.
Speaker 1: You guys were built up like like athletes. You had
Speaker 1: these big entrances. You came out and then it was like,
Speaker 1: I mean, killer, be killed, you're making food. But something
Speaker 1: about that competitive part just connected. But you when you
Speaker 1: kicked as on the show, you almost never lost those
Speaker 1: head to head battles. I mean, what was it about
Speaker 1: that that if? So, they did a Next Iron Chief
Speaker 1: Like they did a first run of Iron Chefs where
Speaker 1: they had three Iron Chefs and then they decided they
Speaker 1: needed to add you know, Aron chefs, so they the
Speaker 1: next season the first season they did the Next Iron
Speaker 1: Chef and they were a ton of us competing for
Speaker 1: the spot. Like time elite chefs around America. I've won
Speaker 1: that and I became an Iron Chef and um, but
Speaker 1: for me, like it got me right back into wrestling mode.
Speaker 1: I'm like, let's go. Like when when Iron Chef was started,
Speaker 1: like it was like I'd look over be versus them,
Speaker 1: let's go. But that's not the same thing as go
Speaker 1: as trying to, you know, break a guy down and
Speaker 1: pan him. I mean, how is working with food and
Speaker 1: how is it the same thing? Because it's like, like
Speaker 1: it's interesting, Like Iron Chef is interesting in the sense
Speaker 1: where a lot of the people were cooking against people
Speaker 1: that we were friends with them, we know, one in
Speaker 1: the business forever, and they would come on that show
Speaker 1: and they wanted to kill you, like they knew that
Speaker 1: if they could beat one of us, it was a
Speaker 1: big feather in their cap, you know. So you know,
Speaker 1: I'm pretty like you know, people that know me, like,
Speaker 1: you know, I like that fun, I like them laugh
Speaker 1: like them the time. I like, you know, but I'm
Speaker 1: also very competitive, Like that's the other side of it.
Speaker 1: So like the first couple after the first couple of
Speaker 1: years I did Iron Chef, Like I remember when I
Speaker 1: went from Iron Chef to The Chew, Like when people
Speaker 1: started watching The Chewo, They're like, oh, he's really nice.
Speaker 1: We never knew he was really nice, like because I
Speaker 1: was just like we're going. But when you say kill,
Speaker 1: I mean, look, what what do you You can't like
Speaker 1: reach over and dump a bucket, assault in their food,
Speaker 1: you try to get in their head? Are you trying?
Speaker 1: Does the trash talk mental combat work and that kind
Speaker 1: of a thing is some trash talk, you know, but
Speaker 1: there's also like, you know, one thing about the culinary
Speaker 1: world is it's big, but it's very small. So when
Speaker 1: you're going against somebody, you know what they're capable of.
Speaker 1: You know, like this ingredient is going to favor them.
Speaker 1: You know, you know all those things. So you just
Speaker 1: have to bring You have to bring your a game
Speaker 1: for a straight hour and you can't pick up. So
Speaker 1: like if I like over there like trying to take
Speaker 1: the person down, know, but like I do know that
Speaker 1: for an hour, I need to be perfect, you know,
Speaker 1: and so that it becomes more of a competition with
Speaker 1: myself at that point. Um, but I know if I
Speaker 1: could challenge myself enough, then I'm gonna win, you know.
Speaker 1: And and not that I understand more when you were
Speaker 1: youre ultru competitive against your own standard, which I talked about.
Speaker 1: That makes sense to me more than trying to like
Speaker 1: beat the ship out of the guy cooking food next
Speaker 1: to you. I know, that's the point of a competition show,
Speaker 1: Like I just want to win. Like so, like it's
Speaker 1: lot when you lost the rare loss where you gutted?
Speaker 1: Were you devastated? I you know, I'm um, as my
Speaker 1: friends like to tell me, they're like, you lose with
Speaker 1: such grace, but man, when you win, you are the
Speaker 1: So I was like, and I mean it was kind
Speaker 1: of like, you know, wrestling in that really elite program
Speaker 1: for being involved with that on the program for such
Speaker 1: a long time at St. Edwards. If you lost and
Speaker 1: you didn't lose, you know, graciously, Ford would have ripped
Speaker 1: our hearts out. I mean, like you lost, you one up,
Speaker 1: you shook the person's hand, you shook the coach's hand.
Speaker 1: You know, if you want to be upset, you do
Speaker 1: it off the map, like you need to carry yourself
Speaker 1: a certain way. So um, you know that has stuck
Speaker 1: with me most of my life. But I do Like yesterday,
Speaker 1: I uh, playing eye golfed and we get to the
Speaker 1: eighteenth hole and we pay on Birdie's and you know
Speaker 1: we played we played like front back total with automatic presses,
Speaker 1: but we also pay on birdie's and sandies, So there's like,
Speaker 1: so I down, he's got a birdie. I don't have
Speaker 1: a birdie on the front night we only can play nine. Um,
Speaker 1: he's got a birdie. I don't have a birdie on
Speaker 1: the front nine. And we're even on the match. Um,
Speaker 1: so you know, we get to the last hole two
Speaker 1: part five, I birdie, I whin whole, I buried the whole,
Speaker 1: and I get a sandy, so that by the time
Speaker 1: it was over, I was And he's everybody as competitive
Speaker 1: as me. And we get off the thing and he
Speaker 1: just looks at me, and I'm like, I just felt
Speaker 1: like this three bing three point all three point. You're
Speaker 1: like a lot of people. I know you're you're a
Speaker 1: good loser, but you're a bad winner. But I love
Speaker 1: I love the power of sports. You've referenced the influence
Speaker 1: of your coach a few times already and the lessons
Speaker 1: I it's a powerful thing that the people that haven't
Speaker 1: been involved in sports don't fully understand. But I can
Speaker 1: tell when you keep talking about your wrestling coach and
Speaker 1: then the number of ways that he influenced you and
Speaker 1: the lessons you took from him that you bring back
Speaker 1: and all kinds of things, whether it's cooking, I'm sure
Speaker 1: in the business world and anything else. So um that
Speaker 1: that's very cool for you to express that all all
Speaker 1: the meals you've created, sir, whether it's on a competition
Speaker 1: show or just for a couple of guests, is there
Speaker 1: one that stands out where you go, Everything was per picked,
Speaker 1: nothing could have been improved upon, nothing could be better,
Speaker 1: and that you're most proud of. Yeah, one dish or
Speaker 1: one meal competition. It was so we used to do
Speaker 1: these holiday battles, um iron chef Hollidy battles were it
Speaker 1: was like iron chefs or iron chefs, and Bobby and
Speaker 1: I would never really compete against each other because of
Speaker 1: our friendship. We just didn't, you know, we compete enough
Speaker 1: like in Gulf and everything else. So we're like, we
Speaker 1: weren't going to do it on TV. So we him
Speaker 1: and I were always partners. It was always Bobby and
Speaker 1: I versus whoever, and we were going against Alex Guana
Speaker 1: Shelley and m Jefferies carrying and it was a Thanksgiving
Speaker 1: battle and the uh I made so so my Italian
Speaker 1: herritage that you know, a dish that I grew up
Speaker 1: with this porquetta where you take the you know, the
Speaker 1: belly of the pork and you roll it and cook
Speaker 1: it very slow and crystal skin. And and so Bobby
Speaker 1: and I would when we would do any of these
Speaker 1: things together, we look at the altar, you know, and
Speaker 1: we'd like grab ingredients and you'd be like, what do
Speaker 1: you want? What do you want? What do you like?
Speaker 1: Like we would just work what we're gonna make, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, I'll take the turkey and two sides like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I got this, and I I'm I worked for a
Speaker 1: butcher for a long time, so I'm very good at
Speaker 1: butchering me. So I like broke down the whole turkey
Speaker 1: and I rolled it into itself and made a poor
Speaker 1: quetta out of turkey and we called it a torquetta
Speaker 1: and um, and it was lights out and like it
Speaker 1: haunts Alex Wanna Shelley like like if someone brings up
Speaker 1: like anything on uh, you know, your worst moment on
Speaker 1: Iron Ship, It'll just say, like fucking turkatta any more,
Speaker 1: because that's it. And so, because we're also competitive with
Speaker 1: each other, that one like really sticks in my mind,
Speaker 1: um quite a bit. Uh. And so I was, what
Speaker 1: about the flip side. Man, they're not all amazing successes.
Speaker 1: I mean, is there anything you cooked where you tasted
Speaker 1: it afterwards? I don't care if it's on a cooking
Speaker 1: show or at home. And just said, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: this is awful, Like there's no way that a dude
Speaker 1: went to ci A top of class and one James
Speaker 1: Beard and all these other awards could possibly have made
Speaker 1: this and it just goes right in the trash can.
Speaker 1: So well, it didn't go in the trash can because
Speaker 1: I was so like certain in my mind that the
Speaker 1: dish would work that I just I like forced the
Speaker 1: issue a little bit. So we were opening our first restaurant,
Speaker 1: Lola in and you know, Liz designs the restaurant, runs
Speaker 1: the front of the house, does the beverage programs, and
Speaker 1: you know I do the food. So this is so
Speaker 1: and so she's like, you know, I had run to
Speaker 1: that point very Italian or Mediterranean based restaurants prior to
Speaker 1: opening Lola, And she's like, what are you gonna do?
Speaker 1: And We're gonna do Italian Like we were talking about
Speaker 1: it like now I'm like, you know, there's just a
Speaker 1: lot of Italian here in the city and like, I
Speaker 1: want to do something different and I'm gonna do Midwestern
Speaker 1: food And she's like, what does what does that? What
Speaker 1: does that even mean? I'm like, I'm not a d
Speaker 1: here yet, but just be a second. So, you know,
Speaker 1: at the time, in my mind, would have meant was
Speaker 1: like I was gonna work with farmers within the area.
Speaker 1: This is before farming table was like a thing so
Speaker 1: much so we're gonna work with local farmers and we're
Speaker 1: gonna um enhanced dishes that like kind of made Cleveland
Speaker 1: the food talent that it is, but we're gonna cheff
Speaker 1: them up for you know. So like we did um
Speaker 1: Like probably the most the dish that kind of got
Speaker 1: the most pressed for me as a chef was we
Speaker 1: made beef cheek, but so we made bogie dough brave
Speaker 1: beef cheeks filled it, you know with wild mushrooms and
Speaker 1: truffle and all that stuff. So that was like my
Speaker 1: breakout dish. So for every hit like a beef cheek parokee,
Speaker 1: there's gonna be you know. So you know, I fought
Speaker 1: him Midwest I called pot pie like pop pie is
Speaker 1: you know what everybody was, But like, we can't, we
Speaker 1: can't put a chicken pot pie on the menu at
Speaker 1: this fine dining restaurant. So I said, I'm gonna make
Speaker 1: you know. So then I worked for French chefs a
Speaker 1: lot young that got new attenant fro whatever. So you know,
Speaker 1: I was thinking of Escargo on CRUs you know, Escargo
Speaker 1: Puffey Street. So I was like, I'm gonna make an
Speaker 1: escargo pot pie. And I made it. And like I remember,
Speaker 1: like like we used to do this thing where we
Speaker 1: would introduce a new dish. All the servers would come
Speaker 1: around and would taste the dish. I explain it to them,
Speaker 1: here's the ingredientsers that we made it. So they were
Speaker 1: put to go to the table and so put up
Speaker 1: dish and taste it. And there's nothing, no like, no reaction,
Speaker 1: nothing like. So the cooks and chefs who had worked
Speaker 1: for me for a while at that time. It came
Speaker 1: from the other restaurant with me and I'm like, you guys,
Speaker 1: none of the surfers are reacting to the dish. They
Speaker 1: say nothing. So my wife is always trutally honest with me,
Speaker 1: which is a good thing, you know. I'm like, Liz,
Speaker 1: serfers haven't responded to the dish, you know, the cooks
Speaker 1: don't seem excited about the dish. I'm like, I like
Speaker 1: the dish. She's like, it's an awful dish. It's not working.
Speaker 1: It's I'm like, I'm gonna put a couple of weeks
Speaker 1: on and I put it on the menu. So so
Speaker 1: sure enough I did that and it was an immense failure.
Speaker 1: It was like it was my first lesson in the
Speaker 1: cooking world a little bit, like you know, just because
Speaker 1: you're good at your craft and you know how like
Speaker 1: you can't will something to taste good, like you can't
Speaker 1: like like it's gonna work, you know, but like mony
Speaker 1: when chefs they all have like that one dish, you know,
Speaker 1: that one dish where it's like in your mind it's
Speaker 1: part of the like the curses being creative, Like you know,
Speaker 1: there's there's chefs that just say, like I may um
Speaker 1: passa puntanesca and marinara and like very classic dishes when
Speaker 1: you're just trying to um master a classic, which is great,
Speaker 1: and there's amazing chefs in death very well, like I
Speaker 1: feel like a very good technique, but I also have
Speaker 1: this kind of creative side of me. And when you're creative,
Speaker 1: there there is the the risk of the disaster. Well,
Speaker 1: I'm sure that the dishes are much better in the
Speaker 1: mind than in the mouth. That that that that's gonna happen,
Speaker 1: And not every creative type pitsa home run every time
Speaker 1: I get it. Hey, you know, for years people said, hey,
Speaker 1: you don't want to know what goes on back in
Speaker 1: the kitchen. Just go to a restaurant, enjoy the food,
Speaker 1: but you don't want to know what's going on back there.
Speaker 1: Then there were books Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential. There's a TV
Speaker 1: show right now called The Bear Said in a sandwich
Speaker 1: shop in Chicago. Some people may have seen that, but
Speaker 1: there's been other examples to where the curtain gets ripped
Speaker 1: back and it looks like chaos. My brother Drew was
Speaker 1: a chef at some nice places, and he used to
Speaker 1: tell me stories about the working conditions, just how stressful
Speaker 1: and how demanding and how tough and how hot and
Speaker 1: gnarly you can get back there. I mean, I'm sure
Speaker 1: that's not all the time. But what what story do
Speaker 1: you have that that says, you know, that symbolizes that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know what it's it's it's a tough job. There's
Speaker 1: no other way like unfortunately what's happened a little bit.
Speaker 1: The great thing about TV is it's it's made a
Speaker 1: profession that I have a lot of love for. People
Speaker 1: were a little bit more aware of it now than
Speaker 1: they were when I got in the business, you know,
Speaker 1: thirty plus years ago. The the hard thing about it
Speaker 1: is it's also been glamorized a little bit where people
Speaker 1: don't always necessarily they're like, you know, they watched Food
Speaker 1: Network and these cookie shows and stuff like that, and
Speaker 1: they're like, oh my gosh, I want to be a chef,
Speaker 1: and they you know, they go to school and then
Speaker 1: they get in that restaurant environment, which you know, like, look,
Speaker 1: I worked for yellows and screamers and crazy people, and
Speaker 1: I didn't want to be that way. So you know,
Speaker 1: I was a little bit crazier when I think when
Speaker 1: I was young. And then like as I'm mature as
Speaker 1: a person and as a chef, and the conference grows
Speaker 1: and all those things, like rarely ever ever ever raised
Speaker 1: my voice in the kitchen. Um, so like I tried
Speaker 1: to control the stress that way, but it's still stressful,
Speaker 1: you know, and and I mean, you know, you think
Speaker 1: of it like it like a little we had twenty
Speaker 1: menu items, had ten starters and ten countries, and we
Speaker 1: had not counting pastry, which was six people on on
Speaker 1: the main line that we're uh, twelve cooks. So basically,
Speaker 1: you know, every cook is responsible for like a dish
Speaker 1: or two couple of dishes, and you know through the
Speaker 1: course of the night. You know you do you do
Speaker 1: three people through the course of a night. So you
Speaker 1: know every cook is putting up like a couple of
Speaker 1: hundred plates. And I know customers never think of this.
Speaker 1: Like back when we open the first restaurant, I'm the
Speaker 1: man you just said no special orders, don't care. I
Speaker 1: wrote it exactly like that, like I don't care. Um,
Speaker 1: I'm not like that anymore. Dipping in a little bit.
Speaker 1: But but like what a lot of customers don't understand
Speaker 1: is like you have this person cooking and you get
Speaker 1: in a rhythm, and let's just say it's the beef
Speaker 1: cheap paroge. Like the pickup on a beef cheap paroge
Speaker 1: is you know, you boil them, you put them in
Speaker 1: brown butter, you caramelize the mushrooms with some fresh herbs
Speaker 1: and thyme, and you lay that down on the plate.
Speaker 1: Was a little bit of a reduction sauce um and
Speaker 1: then to share the truff. So you're in the process
Speaker 1: of making two a night and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: like random wators come in no time. No must know this,
Speaker 1: no that sub this over here. I want this on that,
Speaker 1: you know, and it's hard to get out there. It
Speaker 1: would be like in the middle of calling a college
Speaker 1: football game someone said, you know what, we're playing baseball now,
Speaker 1: please one support at a time, man, one support at
Speaker 1: a time. And there is the customers always right, but
Speaker 1: but it sometimes creates a lot of stress on on
Speaker 1: a a kitchen more than you know. But you want
Speaker 1: to make the customer happy like that the role that
Speaker 1: we kind of live with now. It's like I'll do
Speaker 1: anything it takes to make the customer happy unless making
Speaker 1: that one customer happy makes twenty customers suffer. Like that's
Speaker 1: how I kind of look at it. But um, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a tough business. You have to love it. Like
Speaker 1: there's no if I just start all over again, I
Speaker 1: do it. I get right, I jump right back into
Speaker 1: the business, like I adore the business and and I
Speaker 1: think most people that do it professionally really do. And
Speaker 1: I also think some of the stuff that you see
Speaker 1: on television is like when when Tony used to talk
Speaker 1: about you know, like kitchen confidentials. You know, he was
Speaker 1: writing about kitchens in the eighties and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: We're rough back then. I mean, those are the kittens
Speaker 1: I worked in. They were rough, but they're not quite
Speaker 1: like that anymoreren um, you know. And then the other
Speaker 1: stuff with TV, like I really enjoyed Bear. I think
Speaker 1: it's a fun show and like, you know, the energy
Speaker 1: of it, but a lot of that is hyped up
Speaker 1: for for it's not fun. It makes you anxious you're
Speaker 1: sitting there watching you Okay, this is well acted, well written,
Speaker 1: but I mean I'm so anxious watching it. How do
Speaker 1: these people like you know, then they go home when
Speaker 1: they they eat the crappiest food. I don't know if
Speaker 1: that's true. If yes, you're you're around fine food, so
Speaker 1: much goes into every aspect of food. When you get
Speaker 1: hungry and you're by yourself, you know, are you just
Speaker 1: making peanut brown jelly sandwich or whatever? You we great
Speaker 1: food like basically every day, but so we're not adverse
Speaker 1: to like going home at two in the morning after
Speaker 1: you just worked a fifteen hour day on the line
Speaker 1: and like busted out like a package of romen with
Speaker 1: some peanut butter in it. Like I speaking of unconventional choices.
Speaker 1: One of the pivotal points in Michael's career was in
Speaker 1: the mid nineties when brilliant chef Thomas Keller offered an
Speaker 1: opportunity to join the opening team and what became the
Speaker 1: legendary French Laundry in Napa. He chose to stay in
Speaker 1: his hometown and work with Liz to open Lola, which
Speaker 1: became their breakthrough a restaurant and at Cleveland Landmark. So
Speaker 1: Michael followed his heart and his gut. You know, So
Speaker 1: I I didn't take the job, and I didn't take
Speaker 1: the opportunity, I would say, and so you know, I
Speaker 1: don't even regrets. Thomas and I've been very good friends
Speaker 1: for a long time. Now we're in a book together
Speaker 1: called Solo Chef, and um it like I think about
Speaker 1: it a lot, and I think not a lot, but
Speaker 1: like a long time ago, I used to think about
Speaker 1: a lot. And you know, if I went and I
Speaker 1: worked for Thomas, you know, Thomas, such a is such
Speaker 1: a force. I believe in my heart, and I could
Speaker 1: be wrong that I probably would have cooked a lot
Speaker 1: like Thomas. You know, I like I would have. You know,
Speaker 1: you worked for someone, they mentor you, they they mold you,
Speaker 1: and and so there's gonna be a lot of that
Speaker 1: in your food dna um where you know, I kind
Speaker 1: of worked for several different people and saw different things
Speaker 1: and and then I just kind of, you know, I've
Speaker 1: learned a little bit on my own and it allowed me.
Speaker 1: I feel that it allowed me to be more expressive
Speaker 1: as a chef maybe um going the route that I did.
Speaker 1: And obviously it worked. So it Uh, Thomas certainly didn't
Speaker 1: miss me and just fine. Yeah, without Simon they do,
Speaker 1: that place just flopped. Man, It's a shame I never
Speaker 1: get out the ground, you know. Um, But you know
Speaker 1: it worked very well for for me as as a
Speaker 1: chef to um. So it was it, uh, but you
Speaker 1: know it was it was at the time. It was
Speaker 1: you know again, Thomas wasn't Thomas chef. French Laundry was
Speaker 1: just opening. I mean, the chef role moved him very well,
Speaker 1: but the French Laundery cookbook wasn't out. But like I
Speaker 1: remember like eating at Raquel when he was the chef there,
Speaker 1: when I was like a young cook in New York
Speaker 1: and food was just so perfect, you know, and I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: what am I doing? Like this is a chance of
Speaker 1: a lifetime to work with this guy, like he's He's
Speaker 1: in the chef community. Even before French Landy, everybody knew
Speaker 1: how particulous and spectacular he was as a chef. So
Speaker 1: it was it was a tough decision, it was. It
Speaker 1: was a tough decision, not one that I regret, but
Speaker 1: a very tough at the time. Like you said, it
Speaker 1: worked out for a ball. I have in my hand
Speaker 1: a copy of your latest book, Fix It with Food.
Speaker 1: This is the second one, Every Meal Easy. We ordered
Speaker 1: this book. Amazon told us the other day they had
Speaker 1: delivered it. The box didn't show up. We thought I'd
Speaker 1: have been stolen. They left it outside on on a
Speaker 1: road in a garage, and we thought, I wonder what
Speaker 1: the person who grabbed this Amazon box and open it
Speaker 1: up and found um. Michael Simon's book, along with the
Speaker 1: book The Making of the Godfather, Leave the Gun, Take
Speaker 1: the Cannonality is also a very good book. I don't
Speaker 1: know if you would have been disappointed or thrilled to
Speaker 1: get your book, but we're happy to have it because
Speaker 1: it talks a lot about something that's important to a a
Speaker 1: lot of people, which is, although they love food and
Speaker 1: food is sustenance, food can also make people uncomfortable. They
Speaker 1: can create inflammation. Um. Jennifer struggles with that. So we're
Speaker 1: eager to dive in and see what you've got to
Speaker 1: say about foods and and how to alleviate some of
Speaker 1: the problems because you suffer from a couple of different
Speaker 1: autoimmune diseases and you react to food badly at times too. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I have are a and I have just good lucas
Speaker 1: um and you know, and my body is a little
Speaker 1: beat up from all the years of wrestling, to be
Speaker 1: quite honest. You know that the tour knees and broken
Speaker 1: arms and all that stuff that went with that. So um,
Speaker 1: so inflammation is a problem with me. And I just
Speaker 1: didn't want to you know, when I was younger, I
Speaker 1: just kind of pushed through it and whatever. I'm sore,
Speaker 1: a big deal. I can store my whole life. So
Speaker 1: but I'm just like, this is so stupid. I don't
Speaker 1: want to take a pill for it. I want to
Speaker 1: try to, like, come on, chef, like, let me see
Speaker 1: if I can figure out you know how to reduce
Speaker 1: inflammation with my diet. And you know the old saying
Speaker 1: you are what you eat. It's true, you know, and
Speaker 1: now a big part of me knows it. Also as
Speaker 1: a chef, I gotta be able to taste and eat everything.
Speaker 1: So if I go, if I adjust my lifestyle and
Speaker 1: the way that I eat to help inflammation, I also
Speaker 1: have to know going into that that this isn't a
Speaker 1: perfect world for me. Like like, for instance, my triggers
Speaker 1: are sugar and dairy. Well, you know, if I'm at
Speaker 1: the restaurant someone makes a butter cream sauce, I have
Speaker 1: to taste that, you know. Or if my pacery chef
Speaker 1: makes a great dessert, I'm gonna taste them. Now. The
Speaker 1: great thing about once you learn your triggers, it's kind
Speaker 1: of like you have one bourbon, you find the next
Speaker 1: day you have four. You're hungover, but sometimes you still
Speaker 1: left four. And like that with me with the food,
Speaker 1: you know, I was able to identify my triggers. I
Speaker 1: teach people how to do it um in the book
Speaker 1: and then give them recipes to cook around their triggers. UM.
Speaker 1: And I'm very clear, like what this isn't a perfect world?
Speaker 1: I'm not. I hate the word diet. I can't stand it.
Speaker 1: I think it's like a set up for failure. Um.
Speaker 1: But here's the way to eat smart. Identify what your
Speaker 1: problems are, keep them out of your diet as much
Speaker 1: as you can, and ultimately you'll feel lot better Like
Speaker 1: I feel great, Like you know. I there's days around
Speaker 1: a little more emky than others, But for the most part,
Speaker 1: I've learned how to to this point in my life
Speaker 1: control the inflammation very well. And it works for people
Speaker 1: as well, whether it is dairy or sugar or something.
Speaker 1: You think that just by a little investigation and then
Speaker 1: some diligence and making some sacrifices, they can turn around health.
Speaker 1: That is, it's food related. You know what what I
Speaker 1: found when we I was doing all the research for
Speaker 1: the book and talking to other people with inflammation issues
Speaker 1: and having them kind of play around with these diets
Speaker 1: for me, because everyone's triggers were a little bit different.
Speaker 1: Like you know, I have a friend that has are
Speaker 1: a their triggers slower. You know, flower doesn't affect me.
Speaker 1: I have another friend UM with lupus, not discord with
Speaker 1: you know, regular lupas, and UM meat was their trigger.
Speaker 1: You know, so everybody's bodies is a little bit different.
Speaker 1: And so we we through the book, we take you
Speaker 1: through the little elimination period and then you start introducing
Speaker 1: foods back in. Just see what the triggers are. You're
Speaker 1: obviously a positive guy. We've had fun. I do want
Speaker 1: to ask one thing just from a from a chef's
Speaker 1: perspective and someone who has made their life and food.
Speaker 1: I mean, for me, it's deflating how little emphasis in
Speaker 1: this country is placed on good eating and wellness and health,
Speaker 1: and how little kids are taught about food and how
Speaker 1: to eat well, and and how much of our food
Speaker 1: is processed and so far from the farm before it
Speaker 1: gets to the table. And that's different from a lot
Speaker 1: of places in the world. You know, as an American chef,
Speaker 1: does it get you down? Do you see how is
Speaker 1: there a pathway to a to a healthier way of
Speaker 1: eating in this country? It's a disaster, and you know
Speaker 1: it's it's I mean, it's just at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, it's a disaster. The problem is current. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of problems with the system. But you know,
Speaker 1: if you the the everyone wants everything bigger, faster, cheaper.
Speaker 1: And in order to do a lot of that, people
Speaker 1: pump things with growth hormones, use pestle sides, they do
Speaker 1: all these things that get the product to the people, um,
Speaker 1: in a more inexpensive manner. And um, you know, I
Speaker 1: don't I don't have the answer. I wish I did. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, like my oh, I'm a chef. Answer would
Speaker 1: be like, like, we should be helping the farmers that
Speaker 1: are doing things the right way so then they're able
Speaker 1: to produce food in a manner that's a little bit
Speaker 1: more inexpensive, so everybody could get the benefits of these
Speaker 1: food because the people that unfortunately have the worst diets
Speaker 1: are the people that are struggling the most financially, and
Speaker 1: they don't have a choice. You know, Like, look, you
Speaker 1: and I are fortunate. We could go to the grocery
Speaker 1: store and we could say, give me the organic produce
Speaker 1: or the grass fed beef, and you know, this is
Speaker 1: what I want to eat. Um. But there's a lot
Speaker 1: of people that just in a position to do that,
Speaker 1: and and there's a lot of waste in America too.
Speaker 1: It's like, because we want everything to look a certain
Speaker 1: way or be a certain way. It's like the amount
Speaker 1: of produce and and things like that to get thrown
Speaker 1: out our grocery stores every day would just make your
Speaker 1: mind melt, you know. And and and there's just I'm like,
Speaker 1: why why can't we give these two two food pantries?
Speaker 1: Oh they can't take a tomato with a crack in it,
Speaker 1: or they can't you know. So when people go to
Speaker 1: a grocery store and they root through forty tomatoes to
Speaker 1: find the one that they want and they crack six
Speaker 1: of them out along the way, those get thrown away,
Speaker 1: you know, And and and it's just it's horrible. So
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, we we try to do a
Speaker 1: lot with I work with some schools in Cleveland, Ohion,
Speaker 1: and you know, hopefully I can get it bigger. Like
Speaker 1: I feel like if we could do our best, defeed
Speaker 1: kids great right now and and it could move in
Speaker 1: that direction. It's like, you know, the some of the
Speaker 1: inner city parts of Cleveland has these food deserts, and
Speaker 1: um one of the schools that we worked with, we
Speaker 1: told everybody, like, draw draw your neighborhood for us, you know,
Speaker 1: and we're trying to learn more about the students. And
Speaker 1: they drew them and and you know, put where the
Speaker 1: grocery stores to gas station, So all of the grocery
Speaker 1: stores was the gas station. You know, That's that's where
Speaker 1: they were getting there. These these kids were getting their
Speaker 1: food for the day at the gas station, you know. So, um,
Speaker 1: you know, if we could fix some of those issues,
Speaker 1: I think that will help a lot. But it's it's
Speaker 1: an utpill battle. And then you go like, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm lucky enough to travel, you know, you go to
Speaker 1: some of these other countries, and you know, we're we're
Speaker 1: the smartest, most successful country in the world, but yet
Speaker 1: our food programs are probably worst, the private worst. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna wrap it up, but we're a little more upide here.
Speaker 1: What is it about food that draws people together? I mean,
Speaker 1: I know sports bring people together, Music brings people together.
Speaker 1: They don't have to speak the same language, and that's
Speaker 1: on a very basic human level. But it seems like
Speaker 1: nothing brings people together and binds them and builds relationships
Speaker 1: and strengthens bonds better than food. Obviously, we've been eating
Speaker 1: communally as a species ever since we were walking up right,
Speaker 1: That might have something to do with it. But your
Speaker 1: experiencing in the industry and making great food and and
Speaker 1: and making people feel good around the food. What what
Speaker 1: is it about that about this that makes you sort
Speaker 1: of proud to be part of that industry? You know.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of it is similar to sports
Speaker 1: and um music in the sense I think food has
Speaker 1: the ability to create very specific memories in people's minds,
Speaker 1: um and like anything that has the ability to do
Speaker 1: that and bring someone to back to a place or
Speaker 1: create a new place for them, I feel is incredibly powerful.
Speaker 1: Like you know, right when we the podcast, I talked
Speaker 1: about like when I smelled certain things that my mom made,
Speaker 1: I knew what was coming next, you know, And even
Speaker 1: as an adult, like when I make my mom's lasagna,
Speaker 1: I'm all of a sudden, I just like if I'm
Speaker 1: in a shitty mood, I make my mom's design it.
Speaker 1: You know, it's not as Bitnister's, but just at the
Speaker 1: house smells that way for a couple hours puts me
Speaker 1: in a great mood. And I think food has the
Speaker 1: ability to do that as the ability to transport you
Speaker 1: back to a place or create a new place. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, it's it's and I think that's just what
Speaker 1: does it. I think it generally makes people happy in
Speaker 1: that stuff, and so many people in the industry are
Speaker 1: are generous soul as Michael. The last thing I want
Speaker 1: to ask you about is is chefs instincts to help
Speaker 1: people and do good. There's so many examples of philanthropy
Speaker 1: through cooking and chefs and people like you have used
Speaker 1: your platform and your name to help people, whether it's
Speaker 1: through the pandemic or just through you know, tough times.
Speaker 1: And what is it about people in your industry who
Speaker 1: who feel compelled to just sort of get back and
Speaker 1: do good. Yeah, I don't know, Like I think what
Speaker 1: it is is it's really helped the foundation of the
Speaker 1: industry are are I think the base of the reason
Speaker 1: most people are in the industry industry is they're they're
Speaker 1: naturally giving souls that want to nourish people, you know.
Speaker 1: I think that that's like the core of most chefs,
Speaker 1: especially um you know. And so when there's a time
Speaker 1: and need, I think more like my guests would be
Speaker 1: more than any industry in the world when when things
Speaker 1: get bad, the first industry to jump in and try
Speaker 1: to help is the rest of industry, um, you know.
Speaker 1: So it's it's just it's how it works where that's
Speaker 1: how we're wired, you know. I think when when you're
Speaker 1: you know, like you were saying earlier, Oh, it's the
Speaker 1: stories about how tough it is in the kitchen, the
Speaker 1: the work is really difficult, but it also forms this
Speaker 1: tremendous bond um with these teams of people, and and
Speaker 1: you with that bond you take care of everybody around
Speaker 1: from win those kitchens, and I think it just it
Speaker 1: goes beyond that. Then then it goes beyond that. And um,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, like, look look at what JS
Speaker 1: Andrew's doing. He's doing things in the world that no
Speaker 1: one has been able to do until him, not no one,
Speaker 1: I mean, And and it's truly it just stems from
Speaker 1: here's the guy who I mean is one of the
Speaker 1: greatest chefs in the world, but also more than that,
Speaker 1: has a heart that is like could fill a hundred rooms,
Speaker 1: you know, and he just wants to take care of people.
Speaker 1: And he doesn't care, he doesn't care what it takes.
Speaker 1: He just wants to do the right thing all the
Speaker 1: time and take care of people. And um, I mean,
Speaker 1: he's the extreme example of that. But I think most
Speaker 1: chefs are. There's more chefs like Jose than chefs that
Speaker 1: are not great place to leave it. Speaking of generosity,
Speaker 1: really grateful for your time. Um, someday I'm gonna crash
Speaker 1: one of your your football parties there and and experience
Speaker 1: your food to try to make up for the fact
Speaker 1: that I was last served in college game day. But
Speaker 1: I'll bring I'll bring what I know best. I'll bring
Speaker 1: the bourbon in, the tequila and the beer and you
Speaker 1: can take care of the rest. Is that a deal?
Speaker 1: You guys are always welcome to the house for Sunday supper,
Speaker 1: so I know your busiest on Saturdays. Sundays might be
Speaker 1: a little bit hard, but you know, Clinton, Dave, we
Speaker 1: don't even have to come. You're always welcome Now. Sundays,
Speaker 1: I'm light open, brothers. Saturdays are busy. Sundays I'm exhausted
Speaker 1: but hungry. You can look for Michael on the Food
Speaker 1: Network hosting B b Q USA and Simon's Inners, where
Speaker 1: he cooks in his stunning back your heart. My thanks
Speaker 1: to Michael and a co executive producer Jennifer Dempster for
Speaker 1: her great work in this episode, and editor Jason white Kell.
Speaker 1: I'll talk to you soon with more of season five
Speaker 1: of Fowler. Who You Got