Speaker 1: Welcome to River Cafe, Table four, a production of iHeartRadio
Speaker 1: and adamized studios.
Speaker 2: I remember vividly going to the Palace a fantastic meal.
Speaker 2: I've had many such meals, especially when I was Vice president,
Speaker 2: Formal banquets in China and the Great Hall of the People.
Speaker 2: I don't think I've had an Italian state dinner. I
Speaker 2: wish I had.
Speaker 3: Vice president for I really please that you're here, and
Speaker 3: that you're in Tennessee and I'm in London. We're going
Speaker 3: to find a connection. Do you cook?
Speaker 2: I don't. I've been pretty much a vegan for eight
Speaker 2: years now. I occasionally supplement it with some sustainable seafood.
Speaker 2: But yes, I don't consider myself a great cook Ruthie
Speaker 2: by any stretch of the imagination. But during the pandemic,
Speaker 2: make like a lot of people, I picked up a
Speaker 2: few new skills just because the chance to go out
Speaker 2: to restaurants was foreclosed, and I'm surrounded by a lot
Speaker 2: of fresh food here at the farm. So yeah, I've
Speaker 2: done my best. And do your children cook, Yes, they do.
Speaker 2: They're all good cooks, including my son, my youngest, who
Speaker 2: learned cooking from his grandmother. My mother. I remember when
Speaker 2: he was quite young, she taught him how to make bread.
Speaker 2: She had her own bread recipe that was just absolutely delicious,
Speaker 2: coming hot straight out of the oven, and he loved
Speaker 2: it so much that he got her to teach him
Speaker 2: how to make it. But yes, all the others do
Speaker 2: as well. I would say they're good cooks.
Speaker 3: They are they vegan as well.
Speaker 2: No they're not, but they've cut back on red meat
Speaker 2: for sure.
Speaker 3: You've chosen we've chosen together a recipe for the soup
Speaker 3: Papa pomodoro. Then I think you might have had it
Speaker 3: the last summer that you were in the River Cafe.
Speaker 3: So would you like to read the recipe for Papa alpalmadoro.
Speaker 2: Four kilograms of ripe plum tomatoes peeled, seated and chopped.
Speaker 2: Two garlic cloves sliced, two hundred and fifty milli liters
Speaker 2: of olive oil, one stale sour dough loaf, crust removed,
Speaker 2: one large bunch of fresh basil leaves torn, Heat three
Speaker 2: tablespoons of olive oil in a saucepan. Add the garlic
Speaker 2: and fried gently. Then add the tomatoes. Simmer for thirty minutes,
Speaker 2: stirring occasionally, until the sauce is thick season well. Add
Speaker 2: six hundred milliliters of water and bring to a boiled
Speaker 2: Add the bread cut into chunks, and stir until the
Speaker 2: bread of sorbs the liquid cool slightly, adding more water
Speaker 2: if necessary. Stir the basil into the soup with the
Speaker 2: remaining olive oil. And this dish is best served at
Speaker 2: room temperature.
Speaker 3: I know what I like about this recipe. I like
Speaker 3: the fact that it's only made in the summer, when
Speaker 3: the tomatoes are right, It only has four ingredients, and
Speaker 3: it has such a simple taste of Italy. It reminds
Speaker 3: me of Italy. I was thinking about the way. One
Speaker 3: of the other things about Italian food is that it
Speaker 3: is so regional, and if you're in Tuscany, you eat
Speaker 3: something that you probably would never have if you were
Speaker 3: in Naples and in Venice, you might have a risotta
Speaker 3: that nobody in Pulia would have heard of. And I
Speaker 3: was thinking that about Southern food. Because you grew up
Speaker 3: between Washington and Tennessee, between a hotel and a farm.
Speaker 2: That is exactly right. Every single year of my life
Speaker 2: I went back and forth. My father was in the
Speaker 2: US House of Representatives when I was born, had been
Speaker 2: for ten years and went to the Senate when I
Speaker 2: was four years old, And so we went back and forth.
Speaker 2: As soon as there was a spring vacation or a
Speaker 2: Christmas vacation, off we would go driving back to Tennessee. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it was quite a contrast to enjoy the food on
Speaker 2: the farm and fresh from the garden and then go
Speaker 2: back to the old Fairfax Hotel in Washington, d C.
Speaker 2: Owned by a distant cousin. But the food in Washington,
Speaker 2: d C. Was quite different from that in Tennessee. But
Speaker 2: in my mother's kitchen it was pretty much the same
Speaker 2: in both locations.
Speaker 3: How did she cook in the hotel? I have this
Speaker 3: image of being a kind of eloise in the plaza
Speaker 3: and ordering room service. Would you have family meals in
Speaker 3: the hotel? Or was it an apartment at hotel?
Speaker 2: It was a small apartment, two bedrooms. My sister and
Speaker 2: I shared a bedroom, one bathroom in the entire apartment,
Speaker 2: a small kitchen. It did have a dining area and
Speaker 2: a living room, and that was it. It was a
Speaker 2: very small apartment. I don't really ever remember, believe it
Speaker 2: or not. I really don't ever remember getting room service.
Speaker 3: Because now we equate room service with the hotels. Would
Speaker 3: do your mother cook? Who cooked in your house?
Speaker 2: My mother was a good cook. She was a lawyer,
Speaker 2: one of the first women to graduate from Vanderbilt Law
Speaker 2: School back in the nineteen thirties. My sister, when she
Speaker 2: got older, was a good cook as well. I remember
Speaker 2: one time when my mother and my sister both went
Speaker 2: on a tear competitively making sioux FLEs. They just became
Speaker 2: entranced with the whole notion. And for several weeks I
Speaker 2: would come home from school and there would be a
Speaker 2: one or two different small suit there.
Speaker 3: Sounds good to me and nice thing to come home to.
Speaker 3: And then going down to the farm. So was that well,
Speaker 3: talk about the farm, but also Southern cooking because being
Speaker 3: an American like you, and you think about the identity,
Speaker 3: you know there may be Midwestern food, or there's specific
Speaker 3: Northwest food or upstate New York food. Would you say
Speaker 3: that going to Tennessee there was a kind of real
Speaker 3: basis of food from the South.
Speaker 2: Fried chicken and barbecue, fresh vegetables. We would pay attention
Speaker 2: to when the new corn was ready, when the vegetables
Speaker 2: were coming in, and we had a big garden on
Speaker 2: the farm. My grandmother also had a garden which she
Speaker 2: worked in pretty much constantly, and she canned food. I
Speaker 2: don't remember ever eating any of her canned food, but
Speaker 2: she was of the generation that really prepared for what
Speaker 2: might come by canning lots of food in her cellar,
Speaker 2: and I would help her occasionally. But Southern food has
Speaker 2: changed over time, very influenced by Black American recipes. I
Speaker 2: don't know that the full credit for Southern cuisine that
Speaker 2: should go to Black Americans has been widely understood, but
Speaker 2: it certainly is the case nowadays. Of course, Nashville Hot
Speaker 2: Chicken is a distinctive brand that has gone far and wide.
Speaker 2: Barbecue is still identified with the South, and Tennessee takes
Speaker 2: a lot of pride and it's barbecue. I had a
Speaker 2: barbecue team when I was in the US Senate. Every
Speaker 2: year they have a huge barbecue contest in Memphis, Tennessee.
Speaker 2: It's a wonderful content.
Speaker 3: How many how much you can ort, how delicious it is,
Speaker 3: What do you think was the well?
Speaker 2: The judges primarily graded on taste, but the presentation was
Speaker 2: a factor. But I was in the Senate, so the
Speaker 2: point of it was not necessarily to win the contest,
Speaker 2: but to meet all the people who came by.
Speaker 3: Well, that is food as a connection, you know, because
Speaker 3: on the farm, when you talk about the corn coming
Speaker 3: and eating it right away, and the probably the potatoes,
Speaker 3: all the produce from the farm is one of the
Speaker 3: great luxuries of life. If you can eat a potato
Speaker 3: when it's just been dug up, if you can have
Speaker 3: I grew up in upstate New York and we didn't
Speaker 3: have a farm, but we always knew that if we
Speaker 3: were having the corn for lunch, we'd buy it in
Speaker 3: the morning, and if we were having it for dinner
Speaker 3: we'd have it we'd buy it late afternoon from the
Speaker 3: farm store. Was that sense of the immediacy of farming
Speaker 3: and cooking. Do you think that is something that has
Speaker 3: stayed with you? And now you have the farm, don't
Speaker 3: you You changed it radically.
Speaker 2: Yes, the family farm is now my farm, and starting
Speaker 2: a eight years ago, I converted it to a regenerative
Speaker 2: agriculture farm. We also have livestock. I'm a vegan cattle farmer.
Speaker 2: They are not many of us, but rotational grazing, where
Speaker 2: you manage the livestock in cooperation with the vegetables and fruits,
Speaker 2: really is an effective way to make the soil healthier
Speaker 2: and make the farm successful. You know, regenerative agriculture is
Speaker 2: a farmer lad movement, and it has also led to
Speaker 2: some new food chains. We sell at farmers' markets and
Speaker 2: we sell to local chefs in Nashville, and we have
Speaker 2: several hundred boxes each week that go through a program
Speaker 2: called Community Supported Agriculture, and we deliver the boxes so
Speaker 2: we give twenty five percent of them to the food
Speaker 2: Bank in Nashville, particularly during the hard times of the pandemic.
Speaker 2: It's a connection that I established when I was a boy.
Speaker 2: Every summer of my life I worked on this farm
Speaker 2: and really developed quite an attachment to it, and then
Speaker 2: moved back to Nashville and to the farm which is
Speaker 2: outside of Nashville when I made a transition into the
Speaker 2: business world involuntarily, but I've really enjoyed it a great deal.
Speaker 3: We opened the River Cafe after being closed for four months.
Speaker 3: It was very emotional. You know, people connect, you know.
Speaker 3: I would say, if you go down the list, you
Speaker 3: would say, of course, you know, education, schools, they would say, libraries,
Speaker 3: you would say healthcare. You would say, there were so
Speaker 3: many priorities in the city. But what has been very
Speaker 3: moving to me. Is how important going to a restaurant is.
Speaker 3: It's not just the food, it's connecting with your friends.
Speaker 3: It's sitting at a table and being able to focus
Speaker 3: on who you're with and the conversation. As a child,
Speaker 3: let's go back to the beginning when you were growing up.
Speaker 3: Was going to a restaurant a special occasion?
Speaker 2: Yes, it was a special occasion. But in Carthage, Tennessee,
Speaker 2: the restaurants and cafes were really more basic like diners
Speaker 2: more or less meet and three. Do you have that
Speaker 2: expression in London? A meet and three where you go
Speaker 2: through a cafeteria line. But it was always fun. We
Speaker 2: would go after church to the city Cafe in Carthage,
Speaker 2: Tennessee every week.
Speaker 3: That would be part of the tradition that you would
Speaker 3: go to a cafe after church. That's very nice.
Speaker 2: And what I look for now in a restaurant is
Speaker 2: a place with wonderful food first of all, and a
Speaker 2: wonderful ambiance and a good feeling and wonderful friends that
Speaker 2: you make over the years. There is something special about it.
Speaker 2: And I have become close friends with quite a few
Speaker 2: of the chefs in Nashville. Nashville is becoming a foody
Speaker 2: city and there are a lot of really great chefs
Speaker 2: that have come and every year here at the farm,
Speaker 2: I have a conference in the fall after the harvest
Speaker 2: called the Climate Underground Conference, which looks at the health
Speaker 2: of the soil, the economic health of the farmers and
Speaker 2: the chefs. And of course during the pandemic, a lot
Speaker 2: of restaurants have struggled so much, but the chefs that
Speaker 2: have become friends over the years have really stepped up
Speaker 2: to provide food for populations in the community that really
Speaker 2: fell on hard times during the year twenty twenty and
Speaker 2: in many communities it's a remarkable development that chefs became
Speaker 2: a new variety of superhero. There are many of them
Speaker 2: that filled the breach and fed people that were hungry
Speaker 2: and somehow made it all work.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I think that here as well, and certainly in
Speaker 3: my own restaurant with the young chefs. There's so many
Speaker 3: initiatives that we did with food banks. We have a
Speaker 3: hospital very near us and we were cooking for the
Speaker 3: doctors in the hospital, and I think it really gave
Speaker 3: us all someone You know, how fortunate we are that
Speaker 3: way have a skill can be used for a social purpose.
Speaker 3: And I think that food as politics. You know, there's
Speaker 3: very little separation, is that between what we're all trying
Speaker 3: to do and to make the world a better place.
Speaker 3: But I think it is interesting the way how a
Speaker 3: government and how society looks at feeding the people who
Speaker 3: need help.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and there are so many of these so called
Speaker 2: food deserts in communities black and brown and indigenous communities
Speaker 2: where you might get a kind of a gas station
Speaker 2: that has a mart by it that sells slim gems,
Speaker 2: some kind of jerky and snacks and food that's not
Speaker 2: very healthy for you. And there has been a growing
Speaker 2: recognition in those communities and others that we would all
Speaker 2: benefit by developing a healthier connection to the sources of
Speaker 2: our food and paying more attention to the way it's
Speaker 2: harvested and prepared. And where schools are concerned, I have
Speaker 2: partnered with Alice Waters, so I'm sure you know in Berkeley,
Speaker 2: and one of her programs is called the Edible Schoolyard,
Speaker 2: which has gone beyond the pilot phase and is now
Speaker 2: being expanded into the University of California system and in
Speaker 2: school districts around the country to educate children in school
Speaker 2: about gardening and about growing food and preparing food and
Speaker 2: moving past this era when people thought food came from
Speaker 2: the grocery store and didn't give any thought beyond that.
Speaker 2: And of course it's so much better and healthier in
Speaker 2: every way when people take responsibility for eating enough fresh
Speaker 2: vegetables and fruits, and cutting back on meat consumption and
Speaker 2: really paying attention to the health of the meals they consume.
Speaker 3: Especially children. I remember Longo walking down the street in
Speaker 3: Paris and there was an outside in coal maternel, which
Speaker 3: is a you know, a nursery school for children probably
Speaker 3: between three and five, and they had the menus for
Speaker 3: the week, and it was so moving to see that
Speaker 3: they started with a salary remolague and then they had
Speaker 3: a suit to pois soon I mean, really quite sophisticated
Speaker 3: and tasteful and thought out food, and then a main course,
Speaker 3: and they even had for these little kids a cheese course,
Speaker 3: you know, and then a fruit and I thought that
Speaker 3: was a glimpse. I took a photograph of the way
Speaker 3: society values and educates the children that are growing up.
Speaker 3: That says a mark of their priorities. And I know
Speaker 3: that we have hope now for advancing that with Alice,
Speaker 3: and we actually cook every year in her benefit in
Speaker 3: New York. And again, you know, she's a force, she's
Speaker 3: a phenomenon, and we all just needed to work on
Speaker 3: I think, you know, poverties education food. What was food
Speaker 3: like in the White House? Because my knowledge of the
Speaker 3: White House was watching the West Wing and seeing Toby
Speaker 3: and all these guys go down to the Kent team,
Speaker 3: and I was wondering, did you work over food? Would
Speaker 3: you entertain and talk about policies over food or was
Speaker 3: it quite a separate thing over sandwich?
Speaker 2: I would say it was mostly separate, but it was
Speaker 2: not at all uncommon to work over meals. And former
Speaker 2: President Clinton and I had a weekly luncheon just the
Speaker 2: two of us that was never missed on the schedule.
Speaker 2: And the food, I have to say, was excellent. You know,
Speaker 2: each president or first Lady, I guess the proper analog
Speaker 2: would be first gentleman when we have a woman present.
Speaker 2: Traditionally first ladies have picked the White House chef. And
Speaker 2: during the years when I worked as Vice President in
Speaker 2: the White House, so food was excellent.
Speaker 3: And do you think going back to the farm and
Speaker 3: sustainability and your work on climate change and your books
Speaker 3: and your writing and your constant campaigning for trying to
Speaker 3: save our planet. Would you tell me more about how
Speaker 3: you see the sustainability and what we can do. I
Speaker 3: thought it was impressive that you said it's not it
Speaker 3: doesn't have to be placed as a burden on the individual,
Speaker 3: which I think we all want to share that responsibility.
Speaker 3: But that on policy, which is what we all look towards,
Speaker 3: is how can the policies that you've established on your farm,
Speaker 3: how does that policy reach a global network a larger audience.
Speaker 2: Well, agriculture can be one of the biggest solutions to
Speaker 2: the climate crisis. It cannot solve it by itself, for sure,
Speaker 2: and the main task is to stop burning all the
Speaker 2: fossil fuels. So we are putting more than one hundred
Speaker 2: and sixty million tons of man made global warming pollution
Speaker 2: into the atmosphere every day. But it was not until
Speaker 2: nineteen fifty that the majority of the greenhouse gases the
Speaker 2: global warming pollution came from something other than farming. And
Speaker 2: it was not until the nineteen seventies until the majority
Speaker 2: of the accumulated global warming pollution was no longer from agriculture.
Speaker 2: What happened was, in part the use of heavy plowing,
Speaker 2: and the kind of a reductionist model for growing food
Speaker 2: that says, you know, just get rid of everything except
Speaker 2: what you want to grow, and then use heavy chemical
Speaker 2: inputs and insecticides and herbicides and synthetic nitrogen fertilizer, which
Speaker 2: was only invented in Germany one hundred, ten hundred and
Speaker 2: fifteen years ago. In that stretch of time, we have
Speaker 2: seen a massive outgassing of CO two from the top soils.
Speaker 2: Forgive me for going on on this moment. People talk
Speaker 2: about planting trees to pull CO two back out of
Speaker 2: the atmosphere, and it's something we certainly need to do,
Speaker 2: but we also need to remember that if you look
Speaker 2: at all of the carbon and every tree in the world,
Speaker 2: plus every plant in the world, there's three times that
Speaker 2: much carbon in the first ten centimeters of top soils
Speaker 2: around the world. And by sharply reducing the amount of
Speaker 2: plowing and using natural fertilizing techniques and natural pest control
Speaker 2: techniques and using cover crops, always keep roots in the soil,
Speaker 2: don't let it lie loose, use perennials where you can
Speaker 2: use rotational grazing agro forestry. These techniques can reverse the
Speaker 2: flow of global warming pollution out of the soil and
Speaker 2: actually put a large amount of CO two back in
Speaker 2: the soil. So regenerative agriculture not only produces healthier foods
Speaker 2: and healthier communities, but it also contributes to a healthier
Speaker 2: planet by becoming a key part of our arsenal in
Speaker 2: combating the climate crisis.
Speaker 3: I get asked a lot, and we can answer every question.
Speaker 3: You know, we only fish from the British waters, and
Speaker 3: nothing comes by playing to the River keV except for
Speaker 3: the mozzarella from Naples, you know. And so we're all
Speaker 3: working on this. But how do we make this a
Speaker 3: movement of conscious change?
Speaker 2: Well, it's difficult. Ten Chefs and restaurateurs can play a
Speaker 2: key role in providing information to their customers, contributing to
Speaker 2: their knowledge about where the food comes from and how
Speaker 2: it's prepared. For processed food, there is now a movement
Speaker 2: in some countries to require a labeling of foods. We
Speaker 2: already have it in so many places concerning the nutritional
Speaker 2: content of the food, but now some jurisdictions are requiring
Speaker 2: CO two labeling, which is a big help for those
Speaker 2: of us who are interested in that. And you can't
Speaker 2: go on a detective hunt every time you buy something
Speaker 2: off the shelf or order addition or restaurant. So if
Speaker 2: there is a new standard by which the purveyors of
Speaker 2: food volunteer the provenance of the food and pay attention
Speaker 2: to it and then communicate about it, then that's some
Speaker 2: more general knowledge of how important it is to connect
Speaker 2: to healthy food that's grown in healthy ways.
Speaker 3: I would love to come and see your farm, and
Speaker 3: I think it's so interesting that you are doing this
Speaker 3: and being a vegan, working on your farm, making your
Speaker 3: farm different and showing by example, and as with everything
Speaker 3: you do, I have so much respect for it. And
Speaker 3: I think that apart from being a farmer and a politician,
Speaker 3: I know that you're a really good eater. I do
Speaker 3: know that because I've seen well.
Speaker 2: You know, the way I keep ordering more of your
Speaker 2: food may not be a good standard to go by,
Speaker 2: because you're This will sound like flattery, and I guess
Speaker 2: it is, but it's also true. Your food is delicious,
Speaker 2: so it helps.
Speaker 3: I think the.
Speaker 2: Witnessed me eating a lot of yourn I love it.
Speaker 3: But I think also that Italian food is very Whenever
Speaker 3: we have we have more and more vegans and certainly
Speaker 3: vegetarians coming in, and actually the diet is very healthy.
Speaker 3: It is. You know, when you walk into our restaurant,
Speaker 3: there's always vegetables on the bar, you know, whether they
Speaker 3: are artichids in season ors finished. And I think we
Speaker 3: all go to food for excitement and for communication, as
Speaker 3: you say, for memories of our childhood, and we also
Speaker 3: go to food, I think very often for comfort. And
Speaker 3: so my last question to you is, really, if you
Speaker 3: had to define a certain food that you enjoy eating
Speaker 3: as a food that you go to for comfort, would
Speaker 3: you tell me what that would be.
Speaker 2: I would prefer one of your thin vegan pizzas, yeah,
Speaker 2: accompanied by I don't know the name of the dish,
Speaker 2: but it's fried zucchini.
Speaker 3: String ki flowers.
Speaker 2: Yeah, zucchini flowers. That's what I always start with at
Speaker 2: River Cafe. And I was alerted that you might ask
Speaker 2: about my favorite comfort food, and honestly, that is what
Speaker 2: immediately sprang to mind.
Speaker 3: Well, it's always there for you, comfort or not, whatever
Speaker 3: is needed. Thank you so much again, and much love
Speaker 3: to you. Thank you well.
Speaker 2: You have a standing invitation to come and visit Canny
Speaker 2: four Farms here in Tennessee. Would love to host you
Speaker 2: and look forward to seeing you in person at the
Speaker 2: River Cafe soon.
Speaker 3: Thank you, so much, so much, love to you, Thank you.
Speaker 3: This holiday season. If you can't come to the River Cafe,
Speaker 3: the River Cafe will come to you. Our beautiful gift
Speaker 3: boxes are full of ingredients we cook with and design
Speaker 3: objects we have in our homes. River Cafe Olive oil,
Speaker 3: Tuscan chocolates, Venetian glasses of Florentine Christmas cake made in
Speaker 3: our pastry kitchen and more. We ship them everywhere. To
Speaker 3: find out more or to place your visit, shop Therivercafe
Speaker 3: dot co dot uk.
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