WEBVTT - J.J. Martin 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:00.440 J. J. 0:00:00.640 --> 0:00:04.320 Martin and I, though years apart, have had parallel lives 0:00:04.720 --> 0:00:08.080 where women New Yorkers who left there to live abroad 0:00:08.119 --> 0:00:12.640 for a short time for love and stayed forever for love. 0:00:12.920 --> 0:00:16.919 Mine was for Richard Rogers. Hers was for Andrea Chicoli 0:00:17.320 --> 0:00:21.200 and the magic of everything Italian. A friend once told 0:00:21.239 --> 0:00:23.919 me that living in a foreign city makes you creative, 0:00:24.280 --> 0:00:28.920 even if you do nothing all day. But creativity defines J. J. Martin, 0:00:28.960 --> 0:00:32.400 and she definitely does not do nothing all day, though 0:00:32.440 --> 0:00:35.120 she claims since moving to Milan, she is surrendered into 0:00:35.159 --> 0:00:37.760 the beautiful chaos that is Italy and through a rigor 0:00:37.840 --> 0:00:41.000 and discipline, created a brilliant business La Double Jay, the 0:00:41.080 --> 0:00:44.680 fashion design and lifestyle brand. We have much in common, 0:00:44.880 --> 0:00:47.800 strong values in our workspace, respect for the people we 0:00:47.960 --> 0:00:51.000 deal with every day, and a passion for color. A 0:00:51.080 --> 0:00:54.520 passion for beauty. May be a few different things too. 0:00:54.760 --> 0:00:57.880 JJ is a maximalist, while I'm probably more of a mineralist. 0:00:58.080 --> 0:01:02.320 She loves vintage clothing. I've never worn anything anyone else 0:01:02.400 --> 0:01:05.640 is worn. But today we'll share our parallel lives, our 0:01:05.680 --> 0:01:09.600 love for Italy, our love for food, our love for fashion, beauty. 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:11.920 And I am confident that by the end of our 0:01:11.959 --> 0:01:14.360 time together, we will add our love for a new 0:01:14.360 --> 0:01:16.559 friendship and a love for each other. 0:01:17.040 --> 0:01:21.160 How beautiful. I love that introduction. I'm honored. 0:01:21.400 --> 0:01:23.720 It's so nice because we both know of each other 0:01:23.760 --> 0:01:26.280 through friends, which is always the great connection. I always 0:01:26.319 --> 0:01:29.440 think life is about connections. Maybe we could start by 0:01:30.120 --> 0:01:33.000 your reading a recipe that you chose and it comes 0:01:33.040 --> 0:01:35.240 from I think our River Cafe easy book. But it 0:01:35.280 --> 0:01:37.760 is a really great that you chose this recipe now 0:01:37.760 --> 0:01:41.360 because it is very seasonal with a ridicio. It's creamy 0:01:41.400 --> 0:01:43.240 and warm and what we kind of need right now. 0:01:43.280 --> 0:01:45.360 So would you like to read the rest of love? 0:01:45.480 --> 0:01:49.800 To read? Proshutto and ridicio taliate l three hundred and 0:01:49.840 --> 0:01:54.600 fifty grams of taliatel, six slices of perscutto one head 0:01:54.640 --> 0:01:59.120 of ridicio, one garlic clove, peeled and finally chopped, two 0:01:59.600 --> 0:02:04.040 tea zions of rosemary leaves finely chopped, fifty grams of 0:02:04.120 --> 0:02:10.000 parmesan rigiano grated, one hundred and ten grams of unsalted butter. 0:02:11.240 --> 0:02:13.239 So what you do is you cut the perscutto and 0:02:13.320 --> 0:02:17.000 ridicio into ribbons that are the same with as the telatele. 0:02:17.760 --> 0:02:20.640 You melt half the butter in a thick bottomed pan. 0:02:21.520 --> 0:02:23.520 You add the garlic and rosemary and you cook for 0:02:23.560 --> 0:02:27.560 a minute. Then add half the chopped redicio and proscutto 0:02:28.000 --> 0:02:30.880 and you cook it just to wilt. Then you cook 0:02:30.919 --> 0:02:35.560 the taliately and boiled salted water until al dente. Drain 0:02:35.880 --> 0:02:38.160 and add the rest of the butter and half the parmesan. 0:02:38.960 --> 0:02:42.360 Combine with the cooked ridicio, then stir in the remaining 0:02:42.400 --> 0:02:46.480 ridicuo and procutto, toss thoroughly and serve with parmigiano. 0:02:46.639 --> 0:02:50.840 Hmm, thank you. So you've said that cooking in Italy 0:02:51.440 --> 0:02:55.520 is an art, not a science, and you can pat 0:02:55.600 --> 0:02:58.160 to get laughed out of town? Will to use a cookbook? 0:02:58.200 --> 0:02:59.440 Can you talk to me about that? 0:03:00.040 --> 0:03:02.040 So I moved to Italy in two thousand and one. 0:03:02.160 --> 0:03:07.200 I had no friends, no family, no job, no smartphone, 0:03:07.240 --> 0:03:11.960 no wireless. I was lost and I had no cooking skills. 0:03:12.080 --> 0:03:14.600 And back at that time, there was really no takeout 0:03:14.600 --> 0:03:17.040 food whatsoever. If you wanted to get anything taken out, 0:03:17.040 --> 0:03:19.680 you would get a pizza. Otherwise everyone was either in 0:03:19.720 --> 0:03:23.639 a restaurant or at their home cooking. And I went 0:03:23.680 --> 0:03:27.400 into a panic. I went into my overachieving American mode 0:03:27.440 --> 0:03:30.000 of needing to like conquer this like I did everything 0:03:30.040 --> 0:03:33.320 else in my life. So I ordered the Dean and 0:03:33.360 --> 0:03:37.800 DeLuca Cookbook online, which was sort of my only reference 0:03:37.880 --> 0:03:40.520 point of like, how you know how to make some 0:03:40.560 --> 0:03:44.200 Italian food? And I was reading this cookbook like a 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:47.480 novel every night. I was taking notes, and I was 0:03:47.680 --> 0:03:51.520 practicing recipes from this book, not knowing that it was 0:03:51.600 --> 0:03:54.960 the least Italian kind of book I could have ever 0:03:55.080 --> 0:03:59.560 been working from, because each recipe had forty five ingredients 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:03.760 and would take two and a half hours, and I 0:04:03.840 --> 0:04:07.840 didn't It wasn't until I really started watching the Italians 0:04:08.360 --> 0:04:13.000 and being part of their environment that I realized that, 0:04:13.400 --> 0:04:16.880 first of all, no one cooks from a recipe. Everyone 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:20.720 has learned from their mother or grandmother, and even if 0:04:20.760 --> 0:04:23.640 they do kind of have like a you know, a 0:04:23.680 --> 0:04:26.760 basis of a recipe, the whole idea is to really 0:04:26.880 --> 0:04:29.839 let your intuition take over and let the magic and 0:04:30.000 --> 0:04:33.000 real creativity come over. And it was so funny because 0:04:33.080 --> 0:04:34.560 you know, in these ear it took a long time 0:04:34.560 --> 0:04:36.320 for me to learn this. I've been in Italy twenty 0:04:36.320 --> 0:04:37.839 two years now, but I would say like my first 0:04:37.880 --> 0:04:40.359 ten years I was still in this place of like 0:04:40.880 --> 0:04:44.200 really trying to understand food. I did take one cooking 0:04:44.240 --> 0:04:47.400 class at a Tellian restaurant down on then a video 0:04:47.520 --> 0:04:52.360 called Tano pasa milolo, and I was at this you know, 0:04:52.520 --> 0:04:57.960 table with like fourteen housewives, not understanding that this was 0:04:58.040 --> 0:05:01.120 not a beginner's cooking thing, like the these women knew 0:05:01.120 --> 0:05:03.880 how to cook and and and so he would always 0:05:03.920 --> 0:05:06.000 say the beginning of the recipe was like found a krema, 0:05:06.040 --> 0:05:07.880 find a crema, And I was like, what's a crema? 0:05:07.960 --> 0:05:09.320 How do you fire it on akrema? 0:05:09.440 --> 0:05:11.200 Like I didn't want to do anything. 0:05:11.880 --> 0:05:15.359 And he would give us these sheets where the recipe 0:05:15.440 --> 0:05:18.680 the ingredients were written down and there was no quantity, 0:05:18.839 --> 0:05:22.919 no method, method, No, there was no well maybe a 0:05:22.960 --> 0:05:26.880 little bit of method, but very approximate and literally no quantities. 0:05:26.920 --> 0:05:29.520 So the funny thing about this recipe of reading this 0:05:29.560 --> 0:05:33.159 pursuit from Ridikio, it is a very Italian recipe except 0:05:33.160 --> 0:05:35.080 for the fact that you've included quantities. 0:05:35.160 --> 0:05:38.360 Yeah yeah, but you know, I think that it's really 0:05:38.480 --> 0:05:42.760 endearing that you got Dinan DeLuca cookbook because I think 0:05:42.800 --> 0:05:46.400 that if you don't know how to cook and really 0:05:46.440 --> 0:05:48.720 want to follow a recipe. Then it gives you the 0:05:48.720 --> 0:05:52.600 confidence too to go away. It's like fashion, it's like drawing, 0:05:52.640 --> 0:05:56.200 it's like poetry. You can't write free poetry unless you 0:05:56.240 --> 0:05:59.159 know the rigor of a Shakespeare's sauna. Then you can depart. 0:05:59.279 --> 0:06:02.320 So maybe, unless you have a mother or father maybe 0:06:02.360 --> 0:06:04.839 who taught you to cook every day in your house, 0:06:05.080 --> 0:06:07.960 as you say you're Italian friends, following a recipe and 0:06:07.960 --> 0:06:10.039 then leaving it maybe is okay. 0:06:10.279 --> 0:06:12.560 Yeah, I think it gives you the muscles and the 0:06:12.600 --> 0:06:15.960 training wheels, and just the comfort around being in a kitchen, 0:06:16.279 --> 0:06:21.200 around preparing ingredients, around seeing how you know, oil at 0:06:21.240 --> 0:06:25.520 different temperatures changes, you know, even cooking vegetables. I mean, 0:06:25.560 --> 0:06:28.040 it's the other thing I find really interesting. I was 0:06:28.080 --> 0:06:32.760 reminded as I was reading your recipe here. Italian recipes 0:06:32.760 --> 0:06:35.520 are known for their simplicity, but at the same time, 0:06:35.560 --> 0:06:38.560 there's two things that I've learned that are essential. Number 0:06:38.600 --> 0:06:41.800 one is the quality of the ingredients. Because there's so few, 0:06:41.920 --> 0:06:46.560 you can't masquerade anything. So if you don't have incredible quality, 0:06:46.640 --> 0:06:50.159 ridicu And by the way, I highly recommend Treviso. It's 0:06:50.160 --> 0:06:53.839 the best less bitter, but you know, you need to 0:06:53.880 --> 0:06:56.560 have the best better, the best parmigano, the best rosemary. 0:06:56.640 --> 0:07:01.280 Otherwise nothing's happening. And the other thing is technique. So 0:07:01.440 --> 0:07:05.440 the fact that you are, you know, adding half, you're 0:07:05.640 --> 0:07:08.560 adding the vegetables at different times, you're cooking them a 0:07:08.600 --> 0:07:12.480 different it's not as sort of there's a there's an 0:07:12.640 --> 0:07:16.120 art really to the way they prepare it that is 0:07:16.680 --> 0:07:17.440 really important. 0:07:17.520 --> 0:07:20.120 I totally agree with you about Italian food that I 0:07:20.240 --> 0:07:22.560 lived in Paris for five years, six years when my 0:07:22.640 --> 0:07:25.520 husband is doing a project there and then, and I 0:07:25.560 --> 0:07:28.040 love French food. I love a sauce. I love finding that, 0:07:28.120 --> 0:07:29.960 you know, a piece of turbot under a bar of black. 0:07:30.320 --> 0:07:32.680 But then you go to Italy and the first meal 0:07:32.680 --> 0:07:36.320 I had was a piece of toast bisquetta with a 0:07:36.320 --> 0:07:39.360 little bit of garlic and then the olive oil. And 0:07:39.400 --> 0:07:42.440 that was three ingredients. But had any one of them 0:07:42.640 --> 0:07:47.120 been any less interesting or of the quality, it wouldn't 0:07:47.120 --> 0:07:48.000 have worked totally. 0:07:48.400 --> 0:07:50.600 And it's so funny you bring up France because one 0:07:50.600 --> 0:07:52.400 thing that I was so surprised about when I moved 0:07:52.400 --> 0:07:58.440 to Italy was how proud Italians are of their cuisine. 0:07:59.080 --> 0:08:03.000 And they're quite close minded to other cuisines, so you 0:08:03.080 --> 0:08:06.080 never want to travel with an Italian outside of the 0:08:06.120 --> 0:08:08.960 Italian borders because they're complaining about the food the entire time. 0:08:09.400 --> 0:08:11.960 And the other thing, which I find so funny is 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:16.880 no matter how good it is, French food sucks. They 0:08:17.280 --> 0:08:21.080 hate French food and they are and they and one 0:08:21.080 --> 0:08:24.000 of the reasons why they tell me, because I really 0:08:24.000 --> 0:08:28.440 got curious about this. They don't like a sauce unless 0:08:28.440 --> 0:08:31.080 it's on a pasta, and then it can't be too sauce. 0:08:31.240 --> 0:08:32.880 It has to be the right amount of sauce. Like 0:08:32.920 --> 0:08:36.240 so most Americans tend to oversauce and overcook their pasta, 0:08:36.920 --> 0:08:39.240 you know. So these are just all these like small subtleties. 0:08:39.280 --> 0:08:41.320 But like for example, an Italian would never put a 0:08:41.360 --> 0:08:44.680 sauce on a meat. That's a big no no. So 0:08:44.720 --> 0:08:46.800 it's just funny. Or even a fish. They don't use 0:08:46.880 --> 0:08:47.880 sauces generally. 0:08:47.960 --> 0:08:51.720 When you have misto, you have the sauce of Verde. 0:08:52.080 --> 0:08:58.320 But they're very they're very specific yea in general. But 0:08:58.320 --> 0:09:00.640 if you have a great piece of fish, they have 0:09:00.720 --> 0:09:02.400 SESSI here it is one of the chefs in the 0:09:02.480 --> 0:09:04.760 River Cafe, and you know, if it's as you said, 0:09:04.760 --> 0:09:06.800 it's a great piece of grilled sea beast. Why would 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:08.120 you do anything more? 0:09:08.440 --> 0:09:10.600 Yeah, And that's the I mean, this is what's so 0:09:10.720 --> 0:09:16.839 amazing about Italy is they distill everything down to raw 0:09:17.280 --> 0:09:21.840 its purest state, So you know, you just want the 0:09:21.960 --> 0:09:28.120 crispness of the lemon and the juicy fragrance of the 0:09:28.120 --> 0:09:29.680 olive oil. I mean, the other thing that I got 0:09:29.679 --> 0:09:33.280 there was an education in olive oil. Who knew, you know, 0:09:33.360 --> 0:09:35.600 the guy who I was referring to before about where 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:38.319 I was taking the cooking classes. His restaurant was called 0:09:38.360 --> 0:09:41.920 Tano Paseloyo and you walked in and he had probably 0:09:42.040 --> 0:09:46.640 four hundred olive oils lining every wall of the restaurant 0:09:47.040 --> 0:09:51.720 and he was an expert at pairing. People would go 0:09:51.760 --> 0:09:53.800 to his restaurant because there would be a different olive 0:09:53.840 --> 0:09:58.079 oil paired with every plate daily and it was this 0:09:58.160 --> 0:10:01.720 wonderful symphony that is such a subtletya that you develop. 0:10:01.760 --> 0:10:03.760 But once you get rid of I mean, I think 0:10:03.800 --> 0:10:05.920 it's a really good metaphor for life, Like once you 0:10:05.960 --> 0:10:09.559 get rid of all the noise, then suddenly your senses 0:10:09.760 --> 0:10:14.280 are so much more tuned, and then you're really seeing 0:10:14.280 --> 0:10:16.440 the beauty of something so simple as an oil. 0:10:16.920 --> 0:10:19.520 Just to go back from your incredible palette and your 0:10:20.080 --> 0:10:23.720 interest in food and Italy and ingredients and the way 0:10:23.760 --> 0:10:26.199 to cook. Growing up. We grew up in Los Angeles, Yes, 0:10:26.240 --> 0:10:28.280 I grew up in Tell me about early life and 0:10:28.400 --> 0:10:29.760 the Martin household. 0:10:29.800 --> 0:10:32.520 Okay, well I do remember the spaghetti sauce my mom 0:10:32.520 --> 0:10:33.280 put ketchup in. 0:10:36.080 --> 0:10:39.360 Yeah, okay. We had a. 0:10:39.400 --> 0:10:45.559 Very food centric household because we were all athletes and 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:50.439 there was copious amounts of food being made and consumed. 0:10:50.480 --> 0:10:52.760 So my mom actually did make a lot of stuff. 0:10:53.360 --> 0:10:55.400 My dad was a hunter and a fisherman, so our 0:10:55.440 --> 0:11:01.720 freezers were stocked with dove, quail, dove, dear, yeah, bore. 0:11:02.520 --> 0:11:04.439 I mean. The thing is he would go out hunting 0:11:04.440 --> 0:11:06.200 and bring it all back and we would eat this 0:11:06.240 --> 0:11:09.120 stuff for a long time. It was never really my fake. 0:11:09.400 --> 0:11:10.839 Did you ever go hunting with him? 0:11:11.040 --> 0:11:13.880 I did? I did, and then I just didn't want 0:11:13.920 --> 0:11:17.040 to kill animals. Just wasn't my thing, so I would 0:11:17.160 --> 0:11:19.280 hang out. I have two older brothers. They were really 0:11:19.320 --> 0:11:22.200 into this. So I went on a lot of camping, fishing, 0:11:22.360 --> 0:11:26.480 hunting trips as a as a young girl and wasn't 0:11:26.520 --> 0:11:26.920 into it. 0:11:27.160 --> 0:11:30.480 Yeah, and being athletes, do they want protein or carbs 0:11:30.600 --> 0:11:31.400 or this was. 0:11:32.840 --> 0:11:35.080 This was before knowing that like they needed to have 0:11:35.120 --> 0:11:38.280 the right balance between protein and carbs. They were just starving. 0:11:38.480 --> 0:11:41.400 I remember so well that, you know, we would all 0:11:41.440 --> 0:11:43.440 come back from whatever I was in gymnastics, they were 0:11:43.440 --> 0:11:45.640 in volleyball. We would all come back at like ten pm, 0:11:46.040 --> 0:11:48.640 and we've already had like four meals by that point. 0:11:48.720 --> 0:11:51.600 Because my mom used to pack our dinners. We would 0:11:51.640 --> 0:11:55.360 have Stouffers frozen food that would be put in a 0:11:55.400 --> 0:11:59.680 thermos and that we would eat before practice and you know, 0:11:59.840 --> 0:12:02.280 like at four o'clock or five o'clock, and then we'd 0:12:02.320 --> 0:12:03.960 have another meal when we came home. We were eating 0:12:03.960 --> 0:12:04.719 like four times a day. 0:12:04.760 --> 0:12:06.319 As a gymnast as well as a. 0:12:06.280 --> 0:12:09.160 Gymnast, I was eating just fun of food. 0:12:09.280 --> 0:12:11.160 Did you have to keep you away at a certain 0:12:11.240 --> 0:12:11.959 level or that. 0:12:12.160 --> 0:12:13.960 Well, the thing was I was twice as large as 0:12:14.000 --> 0:12:16.160 every other gymnast because I was so tall, and I 0:12:16.160 --> 0:12:19.600 mean I was literally eight inches taller than most people, 0:12:19.800 --> 0:12:21.960 and you know, you're working. I was working out three 0:12:22.000 --> 0:12:26.000 hours every day, six days a week, and that that's 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:28.960 wasn't seasonal, it was all year round. So I did 0:12:28.960 --> 0:12:31.160 that for about nine years. So it's just an incredible 0:12:31.200 --> 0:12:32.680 amount of calories that you're burning. 0:12:33.000 --> 0:12:34.240 How old were you when you started? 0:12:34.360 --> 0:12:38.120 I started the like the hardcore club gymnastics at nine 0:12:38.200 --> 0:12:42.080 years old, and then I finished when I was eighteen. Yeah, 0:12:42.120 --> 0:12:45.000 so it was really intense. And I and I, you know, 0:12:45.080 --> 0:12:49.120 I went to an all girls' high school, also very regress, 0:12:49.200 --> 0:12:54.360 so I had this upbringing that was very tight. And 0:12:54.400 --> 0:12:56.920 that's also has been such a wonderful thing that I 0:12:57.040 --> 0:12:59.040 that I explore in this in this book. The mom 0:12:59.080 --> 0:13:04.360 I mean Lano about out the loosening, the softening, the relaxing, 0:13:04.720 --> 0:13:06.960 because I really didn't learn that from a from an 0:13:07.000 --> 0:13:09.880 early age. And you know, taking back to food, it 0:13:09.960 --> 0:13:12.560 was not relaxing while we ate because everyone was scared 0:13:12.600 --> 0:13:14.200 that it was all going to be gone, so we 0:13:14.200 --> 0:13:16.720 were all like fighting and grabbing for the food. So 0:13:16.760 --> 0:13:20.800 it wasn't this like long, luxurious, you know, relaxing moment. 0:13:20.840 --> 0:13:23.400 It was like, yeah, you was scarfing it down. 0:13:24.760 --> 0:13:25.680 Did your father cook? 0:13:26.559 --> 0:13:28.400 Was there an My dad barbecued? 0:13:28.600 --> 0:13:32.360 Yeah, that's the thing. Men barbecue, and yeah that's how 0:13:32.360 --> 0:13:33.040 I often. 0:13:33.040 --> 0:13:37.280 And my mom would make really nice stuffings for the meats. 0:13:37.280 --> 0:13:39.000 Like I didn't eat the meat so much I'm not 0:13:39.080 --> 0:13:41.720 into game, and actually, now it's so funny. I know 0:13:41.800 --> 0:13:44.520 I chose this don ride kio tellie I've I've since 0:13:44.559 --> 0:13:48.640 become a vegetarian, so I really don't eat meat or fish. 0:13:49.080 --> 0:13:55.479 But this recipe was my first and favorite from your cookbook, 0:13:56.120 --> 0:13:58.400 and it was one that I did so many times 0:13:58.440 --> 0:14:00.360 and it was so easy, and I was like, this 0:14:00.440 --> 0:14:02.240 is Italian cooking. That's I wanted to share it. 0:14:02.320 --> 0:14:05.040 You can actually have it without the pashuoter. You can 0:14:05.080 --> 0:14:07.600 make it now. We do it a lot the ridicio, 0:14:08.320 --> 0:14:11.480 but sometimes we do a sefrito with the ridico, so 0:14:11.520 --> 0:14:13.960 we put a bit of you know, I can really 0:14:13.960 --> 0:14:16.040 cook it down and then and then. 0:14:15.920 --> 0:14:17.640 You know what I would add maybe if I was 0:14:17.679 --> 0:14:21.520 doing vegetarian, I would add some toasted pine nuts and 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:24.680 maybe just a tiny bit of for modrole, like even 0:14:24.920 --> 0:14:28.080 another for modrole, just to like it. I mean depends, 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:29.360 but I think it's a great rest. 0:14:29.440 --> 0:14:31.280 Do you want to say something about do you never 0:14:31.360 --> 0:14:32.920 made this recipe in the river carefoe? 0:14:33.000 --> 0:14:33.360 I have? 0:14:34.280 --> 0:14:34.720 I love. 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:41.800 Sounding very English. What I love is that the ridicule 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:44.720 is the same shape as the pasta. Yeah, and so 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:47.760 you have like this mouthful and you can't quite differentiate 0:14:47.840 --> 0:14:49.840 which part is which, but it all sort of is 0:14:49.840 --> 0:14:52.280 the same shape and it's so delicious when it all 0:14:52.280 --> 0:14:52.880 comes together. 0:14:53.320 --> 0:14:55.560 And that is exactly one of the things that I 0:14:55.600 --> 0:14:57.600 was saying. It's like, you can have all the same ingredients, 0:14:57.640 --> 0:14:59.800 but it's about how you prep it. It's how you 0:15:00.680 --> 0:15:03.760 exactly these very simple subtleties that make all the difference. 0:15:03.880 --> 0:15:06.160 Yeah, and as long as the ingredients are the freshest 0:15:06.200 --> 0:15:08.680 and the most beautiful, which we have hit the River Cafe, 0:15:09.120 --> 0:15:12.720 it just transforms the dish completely, makes it something really special. 0:15:13.120 --> 0:15:15.920 Is that the ment. I still can't believe Sassy is 0:15:15.920 --> 0:15:16.680 a telling me because our. 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:20.600 English is so It was amazing when you left this 0:15:20.720 --> 0:15:23.640 home of family meals and your mother cooking and your 0:15:23.720 --> 0:15:27.280 dad barbecuing and hunting and fishing and you know, shooting, 0:15:27.400 --> 0:15:33.840 not fashion nothing. But then you went to university. 0:15:33.960 --> 0:15:34.720 I went to Berkeley. 0:15:34.760 --> 0:15:38.560 You went to Berkeley, and that was a big change 0:15:38.560 --> 0:15:40.480 in terms of food for you did it well. 0:15:40.520 --> 0:15:43.640 Unfortunately, I didn't know who Alice Waters was at that time, 0:15:43.680 --> 0:15:46.600 and I didn't you know, I wasn't you know, probably 0:15:46.600 --> 0:15:50.040 in the position to go eat there. But the food 0:15:50.240 --> 0:15:54.520 was quite sophisticated, even just around Berkeley. I remember, you know, 0:15:54.560 --> 0:15:56.400 I lived in a sorority house, so we actually had 0:15:56.440 --> 0:15:59.400 these buffets of wonderful food and there was an incredible 0:15:59.400 --> 0:16:02.960 cook there. I've always been a baker, like that was 0:16:03.000 --> 0:16:05.560 something that I knew from a young age. My mom 0:16:05.640 --> 0:16:07.480 was baking a lot. She made a lot of really 0:16:07.480 --> 0:16:11.440 great desserts. So the cook at our slaty house would 0:16:11.440 --> 0:16:16.000 always be making these wonderful homemade American cookies that I 0:16:16.080 --> 0:16:18.880 now cannot find in Italy if my life depended on. 0:16:18.840 --> 0:16:19.920 It, Like what which one? 0:16:20.080 --> 0:16:26.400 Just like just any chocolate, chewy, yes, ginger, molasses, oatmeal, raisin, 0:16:26.640 --> 0:16:29.640 all of those like that, the chewiness and the sort 0:16:29.680 --> 0:16:34.000 of softness brown sugar is an ingredient that just doesn't 0:16:34.000 --> 0:16:36.240 seem to exist in Italy the way we use it 0:16:36.280 --> 0:16:39.120 in American in the UK, and they don't use as 0:16:39.200 --> 0:16:42.440 much butter. I noticed Italians in general, so I would 0:16:42.480 --> 0:16:45.320 say the only kind of food group that's missing for 0:16:45.440 --> 0:16:46.920 me in Italy are the desserts. 0:16:46.960 --> 0:16:49.520 Really Yeah, well, Italians I always you know, we always 0:16:49.560 --> 0:16:52.800 say Italians have their cakes for breakfast in there, ice 0:16:52.880 --> 0:16:55.520 cream on the streets and then an espress for a dessert. 0:16:55.800 --> 0:16:59.360 You know, you're so right. And I've been in homes 0:16:59.480 --> 0:17:02.440 where the food is so good and then they'll bring 0:17:02.480 --> 0:17:05.920 out one of those kind of custardy pies with the 0:17:05.920 --> 0:17:08.280 custard and then the food on the top, and you think, 0:17:08.320 --> 0:17:11.240 what relationship does this have to do with the most 0:17:11.280 --> 0:17:13.919 amazing pasta sauce. We just they don't. They do not. 0:17:14.720 --> 0:17:18.800 Actually, there's there's I have two small complaints with Italian cuisine. 0:17:19.000 --> 0:17:20.800 Is one is the desserts and one is the bread. 0:17:21.240 --> 0:17:24.480 Oh yeah, well you're not even in Tuscany. Wait, you 0:17:24.520 --> 0:17:27.800 get to Tuscany and there's no. 0:17:27.680 --> 0:17:30.160 I mean, it's like a cardboard. It's a piece of cardboard. 0:17:30.280 --> 0:17:30.879 It's susy. 0:17:30.960 --> 0:17:32.720 Jump in tell us. 0:17:32.760 --> 0:17:35.040 What's nice though, is it's kind of like a vessel, 0:17:35.480 --> 0:17:37.639 so it can carry whatever you put on it. So 0:17:37.680 --> 0:17:41.000 if it has no taste, So when you taste the 0:17:41.040 --> 0:17:46.720 new oils, yeah put them on that bridge. It's catches, 0:17:46.760 --> 0:17:49.480 the sort of more salty or colta. 0:17:49.200 --> 0:17:52.080 Is wonderful, but it's not bread. There's sometimes when I 0:17:52.160 --> 0:17:53.879 just miss bread and butter. 0:17:54.160 --> 0:17:54.680 Yeah butter. 0:17:54.840 --> 0:17:57.440 I love butter. And it's not a cult. We don't have. 0:17:57.640 --> 0:17:59.560 There's not a culture for that. And there are certain 0:17:59.600 --> 0:18:03.560 things that I learned. You know, one of the messages 0:18:03.600 --> 0:18:06.359 of this book that I wrote was surrendering to what 0:18:06.560 --> 0:18:09.080 is in Italy instead of always looking at what was 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:10.760 not there. And at the beginning, I was like, where 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:14.080 are the avocados, where's the cilantro, where's my non fat milk? 0:18:15.119 --> 0:18:16.960 Yeah, you know, it's trying to find all these things. 0:18:16.960 --> 0:18:18.399 Where's my butter, where's my good bread? 0:18:18.960 --> 0:18:21.800 And what I realized, so much of the exercise of 0:18:22.000 --> 0:18:27.959 living and embracing Italy is just allowing yourself to melt 0:18:28.240 --> 0:18:30.720 into the wonder and the magic and the beauty that 0:18:30.920 --> 0:18:34.159 is there, because once you do that, you will be 0:18:34.320 --> 0:18:37.040 rocket shipped off the planet into ecstasy. It's amazing. 0:18:37.200 --> 0:18:39.919 I should probably say that with most travel you know 0:18:40.040 --> 0:18:43.640 that living in another country that you do is Mexico, 0:18:43.800 --> 0:18:48.040 or if you were in China or Japan that you 0:18:48.040 --> 0:18:50.200 you know, as you say surrender. I think it's really 0:18:50.200 --> 0:18:52.639 interesting the way I use the word surrender so often, 0:18:52.760 --> 0:18:55.359 and I really had to learn it, and it's and 0:18:55.400 --> 0:18:58.160 you use it in a very energetic and positive way 0:18:58.280 --> 0:19:01.160 rather than giving up. You know, it's not you know, 0:19:01.440 --> 0:19:05.280 in military terms, you're surrendered by it. You giving them 0:19:05.320 --> 0:19:09.520 your flag and we've surrendered. Whereas you're using surrender as embracing, 0:19:09.560 --> 0:19:12.200 I would say, much more embracing the culture that you're 0:19:12.240 --> 0:19:14.800 living in. Talk to me more about the book and 0:19:14.840 --> 0:19:16.600 talk to me what you would try. Because it's so 0:19:16.600 --> 0:19:17.480 it's so funny, you know. 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:20.560 I when I first started my company, lit Double Ja 0:19:20.600 --> 0:19:23.560 in twenty fifteen, I was selling my collection of vintage clothing, 0:19:23.600 --> 0:19:25.560 and I was showing it on all of the creative 0:19:25.560 --> 0:19:28.239 women in Milan, the women that I you know, as 0:19:28.280 --> 0:19:30.600 a journalist for fifteen years. They didn't want me writing 0:19:30.640 --> 0:19:32.879 about those women. They wanted me interviewing George Romani and 0:19:32.960 --> 0:19:35.879 dul Jingobana and the advertisers. But I had found that 0:19:35.920 --> 0:19:42.000 there was this like incredible cluster of the most creative, cool, 0:19:43.400 --> 0:19:49.240 shockingly adept housemakers in Milan. Like I couldn't believe that 0:19:49.240 --> 0:19:52.040 they were these women that had these incredible creative careers 0:19:52.080 --> 0:19:56.119 and that could still turn out dinner beautifully or entertaining flawlessly. 0:19:56.440 --> 0:19:59.960 Their homes were decorated incredibly, everything, even their pantry clas 0:20:00.080 --> 0:20:01.840 it's were amazing, and there was so much to learn 0:20:01.880 --> 0:20:04.240 from them. And I launched the website. I had this 0:20:04.280 --> 0:20:06.439 whole section on you know how to live like an 0:20:06.480 --> 0:20:08.960 Italian and the school of shura. A shura is an 0:20:08.960 --> 0:20:12.720 Italian or a Milanaise housewife, which these women were not housewives, 0:20:12.720 --> 0:20:15.000 but they had all the like the tools, and they 0:20:15.000 --> 0:20:19.120 had all the techniques. And at the time, well, they're 0:20:19.119 --> 0:20:19.880 well staffed. 0:20:20.160 --> 0:20:22.280 That's I was going to wait for that. They're well 0:20:22.320 --> 0:20:25.440 staffed laws because I think to do that, to work 0:20:25.480 --> 0:20:28.640 all day and then do all that they know how to. 0:20:28.680 --> 0:20:29.720 It's a division of power. 0:20:29.760 --> 0:20:32.040 But like you know what I've also learned as having 0:20:32.080 --> 0:20:34.600 a company, so much of that is understanding, like what 0:20:34.640 --> 0:20:37.000 you can farm out to others, like what should be 0:20:37.160 --> 0:20:40.879 your own purview and what you can share with others. 0:20:40.960 --> 0:20:44.240