Speaker 1: You're listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.
Speaker 1: When I started the River Cafe with Rose Gray in
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty seven, I was told over and over how
Speaker 1: cutthroat it would be. Danny Meyer convinced me otherwise. Opening
Speaker 1: Union Square Cafe and Gramercy Tavern in New York more
Speaker 1: than thirty years ago, he proved values matter. One could
Speaker 1: not only treat staff with respect they deserve, but make
Speaker 1: customers happy, happier, as we always say, when they leave
Speaker 1: than when they arrived. What surprised us all was that
Speaker 1: for his next act, Danny launched Shakeshack in two thousand
Speaker 1: and one, a hot dog stand in Madison Park. The rest,
Speaker 1: as they say, is history. Today, when I have a
Speaker 1: question about fair policies for the people who work with us,
Speaker 1: or how to think about expanding or contracting the River Cafe,
Speaker 1: or whether it be possible to do exchanges with our
Speaker 1: best chefs, I called Danny.
Speaker 2: My heart just melted right back at you. In so
Speaker 2: many ways. I turned to you as my touchdown for taste.
Speaker 1: There we are, and we're on well eighteenth floor. The
Speaker 1: most incredible view to be in New York is to
Speaker 1: be high. People love Soho and they love Greenwich Village.
Speaker 1: I want to get hot. I was going to say,
Speaker 1: I want to get high when I come to New York.
Speaker 1: But for me being high as the great luxury. We're
Speaker 1: here surrounded, of course, no surprise by food. Amazing doughnuts,
Speaker 1: would you calls?
Speaker 2: Yes, from Daily Provisions.
Speaker 1: From Daily Provisions. And we have ice cream from Danny
Speaker 1: Meyer's daughter, Hayley, and she makes great food, great ice cream,
Speaker 1: and she cooked in the River Cafe. She came and
Speaker 1: worked with us, so she's part of the family. Now,
Speaker 1: do you want to tell us about the ice cream?
Speaker 2: Yeah, let's actually you know what I want to do.
Speaker 2: I want to tell you about the crullers because this
Speaker 2: ice cream is going to temper for al times, okay,
Speaker 2: and we can we can open them and help that
Speaker 2: process go. But the crullers are pretty much the signature
Speaker 2: item at a restaurant called Daily Provisions, which we opened
Speaker 2: about six years ago right next door to Unions to
Speaker 2: the brand new Union Square Cafe. When we had to
Speaker 2: move it after thirty years, we have this extra little space.
Speaker 2: We didn't know what to do with it, and we said,
Speaker 2: let's give a gift to the neighborhood. And what did
Speaker 2: the neighborhood need? We said, a better cup of coffee,
Speaker 2: a really good bacon, egg and cheese sandwich, a really
Speaker 2: good donut, and a good roast chicken for dinner. And
Speaker 2: that's daily Provisions. And the Cruller is the only donut
Speaker 2: we serve. And Ruthie, if you don't think that's one
Speaker 2: of the top three donuts you've ever had, I just
Speaker 2: want I won't keep talking on this podcast, so I
Speaker 2: want you to cut yourself some of that.
Speaker 1: So tell me about clers, because tell me about donuts.
Speaker 1: It's not my great knowledge donuts.
Speaker 2: Doughnuts are often cakey. This, as you will taste on
Speaker 2: one bite, is not cakey at all. In fact, it's
Speaker 2: quite aggy. And what I love about the cinnamon crawler,
Speaker 2: we only make three different kinds. We make, a maple croller,
Speaker 2: a cinnamon croller is it's crunchy on the outside and
Speaker 2: it's almost your take a bite because it's better if
Speaker 2: you try it than if I describe it. Here we go,
Speaker 2: So croller.
Speaker 1: As I said, I'm not the nash and the cultural
Speaker 1: heritage thing.
Speaker 2: Come on, show me what you got.
Speaker 1: Mlichio's first from anybody on this podcast has actually given
Speaker 1: me something to eat. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2: This is delicious good. It's almost like God.
Speaker 1: Is a contrast between the outside thee.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's very aching.
Speaker 1: This is divine not to tweet, you know, just more
Speaker 1: that's a good thing. I don't live next to It Provisions.
Speaker 2: So that is a croller and that is a good Onelturo.
Speaker 2: All crawlers are donuts, but not all doughnuts are crawl.
Speaker 1: These are until you tell me how you make them?
Speaker 1: Do you know?
Speaker 2: I do. But that's the only thing we got calling
Speaker 2: for us. So when you tell me how you make
Speaker 2: your state secret, I got it. Like everything at the
Speaker 2: River Cafe, anything away this is They're just they're just
Speaker 2: so good. Have a sip of your coffee with it, please, Okay,
Speaker 2: this is not all right?
Speaker 1: So those are crawlers.
Speaker 2: And then Hallie after she learned how to make ice
Speaker 2: cream at the River Cafe and also in Rome.
Speaker 1: I think she learned in Rome, and then she came.
Speaker 2: To she opened right down the street from Daily Provisions,
Speaker 2: and she is doing such a great job. That was
Speaker 2: exactly three years ago. They just had their third birthday.
Speaker 1: It's kind of seasonal to ice cream one in the summer, and.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's got six that are always on and then
Speaker 2: she changes one every single day. Now, there's there's a
Speaker 2: few here that we're going to try, and we have
Speaker 2: to because you gave her a lot. I want information.
Speaker 2: I'm going to start off with Aud's dream.
Speaker 1: Okay, there's still not Is that what it's called.
Speaker 2: It's named that for her mom, Audrey, because this is
Speaker 2: Audrey's favorite flavor combination, which is vanilla and peanut butter.
Speaker 1: So swelled through it.
Speaker 2: Swirled through it. I think I better try somewhere we're
Speaker 2: at it. I'll get in trouble. I'll get in trouble
Speaker 2: with two ladies in my life.
Speaker 1: M m, it's delicious. Id you have to try this? Well?
Speaker 1: That sounds what's good? You know it's really good? Is
Speaker 1: vanilla ice cream? Part? Well? When she was growing up,
Speaker 1: was ice cream her favorite dessert.
Speaker 2: I think she has probably had ice cream every day
Speaker 2: of her life for the last twenty five years.
Speaker 1: So as a child, she was.
Speaker 2: Five years old, yep.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: She worked in an ice cream store when she was
Speaker 2: at Yale and New Haven and she just yep, way
Speaker 2: before she opened a place. Every single one of her
Speaker 2: Instagram posts was eating ice cream in someone else's place,
Speaker 2: which is pretty cool. Now that everybody travels, everybody has
Speaker 2: access to obviously the Internet, so they can see pictures,
Speaker 2: read recipes here we're you know, hear how people feel
Speaker 2: about the food, et cetera. I think the curiosity of
Speaker 2: chefs to kind of cross pollinate is fascinating. The key, though,
Speaker 2: is the gimmicky stuff has my entire career. It never lasts.
Speaker 2: It's kind of like music. There's eight notes in the
Speaker 2: octave no matter what you try, plus you know the
Speaker 2: sharps and flats, and yet there's a myriad number of
Speaker 2: songs that can be written. And I think the same
Speaker 2: thing is true in our industry is there's really nothing
Speaker 2: that new under the sun. Now. What I love about
Speaker 2: Ruthie and the River Cafe, and this is something that
Speaker 2: I really believe in deeply. It's not so much about
Speaker 2: invention as it is cooking food I know, but cooked
Speaker 2: better than I knew it could be. There is an
Speaker 2: enormous amount of skill involved with that, and I wish
Speaker 2: more chefs understood that in excellence lies creativity. It's not
Speaker 2: just coming up with something I.
Speaker 1: Always say we don't do ideas. You know, No, did
Speaker 1: you ever have an you know? But sometimes people say
Speaker 1: I have an idea for something, you have to listen
Speaker 1: to it. But generally it's a progress of what we did.
Speaker 1: You know, we did a paran almond tarde. It's strawberry season.
Speaker 1: We'll put strawberries, or we'll put you know what Haley
Speaker 1: is doing with her ice creams. It's a process. It's
Speaker 1: your work every day.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what made me fall in love with barbecue.
Speaker 2: For example, when we did blue Smoke, it's what a
Speaker 2: great pitmaster does. They don't reinvent it. They say, you
Speaker 2: see that angry piece of meat called brisket. I'm going
Speaker 2: to figure out something to do with that over the
Speaker 2: next twelve hours. It's going to blow your mind, just
Speaker 2: because of meat selection, dry rub temperature, what kind of
Speaker 2: wood did I smoke it with, how did I hold
Speaker 2: it afterwards? All that stuff is really really hard, and
Speaker 2: there's a huge difference between your favorite brisket and your
Speaker 2: least favorite brisket. But it's not about can I drizzle
Speaker 2: balsamic vinegar on it? And I would say that from
Speaker 2: a food standpoint. The reason you are my favorite chef
Speaker 2: in the world I will tell that to everyone, not
Speaker 2: just your many listeners here is that you have the
Speaker 2: confidence to make sure that what's on the plate is
Speaker 2: essential to that plate, and if it's not essential, it's
Speaker 2: not on that plate, and you find a way to
Speaker 2: make it taste amazing.
Speaker 1: Do you know how when you edit something, and when
Speaker 1: you wrote your book, or when we try to do something,
Speaker 1: you go through and you take out a word. I
Speaker 1: was saying to them today that friend of mine who
Speaker 1: is a screenwright, told me, don't use the word that.
Speaker 1: You can always take that out of a sentence and
Speaker 1: it still works, which is interesting. And I said that,
Speaker 1: you know, when we plate, we do the menu, because
Speaker 1: you know, we write the menu for two meals and
Speaker 1: then we write it. And I was doing to a
Speaker 1: chef on the phone because I was late and we
Speaker 1: were talking about her menu, and I said, go through
Speaker 1: it and just take one thing off. Almost everything you've done,
Speaker 1: just take one whether it's a parsi, whether it's a
Speaker 1: sal severity, whether it's the you know, the panchatta, just
Speaker 1: take one thing off. And I'm not talking about the
Speaker 1: kind of cooking that when you know the cuisine massaur
Speaker 1: or that, but it's just thinking, isn't it about.
Speaker 2: Does that really need to be there? Yeah, there's a
Speaker 2: writer's expression which actually applies to the kitchen, applies to
Speaker 2: almost everything, which is learn how to murder your darlings,
Speaker 2: which is a kind of have you heard this well?
Speaker 1: I heard Mark Twain once said, if you see the adjective,
Speaker 1: shoot it.
Speaker 2: But we all, whenever we write something or cook something,
Speaker 2: we assume that that first clever idea we had is
Speaker 2: essential to it. In general, generally it's not, but it's
Speaker 2: generally the thing we're most in love with that needs
Speaker 2: to be the thing that comes off.
Speaker 1: Did you know The River Cafe has a shop. It's
Speaker 1: full of our favorite foods and designs. We have cookbooks,
Speaker 1: linen napkins, kitchen ware, tote bags with our signatures, glasses
Speaker 1: from Venice, chocolates from Turin. You can find us right
Speaker 1: next door to the River Cafe in London or online
Speaker 1: at Shopthrivercafe dot co dot uk. Of all the books
Speaker 1: we have, and I see some of them on your desk,
Speaker 1: it was interesting to me that you chose for a
Speaker 1: recipe pure al Romana and a recipe from Rome. One
Speaker 1: of my favorites, and one of that is in season
Speaker 1: very soon. So would you like to read the recipe?
Speaker 2: I would love to tell.
Speaker 1: People how to make it and tell me why you
Speaker 1: chose it.
Speaker 2: Well, first of all, I love Rome. That is my
Speaker 2: I don't know, it's just my sole place. I always
Speaker 2: associate puntarell with Rome. You don't really get it too
Speaker 2: often here in New York. When I've had it at
Speaker 2: the River Cafe, it's better than when I have it
Speaker 2: in Rome, which is hard because we have an expression
Speaker 2: hot dogs always taste better at the ballpark. You would
Speaker 2: think puntarelli only tastes better in Rome. But at the
Speaker 2: River Cafe, you just you know exactly what to do
Speaker 2: with it. It's a type of chickory that is not
Speaker 2: typically found in the United States. It's not the easiest
Speaker 2: thing to handle, and you know exactly what to do
Speaker 2: with it. It's about the temperature. It's about the balance
Speaker 2: of the anchovy. So may I read the recipe?
Speaker 1: Please read the recipe, and if you feel free to
Speaker 1: add or take away or comment on anything you like.
Speaker 2: Okay, So we're going to have two heads of puntarelli
Speaker 2: five salted anchovies, and I bet you have a point
Speaker 2: of view on where I should get those anchovies, two
Speaker 2: tablespoons of red wine vinegar, one garlic clove, two dried chilies,
Speaker 2: one teaspoon of black pepper, four tablespoons of extra virgin
Speaker 2: olive oil, and one lemon. So To prepare the puntarelli,
Speaker 2: fill a bowl with ice cold water, adding as many
Speaker 2: ice cubes as you can fit in there. Pull the
Speaker 2: hollow buds from the puntarelli heads. Using a small knife,
Speaker 2: slice the buds very thin the lengthwise. Place them in
Speaker 2: the water to crisp until they curl up. This will
Speaker 2: take about an hour. Rinse and fill at the anchovies.
Speaker 2: Cut them into one half inch pieces and place in
Speaker 2: a small bowl. Cover them with the vinegar and stir
Speaker 2: to let the anchovy dissolve. Peel and chop the garlic
Speaker 2: very finely and add to the anchovies with the crumbled
Speaker 2: chilies and pepper. Add the olive oil. Spin dry the
Speaker 2: punterairelli as for a salad, Place in a bowl and
Speaker 2: serve over the anchovy sauce. Serve with lemon. Yum yum.
Speaker 1: It's interesting because it feels like a very easy recipe
Speaker 1: to make, and it is, and it's one, but when
Speaker 1: we're explaining it to the chefs making it for the
Speaker 1: first time, the balance of anchovies, the balance of olive oil,
Speaker 1: no salt, because the salt it's so salty. With the anchovies,
Speaker 1: the christminast. I think for myself it is the ideal
Speaker 1: way to start a meal.
Speaker 2: I love it so much, and it just works.
Speaker 1: It works. You know.
Speaker 2: When I was growing up, we used to go to
Speaker 2: restaurants and you'd be met with the relish trade, which
Speaker 2: was the celery carrots and lindsey pitted black olives on
Speaker 2: a bed of crushed ice. But there was something about
Speaker 2: that really cold, crispy Sorry that made a taste, But
Speaker 2: this is not really that different.
Speaker 1: No' right. Maybe every culture has their crispy krispy vegetable.
Speaker 1: Tell me about growing up, then let's talk about We
Speaker 1: were talking about restaurants. But when you said the words
Speaker 1: when I was a kid, So, what was it like
Speaker 1: growing up in the Meyer.
Speaker 2: Household in Saint Louis, Missouri. Yeah, well we didn't. You know,
Speaker 2: we had a lot of cooking going on at home.
Speaker 2: My dad was in the travel business and he was
Speaker 2: the first American agent for an organization called Related Compagna,
Speaker 2: which would later become Relay in chateau, and so we
Speaker 2: had French people living in our home, in your home,
Speaker 2: in our home, who would work in his office by
Speaker 2: and then at nighttime they were around the table and
Speaker 2: French was spoken every night lots of times, so the
Speaker 2: kids wouldn't understand what they were talking about, which encourage
Speaker 2: us to learn French. There was always a bottle of
Speaker 2: baugeolis on the table, and so I, without knowing it,
Speaker 2: I was getting a little bit of an education.
Speaker 1: Who did the cooking.
Speaker 2: My dad cooked a lot, my mom did as well.
Speaker 2: He and I cooked together. He taught me how to cook.
Speaker 2: His favorite dish was ratatoui and we had a dog
Speaker 2: by that name, ra Tatui when I was seven years old.
Speaker 2: So I grew up, you know, with the smells and
Speaker 2: sounds and fun of cooking, and so it was just
Speaker 2: kind of part of my upbringing. I got to go
Speaker 2: to France pretty early in my life, and then later Italy,
Speaker 2: and then I was a tour guide working for my dad.
Speaker 2: He started selling group tours. And when my sister, who's
Speaker 2: older than I am, turned twenty, she got to pick
Speaker 2: a city, so she picked Copenhagen. When I was twenty,
Speaker 2: I picked the wrong. My brother picked Paris, and interestingly,
Speaker 2: we all three had a kind of love affair with
Speaker 2: the place we picked. I would go back to Rome
Speaker 2: to study political science, and and that was supposed to
Speaker 2: lead me into being a lawyer, but thank goodness, I
Speaker 2: would have been the world's worst lawyer. Thank goodness. I
Speaker 2: converted quickly, and I said, why not? Why not? You know,
Speaker 2: so embrace My real passion was.
Speaker 1: So growing up you had you had a lot of
Speaker 1: French food, and you were you what was it from
Speaker 1: that region because France Association.
Speaker 2: No, it's not just that we had French food. I
Speaker 2: grew up appreciating French food, but I really you know,
Speaker 2: growing up in Saint Louis, we didn't have French restaurants
Speaker 2: per se. We had great burgers. So I had smash burgers,
Speaker 2: which would one day lead to shakeshack, and frozen custard,
Speaker 2: which would len one day lead to shakeshack. We had.
Speaker 2: Here's what Saint Louis actually did have. Yeah, use have
Speaker 2: an amazing immigrant population. It began with lots and lots
Speaker 2: of Germans. And that's how you get restaurants that I
Speaker 2: used to go to called Schneidhorse and Anheuser Busch, the
Speaker 2: beer company was there, et cetera. Lots and lots of
Speaker 2: sausage makers, lots of beer companies, So there was that
Speaker 2: going forward. There was also something and it still remains
Speaker 2: called the Hill, the Italian Hills. So lots of Italians
Speaker 2: came to Saint Louis and they had their South from
Speaker 2: the South primarily, and they had their own style of
Speaker 2: cooking that came to Saint Louis. To this day, they
Speaker 2: all have almost the exact same menus. So their carbonara
Speaker 2: has cream in it, which you would never do. Toasted
Speaker 2: ravioli with Marina and.
Speaker 1: I wonder where that came toasted that is in chreat
Speaker 1: go figure. I don't know, Ruthy, but did you like
Speaker 1: it as a kid, of course I did.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean.
Speaker 2: People you know in London like marmite or whatever that
Speaker 2: stuff is called.
Speaker 1: I wanted to do a photography project when I came
Speaker 1: to London. I was doing art school of giving Americans
Speaker 1: more mte and taking a photograph of the face after
Speaker 1: they ate.
Speaker 2: I promised toasted ralli Oli would only put a smile
Speaker 2: on your face. It's really good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, so we're okay on from toasted. So you
Speaker 1: grew up in this culture of your mother's cooking, your
Speaker 1: father's cooking.
Speaker 2: And getting to cook. But what I really liked more
Speaker 2: than anything was going to restaurants. I just loved it.
Speaker 2: There was one restaurant that is still around called Chris's.
Speaker 2: It's a German place, Kreis Apostrophe Chris's, and they gave
Speaker 2: me an idea that I used when I opened Union
Speaker 2: Square Cafe at the age of twenty seven, which was
Speaker 2: to have a nightly special that you could depend on
Speaker 2: every night of the week. So you knew if you
Speaker 2: went in there on Monday nights, yeah, that was chicken
Speaker 2: and Dumplings night. You knew if you went in on
Speaker 2: Tuesday night was sour Brought to Night, which I didn't
Speaker 2: really care about too much, but they had a different
Speaker 2: special every night.
Speaker 1: We did that.
Speaker 2: When I opened Union Square Cafe because I love the
Speaker 2: idea that you could create an habitual regular. But they
Speaker 2: also did which I loved from the age of six on.
Speaker 2: They remembered my favorite table. Yeah, I'm the guy. Well,
Speaker 2: there's probably every kid who liked to have the table
Speaker 2: underneath the cuckoo clock, but it meant the world to
Speaker 2: me that they remember that.
Speaker 1: That's what we talk about, you know, with restaurants, is
Speaker 1: that we were talking about this morning, that you'll go
Speaker 1: back to a restaurant if they didn't cook the sea
Speaker 1: pass to perfection, but you won't go back if there's
Speaker 1: a waiter that makes you feel bad about yourself.
Speaker 2: And then furthermore, taking it back to the positive side,
Speaker 2: you'll always go back where you feel most loved. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and remember, I remember the late James Beard was constantly
Speaker 2: accosted in airports, restaurants everywhere because everyone recognized the bald
Speaker 2: head with the bow tie. And obviously the question everybody
Speaker 2: asked James Beard was what's your favorit restaurant? Especially in
Speaker 2: an airport? Where should I? And he said, my favorite
Speaker 2: restaurant is the same as yours. Yeah, it's the one
Speaker 2: that loves me the most. That's hard to argue with that.
Speaker 1: I would say. You know that you never know with
Speaker 1: the table what they've gone through when they come in.
Speaker 1: You know, they may have had they have gotten lost,
Speaker 1: they might have been fired that day, they may be
Speaker 1: celebrating something, and most you know, most often or maybe
Speaker 1: we should think about, is they may have saved up
Speaker 1: to come to the river cafe.
Speaker 2: That's a really good point.
Speaker 1: Really saved up to come and so how are we
Speaker 1: going to make them feel that everything was, you know,
Speaker 1: here for them? And I think that's it's really something
Speaker 1: I learned from you. I think we've all learned that
Speaker 1: from you. Is how to be happy, making people happy,
Speaker 1: you know, simple as that.
Speaker 2: Well, the last thing I want to say about Saint
Speaker 2: Louis is that was the biggest lesson I learned because
Speaker 2: Saint Louis was long on hospitality. It wasn't necessarily the food.
Speaker 2: But then what I got to do, probably because of
Speaker 2: the the privilege of growing up with a lot of
Speaker 2: travel because my dad's company was a travel business, I
Speaker 2: got the flavor of really good food in Italy and
Speaker 2: in France. But I also was able to pair that
Speaker 2: with the kind of hospitality that I always got in
Speaker 2: Saint Louis. And when I moved to New York at
Speaker 2: the age of twenty one, there wasn't a lot of
Speaker 2: hospitality around here. It was basically, you're lucky to be
Speaker 2: eating here, and if you don't feel that way, we've
Speaker 2: got a really nice table by the bathroom for you.
Speaker 2: There was a lot of that kind of mentality left
Speaker 2: over from the Studio fifty four eras the Red Velvet Rope.
Speaker 1: What year is well?
Speaker 2: I moved here? My first night here was the night
Speaker 2: John Lennon was assassinated in December of nineteen eighty and
Speaker 2: I got my first apartment in nineteen eighty one. It
Speaker 2: was not necessarily a nice city back then, so it
Speaker 2: was kind of a slam dunk when I opened Union
Speaker 2: Square a cafe to say, well, whoever wrote the rule
Speaker 2: that good food's gonna taste worse because you're nice to people?
Speaker 1: Yeah, if you like listening to Ruthie's Table for would
Speaker 1: you please make sure to rate and review the podcast
Speaker 1: on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, O, wherever you
Speaker 1: get your podcasts. Thank you. Going back then to leaving
Speaker 1: Saint Louis and what was food like after that? We
Speaker 1: suddenly you're on your own and what am I going
Speaker 1: to eat? Or can I afford a restaurant? What was
Speaker 1: that world like when you left?
Speaker 2: I couldn't stop discovering things everywhere. So when I was
Speaker 2: in college at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, Sunday night
Speaker 2: could be the local burger king because that's what I
Speaker 2: had enough money to do. But I also would go
Speaker 2: to their little Italy and find the best we call
Speaker 2: them grinders. Every town has a different name for submarines
Speaker 2: or poe boys. In Hartford they're called grinders. And I'd
Speaker 2: go find the best pizza in the city. It was
Speaker 2: all inexpensive stuff, go find the best espresso. I could find.
Speaker 2: Couldn't understand why the espresso there would be served with
Speaker 2: a lemon peel and the cappuccino would be served with cinnamon,
Speaker 2: which is not what I had seen. But again, because
Speaker 2: of my dad's travel business, until I was twenty one,
Speaker 2: I could fly anywhere that pan Am flew for forty
Speaker 2: four dollars round trip forty four dollars. So every time
Speaker 2: we had a three day weekend, I got myself down
Speaker 2: to Kennedy Airport and I went. I would almost always
Speaker 2: go to run. I went to Venice once in the
Speaker 2: middle of winter, which is the loneliest place on earth.
Speaker 2: I did go to London and I really enjoyed it.
Speaker 1: Okay, but you hadn't started. Yeah, this was still pre.
Speaker 2: This was still pre in Square Cafe. But I was
Speaker 2: educating myself and I would eat anywhere by myself, you know,
Speaker 2: I'd go to Popeyes Fried Chicken any anywhere where I could,
Speaker 2: or I'd go to diners in Long Island. I would
Speaker 2: just get in my car and go see what was was.
Speaker 1: Do you have friends who shared that passion or.
Speaker 2: Not as much as I did. You know, I would
Speaker 2: drive people crazy because I couldn't like New York is
Speaker 2: one of the greatest walking cities in the world, and
Speaker 2: I couldn't pass a menu on the outside of a
Speaker 2: building without studying it. And I would do that in
Speaker 2: every town in Italy, every town in France. When I
Speaker 2: went to London by myself for those two weeks, I
Speaker 2: had this book. I think American Express published the book,
Speaker 2: and it was their reviews of you know, one hundred restaurants.
Speaker 2: And I didn't have much of a budget, so I
Speaker 2: saved up for the ones I could get into. There
Speaker 2: was one restaurant that I went to and they wouldn't
Speaker 2: take me as a solo diner, so I made a
Speaker 2: reservation for two and I walked dan and I kept
Speaker 2: looking at my watch, where's my friend? Where's my friend?
Speaker 2: And I finally ordered a decent bottle of wine for
Speaker 2: myself so they wouldn't kick me out. You know, no
Speaker 2: solo diners going to order a single bottle of wine.
Speaker 2: But you know, I was learning about hospitality too, because
Speaker 2: they weren't very very nice at that point. But you know,
Speaker 2: I just I just love discovery. I think discovery is
Speaker 2: one of the great things in life when and by
Speaker 2: the way, as you get older, you can still discover
Speaker 2: things you've never tried before. But when it comes to food,
Speaker 2: it's like.
Speaker 3: Can I ask you a question. When you were traveling
Speaker 3: and exploring all these places, were you conscious of a
Speaker 3: difference between a restauranteur and the chef or were you
Speaker 3: seeing it then a chef's eze or.
Speaker 2: That's such a good question. I think I probably was.
Speaker 2: There were many many restaurants at that time where you
Speaker 2: didn't have any idea who the chef was. Know, you
Speaker 2: obviously had some trail blazers in London everywhere when it
Speaker 2: came to chefs, and I was very very inspired and
Speaker 2: motivated by that. As a matter of fact, when I
Speaker 2: first broke the news to my parents that I was
Speaker 2: not going to become a lawyer as everyone had expected,
Speaker 2: but so I was going to go into this business,
Speaker 2: I said, I want to be a chef because I
Speaker 2: had seen people like Alice Waters and Joyce Goldstein and
Speaker 2: Jeremiah Tower and Wolfgang Puck and Paul Prudhom you know,
Speaker 2: I can mark guy named Mark Miller and the Miller Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: great memory. And all these people had liberal arts educations.
Speaker 2: So I wasn't going to let my parents down, but
Speaker 2: I was afraid to tell them I wanted to be
Speaker 2: a restaurateur. And so it got to the point where
Speaker 2: my dad said, well, then you're going to really need
Speaker 2: to you better get some cooking in and he set
Speaker 2: up two stages for me in Bordeaux at places that
Speaker 2: had been part of laying chateau. And the first one
Speaker 2: I went to was called La Reserve in Paysack.
Speaker 1: Reserve. Where where was that reserve? Restaurants called Aurey Cat.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so this one was in the Bordeaux village called
Speaker 2: Paysack pe s S A C. And the day I
Speaker 2: got there as a stagier, they had just lost their
Speaker 2: second star, and so everyone in the restaurant was completely demoralized.
Speaker 2: As a matter of fact, on day two, four of
Speaker 2: their cooks left because God forbid, they did not want
Speaker 2: to have a one star Micheline restaurant on their on
Speaker 2: their resume. So what that meant is I got a
Speaker 2: big promotion meeting. I got to open the oysters and
Speaker 2: pull the feathers from birds and chop the shallots and
Speaker 2: all that kind of fun stuff. But I also got
Speaker 2: to cook family meal for them, and that was that
Speaker 2: was a big deal. Well, the very first day that
Speaker 2: I got to cook family meal, I'll never forget. I
Speaker 2: made my grandmother's spare ribs with her barbecue sauce Cote
Speaker 2: de port, Cote de port, and they loved it. And
Speaker 2: then I made a pasta for them, and I forget
Speaker 2: what the pasta was, but I could not believe my
Speaker 2: eyes that all these mishline level cooks, you know what,
Speaker 2: they dressed my pasta with ketchup. They just started pouring
Speaker 2: ketchup all over the noodles. I've never seen that in
Speaker 2: my life, but I guess they considered that to be
Speaker 2: a good.
Speaker 1: Pass your Did you feel more Italian than French and
Speaker 1: more French than Italian or was it?
Speaker 2: Well, during that time I had also spent I probably
Speaker 2: spent half my time in Italy. I was in Rome, Bologna, Milan, Sardinia,
Speaker 2: and I think I probably always felt like both. I
Speaker 2: think that, you know, the original Union Square Cafe menu.
Speaker 2: We had pasta dishes, we had confe de Canard.
Speaker 1: Union Square just changed the way we thought about restaurants.
Speaker 1: It did. It was a I remember going with Richard.
Speaker 1: It must have been what year did.
Speaker 2: You open, nineteen eighty five.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it must It was certainly before the River Cafe.
Speaker 1: And we used to make some journeys to New York
Speaker 1: and I remember, you know, there's certain things. You remember
Speaker 1: where you were when that song played, or where you
Speaker 1: are when you had that I remember where we were,
Speaker 1: where we sat, the whole square. How did that happen?
Speaker 1: How did you Well?
Speaker 2: I wanted to open a restaurant that, if only it existed,
Speaker 2: would be my favorite restaurant in the world. And as
Speaker 2: I was saying earlier, it was truly an amalgam of
Speaker 2: my favorite places to eat in the world. They were
Speaker 2: always I had no interest in being an exalted kind
Speaker 2: of restaurant, but I wanted to be a place that
Speaker 2: you would feel equally comfortable wearing jeans or wearing a
Speaker 2: coat and tie, if that's what you felt like.
Speaker 1: It's called Union Square Cafe.
Speaker 2: Union Square Cafe.
Speaker 1: And that's what we did with the River cafe. People
Speaker 1: always said, why did you put the word cafe, you know,
Speaker 1: which is not a cafe. But you didn't. We didn't.
Speaker 1: I think probably just wanted to step away from that.
Speaker 2: And let people know that everyone's welcome for every kind
Speaker 2: of occasion of something. Doesn't that you can eat at
Speaker 2: the bar from the day we opened. We had good
Speaker 2: wines by the glass from the day we opened. But
Speaker 2: I actually had the But Jesus scared out of me
Speaker 2: because early on, as I was planning this thing, my
Speaker 2: uncle introduced me to the guy that was the food
Speaker 2: and beverage director at the Harvard Club. He said, you
Speaker 2: need to talk to this guy because he knows everything
Speaker 2: about restaurants. So the guy starts grilling me what kind
Speaker 2: of restaurant are you going to open? And I said,
Speaker 2: I don't know. I'm going to have a little French stuff,
Speaker 2: a little Italian stuff, a little California kind of stuff.
Speaker 2: And he said, I'm going to tell you right now
Speaker 2: it's not going to work. And I said, what do
Speaker 2: you mean? And he said, when people decide where they
Speaker 2: want to eat in New York, they say French, Italian, Chinese, German.
Speaker 2: No one says, let's go out and eat eclectic. It's
Speaker 2: not going to work. And I fortunately did not let
Speaker 2: that stop me. I just wanted to have food that
Speaker 2: I loved. And to this day, you know, I've already
Speaker 2: been in touch with two of our chefs today, three
Speaker 2: of our chefs. Actually, I just that's one of my
Speaker 2: favorite parts of my job is talking about food.
Speaker 1: So from from Union Square, the next you expect you
Speaker 1: did another one, you did. I'm not going to have
Speaker 1: just one restaurant. I'm going to do another restaurant.
Speaker 2: You ten years after the Square cafe.
Speaker 1: That was ten years later.
Speaker 2: Yep, because I said, I'm never opening a second restaurant
Speaker 2: like someone else. I know.
Speaker 1: I'm I remember once calling you, as I kept saying,
Speaker 1: for advice, and I said, should I do river cafe cafes?
Speaker 1: And we could do Somebody wants me to do one
Speaker 1: here and and he said, really, don't think about more
Speaker 1: than one. You did say that to me. You said,
Speaker 1: just think one and then grow. You know, don't think
Speaker 1: did you think.
Speaker 2: Did I say, don't think about a river cafe cafe
Speaker 2: or don't think many river many?
Speaker 1: That's what I'm saying. When you started Shakeshack, when you did,
Speaker 1: you didn't think it would be a global thing that
Speaker 1: I know.
Speaker 2: We wanted to open something to help Madison Square Park.
Speaker 2: In fact, we did open a second Shakeshack for five years.
Speaker 2: Can you believe that it just was never ever. The
Speaker 2: part of the plan was that we wanted to have
Speaker 2: a place that, if it worked, would attract people day
Speaker 2: and night to keep the park safe because people make
Speaker 2: people using a park keep park safe. And then furthermore
Speaker 2: that a percentage of every sale would go right back
Speaker 2: into the park. That's all we wanted to do, and
Speaker 2: it worked. It worked so well that we said we'd
Speaker 2: better do a second one because the biggest complaint we're
Speaker 2: getting is the lines are day and long.
Speaker 1: They're still long. I have to say, there's one around
Speaker 1: the corner from in Victoria from where.
Speaker 2: I live Victoria, Nova.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and in the line so long, Well.
Speaker 2: People need to get the app. That's kind of like
Speaker 2: when you see people waiting in line to pay their tolls,
Speaker 2: why didn't you just get easy Pass.
Speaker 1: It's not that it's one thing.
Speaker 3: You both got amazing restaurants and you've got just one restaurant,
Speaker 3: and you can create that and create that. It's being
Speaker 3: the best food and the best service together how did
Speaker 3: you do that when you're running out dozens of them?
Speaker 3: It must be very different skills.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the common skill set is if you
Speaker 2: can actually really really advance the workplace culture and the
Speaker 2: hospitality culture for all of your stakeholders, that's common to
Speaker 2: all of them. As a matter of fact, I care
Speaker 2: as deeply about the guest experience in the workplace experience
Speaker 2: at Shakeshack as I do at the Modern or Gramercy
Speaker 2: Tavern or Manhattan. The skill set that goes with that
Speaker 2: is completely different. So for example, if you're going to
Speaker 2: get a job at the Modern, which has two Michieline stars,
Speaker 2: We're going to look deeply into your work resume. Do
Speaker 2: you have the wine knowledge or do you have the
Speaker 2: culinary knowledge? At Shakeshack. I don't think one person in
Speaker 2: the history of Shakeshack has ever been asked, can I
Speaker 2: please see your credentials for how well you make milkshakes
Speaker 2: or burgers. I think we hire one hundred percent for
Speaker 2: emotional skills, in hospitality skills, and then believe that we
Speaker 2: can teach and train people. So that's the thing that
Speaker 2: every day I get up if I have one job,
Speaker 2: it's truly you know, fueling the culture how we do things.
Speaker 1: And that culture, I think, is what you do, what
Speaker 1: we try to do with the people who actually work
Speaker 1: and go to work every day. And I think if
Speaker 1: we want to go to work, they'll want to go
Speaker 1: to work. I think if my view is that we
Speaker 1: want somebody to want to come to.
Speaker 2: Work, absolutely, And I think, what of the many, many
Speaker 2: things that you've done brilliantly, is you've created two communities
Speaker 2: that have fallen in love with each other, the people
Speaker 2: who work there and the people who dine there, and
Speaker 2: then collectively. I see it every time I.
Speaker 1: Go, We we do, we try.
Speaker 2: Excuse me, I feel it every time.
Speaker 1: I want you to come more. When do you come again?
Speaker 2: I don't think I ever go to London and don't
Speaker 2: see you. So don't give me that. I don't go
Speaker 2: to London all the time.
Speaker 1: The guilt, guilt, guilt. So food can which it is
Speaker 1: if it's love, it's sharing, it's staving off hunger, it's
Speaker 1: thinking about what you want to eat with excitement and
Speaker 1: getting to know culture. It's also comfort. And so I
Speaker 1: suppose my last question to you, Danny Meyer, my friend
Speaker 1: nice speed dial, is what would be your comfort food?
Speaker 2: Fried chicken? Fried chicken, really good fried chicken.
Speaker 1: Okay, And what do you do? How do you make that? Well?
Speaker 2: I actually don't make it that often because it makes
Speaker 2: a bloody mess and there's so much good fried chicken
Speaker 2: that you can get out there. But when I do
Speaker 2: make it, it's very, very very simple. It's very simple.
Speaker 2: So the key thing is obviously getting a good chicken.
Speaker 2: The next key thing is what are you frying it in?
Speaker 2: And you're going to laugh, but I use Crisco.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Crisco, Mozola oil, Crisco. Yeah, they're pure, aren't they?
Speaker 1: It's pure? Is it pure? Is Crisco? I know it?
Speaker 1: Sola is pure?
Speaker 2: Large isrand.
Speaker 1: Mother used to use Motzola oil because it was pure.
Speaker 1: This is loud, This is lard.
Speaker 2: And you get a reasonably shallow frying pan with the
Speaker 2: top on it. And meanwhile, with the chicken, you've just
Speaker 2: seasoned it salt and pepper. That is it, salt and pepper,
Speaker 2: lots and lots of black pepper. And then you dredge
Speaker 2: it in flour that's also been seasoned with salt and pepper.
Speaker 2: That's it, And then you cook it one side down
Speaker 2: over sort of medium high heat, right, and then as soon,
Speaker 2: and you've got to be somewhat patient. You can't turn
Speaker 2: it too quickly or it'll stick to the bottom. But
Speaker 2: if you just make sure that the bottom has cooked
Speaker 2: pretty well, turn it over, lower the heat, the put
Speaker 2: the top on, the lid on and so it steam
Speaker 2: finishes the whole thing and it should come out pretty
Speaker 2: crispy and just absolutely delicious and you feel yep, And
Speaker 2: I spend the rest of the time cleaning up the
Speaker 2: kitchen after that, not much comfort.
Speaker 1: Well, thank you, Danny, It's great to see you. I'll
Speaker 1: see you in line.
Speaker 2: I love that you came here to do this and
Speaker 2: I love this podcast.
Speaker 1: Now it's honor to have you and delicious food. I'm
Speaker 1: so happy.
Speaker 2: All right, Brawlers forever.
Speaker 1: And Hallie is ice cream. Thank you, Thank you for
Speaker 1: listening to Ruthie's Table for in partnership with Montclair.
Speaker 3: Ruthie's Table four is produced by Atamei Studios for iHeartRadio.
Speaker 3: It's hosted by Ruthie Rogers and it's produced by William Lensky.
Speaker 3: This episode was edited by Julia Johnson and mixed by
Speaker 3: Nigel Appleton. Our executive producers are Faye Stewart and zad Rogers.
Speaker 1: Our production manager is Caitlin Paramore and our production coordinator
Speaker 1: is Bella Selini.
Speaker 3: Thank you to everyone at The River Cafe for your
Speaker 3: help in making this episode.