Speaker 1: Hello Sunshine, Hey fam Today on the bright Side, the
Speaker 1: incredible Kristin Kish is here to talk to us about
Speaker 1: stepping outside of her comfort zone to take on a
Speaker 1: new role hosting the hit show Top Chef, and she's
Speaker 1: going to show us how to level up our cooking
Speaker 1: game at home.
Speaker 2: It's Tuesday, June eleventh.
Speaker 3: I'm Simone Boyce, I'm Danielle Robe and this is the
Speaker 3: bright side from Hello Sunshine, Danielle.
Speaker 1: We are a week away from the finale of Top Chef.
Speaker 1: Next Wednesday, June nineteenth, we are going to see which
Speaker 1: one of the contestants is crowned the all new Top Chef.
Speaker 3: I'm excited because usually the winners of this show go
Speaker 3: on to do very cool things. They open restaurants. There's
Speaker 3: been a few Chicago winners, and I love eating at
Speaker 3: those restaurants when I'm home.
Speaker 1: It's a cool show. It's usually the beginning of a
Speaker 1: lot of great opportunities. And that's exactly what happened to today's
Speaker 1: guest christ And Kish.
Speaker 3: Yeah, she's the new host of Top Chef and since
Speaker 3: her win a decade ago, she's been a force in
Speaker 3: the culinary world. She has titles now like cookbook, author,
Speaker 3: restaurant owner. She hosts several food shows like Iron Chef
Speaker 3: and Restaurants At the End of the World, She's really
Speaker 3: doing it.
Speaker 1: It's Kristen Kish's world and we're just living in it.
Speaker 1: She has such an interesting backstory. Danielle So she was
Speaker 1: born in South Korea and then adopted into a family
Speaker 1: in Kentwood, Michigan, when she was four months old. And
Speaker 1: she says her greatest success as a chef happened when
Speaker 1: she quotes stopped trying to be a chef that impresses
Speaker 1: everyone and just tried to tell her.
Speaker 2: Own story through food.
Speaker 3: That's so beautifully said and so oprah of her, Like,
Speaker 3: I feel like that's always the advice that people finally
Speaker 3: break through when they let go of other people's expectations.
Speaker 3: And I think this is also really an opportunity to
Speaker 3: highlight women chefs and women head chefs. There was a
Speaker 3: twenty twenty two Industry Insights report that cited forty eight
Speaker 3: percent of students attending the Culinary Institute are women, but
Speaker 3: only twenty percent of head chef positions are held by women.
Speaker 3: Not that long ago, female executive chefs were much less
Speaker 3: visible than they are today, and Kristin is one of
Speaker 3: the women helping to change that.
Speaker 1: After the break, Kristin Kish takes us back to the
Speaker 1: moment when she first found out she got the Top
Speaker 1: Chef hosting gig, Plus she tells us what Easter egg
Speaker 1: to look out for in the season finale.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back.
Speaker 3: We're back, and we're here with Top Chef host Kristin Kish. Kristin,
Speaker 3: welcome to the bright Side.
Speaker 2: Thank you. I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 3: We have to start by congratulating you on becoming the
Speaker 3: new host of Top Chef.
Speaker 2: This is so major.
Speaker 3: Can you take me back to the moment you found
Speaker 3: out you got the gig?
Speaker 2: Where were you? Who did you call? Give us all
Speaker 2: the details? Yeah, I threw up in my mouth. I panicked,
Speaker 2: had moments of like kind of like pacing around the house.
Speaker 2: You're like, is this actually happening? And it's happening. I
Speaker 2: read the whole thing about Padma leaving on Instagram and
Speaker 2: found out, just like everyone else, did you know, I
Speaker 2: didn't know a second before. I thought that Top Chef
Speaker 2: was always this thing that was never going to change,
Speaker 2: like it was indestructible in the way of Tom Gale
Speaker 2: and Podman will always remain those three people representing the show.
Speaker 2: And so when I read it, I was like, holy shit,
Speaker 2: is the showgunna and what is she doing? How are
Speaker 2: they going to fill that space?
Speaker 3: Man?
Speaker 2: Whoever has to fill those shoes good luck. And it
Speaker 2: wasn't until a couple weeks later where I think my
Speaker 2: manager was like, so would you ever and I said, hmm.
Speaker 2: I was like no, no, no, no, there's no way.
Speaker 2: The pressure that one the public and the viewers are
Speaker 2: going to put on me, I don't want to deal
Speaker 2: with it. Two, I don't think I can do that.
Speaker 2: And I don't know what happened. I was in Thailand
Speaker 2: and I was flying back from Bangkok, flying through Dubai.
Speaker 2: I was in Dubai and the airport going through additional security,
Speaker 2: put my bag on the thing. My manager's like call me.
Speaker 2: I got all these texts. When I opened up my phone,
Speaker 2: I was like, oh my god, what's wrong. I start
Speaker 2: panicking because my initial reaction is like something's wrong. And
Speaker 2: so I called her and I was like listen. I
Speaker 2: got like I'm going through security. What she was like,
Speaker 2: Bravo wants to talk to you. I was like, oh
Speaker 2: my god. And I knew immediately what it was. I
Speaker 2: hung up. I looked at my wife. I said, Bravo
Speaker 2: wants to meet with me. She looked at me. Oh,
Speaker 2: I will never forget it. She looked at me, and
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, it's like she's up on her
Speaker 2: tiptoes with her arms around my neck. She was like,
Speaker 2: oh my god. Not because I got the job, because
Speaker 2: I didn't know yet, but the idea of being considered
Speaker 2: to be the one to fill those shoes was an
Speaker 2: honor in and of itself. He gave me a few
Speaker 2: chills there. That's really cute, Kristen. I love that. It
Speaker 2: was cool.
Speaker 1: Can you tell us the story about how you got
Speaker 1: on Top Chef as a contestant in the first place.
Speaker 2: Certainly was not because I wanted to be. My then
Speaker 2: boss recommended me because she was invited to go on
Speaker 2: to the finale on season nine. People are always asking
Speaker 2: do you have anybody that'd be great for the show,
Speaker 2: like friends of friends of friends, or you know, word
Speaker 2: of mouth and recommendations go a long way. And she
Speaker 2: came back and she gave three names, my name being
Speaker 2: one of them. She came back and she was like, hey,
Speaker 2: I gave your name over. I was like, no, you didn't.
Speaker 2: I said, I'm not going. I'm not doing it. I'd
Speaker 2: watched the show. There was not announced to me. That
Speaker 2: was like, you know what, I could beat all of them, Like,
Speaker 2: absolutely not, and you're not going to go on there
Speaker 2: if you don't think you can win. So I was like,
Speaker 2: you know, I don't think this is for me. It's
Speaker 2: not the right time. But I don't know. There's a
Speaker 2: lot of things that came together. And believe in whatever
Speaker 2: you want to believe in, but I'm a believer of
Speaker 2: the universe. Like putting you in a position to have
Speaker 2: to make a hard choice and testing you in that way,
Speaker 2: and I was like, you know what, I'll just I'll
Speaker 2: just take the first calls, like I am in full
Speaker 2: control and I have the choice, and I just I
Speaker 2: don't know. I kept saying yes, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: it just was happening, and at a certain point I
Speaker 2: got excited about it.
Speaker 3: Kristin, I am from Chicago and I went to school
Speaker 3: at the University of Wisconsin Madison.
Speaker 2: I am a Midwest girl.
Speaker 3: And one of the things that I love about your
Speaker 3: cooking style is that it's this blend of your Korean
Speaker 3: and Midwestern sensibilities. When did you start to embrace Korean
Speaker 3: flavors in your cooking.
Speaker 2: My food is the story of my life, and being
Speaker 2: Korean is something that I never fully embraced until much
Speaker 2: later on, because as an adoptee, you struggle with identity
Speaker 2: in your place and what you can own and what
Speaker 2: you're allowed to be. And it wasn't until much later
Speaker 2: on in life where I think also socially and like
Speaker 2: the world became a little bit more kind in experimentation
Speaker 2: and giving people grace in that way where I started
Speaker 2: to do the same thing for myself, and I started
Speaker 2: dabbling a little bit and more in the technique and
Speaker 2: the processes of different things in Korean cooking. But you
Speaker 2: realize that cooking and technique and dishes are far more
Speaker 2: similar than they are different. So you could pick five
Speaker 2: different countries. Each country guarantee has like this homie rice
Speaker 2: dish or something, or has this great one pot stew
Speaker 2: or this bray dish or deep fried dish, Like there
Speaker 2: are all these things that connect all of it, and
Speaker 2: we just use the environment and our product and our
Speaker 2: own storytelling to impart individuality and uniqueness to a dish,
Speaker 2: and so that's what I just started doing. But it came,
Speaker 2: I don't know, in the past eight years five years
Speaker 2: where I started to embrace my Asian American self. Then
Speaker 2: I could also experiment with it and by way of
Speaker 2: my food.
Speaker 1: So Danielle and I both worked in news for a
Speaker 1: long time, which means that anyone who has seen the
Speaker 1: Morning Show loves to ask us how accurate it is.
Speaker 1: And for a lot of people, watching The Bear is
Speaker 1: their first into the world of hospitality. So one have
Speaker 1: you seen it? And two, how does it compare to
Speaker 1: your experience coming up as a chef?
Speaker 2: You know, I gotta say I resisted watching The Bear
Speaker 2: for a long time, largely in part because I just
Speaker 2: don't watch a lot of television, and when I watched television,
Speaker 2: I don't want anything remotely relatable to my real life,
Speaker 2: and so I was like, you know, I don't really
Speaker 2: just everyone's talking about it, and then when something becomes
Speaker 2: so hyped up, I like, I don't want to watch it.
Speaker 2: And so we finished filming our Milwaukee season, Tom and
Speaker 2: Gail kept talking about it. I was like, damn it,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go home. I'm gonna watch it, and I
Speaker 2: did one amazing much more than just a cooking show. Yes,
Speaker 2: uh two, there are a lot of birds in there
Speaker 2: that I can relate to. What's most relatable about it?
Speaker 2: You know, I think it's the pressure. I think it's
Speaker 2: thing that I found most relatable to a lot of
Speaker 2: the characters, as everyone trying to do this job and
Speaker 2: do it really well. Everyone has their own ideas, their
Speaker 2: own point of views, their own experiences, and when they
Speaker 2: all come together, sometimes those things do not work together
Speaker 2: in order to create a bigger, greater restaurant or you know, experience.
Speaker 2: And so I could relate to having been the one
Speaker 2: with ego. I could relate to being amongst a lot
Speaker 2: of ego, toxic ego, regular ego, all of it. And
Speaker 2: I could relate to wanting to do such a good
Speaker 2: job that you kind of almost self destruct. I mean,
Speaker 2: the energy in a kitchen is so intense.
Speaker 3: I worked as a server for a little while, and
Speaker 3: I almost shuddered going into the kitchen because everybody is
Speaker 3: working with so much adrenaline. What do you think you
Speaker 3: need to become excellent in that kind of environment?
Speaker 2: You know, I think it's changed. I think prior to
Speaker 2: a lot of lights being shown on a lot of
Speaker 2: toxic behavior in the kitchen. You know, before it was
Speaker 2: work harder than everyone else. I think now and I
Speaker 2: was on kind of the cusp of that transition is
Speaker 2: it's a lesson in human behavior. It's an experiment and
Speaker 2: putting a lot of different people together and learning how
Speaker 2: to lead. It's about being led and being open to
Speaker 2: being led by someone that you trust. Now I feel
Speaker 2: like what it takes is you just got to be
Speaker 2: a good person, willing to learn, willing to take critique
Speaker 2: and hold yourself accountable, and then as leader side, be
Speaker 2: willing to learn how other people learn and maneuver amongst
Speaker 2: all the different personalities in your space.
Speaker 1: You mentioned how much it's changed, even in the time
Speaker 1: that you've been a chef, this idea that we think
Speaker 1: of women as home chefs but not professional chefs. I
Speaker 1: still can't wrap my brain around why this is so
Speaker 1: pervasive in our culture. But what have you noticed is
Speaker 1: the difference between kitchens run by men and kitchens run
Speaker 1: by women.
Speaker 2: So I've had two very important mentors in my life.
Speaker 2: One happened to be a male chef and the other
Speaker 2: one happened to be a female chef. I will say
Speaker 2: that working for a woman. What that did for me
Speaker 2: was she was able to understand that we needed more
Speaker 2: of us on television, that we needed more of us
Speaker 2: in the forefront, that we needed more of us telling
Speaker 2: our story. But a woman knows what it felt like.
Speaker 2: There is a sense in memory of what that felt
Speaker 2: like when you are not seen and not given a
Speaker 2: chance or not provided the same opportunity as those around you,
Speaker 2: And I feel like that's the difference. I think a
Speaker 2: man could encourage me to go out there and prove
Speaker 2: myself and do good and all that stuff, but it's
Speaker 2: different when someone else goes through it.
Speaker 3: I'm so curious what your personal philosophy as a chef is.
Speaker 2: You have to be kind but not nice. That's personal
Speaker 2: philosophy in life. In my kitchen, that's what I tell
Speaker 2: my chef all the time, because I spent a lot
Speaker 2: of my career trying to be nice. Don't rock the boat,
Speaker 2: don't be the aggressive woman. You aren't allowed to say
Speaker 2: things in the same way that a lot of other
Speaker 2: people could say things like a man could say something.
Speaker 2: And so I tried for a long time just to
Speaker 2: be nice and like make sure everyone got what they
Speaker 2: wanted make sure no one was mad. But what ended
Speaker 2: up happening is that I was losing myself in that,
Speaker 2: and I was also not putting the business first. And
Speaker 2: so you're like, wait a second, but this is my business,
Speaker 2: this is my name, so it's going to come first.
Speaker 2: And I will never forget. When I was opening the restaurant,
Speaker 2: I hired so many talented, skilled people, but a lot
Speaker 2: of them weren't nice, and they weren't kind, and they
Speaker 2: took advantage of the fact that it was being too nice,
Speaker 2: and so I had to reconfigure the way I looked
Speaker 2: at it, and I was like, well, listen, if you
Speaker 2: don't like the way I hold you accountable, you may leave. Goodbye,
Speaker 2: see you later. If you don't like the fact that
Speaker 2: I'm going to tell you no or call you out
Speaker 2: when you do something wrong, or quite frankly, when you're
Speaker 2: being a bully, which I will not stand for in
Speaker 2: my kitchen, I'm sorry, Well, yeah, you may go as
Speaker 2: long as you lead with kindness. I'm not going to
Speaker 2: ins to you personally or take you down. What you're
Speaker 2: doing is not about you. It's about a job that
Speaker 2: you're doing that we can improve on. And so it's
Speaker 2: saying no and still being able to tell people that
Speaker 2: they need to be better.
Speaker 3: All right, we have to take a quick break and
Speaker 3: when we come back, we're getting into culinary hot takes
Speaker 3: with chef Kristin Kish. We're back with Kristin Kish, Kristin
Speaker 3: Simone and I love another one of your shows.
Speaker 2: It's called Restaurants at the End of the World.
Speaker 3: Yes, so you've been to Panama's Cloud Forest Kitchen, a
Speaker 3: floating restaurant in Brazil, the oldest restaurant in the world
Speaker 3: in Madrid. And some of these journeys that you take
Speaker 3: require like a seaplane, a speedboat, walking down a jetty,
Speaker 3: descending into a tunnel that leads to a restaurant sixteen
Speaker 3: feet below sea level. Like it is a journey to
Speaker 3: get there. We want to know which journey was absolutely
Speaker 3: worth your while.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I think there was one where I was pretty damn
Speaker 2: close to the North Pole. It's as close as a
Speaker 2: commercial plane can get you to the North Pole. And
Speaker 2: in order to get there, I had to take so
Speaker 2: many different planes, a boat, and then I got to
Speaker 2: take a boat out into a glacier, which is magnificent
Speaker 2: when you see it in person. Oh my god, it
Speaker 2: is nothing like the greatest documentaries and pictures in Natio
Speaker 2: can ever do justice to it. It literally took my
Speaker 2: breath away, and I think those are the life experiences
Speaker 2: that I tend to go back to. But you know
Speaker 2: how memory and time and place and smell and everything
Speaker 2: that you're seeing is so tied to why something's so amazing.
Speaker 2: And there was this moment with my wife, Oh yeah,
Speaker 2: in the Arctic. She wasn't on camera, there's nothing, no
Speaker 2: reference to her whatsoever, but I just remember looking up,
Speaker 2: I see her and then I see like the vast
Speaker 2: nothingness of the Arctic ocean, and it was I don't know,
Speaker 2: it was just one of those things that I'll never forget.
Speaker 2: It was like a true, once in a lifetime experience
Speaker 2: with someone that I wanted to have it with, and
Speaker 2: it was it was really special.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, that's so sweet. I love that story.
Speaker 1: I want to ask you about your wife. I'm sure
Speaker 1: that you test out new dishes on her. Maybe does
Speaker 1: she keep it.
Speaker 2: Real with you? Is she like Kristen, I'm not really
Speaker 2: filing this one. So she helped me open my first restaurant.
Speaker 2: That's how we met. So when we first met we
Speaker 2: were not dating. We were simply just She was on
Speaker 2: the corporate side. I was on the you know, the
Speaker 2: chef partner side. She will tell me the truth. She
Speaker 2: will tell me when something doesn't look right or when
Speaker 2: it just is missing something. She'll tell me when something
Speaker 2: just doesn't fit really like the vibe of what we're
Speaker 2: trying to go for. She tastes everything that I cook.
Speaker 2: I trust her. Is she kind or nice or neither?
Speaker 2: She's kind and she says this sucks in a really
Speaker 2: nice way. No, she'll tell me the truth. And I
Speaker 2: can see even if she doesn't want to say it,
Speaker 2: I can see it on her face if she doesn't
Speaker 2: like something. But you know, we're very open and honest
Speaker 2: with each other about all of that. When we think
Speaker 2: something's a good idea or not. Does she cook with
Speaker 2: you or is she just strictly the taste tester? Taste
Speaker 2: test her. So she has like a repertoire of like
Speaker 2: five recipes from her mother, and I love them so much.
Speaker 2: But she is a recipe follower. If she doesn't have
Speaker 2: a recipe, she's not really winging stuff. And when I'm
Speaker 2: not here, and if I don't feel prep for her
Speaker 2: and she's home by herself, she will like chuck a
Speaker 2: piece of salmon in the oven and steam some vegetables
Speaker 2: and like call it a day. That's it. She's more
Speaker 2: of like, that's not bad. She can feed herself. She
Speaker 2: can feed her Oh, she's one hundred percent capable of
Speaker 2: feeding herself. I just make it tastes better, that's all amazing.
Speaker 1: I'm the opposite of your wife. I call myself the
Speaker 1: blackout chef. I don't believe in recipes. It's like a
Speaker 1: philosophical disconnect for me, a spiritual disconnect, and I just
Speaker 1: just make stuff up in my head.
Speaker 2: I think I'm on an episode of Chop.
Speaker 1: I'll take the most disparate ingredients from my fridge and
Speaker 1: I'll just try to make something beautiful from the mess.
Speaker 2: But how often does it not work out? Great question?
Speaker 1: Now you're getting personal, Kristin, and I feel I feel attacked.
Speaker 2: Kristin.
Speaker 3: Let's just say her husband is a saint. Okay, he's
Speaker 3: a saint taste tester. Okay, So, Kristin. I have interviewed
Speaker 3: a few chefs, and most of the time they tell me,
Speaker 3: and it's always different, but they tell me that they
Speaker 3: have something that they keep in their bag at all times.
Speaker 3: I've heard sea salt, I've heard hot sauce. What is
Speaker 3: your essential? What do you think we need in our
Speaker 3: bag at all times? Gummy candy?
Speaker 2: Yah? What kind? Any fruity chewy but not too chewy,
Speaker 2: slightly sour, but an assorted peck So like there's you know,
Speaker 2: candy that comes in one flavor, one bag with one flavor.
Speaker 2: I get flavor feindo. Yes, I need a variety pack
Speaker 2: of something things like a skittle or star Wars that
Speaker 2: has different flavors. Having snacks can like curb offs a
Speaker 2: little bit angry and impatience so you can get to
Speaker 2: the next thing of like actually making food for yourself.
Speaker 2: So you know, sure, salt sounds great, hot sauce is wonderful,
Speaker 2: but if you're hungry, how far is that gonna get you?
Speaker 2: Candy approached at all times?
Speaker 1: Candy? Have you tried the harrowbo All Star mixed bag?
Speaker 2: I love that one? Someone is that the one with
Speaker 2: the berry is so lit?
Speaker 1: Yes, it has the cherries, it has those sour worms,
Speaker 1: it has the coke bottles, it has the gummy bears.
Speaker 2: It's like chef's kiss.
Speaker 3: And sometimes they're misshapen in the best way, Like you
Speaker 3: get the reject bag. It's so fun. So is that
Speaker 3: why you have a gummy bear tattoo?
Speaker 2: So I'll give you the story about the gummy bear.
Speaker 2: I like to get tattoos that mark moments in time.
Speaker 2: I clearly have a lot of tattoos or a lot
Speaker 2: of moments in time, some that are you know, are
Speaker 2: worthy of talking about, and some that just aren't. The
Speaker 2: gummy bear is one of those things that brings me
Speaker 2: a lot of joy. And so the gummy bear is
Speaker 2: because on set, during all of our cuts and takes
Speaker 2: at the beginning of the season, like my onset assistant
Speaker 2: would come on and like he'd always carry candy and
Speaker 2: his fanny pack, my water bottle and my candy, my chapsticks.
Speaker 2: So you'd come open up a bag and between takes,
Speaker 2: I take a couple of pieces that we carry on
Speaker 2: and then second day, third day, Tom and Gill are like,
Speaker 2: what is this guy like pulling out candy, and so
Speaker 2: they're like, let me have some. And over the season
Speaker 2: it grew into we'd have candy breaks in between every take,
Speaker 2: and they started bringing out boards of gummy ca any
Speaker 2: of different kinds and so Tom and Gale sits to
Speaker 2: my left at Judge's table. So I got a gummy
Speaker 2: bear on my left side to represent this. Oh my god,
Speaker 2: that's really cute. Kristin.
Speaker 3: I feel like you need to come out with your
Speaker 3: own line of high end gummies.
Speaker 2: Do we want high end gummies? Do we want just
Speaker 2: like down and dirty kind of crappy gummies? Like a
Speaker 2: little bit you know what, you're the chef, you decide,
Speaker 2: I'll do an all star mix of crappy and high end,
Speaker 2: so we you know, we cater to the bougie and
Speaker 2: then the basic perfect.
Speaker 3: I feel like in this scenario, I'm the basic, but
Speaker 3: it's fine, I'll take it.
Speaker 2: Oh my goodness. Okay, Danielle and I both have culinary
Speaker 2: hot takes.
Speaker 1: Mine is that? And get ready for this. I think
Speaker 1: pizza is overrated all pizza. I think that people lean
Speaker 1: on pizza too often. I find that pizza is the fallback,
Speaker 1: it's the answer for everything, and.
Speaker 2: I don't know that I spiritually connect with that.
Speaker 1: I mean, I love pizza, but I don't know that
Speaker 1: it needs to be the go to takeout food. So listen,
Speaker 1: I've given you my culinary hot take. I've bared my
Speaker 1: soul to you. I've been vulnerable Kristin. Now it's your turn.
Speaker 1: What is your culinary hot take?
Speaker 2: Okay, so there's a lot of things that I don't
Speaker 2: yuck on, like it brings joy to someone else. So
Speaker 2: I'm like, do you whatever makes you happy? Yeah? I can't. Yeah,
Speaker 2: somebody's right, however I can't. You know, the restaurants, and
Speaker 2: this is very specific to like the restaurant scene. Is
Speaker 2: that the way we consume life. And I feel like
Speaker 2: sometimes like social media and what our life has become.
Speaker 2: It's like pure on maximalist. It's like more and more,
Speaker 2: and so restaurants, some restaurants have started to adopt this,
Speaker 2: like cook for trend. Everything's like looks good and everything
Speaker 2: looks like, oh my god. But you go and you
Speaker 2: order several different things and everything is high acid, high salt,
Speaker 2: high spice, high texture. Everything is just high all the time.
Speaker 2: Problem with that is, but you don't actually taste anything.
Speaker 2: It's just like sensory overload, which fires in all cylinders
Speaker 2: and makes you think you're having a great meal. But
Speaker 2: the artist subtlety needs to come back in all forms.
Speaker 2: I don't like the mores more approach.
Speaker 3: Okay, I'm gonna get I have a few hot takes
Speaker 3: at Simone. I ardently disagree with your pizza hot take.
Speaker 3: As a Chicago in, it's against my religion to agree
Speaker 3: with that.
Speaker 2: That's fine, makes sense.
Speaker 3: Hot take number one, ketchup is good on most things,
Speaker 3: if not everything.
Speaker 2: Number two.
Speaker 3: Have you ever tried cottage cheese with a baked potato? Unbelievable?
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, it's like so good.
Speaker 2: Also hot take. Okay, hold on, let's go back to
Speaker 2: this pizza take. Okay, let's go back. Let's talk about it.
Speaker 2: When we say all pizza, Simone, there are several different kinds.
Speaker 2: It's different forms. It has the same variety as your
Speaker 2: all star Aerobo mix. Like when's the last time you
Speaker 2: had pizza? You know what?
Speaker 1: Okay, I think you bring up a good point. The
Speaker 1: truth is, I'm a bougie bitch and I really like
Speaker 1: like a coal fired pizza, you know, like I want
Speaker 1: bubbles in the crust. So I think that I'm I'm
Speaker 1: a Politan style Yeah exactly, I'm a Neapolitan girl living
Speaker 1: in a corner slice world. And I think that's where
Speaker 1: my disappointment comes from.
Speaker 2: That's what I just need to eat. More so, Danielle,
Speaker 2: pizza you do. Yeah. Also to go off Danielle culinary
Speaker 2: hottech that I did not mention is I don't think
Speaker 2: deep dish pizzas. What do you consider it a pie?
Speaker 2: I think that it has more qualities to Lasagnia than
Speaker 2: it does a pizza. That's actually a great call. It's
Speaker 2: a casserole. It is a Midwestern pizza. Cast I would
Speaker 2: agree with you on that. I think we just pissed
Speaker 2: off a bunch of Chicago by Chicago.
Speaker 1: They just left the show, so it's been a minute
Speaker 1: since You're on the other side of the camera. For
Speaker 1: a Chef's Challenge, right, and for listeners. On Top Chef,
Speaker 1: the contestants compete in a quick fire challenge based on
Speaker 1: a limited number of ingredients, and it forces you to
Speaker 1: get super creative, which is why I love watching these
Speaker 1: cooking shows. Now, we've seen lots of people trying to
Speaker 1: recreate the magic on TikTok with varying degrees of success.
Speaker 1: So we think that we could use your help. We
Speaker 1: need a little Chef's kish, good on good on good one.
Speaker 3: So in this game of Chef's Kish, we're gonna throw
Speaker 3: out some TikTok trends, and you can give us your
Speaker 3: top chef take on how people can level up their
Speaker 3: cooking game. So the first one is the Green Goddess
Speaker 3: dressing that took TikTok by storm. It's made with mayonnaise,
Speaker 3: yogurt or sour cream, parsley, lemon juice, and that's the
Speaker 3: basic way. What's your top chef take on a salad
Speaker 3: dressing that everybody should or could make it home.
Speaker 2: Listen, here's the thing with salad dressings. I prefer an
Speaker 2: a mulcified dressing, which means you have to have an
Speaker 2: emulsifying agent. So, because the kids on TikTok don't necessarily
Speaker 2: talk about food in this way, we're the at least
Speaker 2: the ones that I have I've seen. And so what
Speaker 2: that does is it takes oil and vinegar, two things
Speaker 2: that don't want to mix inherently, and allows them to
Speaker 2: come together in a really creamy emulsified dressing. You can
Speaker 2: do that with egg, yolk or mustard. So how about
Speaker 2: my hot take on salad dressing is that before we
Speaker 2: start dumping a lot of things in some blenders and
Speaker 2: calling it addressing, is we learn the basic scientific ways
Speaker 2: to properly emulsify addressing so you don't use globs of
Speaker 2: mayonnaise and sour cream. I love this, It's bougie. It's
Speaker 2: a multifying mn. She hit us with the emulsification, y'all.
Speaker 2: Straight out the gate, straight out the MF gate.
Speaker 1: Okay, people are doing the most with croissants on TikTok right,
Speaker 1: So we've seen the flattening trend where people are literally
Speaker 1: flattening them instead of keeping them light and puffy and airy.
Speaker 1: What is your top chef take on cooking with croissants?
Speaker 1: Are people committing like high culinary sin here?
Speaker 2: What do you think? Yes, yes they are. Here's the
Speaker 2: thing again, from someone that has made my fair share
Speaker 2: of croissants that have been a part of the painstaking process.
Speaker 2: It takes the whole point. I'm gonna get fired up
Speaker 2: on this one. The whole point of a croissant and
Speaker 2: the laminating of dough and fat is to get those light, flaky,
Speaker 2: beautiful layers like layer on layer on layer. It takes
Speaker 2: days to make a great croissant. Days? And how dare
Speaker 2: someone smash that thing? What's the point? I'd rather you
Speaker 2: take store bought puff pastry and go and smash that
Speaker 2: because fine, do that, but to take a perfectly beautiful
Speaker 2: croissant in its purest, most perfect form and take away
Speaker 2: the whole point of why someone made it in the
Speaker 2: first place. No, it's bullshit. It's bullshit that pisses me off.
Speaker 2: Don't do that to a croissant. I'm with you.
Speaker 3: We need to respect the way things are made.
Speaker 2: I got fired up on that one. Tell us how
Speaker 2: you really feel, Kristen, tell us how you really feel.
Speaker 3: Our producers are writing obsessed, obsessed. Okay, we have one
Speaker 3: last question for you, because we appreciate you putting on
Speaker 3: your chef's kish on some of these tasty topics, but
Speaker 3: we need to dish on the Top Chef finale coming up.
Speaker 3: What can we expect to see? What were you surprised
Speaker 3: by anything this season? We won't be mad if you
Speaker 3: want to break a little news here.
Speaker 2: On the bright side, there's not a time I can
Speaker 2: say about the actual happenings on the season. But what
Speaker 2: I can talk about is that somewhere in my journey,
Speaker 2: my personal journey of my wardrobe, because I'm not scared
Speaker 2: to get in trouble to talk about that love, this
Speaker 2: is that we level up in the mid drifts, and
Speaker 2: there are some there are some things that have challenged
Speaker 2: me and pushed me out of my comfort zone. Imagine
Speaker 2: having that while you're eating all the food, which is
Speaker 2: not the most comfortable thing. So during the Top Chef finale,
Speaker 2: while we're sitting there dining all together, my pants are undone.
Speaker 2: So take a little peek and see if you can
Speaker 2: find it.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, you're my people. I thought I was
Speaker 1: the only person who did that at a restaurant. That's amazing.
Speaker 3: If somebody does peep your pants undone and sends you
Speaker 3: a DM on Instagram, can they win a meal cooked
Speaker 3: by Kristen.
Speaker 2: I will, I will do this, I will, I can.
Speaker 2: I will officially put this out there now if someone
Speaker 2: can find it and the producers er it, and someone
Speaker 2: can screenshout it in the moment that I'm sure it's
Speaker 2: half a second. You are welcome to come to Arlo
Speaker 2: Gray and you and a guest can have dinner on me. Wow. Wow, Wow,
Speaker 2: Simon and I are going to be screenshotting. It's not ready,
Speaker 2: eyes out. I hope they show it. I really do
Speaker 2: hope they show it.
Speaker 3: Kristin, we could have you here all day. I wish
Speaker 3: we could. Thank you so much for coming on, Thank you.
Speaker 2: For having me. Thank you, Kristin, this was the best.
Speaker 2: You're the best, the thank you.
Speaker 3: Kristin Kish is a chef, restaurant owner, innovator, and the
Speaker 3: host of Top Chef.
Speaker 2: That's it.
Speaker 3: For today's show, Tomorrow, we have the original Fresh Prince
Speaker 3: of bel Air star Tatiana Ali. She's joining us to
Speaker 3: talk about her latest venture supporting birth workers with her
Speaker 3: baby yams quilts.
Speaker 2: You don't want to miss it.
Speaker 1: Listen and follow the bright Side on the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Simone Boye.
Speaker 1: You can find me at Simone Boice on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 3: I'm Danielle Robe on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 2: That's r O B A Y. We'll see you tomorrow.
Speaker 3: Keep looking on the bright side.