Speaker 1: You are listening to Ruthie's Table four in Partnership with Montclair.
Speaker 2: I'd been wanting to read Keith mc nally's memoir I
Speaker 2: regret almost everything for some time because I know Keith
Speaker 2: and I love him. It also has the best title ever.
Speaker 2: But the first chapter nearly finished me off. In the
Speaker 2: very first sentence, Keith writes about his attempted suicide in
Speaker 2: Martha's Vineyard. It's painful to absorb as a reader, but
Speaker 2: for a friend it was monumental. It took me some
Speaker 2: time to return to the book, but I'm glad I
Speaker 2: did because this is a brilliant book. It's funny, it's
Speaker 2: moving and deeply honest. When arriving in New York City,
Speaker 2: I go straight to Minetta Tavern before anyone knows I'm there.
Speaker 2: Quite simply, it's my favorite restaurant I know, and I
Speaker 2: love people who work there, and I love the food.
Speaker 2: Mostly I go because it's a connection with Keith. From
Speaker 2: the moment Rose Gray and I, two inexperienced women thirty
Speaker 2: eight years ago, thought about doing the River Cafe, Rose
Speaker 2: made it very clear that everything she knew she had
Speaker 2: learned from Keith McNally, and over the last thirty eight years,
Speaker 2: Keith has been our mentor, our model, and a hero
Speaker 2: of restaurants, The Odeon, Pastith, Balthazar, Lucky Strike, to name
Speaker 2: a few. Keith is here with me today to talk
Speaker 2: about friends and family, writing a book, and most of all,
Speaker 2: regretting almost everything.
Speaker 3: I always say that we make very few decisions.
Speaker 4: You hear that?
Speaker 2: And what do we decide? You know? Nothing?
Speaker 4: Nothing? Nothing?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think so?
Speaker 4: And so when did you what was your first restaurant working?
Speaker 4: Was actually a place called seven Serendipity. I really good
Speaker 4: ice cream, really good back time.
Speaker 2: When I was a little my dad, is it still there?
Speaker 2: Do they still have those ice creams? Listeners? There was
Speaker 2: a little place on the it's still there's a kind
Speaker 2: of basic.
Speaker 4: Go down.
Speaker 2: That must be like one of the oldest longest restaurants
Speaker 2: in New York because I probably went there in the lake.
Speaker 2: So you worked at Sarah Dipity is the Boy.
Speaker 4: But the first brag I really enjoyed working out place
Speaker 4: not in there now called one fift Yeah. Yeah, that's
Speaker 4: when I make the lawn and micros actually because sat
Speaker 4: in Knight Live. If it just opened for three months earlier,
Speaker 4: then always have the pasties after passes, they still do.
Speaker 4: There were days people were like John Blueshi chav Is
Speaker 4: chasing with the brown certain It was quite bizarre because
Speaker 4: I was in chart at the pasties and so I
Speaker 4: made to meet all the fancy people.
Speaker 2: So you in charge of parties at one f job.
Speaker 4: I was also waiting, and then eventually became GM and.
Speaker 2: Then you decided to do well, you didn't decide, But
Speaker 2: how did? Then? How did? Because starting a restaurant is
Speaker 2: a big deal, yes it is.
Speaker 4: But then I left the one face and got a
Speaker 4: green card because I was quite illegal these days. I
Speaker 4: was default and mad, so why I was legal for
Speaker 4: the four years? And then once I got my green car,
Speaker 4: my brother Brian and my girlfriend Lynn decided to look
Speaker 4: for the place because we really got fed up with
Speaker 4: working for the other people.
Speaker 2: Did you think there was also a kind of restaurant
Speaker 2: that you missed that you wanted?
Speaker 4: I don't know. First of all, I wanted just a
Speaker 4: sandwich shop, but one we found Towers cast up Ceteria
Speaker 4: and tried Beckham and that we loved. It was bath placed,
Speaker 4: as was larger wrestle. But I always liked everybody enjoyed
Speaker 4: lack of Pol in mid from Paris, so I had
Speaker 4: that my mind would beat.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what did you love about locker.
Speaker 4: Pool because it was open to all hours to all
Speaker 4: kinds of people.
Speaker 2: I was sitting outside locker Pool with Richard and we've
Speaker 2: been to a movie and it must have been about
Speaker 2: twelve thirty and we're very young. We're just doing the pomperty.
Speaker 2: And there was a couple and they it was like
Speaker 2: it really was almost one in the morning, and they
Speaker 2: came and the man was on his cane and they
Speaker 2: looked kind of elderly at frail and they looked at
Speaker 2: the menu, and then they talked to each other and
Speaker 2: then they went inside. And I said, that's how I
Speaker 2: want to get out. I don't want to live in
Speaker 2: the country. I don't want to retire. I want to
Speaker 2: be deciding at one o'clock in the morning whether I
Speaker 2: should go to local pol or not. I was so.
Speaker 4: Excited, but it was changeful for me too. I don't
Speaker 4: have to each the two week in the morning. But
Speaker 4: New you cand of if you love me. That's why
Speaker 4: I left London. I didn't know the reason, but when
Speaker 4: I've personally arrived in New Yorm, that's one of the
Speaker 4: main things I really enjoyed, and I don't necessarily really
Speaker 4: want to go every night, just the idea that I
Speaker 4: can do.
Speaker 2: You can. Yeah, and so Odeon Why did you call
Speaker 2: it Odeon?
Speaker 4: But my brother Brian kind of by their name because
Speaker 4: of Cinema Cinema.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the Odeon Cinemas, which are chain of cinemas in London. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's a great name. Was it difficult opening yet?
Speaker 4: No, but it it's costs under one fifty two thousand dollars. No,
Speaker 4: it's just memory cole. Now this one.
Speaker 2: Costs US thirty thousand pounds. Rose is to drive up
Speaker 2: to like miles away to find some broken down fridge
Speaker 2: in Lovely.
Speaker 4: Maybe by necessity. Yeah, once you got money, you fixed
Speaker 4: province with money. If we don't have the money, it
Speaker 4: must be fixed birth provilence created.
Speaker 2: Yeah, if you have money, you fix it with money.
Speaker 2: If you don't have money, you fix it creatively.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Interesting and was an immediate success.
Speaker 4: By third night with but because working downtown for so long,
Speaker 4: when you go to know lots of people and the
Speaker 4: thing that got off the ground was really normal. Michaels
Speaker 4: and just sat in and I would come and needs
Speaker 4: to also drive back in the early eighties, so that
Speaker 4: was nineteen eighty was the center of the artwork arters.
Speaker 2: So do you remember Jack's Kansas City or.
Speaker 4: It makes its Kansas City?
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was kind of cool because my older sister
Speaker 2: was a painter and a lot of those artists, you know,
Speaker 2: painting alone all days, lonely and you know, you don't
Speaker 2: see anybody, and then they used to go out at
Speaker 2: night and then everybody would meet up at night.
Speaker 4: Lots of the painters like Jacks and podk was.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, how did you deal with that? I was
Speaker 2: drinking a different thing then.
Speaker 4: Yes, because we were at the same age basically. Yeah,
Speaker 4: it's different.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's interesting how it's changed. Do you
Speaker 2: think it was more forgiving then do you think?
Speaker 4: Yes, My happiest times was actually with hisself after work
Speaker 4: because they treating me as one of the son. But the
Speaker 4: drinking beers and then after after doing Catherine Lutemburg, that
Speaker 4: was way uptown.
Speaker 2: I remember they have white childs on the floor, is it?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I remember Luxemburg is still there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I didn't have been there for four to five years,
Speaker 4: carefully members forty one years and after that now and
Speaker 4: after that Lectrige drive, Lucky Stride.
Speaker 2: I remember Lucky Strike. We have just a word before
Speaker 2: he said about Balthasar, because Balthasar is completely well. You've
Speaker 2: changed cities. I mean you've changed New York. You have
Speaker 2: You've made restaurants that people want to go to to
Speaker 2: have fun, to think about themselves. The changes, the whole dynamic.
Speaker 2: Didn't you find when COVID happened and there were no
Speaker 2: restaurants here, restaurants closed, and then when they opened people
Speaker 2: were so happy.
Speaker 4: I remember it's Bouncers. Before COVID, I didn't really understand
Speaker 4: well restaurant makes for people in the city. There's after
Speaker 4: COVID I did. But when it reopened Boss, which which
Speaker 4: is late March twenty the people with their first night
Speaker 4: was crazy.
Speaker 2: The dance.
Speaker 4: It's like if we hear day.
Speaker 2: I agree. I used to say that, you know, if
Speaker 2: you ask me what makes the city great, it would
Speaker 2: be museums and parks and hospitals and you know, theaters.
Speaker 2: We realized that restaurants are right up. People cried when
Speaker 2: they came back here having a bit away and you
Speaker 2: realize that you go to a restaurant, you bump into
Speaker 2: people you might not Yeah, I've seen.
Speaker 4: You get, especially these days with people are online so much.
Speaker 2: Yeah, just tell us about Balthazar. What was the idea?
Speaker 4: Was in Paris? And then I saw a polk a
Speaker 4: barmb for one hundred years ago. It was a huge
Speaker 4: bomb and some ma'am I liked it so much I
Speaker 4: bought their potoo and carried the photographs when every day
Speaker 4: for five years and one day and I saw a
Speaker 4: space and because them that was so high but lovely bomb.
Speaker 4: That's when I got the I and the needs of
Speaker 4: high seeing. Relatively so, there's some paces I saw, hell see,
Speaker 4: but when I saw there's a warehouse and swoming students
Speaker 4: and then yea.
Speaker 2: And what a great restaurant it is. You know, if
Speaker 2: you go there a lot.
Speaker 4: I remember, I'm like to be alone there and we
Speaker 4: be on. I also left the music late a night.
Speaker 2: Does everybody start dancing? See that? Do you think it's
Speaker 2: only a night nightclubs and restaurants you are slightly watching
Speaker 2: people think I'm incredibly out there and very open, but
Speaker 2: actually quite shy. I'm quite quite shy, and so in
Speaker 2: a way it's a good way to see people have people,
Speaker 2: but you don't actually have to engage that much.
Speaker 4: But we'd like to watch other people not participaly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree. When I when I have a big
Speaker 2: party at our house, I always stand at the door,
Speaker 2: and everybody thinks Ruthie is so polite because I see
Speaker 2: every single person who comes in. I say hello to
Speaker 2: every person, but I don't have to mingle. Yeah, very similar.
Speaker 2: There's a great you know the movie Castablanca. Well, that's
Speaker 2: my favorite line. When people ask me to sit down,
Speaker 2: I always say that. In Castablanca, Ingred Bergmann comes back
Speaker 2: having looking for Rick, you know, and she had an
Speaker 2: affair with him, and they left in Paris in a
Speaker 2: very romantic way. And it's during the war, and she says,
Speaker 2: please tell Rick, I want him to come and sit
Speaker 2: with us.
Speaker 4: And the lot. I remember that it never.
Speaker 2: Sits with the customers, you know, And so sometimes I
Speaker 2: say that everything, come and sit down and say rip never.
Speaker 4: Sits allowed line too.
Speaker 2: And your children, your son George is on the ball.
Speaker 4: Great. The other kids worked barely, luckily they're not intan,
Speaker 4: but George.
Speaker 2: George is yeah, lovely, lovely guy. No, my kids don't
Speaker 2: haven't taken up. Rose's son Ossie worked in the wine
Speaker 2: and managed us and but my again, my family have
Speaker 2: all worked here as waiters. It's nice, lovely.
Speaker 4: One thing about love what you do here. The waiters
Speaker 4: have to do the prep Yeah, I love.
Speaker 2: It, do you? Yeah? It makes some bit. Now we
Speaker 2: have so many people they do. We have preppers as well.
Speaker 2: But that kind of involvement with food is good. But
Speaker 2: you do that do they? What time? What time do
Speaker 2: your waiters come in?
Speaker 4: So when when the busy day we have to prepare them?
Speaker 4: Can do one thousand cover amazing? That a month amazing.
Speaker 2: But it's we have the best job in the world.
Speaker 4: I think.
Speaker 2: So don't you think we do?
Speaker 4: I do know talking to you, to you makes me inspired.
Speaker 2: We have to keep what else? You know? That's what
Speaker 2: I think. I think we have a great and the
Speaker 2: problems are you know, when we have a problem, you
Speaker 2: can solve them, you know.
Speaker 4: And I love the jump. I think the jump is
Speaker 4: all about how do you solve problem? People saved to
Speaker 4: take to me, but runs about of itself. It doesn't
Speaker 4: It's almost closes every day there maybe your problem.
Speaker 2: They come up to me and say, Ruthie, we have
Speaker 2: a you know, table four is a difficult table, and
Speaker 2: I think great, Yeah, imagine estate bottled olive oil chosen
Speaker 2: and bottled for the River Cafe, arriving at your door
Speaker 2: every month. Our subscription is available for six or twelve months,
Speaker 2: with each oil chosen personally by our head chefs and
Speaker 2: varying with each delivery. It's a perfect way to bring
Speaker 2: some River Cafe flavor into your home, or to show
Speaker 2: someone you really care for them with a gift. Visit
Speaker 2: our website shop the Rivercafe dot co dot uk to
Speaker 2: place your order. Now, I wanted to read you this
Speaker 2: piece so you could read it from your book about Rose,
Speaker 2: because it was so moving. Okay, I just read this.
Speaker 2: This is from Keith's book I regret almost everything, and
Speaker 2: this is a piece he wrote about Rose a month
Speaker 2: before we opened. Nell recommended, So that was Nel Campbell,
Speaker 2: and this is Keith talking. Recommended an English friend of hers.
Speaker 2: A brilliant home cook, she said, but someone who'd never
Speaker 2: worked in a restaurant kitchen. While being skeptical of hiring
Speaker 2: a non professional, I was in tre us enough to
Speaker 2: fly to London to meet this woman. Her name was
Speaker 2: Rose Gray. The meeting started awkwardly because we both knew
Speaker 2: I was there to discuss food, but we consciously avoided
Speaker 2: the subject. Eventually, Rose asked me if I fancied a
Speaker 2: bite to eat. Her bite was a grilled, marinated lamb sandwich.
Speaker 2: It was one of the most delicious sandwiches I'd eaten
Speaker 2: in my life. I hired her on the spot. Rose
Speaker 2: planned to stay for two months, but it ended up
Speaker 2: being four. She couldn't continue any longer, she said, because
Speaker 2: she was planning on opening an amateur sounding place in
Speaker 2: London with her friend Ruthie Rogers. After she described her
Speaker 2: cafe by the Thames, I told her it probably wouldn't
Speaker 2: work and that she was better off remaining with me
Speaker 2: at Nell's. Do you remember that, Yeah, So tell me
Speaker 2: the story.
Speaker 4: In one hand, of course, I wanted to be access
Speaker 4: and the other way and I was quite jealous.
Speaker 2: Oh, it was very It was very very tiny. We
Speaker 2: wanted to be, you know, being Rose. Rose had this
Speaker 2: incredible air of confidence and she just an ambition. And
Speaker 2: I remember in the early days she used to get
Speaker 2: into a taxi, but really early, and she would just
Speaker 2: get in the cab and she'd go the River Cafe
Speaker 2: and I'd go. That poor driver, so he has no
Speaker 2: idea what the River Cafe was. And she could sound
Speaker 2: quite fierce. No, actually she wasn't at all. She was
Speaker 2: so vulnerable and so but.
Speaker 4: She was fantastic cook, maybe the best cook every she is.
Speaker 2: She was, And she was also a great cook and
Speaker 2: a great teacher. She loved teaching these kids and coming in.
Speaker 2: I've never worked in a restaurant at all, and I've
Speaker 2: been a waiter when I was sixteen, and so to
Speaker 2: come in and start this teene. The only good thing
Speaker 2: we had was it was small, and the other good thing,
Speaker 2: you know, because sometimes restrictions are good, you westract, I agree.
Speaker 4: How do take to realize how good she was and
Speaker 4: how the great their food was?
Speaker 3: When when when we just started working, we sat down
Speaker 3: and because again we only had a tiny, teeny little kitchen,
Speaker 3: you know, we had one fire, one grill, and four
Speaker 3: hot plates.
Speaker 4: What was it on your menu?
Speaker 2: We had two menus. We had a menu that was sandwiches,
Speaker 2: so people could come in and have a sandwich for
Speaker 2: two pounds fifty. And then we had a pasta every
Speaker 2: we had one pasta and sandwiches.
Speaker 4: What pasta has changed every day?
Speaker 2: Yeah, the pasta changed every day. So I would do
Speaker 2: one day, I would do the pastas and Rose would
Speaker 2: do the sandwiches, and then one day I would do
Speaker 2: the sandwiches and Rose would do that. We just switched
Speaker 2: every time, and so it was learning. I'd known Rose
Speaker 2: because she was Richard's girlfriend really before I even knew it.
Speaker 2: They were about sixteen. They went to some Guildford college
Speaker 2: or something, and then you know, we just we just
Speaker 2: worked together, you know, and we just found we were different.
Speaker 2: We had different approaches, we had different ways of cooking.
Speaker 2: But you know what, well, I think in probably twenty
Speaker 2: We started in eighty seven and she died in twenty ten,
Speaker 2: so what's that thirty how many years is that? Twenty
Speaker 2: twenty three years? We never had an argument and it
Speaker 2: was conscious. My brother, actually, Michael said to me, I'll
Speaker 2: give you one piece of advice if you ever worked
Speaker 2: with somebody else, never have an argument, because you'll always
Speaker 2: remember that argument. You'll remember the time, you know, you
Speaker 2: turned around and said, well, I never liked the way
Speaker 2: you come. And mostly it took an effort on my
Speaker 2: part because I think she was happy to argue anything.
Speaker 2: But it was a really good relationship.
Speaker 4: How do you wasases get along with this kitchen?
Speaker 2: Well, because we're all because we have an open kitchen.
Speaker 2: First of all, you can't get angry, you know, you
Speaker 2: just can't. It's a real kind of barrier there. So
Speaker 2: if you say I've been waiting for this, I've been
Speaker 2: waiting for that. And so they all I think they
Speaker 2: get They get along pretty pretty well. And we don't
Speaker 2: have that tom chef waiter front of house back. And
Speaker 2: I have to say also, as you know, I have
Speaker 2: a friend who has a restaurant and he's often talks
Speaker 2: about having difficult customers. We don't have difficult I don't
Speaker 2: complain about my customers very much, do you. I generally
Speaker 2: quite like my customers.
Speaker 4: Can't say I like them. I like, I'm jaking.
Speaker 2: What do you mean that you don't.
Speaker 4: James Gordon, yeah, Joining I wasn't there, but I was
Speaker 4: a home and the manager called me and said joined
Speaker 4: gracious in tears because James Gordon got angry and speacause
Speaker 4: of the instrument.
Speaker 2: So for the person who hasn't read Keith McNally's Instagram,
Speaker 2: and I suggest you follow him because they're a great
Speaker 2: way to start the day or end of the day.
Speaker 2: Is that especially for somebody who works the way I do.
Speaker 2: But also I think just for you know, seeing you're
Speaker 2: such a good writer and the way that you Again,
Speaker 2: there are letters. The instagrams really are about the people
Speaker 2: who work in your restaurant. You give them credit, you
Speaker 2: praise them, you're proud of them. You give them and
Speaker 2: fire them, you fire them. I haven't seen instagram saying
Speaker 2: you fire? Do you fire people.
Speaker 4: About?
Speaker 2: Have you fired people?
Speaker 4: Yes, right of course, But I'm like you. I didn't
Speaker 4: enjoy it. But he would give to him if I.
Speaker 4: Of course, somebody to fire somebody often I have to
Speaker 4: do with fire people.
Speaker 2: I once had to fire somebody. I knew I would
Speaker 2: have to because he behaves so badly. I mean, he
Speaker 2: actually harmed somebody. And he's a great guy actually, but
Speaker 2: he kind of had a breakdown. And I called him
Speaker 2: up the next morning and I said, you've got to
Speaker 2: come and see me. And I sat down. I said,
Speaker 2: you know, what you did last night was crazy? You
Speaker 2: are you know you did this, you did that, and
Speaker 2: you harm somebody. And I said, you know what would
Speaker 2: you do if you were me? He said, I fired me.
Speaker 2: I said, okay, you're fired, and that was it.
Speaker 4: Let go.
Speaker 2: It's not a nice thing to do. I don't like it.
Speaker 2: I don't like firing people, and usually you can just
Speaker 2: move them around or find a place for them something
Speaker 2: else to do.
Speaker 4: I'm alwaysome. I often gave it to people with second chances.
Speaker 4: I believe believer in second chances. So I might find
Speaker 4: somebody that Manda and the Monday and choose to beg
Speaker 4: them to come back.
Speaker 2: Do you think that me too? And all of that
Speaker 2: has helped restaurants.
Speaker 4: Because I do.
Speaker 2: I think it's better.
Speaker 4: Maybe I'm overall I agree with maybe, but when one
Speaker 4: actually meant I was done alive about them summertime, one
Speaker 4: to twenty people might be innocence.
Speaker 2: I think it's getting better here because there's a process.
Speaker 2: And I don't know about big people, but here in
Speaker 2: the River Cafe now in Britain, I think if somebody
Speaker 2: reports anything, you know, we used to sit down with
Speaker 2: them and say, hey, God, you know you can't talk
Speaker 2: that way, you shouldn't do this. Now there's a process
Speaker 2: which is that everything stops. You bring somebody in and
Speaker 2: there's a fair trial and kind of you know, they
Speaker 2: bring witnesses, they do, and it's handled in a way
Speaker 2: that it is not personal, it just is. And I
Speaker 2: think young people now they say that when you talk
Speaker 2: to the women or even the guys. They say, people
Speaker 2: in their twenties, they know they know how to speak
Speaker 2: to women, but they know how to deal with it.
Speaker 4: Two of months ago I had a couple of to
Speaker 4: caught having sex in the base bringe doing the service.
Speaker 4: Those are angry and then twenty two Yeah, that's why
Speaker 4: nothing at one went after chext. But as long as
Speaker 4: and then I've didn't buy him. I just you said,
Speaker 4: don't need doing again, doing again, something else, but not
Speaker 4: with Yeah, I didn't mention it to a job because
Speaker 4: my ah person would.
Speaker 2: Like if he was a manager and she was a waiter. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no,
Speaker 2: I think I mean that's kind of why we used
Speaker 2: to go to work.
Speaker 4: I'm by the way, and maybe we're gonna be sex,
Speaker 4: but maybe my two wives of the professional exactly exactly.
Speaker 2: But I think I think for us now it's kind
Speaker 2: of like but also you can do all that and still,
Speaker 2: well we've always had you. I'm sure you too. It's
Speaker 2: just the same thing you never had, bullying or you know,
Speaker 2: kind of bad bad stuff, you know, But now I
Speaker 2: think it's everybody is just more conscious, everybody's more clear,
Speaker 2: and you know, women have had a rough time in
Speaker 2: restaurants for a long time. I was just expected of,
Speaker 2: you know, So I think.
Speaker 4: A couple of allowed to date with working them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think. I think there's a rule
Speaker 2: of the handbook that if you're in a having a
Speaker 2: deep relationship, you need to report it to HR or something.
Speaker 2: Just saying so we know, I would What I wouldn't
Speaker 2: tolerate is people like tolerate. I'd be much more upset
Speaker 2: if they were drinking. You know. I think alcohol and
Speaker 2: work is not a great thing. You know, we work
Speaker 2: in an environment where there's alcohol everywhere, and so that
Speaker 2: I kind of have.
Speaker 4: A bullets somebody I wasn't bullet Yeah.
Speaker 2: I've had your sexes, Well we'll go for sex. An
Speaker 2: open kitchen in the River Cafe means we as chefs
Speaker 2: are able to talk to our guests dining in the restaurant,
Speaker 2: and now we're bringing that same ethos to our podcast,
Speaker 2: a question and answer episode with me and our two
Speaker 2: executive chefs. Send a voice note with your question to
Speaker 2: Questions at Rivercafe dot co dot uk and you might
Speaker 2: just be our next great guest on Ruthie's Table four.
Speaker 2: One of the few people that has one restaurant. Nobody
Speaker 2: has one.
Speaker 4: I'm thinking there was a great thing I wish I
Speaker 4: did the same. I have one more restaurant forever, much
Speaker 4: about much about.
Speaker 2: It, But you've just opened one in Washington.
Speaker 4: Because I have to have But no, I do because
Speaker 4: I need the money, because it might do horses and
Speaker 4: my health. I need money. But also I wanted to
Speaker 4: make the chef Mandesa and partner, and I also the
Speaker 4: gentleman reminded som in DC is actually owned by me
Speaker 4: and the chepherd and the Yeah, but if it was, well.
Speaker 2: I think that's the thing that you do feel. If
Speaker 2: you grow, you can move people, you know in a
Speaker 2: way that there they don't move here, and so it
Speaker 2: gives people an opportunity to do more, gives you know,
Speaker 2: people an opportunity to enjoy something more.
Speaker 4: So there is that long when and to the firehouse. Yes,
Speaker 4: ten years ago he told me that he asked you
Speaker 4: to Yes, why didn't you do it?
Speaker 2: I think there was just a point then that Rosa
Speaker 2: just died and we love the site, Richard absolutely, you know,
Speaker 2: he was ready to move in there, and I like Andrea.
Speaker 2: And then I think what happened was that I realized
Speaker 2: that it wouldn't be mine. It would be it would
Speaker 2: it would be a step is. Andrea is such a force,
Speaker 2: and he did it. Would you know you say you
Speaker 2: regret now that I really regret not having gone to
Speaker 2: the children, because it's such a beautiful place and it's
Speaker 2: a great spirit, and he's great. But I think it
Speaker 2: was just when he you know, I think there was
Speaker 2: an idea that I couldn't control what the plates look like,
Speaker 2: what the furniture would be. But it just there is
Speaker 2: something having worked on my own that I wrote Andre,
Speaker 2: a dear Andre letter. But we've remained great friends, and
Speaker 2: then maybe we'll work together. I think he's done. He
Speaker 2: knows how. I don't know how to start a restaurant.
Speaker 2: I literally don't know how to. But that's why I
Speaker 2: don't have you do no, no, don't you do? You do? Well?
Speaker 2: Then how do you start a restaurant?
Speaker 4: I know.
Speaker 2: An argument? We won't those.
Speaker 4: I can't say. That's when I always tried to sign
Speaker 4: the lease quickly. I can don't have time to think
Speaker 4: much about it.
Speaker 2: I never Yeah, I got I got into that thing
Speaker 2: because that my son said, just sign the lease and
Speaker 2: you'll sort it out. I'll go, hell, you know, the money,
Speaker 2: the architect, the investors. That's the other thing. Do you
Speaker 2: have investors?
Speaker 4: Yes, but nobody exactly would actually an investor in the
Speaker 4: DC with me? It's okay, ever fun. I hate people from.
Speaker 2: Marble horrible ideas because the way I talked and the
Speaker 2: way I looved it's not exactly. If you look a
Speaker 2: million dollars, yes you do, and I would give you
Speaker 2: a million dollars, Yes you do. You probably asked this
Speaker 2: question a lot. But do you give people advice when
Speaker 2: they come to say.
Speaker 4: No the advice? Never take advice from somebody.
Speaker 2: I say, I do give one piece of advice, which
Speaker 2: I think maybe is it?
Speaker 4: Maybe?
Speaker 2: Is it?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Like don't take advice? But also maybe start small? Maybe
Speaker 2: maybe Do you think starting small it's not a bad idea,
Speaker 2: but if you go to open some huge thing, it's
Speaker 2: such a I've always kind of grown talk about food,
Speaker 2: as you know, having fun the way you and I do,
Speaker 2: and getting people to cook and getting people to eat
Speaker 2: and giving people meals and not.
Speaker 4: Charging loved it, loved it.
Speaker 2: What's nicer in life? You know? I Richard had that though.
Speaker 2: I used to have a phrase like if in doubt
Speaker 2: do it? You know, because sometimes a way to who
Speaker 2: should eat this person is here? Yes, you know, do it?
Speaker 2: Do it?
Speaker 4: Nothing to lose?
Speaker 2: Why why not?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Know, we're the same. And so I think that if
Speaker 2: all that is giving joy and making people happy and
Speaker 2: cooking great food and serving it in a way that
Speaker 2: makes them want to eat and stay, we also sometimes
Speaker 2: need food for comfort. And I'm sure over the last
Speaker 2: year since you had your jokes that you want food
Speaker 2: as comfort. Is there a food that you would go
Speaker 2: to for comform And this is our last question. Is
Speaker 2: there something you love from your childhood or that you
Speaker 2: remembers Prie Mash? Is it?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Do you have it when you come back to London?
Speaker 2: What do you like about it?
Speaker 4: A little liquor that greens to her sauce. It's called liquor.
Speaker 2: And what is it?
Speaker 4: Partially I don't know about partly based source.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you, Keith, this has been a great time.
Speaker 1: Love you, Thank you for listening to Ruthie's Table four
Speaker 1: in partnership with Montclair