Eat My Globe

Interview with Award-Winning Chef,

Alex Guarnaschelli

INTRO MUSIC

Simon Majumdar (“SM”):

I first met Alex some 13 years ago.

[Laughter]

Can you believe that?

Alex Guarnaschelli (“AG”):

My God.

SM:

I know. Probably 14 now. When she was a competitor on the Next Iron Chef and I was a judge. It was at that point, I realized, quite frankly, how much I loved her food. It was this odd combination of French, Italian, American, and lots of other types of cooking. And that made her food so special alongside her ability to make food well, so constantly delicious. It always made me look out for all her food when judging. And I have visited Butter a number of times when I've been in New York. She was and is one of my favorite chefs on the planet. And trust me, I have met a fair few chefs. Now, so many years later I hopefully consider her a friend. . .

AG:

Yes.

SM:

. . . and we have done so many shows and a number of events together. So, it gives me the greatest pleasure to be able to invite her onto my podcast. Ladies and gentlemen, the one and only Alex Guarnaschelli.

AG:

Oh. Wow.

SM:

I am so. . . . I can't tell you, I'm so pleased that you are on my podcast, my humble little podcast.

AG:

I don't think so.

SM:

And what I was going to do now is just let's get a feeling for what you are doing now, and then we'll get into some of the kind of history of who you are and what you've done, because it's a really fabulous history you've got. Because you've been to France, you've done other things, which I'll explain to people. But let's find out what you are doing now because you've got a book and you've got all the shows you're doing. So, give us a little bit about that first.

AG:

Well, I'm doing this funny. . . this kooky little show called Supermarket Stakeout. . .

SM:

Yep.

AG:
. . .where chefs cook in a parking lot. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
. . . and it's kind of grown into this, I don't know, exploration of Americana because we're in a parking lot and whether you realize it or not, a lot goes on in a supermarket parking lot in America, Simon. So. . . .

SM:

I’ve done it once. I've only done it once. But it's a great, great show. I know, it's just an amazing, it really is an amazing show.

AG:

Well, I like the playfulness of the competition and the resourcefulness that this recruits. My. . . . the show that I developed with Brian Lando, Alex vs America. . .

SM:

Yep.

AG:
. . . is obviously something I've been working on for years with him.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:
So, that's really, you know, near and dear to my heart since we can't seem to find Iron Chef America yet again. And then I had this other show called Ciao House with Gabriele Bertaccini, who is a Tuscan native, and he and I went to Tuscany with a group of young chefs, and the prize for winning was actually working with a number of different chefs all around Europe.

SM:

Wow.

AG:
That was the surprise for the winner, and I just thought it was great. But, what I thought. . .

SM:

Which kind of chefs, sorry, which kind of chefs were you going to. . . were they going to work with? Because I know a lot of the chefs there.

AG:

Mostly through Italy.

SM:

Yep.

AG:
Because the. . . the. . . we. . . I mean, I wasn't given the names.

SM:

Okay.

AG:

It was just lots of chefs in Italy, some in France.

SM:

Oh.

AG:
But I think really the funny little, I don't want to call it deceptive, but the twist of all this really was how much these chefs learned about themselves, one another, teamwork and the great cool humanity.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
And so, it was sort of, first of all, fascinatingly Shakespearean.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
But also just, you know, when you kind of say the prize is the journey, and you know that kind of stuff that you read, you know, in those books that are by the toilet in your friend's house. And in all honesty, there was a lot of that that went on. So, I found that fascinating. And honestly, Simon, so did the viewer.

Now, I will say you are the judge. You are not just a judge. You are the judge that everybody wants.

SM:

Oh.

AG:
And you are a magnificent translator and interpreter and compassionate, empathetic floor reporter for Tournament of Champions.

SM:

Oh, well, thank you.

AG:

I say to all the chefs that go on the show, you got to have Simon, you know. It's like when you go to the movies, I got to have a Coke and popcorn. Nothing else will do Simon. It has to be the tried and true classic.

SM:

Well, I would give Justin my support as well. He's a fantastic, totally different, totally different from me.

AG:

Oh no, he’s fantastic too.

SM:

He's totally different from me.

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

But I think together we form a team.

AG:

Oh, yeah.

SM:

And he. . . . I'm a very straightforward person.

AG:

Yes.

SM:

He's a very witty person. . .

AG:

Very clever.

SM:

But very witty. Yeah, very clever. And I think together with Guy, we form a great team.

AG:

Oh yeah.

SM:

But he's an amazing person.

Tell me about “Cook It Up” because I know, and I want to ask you about this later as well. You've been talking with Ava, well, you've been working with Ava about this book and she's contributed lots of recipes to it too. And I wonder how you. . . you. . . was that coming from, and we'll talk about this now then. Was this coming from what your mother did with you and you were trying to do it there, or was it just this is my, you know, the. . . this is my perfect person to work with because she's my daughter?

AG:

I would say neither.

SM:

Oh really?

AG:

I mean, you wouldn't be wrong, by the way. All of what you said definitely plays a part in this situation. But I noticed that, you know, everybody says, oh, you're a chef. Did you teach your daughter how to cook? I mean, you know, it doesn't feel that way teaching your children your craft. It may work that way for a lot of people. It just doesn't work that way for me. I never wanted Ava to feel like she had to cook or anything of the sort. So, some days she'd pop in the kitchen and be very interested in what I was doing, and some days she would ignore me, and just. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
. . . come to the dinner table and eat dinner like any normal kid would. And I just thought, let me give this kid a chance to find food on her own a little bit and see how that goes. And she didn't cook much, honestly. You know, she took an interest in food. We go places, whatever. She knows a lot. But then all of a sudden she'd say to me, oh, you know, I'm going to make these kimchi pancakes because Hooni Kim made them in his book, “My Korea,” and I just think they're cool. And I'm thinking, how do you know who Hooni Kim is?

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
How'd you find the book? She also would come in the kitchen and say, I'm going to make Gordon Ramsey's, you know, Beef Wellington ‘cause I saw it on TikTok. So, there was a lot of different learning going on for Ava. She dabbles in a lot of different mediums and she makes a lot of her own food. And I said, you know, would you like to do a cookbook but really do a cookbook?

SM:

Yeah.

AG:
Not like I write the whole thing and then you act like you do part of it. So, she said, yeah, but, you know, I don't like the same things you like and you're a weirdo, so can I do my own lunchbox stuff and my own breakfast? So, I said, why don't we just kind of split the book up? And she said, well, I don't want to make any desserts. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
. . . but I want to make all the meat and all the fish. And so, we just put it together kind of on her terms. I just didn't want this to feel like, you know, that it was designed for a magazine piece. And that isn't this a cute little multi-generational story about women that cook. My mother found food in her own way.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

Her mother cooked. My mother did not cook growing up. And my great aunt would tell me stories about, honestly, what a disaster my mother was in the kitchen for years, but that my mother. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
. . . would always come over to her house, make a huge mess. Half the time, it wasn't good. When my parents got married, they both had their little things that they cooked. But when my mom started working in publishing, she used cooking as a tool to edit her cookbooks. And she would cook her way through the book and write all the questions she had to the author as she cooked through it. And, you know, people say, there was no one like your mother. There is no one. And I'd say, yeah, well, you know, it's like someone who could play all the instruments on a record listening to your music. That's what my mother ended up using as their process. And then Ava, you know, I just thought I was a spectator to so much of my mother's cooking growing up. I think being a spectator to cooking in some form or another is underrated. I think it's a visual medium, and I think you have to watch for a while. You almost have to watch so long that you just amped and itching to get there and just burn your first omelet.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
And that's kind of what Ava does.

SM:

Which I still do. I have to tell you that when I met your mother, which is on this show called something like All Star Challenge, we did it once.

AG:

Oh, yeah, yeah.

SM:

Yeah. And I met your mother, and I was. . . . Because I come from publishing and I worked in cookbooks, she was the only person I was petrified of.

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

Your mother was. . . . She came in and she came to shake my hand, and I never worried about it with any of you chefs because you were, you know, my people, as it were, and she came to shake my hand and I was petrified. Just to tell people who she is in case people here don't know. She published, you know, “The Joy of Cooking,” which everybody, everybody. . . . I have a copy. And where. . . I'm from the UK, I have it in my house.

AG:

Yes.

SM:
And the Zuni cookbook, which I have in my house.

AG:

Oh I love that book.

SM:

Because. . . . And so, for her to come to me, that was incredibly. . . . She was very polite and very nice and all of this. But she was the one I was shaking about.

AG:

Well, you got her on a good day, Simon.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
Go with God. Yeah. I mean, I would go to parties and people would say, I know you. Your mother declined my book. I mean, that was kind of. . . .

SM:

Oh.

[Laughter]

AG:
Yeah. So, I just kind of started introducing myself as Alex, if you know what I mean? Yeah. She was really something. But my mother would spend nine-tenths of a moment with her nose in a book and one 10th of the time cooking.

SM:

Oh.

AG:
And my father would spend 10 tenths just cooking and feeling his way around. And so. . .

SM:

Yeah.

AG:
. . . I had two very different examples. But again, with Ava, I mean, I just think it's such a cliche or a classic like, oh, mother-daughter stuff. But honestly, I don't know. I felt like there was something to be said here at this point in her life. I don't think Ava will be a chef. And, and watch they're going to play this in 10 years and laugh at me.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

. . . But I really don’t. . . . I don't know. I think food is just something Ava will love and enjoy and something she can do that she's really naturally good at. So that's nice.

SM:

Well, what do you think she's going to do? I mean, that's a totally different question, but what do you think she's going to be before we move on to your questions? Because she's a great girl. I mean, I see her on, you know, Instagram and see her cooking with you, and I've seen her growing up, and I'd love to see what she's going to do.

AG:

I don't know.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
I mean, she wants to be a journalist and she wants to write and be a writer. And I think, you know, but she also really likes fashion, and I really don't know. And people say to me, isn't there a place where all those things intersect? And I say, no. In fact, I don't think so. I think she's got to pick something along the way. So, I don't know. Simon, she may go to school for fashion and just end up working at a big fashion house or something. So, I want you to be prepared that there may be very little food professionally cooked by my daughter in the world, and everybody's just going to have to deal with it.

SM:

[Laughter]

Well, that's great. But as a writer, I appreciate her love of writing.

AG:

Yes.

SM:

So, let's find out then how you got your entry into cooking, because with, you know, you do have this wide variety of influences, even if they didn't impact you. So, what’s, what is your entry into it? Because you went to France and you were. . .

AG:

Yeah.

SM:
. . . I hate to. . . hate to say this, but you are one of the last people really from America, did go to France. . .

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

. . . you, Mark Forgione. People like that went to France. So, was that, you know. . . why did you go to France in the first place. . .

AG:

Yes.

SM:

. . . when you really brought most of your Italian and American cooking back home?

AG:

Yeah. It's funny you should say Mark Forgione, because the first chef I ever worked for was his father, Larry.

SM:

Oh yeah.

AG:

And Larry said, I worked at an American place for [indecipherable]

SM:

Oh, okay.

AG:

And Larry said, I could keep you here, you know, and you could, you know, five, 10 years be the chef, whatever else. He said, why don't you go to France and just cook where the world is perfect? And I thought, okay.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
So, I find it very interesting that you bring up his son ‘cause I'm sure he told his son a similar thing. So, that was a big reason why I went ‘cause Larry. . . . And, you know, that's a very basic answer but. . . ‘cause Larry Forgione told me to. But also my father was a European history professor and got a PhD in Yale. At Yale in European history.

SM:

Wow, okay. So, you do come from a very academic family. . .

AG:

Oh yeah.

SM:

. . . in a way.

AG:

It skips a generation Simon.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
In fact, I think. . .

SM:

No, it doesn't. It doesn't. Because you’re. . . . I just want to say when I'm talking about food with anybody, you are one of the few people who I. . . I know I said, but I can have a chat to about the history, about the, you know, the things. I'm writing a book now about cakes, and it's going all the way. And you going from the ancient Egyptians all the way through to the modern day, and you are one of the few people I could have that conversation and would understand each of the. . . the nuances of each cake as it were.

AG:

Oh [indecipherable]

SM:

Yeah, oh, no, absolutely. But you are one of the few people who could understand that. So, I don't think it skipped a generation, but do tell me.

AG:

Well, let's just say, Simon, that my father was getting his PhD in European history at Yale, and my mother was getting a master's in Russian studies at Yale.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
And they met there and they got married in the chapel at Yale, which is so very nauseating to me. And I think, you know, they were just voracious readers. Voracious. Both of them. They would read and then they would talk to each other and they wouldn't read the same thing. And then they would read more and then they would talk more. And they did that for 54 years. So, I'm thinking they were onto something.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
But there was a bust of Napoleon on our dining room table, Simon. And I think it's important for you to know that I ate dinner every night looking at a bust of Napoleon, you know the one of him up on the horse.

SM:

I do.

AG:
And then there was one point a poster of Napoleon in the dining room that hung facing where I would sit every night. And I always say this, it's important what you see as a child in your immediate environment. And, you know, was he Italian? Was he French, Napoleon? Well, he was sort of a little bit of both. And so, I think it's interesting that you describe my cooking as somewhat incidentally Napoleonic, but I don't think that was an accident. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
. . . considering that there was this pulsating French flag fluttering in the dining room at all.

SM:

Why Napoleon?

AG:

My father was fascinated with Napoleon. His specialty was Napoleonic warfare.

SM:

Oh.

AG:
So, he went to all the battlegrounds. My parents spent the rent money traveling in France. I mean, that's what we did. We went to France. When I was 12, I ate at Joel Robuchon’s Jamin on the Rue de Longchamp. . .

SM:

Oh.

AG:
. . . I was 12 years old. Joel Robuchon came out and said to me, oh, you're 12. Do you like cooking? And I'm just looking at this guy thinking, like, I just want to go to a movie. I don't. . . I don’t care about this tomato crab mille-feuile and this guy who has a six-foot high hat. . . . But that's what my parents were doing. And, you know, I remember I fell asleep on the train and my father woke me up and he said, I paid a fortune for this scenery. Sit up.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

You know the French stuff was very important always. And I think I never thought much about it, to be honest. It was just the way things were. I'm sure you had plenty of things growing up that were the way they were.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:
Like a good doll. When you describe to me how you feel about a good doll, I'll say that Napoleon was my father's doll. And that, you know, to get your parental blessing when you leave the house, people act like it doesn't matter. I think it did. And I said to my father, you know, I’m just going to go. I'm going to apply to a cooking school as a work study student, and I'm going to go work in France. What I didn't know Simon was I went for about a year and a half. I lived in Burgundy. . .

SM:

Yep.

AG:
. . . and by the Alps, but then I was going to go home and I met Guy Savoy. . .

SM:

Wow.

AG:
. . . and I was working in his kitchen for free, and I got to meet him. And I don't know what happened, Simon, I think, I don't know. He was a father like I never had. And I just. . . . I spent six and a half, seven years just staring at him every day.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
It's hard to leave a guy like that.

SM:

It is. I mean, I never met him.

AG:

Right.

SM:

I've eaten at his restaurant. I know who he is, but I've never met him as close as you have. And for me. . . . That again, he's someone who I would be like quaking if I was shaking his hand.

AG:

He's the nicest.

SM:

Really?

AG:

He's the kindest, nicest. He’s. . . .

SM:

Oh.

AG:
I'm telling you right now. He's a man of the people. He would win like friendliest in the high school yearbook.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
Do you know what I'm saying, Simon? Go for it.

SM:

Oh, I'm going to have to. I'm going to have to.

So, tell me before we start going on about your cooking, I know from chatting to you that you went to. . . you went to Barnard, didn't you?

AG:

I did.

SM:

And you studied. . . you studied. . . and I remember this from you telling me it was an art history course or an art. . . Is that right?

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

So, I mean, was that something, I mean, two things, did that impact the cooking, which is I think it does. And does that. . . and did that give you another career that you were going, or was that just something you were doing because you were happy doing it, if that makes sense?

AG:

Well, my dad said when you go to school you should study some stuff that you like, and then you should pick a profession that you like, he said, because you're going to do it a lot.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

That's pretty basic. I know. But I don't think we really think about it much that way. I think we have allegiance to a lot of other things that can get in the way. But my father. . . . You know, my. . . my mom sort of worked more the nine to five, or I should say more like eight-to-eight shift.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:
So, when I was growing up, strangely, my father made a lot of the weeknight dinners. . .

SM:

Okay.

AG:
. . . and he would be home at odd hours ‘cause he was a teacher.

SM:

Yep.

AG:
So, he would say to me, let's walk over to The Met. We went. . . . Or the MoMA. We. . . I grew up in Midtown Manhattan. My father said, let's stroll over to the MoMA and look at the Picassos. And he took me. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
. . . through a lot of. . . . I know, I know. Believe me. . . .

SM:

I used to, I used to stroll over when I was a student over to the British Museum. . .

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

. . . and go and look at the Rosetta Stone. I used to do that a lot, in fact. So, I do get what you're saying.

AG:

Yeah. And I think I just liked that. I liked looking at the paintings with my father. He would ask me questions and I didn't know anything. And I think he enjoyed the freshness of my perspective because you know how that can be when someone just looks at something and reacts. But also, I think. . . . Understand this. My father was asking me, okay, what is, you know, this Matisse? You know, I said, well, it's a giant painting of a pink table. Like how. . . . Didn’t he. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
. . . have anything else lying around? And my father would laugh. But my father was asking my opinion and then asking me to articulate my feelings about paintings. And then I would go home and my mother would cook dinner and say, how do you feel about this blueberry pie? Is it better than the one I made five years ago, which had more corn starch but less sugar? And I think honestly, Simon, that it was an accidental training. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
. . . to talk about food, which I think is actually my, my accidental real profession. I mean, Simon, if you had to write a business card for what you do, I mean, wouldn't it be sort of really the wackiest business card? Like, hi, this is, this is, call me. This is what I do. And I think mine would be equally odd, you know, like accidental competition show cook, sometime judge, occasional therapist. You know I think it would say it would be a lot of different things. But the art came from going to the museum with my father, and I think the food and the cooking really came more, but from my mother, but both. And I thought, well, you know, I don't want to pick a major that's boring.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:
And there's nothing like, you know, looking at paintings all day. We went to the museum. You know, I took a class called Introduction to Connoisseurship in my senior year of college, and we went through The Met with the teacher picking out all the underpainting and the cracks and all the things.

SM:

Oh.

AG:
Every time I look at a painting now, I say to Ava, oh, can you see this was warped and they fixed it and this and that. And she said, did this class skew your perspective about. . .

SM:

Love this.

AG:

. . . this art? And I think it did. But the art in the food are not related to me, Simon, that I can see. I would love to tell you that I hear Mozart. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:
. . . and I eat Monet when I am making a bowl of soup, but it would be a lie.

SM:

Okay, well that's very honest of you when you. . .

AG:

Yeah.

SM:
. . . when you talk about that.

So, let’s, let's talk about, you know, your, your visits to different places and you. . . . Let's talk about the difference between, you know, cooking in France, which at the time was probably, you know, it is and even is now very forthright, it’s very, you know, I always say it was straight toques and all of that kind of stuff.

AG:

Oh yeah.

SM:

And then you came back to America. But tell me the difference between cooking for them. I wonder what that difference in culinary training, which you were still figuring from, and then, and then let's take it from there if you don't mind.

AG:

Yeah. Well, I worked for Guy Savoy. I worked for some other chefs intermittently, and he was. . . not was, I think he still is, but at that time I would say, he was sort of. . . I think he was more of a modern French chef.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:
I think he had great allegiance to the classic techniques, a lot of them obviously. But he was, you know, sort of meddling and fiddling and he would mix unconventional things together. He also was, I think, really big on humble ingredients, which I really, really resonated with me. He would make a whole dish out of cabbage a hundred ways and then plop a scoop of caviar on it. Or he would make a big dish of braised lentils with butter and tons of black pepper and vinegar, which to me was kind of bold for France, you know. Black pepper alone. Like the French are all team white pepper because they don't want you to see it.

SM:

I love white pepper, I have to say. White pepper and black pepper. By the way, did you know black pepper used to be so expensive back in the Roman times, the ancient Romans. . . that it came from Tellicherry and it was only kept for the emperors and it was. . . . Well, they would bring it in and this is. . . people don't know this. We have it kept on the, on the sideboard and we kind of throw it on whatever dish we're doing, and yet it was the most expensive ingredient on earth back in the Roman times. And it was, oh, anyway, I'm giving you this.

AG:

I love that.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

Was the effectiveness of its preservative abilities part of that, or was it really the taste?

SM:

It was just the taste. The Roman emperors really. . . like the people now. They didn't know a lot about it. All they knew was it was expensive, so they must have it.

AG:

I mean that's true now, isn't it?

SM:

Yeah. So anyway, I just wanted to give you that because I think. . .

AG:

I love that.

SM:

. . .  yeah, and same with salt. They used to give away salary. That's what the term salary became. And salt, they used to give to the Roman troops because everywhere they went, they could trade the salt a little block, and that would, they'd get cattle for that. They'd get whatever, and that's where salary comes from. But anyway, sorry.

AG:

And also, the expression, he's not worth his salt.

SM:

Absolutely.

AG:

I didn't know that. Yeah. I love a podcast where we learn.

SM:

Well, this is where I, I try and talk about. . . . Because I’m talk. . . I'm writing. . . . I've written four essays for this season. So, we've done Corn, Cakes, the Chicken, which by the way had its relationship to the dinosaur Tyrannosaurus Rex. I mean, it's all. . . . Anyway, I'm sorry, I'm just giving you stuff.

AG:

I love it.

SM:

But that's what I do about this history, and that's why I wanted you to come on and share this food history that came from, you know, where you've come from, which is a very different relationship to a lot of chefs. Very different.

AG:

Yeah. I mean, think, honestly, I just knew that I didn't have the confidence. So, I knew that if I. . . . I had to go where the cooking was really good and do it over and over and over again until I. . . it was. . . . I do believe. . . . The power of repetition to me, I can't. . . I can’t say enough about it. I, I like to tell people the same story over and over again. I think you learn by just even repeating the same story. You are looking at it from a different vantage point. Or you need to talk about it again, because you’re working through something, and I just think the same is true with onions.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

You just have to cut them over and over again. Also, it was kind of interesting to. . . . You know Larry Forgione is considered a pioneer of American cuisine and American ingredients.

SM:

Yes.

AG:

He's called the Godfather of American cooking, although I think he and Jonathan Waxman, and maybe even arguably someone like Bradley Ogden would share that title.

SM:

Wow.

AG:

And I often found myself at An American Place. Larry would be there, and Jonathan and Bradley and whomever else would come in and they would be cooking with blueberries from Maine and, you know, black trumpet mushrooms from Oregon. All of a sudden, you know, the geography of the ingredients, I don't feel like in the ‘90s, I don't think it was as prevalent, nearly as prevalent as it is now. But the minute I started working in a kitchen, that geography was just part of what I was experiencing. So, when I went to France, you know, rice from the Camargue, right. . .

SM:

Oh.

AG:

. . . true Périgord truffles, mussels, you know, flown in from Lisle. I mean, it really mattered where everything came from. And people will just come and drop these little buckets and, and leave. And, you know, you sort of look like, you know, this. . . what was this dude doing like walking around the street of. . . streets of Paris with a little five pound or six kilo box of Porcini mushrooms that came on almost the same exact day every year. So, I think the seasonality and the geography of the ingredients was something that just pulsated in the background for me. And then it became sort of part of my own personal language. Like you would never serve asparagus in January. Why would you even think about a Porcini mushroom, you know. . . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

So, I think that got in my DNA pretty quickly. And so did all the classical French cooking that Guy Savoy was actually really doing. And that's what I learned.

A whole separate conversation could be had about the social complexities of being an American woman in a three-star Michelin kitchen in Paris. Not ideal, honestly. I, you know, I look back on it probably far more romantically. I'm glad I was really young and that I could deal with it, but, you know. . . and people weren't, you know, throwing me around. It wasn't like that, you know, but it was just, you know, they didn't let me cook anything for the first year I worked there.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

So, I wasn't allowed to go to the stove or turn the burner on or put a pot on the stove. And I think that they thought if I didn't cook. . . actually cook anything that how could I screw anything up? It took me a year to be allowed to heat up something someone else had cooked and put it on a plate.

SM:

Wow.

AG:

And I guess you want to talk about food history, you know, when I watch something, like, I'm thinking of something really mainstream like Jiro Dreams of Sushi, right. . .

SM:

Yeah, yeah.

AG:

. . .where they wait decades to be the one to cut the fish, so to speak. There's a lot of that sensibility where I was working. You know, just sort of like, you need to earn it, and the only way to earn it is to not screw anything up and do the time. And that sounds fairly straightforward, but you'd be surprised in a 16-hour day how much someone who doesn't know a lot about food and doesn’t. . . didn't yet speak really perfect French, how much I could screw up.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

When you talk about that, and I was gonna ask you about the kind of, well, was the US more liberated than France? Was it slightly more liberated than in the US than it was in France, or was it. . . No?

AG:

Okay, Simon, if you, if you insist.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

I think most of this is. . . can you do the job at hand and how well can you do it? And then can we let the differences between me and you, whatever they are – gender, culture, age, whatever it is – let all that melt away when we collaborate. And it takes time. I will say Guy Savoy was unbelievably welcoming, and, and, you know, I think he just got such a kick, you know, a kick out of me. It was sort of like this Martian that landed in the kitchen. And honestly, weirdly, years later, when I was. . . went to leave the restaurant, they said, can you make us a whole American meal? And I said, I don't know if I can do that. You guys. . . I feel like you guys are going to make fun of me. But these guys were coming in the kitchen with Mickey Mouse sweatshirts holding a Coke and laughing at me for being American. And I'm looking at them, I don't know, but chances are the jokes on you. So, I made ribs and I made chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwiches. I made this whole giant American spread. It took me about a week, honestly. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

. . . to find everything. And they just, you know. . . there wasn’t a. . . you know, there wasn't a crumb left, and they were all outside with their espressos and their cigarettes, and I thought, you know, we might be onto something here.

SM:

American food is really delicious. Let's not forget that. American food with its impact of Italian, but now with other impacts coming in. . .

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

. . . from different nations, American food is really delicious. And it can be.

AG:

My daughter is much more interested in Korean food. . .

SM:

Oh.

AG:

. . .Japanese food, Chinese food. Those are the things that are mostly impacting my daughter's choice of ingredients in cooking, which I find so interesting. But I would say there's some through line, Simon, between starting with Larry Forgione and seeing people like Jonathan Waxman and then going in working with Guy Savoy. It was sort of like this deeply American and then deeply French. And then I came back and I started working for Daniel Boulud. And Daniel is really an example of a. . .

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

. . . classic Lyonnaise chef, right? The heart of France, the heart of French Gastronomy.

SM:

Yes, he is.

AG:

But then he's cooking with corn and crab, and. . . . So, it's this interesting mix of kind of this hybrid Guy Savoy Forgione model for what Daniel’s doing. ‘Cause I think Daniel’s really making truly French American food. It's gotten a little, I might say Mediterranean now, but when I was working for him, it was really like France crashed into a huge, beautiful American farm.

SM:

I’ve. . . . Yes, I've eaten at his restaurants many times, and he is one of the greats.

AG:

Oh yeah.

SM:

He is. He is one of the greats just as it has been in London, in fact, with Marco Pierre White and Gordon Ramsay and all the people before that. You know, we had Escoffier before, you know, before anyone else was doing it.

Let's just talk about culinary schools. ‘Cause I know you go and chat to culinary schools, which was very different, I think, to when you went.

AG:

Oh yeah.

SM:

You know, you did your. . . . Yeah. You know, you went to work in a restaurant, you went to work rather than a three day here or a four. . . you know, a day here, or a. . . and. . . I don't know which is better or which is, but I, I don't know. When I go to the CIA, they spend a lot of time, I always say wrapping up their bouquet garni and putting it in. But it takes them four hours to do it, or, you know, and I. . . and it takes 'em one day to do fabrication.

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

And I don't. . . I don’t quite understand that. And I just wondered what your thoughts were ‘cause you know.

AG:

Well, yeah, cooking school's complicated, Simon. I think it's designed to make you fall in love with cooking or that's my hope. And I think that in a lot of instances, it does successfully do that for a lot of people. I also think you have to do something really slowly at first very well, and develop the good habit and know what good is. And then you can really go 90 miles an hour. So, I think if you. . . you’re training early on or your formative years where you learn those habits that stay with you forever. . .

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

. . . if you're in a better place, whatever better is. Better, I think, is defined by what your goal is also, by the way. If you want to be a chef in a restaurant, you've got to, I mean, to my mind, that means years of line cooking. It does.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

To me. And by the way, I don't care who agrees with me.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

And everybody has a different path. I know there are some chefs out there that are very world renowned. But some people have never seen them cook. And that's fine. And that works for some. But I think, ideally, yeah, tons of cooking over and over again. Working with all different types of ingredients. I think that's the other thing that's really important, you know.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

Okay, it's fantastic. Work in a vegan restaurant and do that for a year, but then go work somewhere where they're cooking large pieces of meat or giant pieces of fish. Work somewhere where there's a lot of charcuterie. Just maybe diversify the skillset. And then when you pack up your toolbox and you leave, when you unpack it to create your own menu, you've got this wide breadth of knowledge in a few different areas, and. . . and that really impacts what you end up producing yourself. And by the way, that takes years. So. . . and I don't know necessarily that we think we have to do all that time anymore. And I’m just. . . I'm not convinced there's any way around doing the time.

SM:

Yeah, that’s. . .  I mean, I've always. . . . I’ve always been thinking that's exactly what I've been thinking. As a non kind of culinary, you know, person who works in the kitchens, you know, I watch it from the outside and I go, I know that this fish has come in completely skinned, you know, in a bag. I know it. And that comes out because it tastes different than getting a fresh fish. And I think that's something that we have to bring.

Now, we've talked about so many areas. Let's just talk about the point that we have in common, which is the Food Network, which is, so. . . . How, how I ended up on the Food Network was completely, yeah, we, we know Eytan Keller, we know all of these people who did it. But how I ended up was when I wrote a book and someone was listening to me on a food. . . on a show called The Word, BBC, and said, oh, we might get him in to see if he could do an episode of Iron Chef. And in the end they said, well, actually, we'll get him to do The Next Iron Chef, where I ended up doing, you know, 12 episodes or something. And I go, how did this happen as I stood next to Alton Brown and Michael Symon? And, you know, for you coming in for the first time, you must have had the same – how am I here with Bobby Flay and all these people? So, tell me about your first entry into it.

AG:

Yeah, I, I, I. . . . A little weird, honestly.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

Because I really. . . I really wanted to be on the show Iron Chef myself as a, as a. . . . I wanted to challenge an Iron Chef, but I wanted to be one. From the very, you know, from the second I saw the show, I just said, this is the show. You know like people say, I want to be shortstop for the New York Yankees.

SM:

[Laughter]

I dunno what that means.

AG:

Well. . . .

SM:

I don’t. . . is that basketball or. . . .

AG:

The New York Yankees, the baseball team.

SM:

Oh, okay. I know nothing about baseball. . .

AG:

I love you.

SM:

. . . or basketball. Football. . .

AG:

I love. . . .

SM:

. . . Football as in using your feet, I know a lot about. Sorry, I don’t know anything about that.

AG:

This is baseball.

SM:

Okay.

AG:

You need a bat in two hands. It's not dissimilar to cooking.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

So, I just thought I want to be on that show, you know. I just picked it. And I would watch it, and I was jealous and I was grumpy, and I was. I was super jealous. I don't know how else to put it. Jealous, but not, you know, not in a sort of homicidal sense. Passively, politely jealous. And, what happened? I spent three years trying to get on the show. And I challenge. . . . I finally got on and I challenged Cat Cora. And I was on it. And I just met Alton, and I think you and I sort of had a similar entry in this way, which was this unbelievable show. I mean, all of a sudden you turn around and there’s Morimoto.

SM:

I know.

AG:

Right?

SM:

I know.

AG:

And Alton's standing there, and, you know, old Bobby just, you know, popped in ‘cause he's cooking tomorrow, whatever. So, they asked me to do The Next Iron Chef the first season, but I was unable to because I was giving birth to Ava.

SM:

Okay.

AG:

So, I was so upset. I mean, I was really distraught at the thought that I couldn't. And I thought, this is my only chance. This is it. I blew it. But someone called me and said, you know, come in and judge. You know you can sit behind the desk. We're not going to see.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

And I thought, well, am I really qualified to do this? But I went in and I just started talking about food. I think, like you, I think that I would eat something and I would. . . . All of a sudden, I was at the dinner table with my mother and I was 12 years old, and she was saying, you know, did you. . . do you think the cranberry sauce is as viscous as it should be?

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

And do you know that, you know, these cranberries have more pectin than crab apples? You know, that's kind of what my mother was saying at the dinner table. I thought everyone was talking, Simon, about the various pectin levels of fruit, but I guess not.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

So, I. . . I got invited to do that again and again. Like you, they just kind of. . .

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

. . . Hey, you free Monday, hey. And I was like, listen, my calendar is wide open for this.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

And so, I did that for a while, and then I think they started doing Chopped. And they sent me the pilot episode in the mail, you know, in a DVD. . .

SM:

Yep.

AG:

. . . and said, watch it, and we want you to be on it. And I said, this show's dumb.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

Who's going to watch this show? I know, right? Yeah.

SM:

And how many episodes later?

AG:

Well, I. . . I mean, I've got to imagine it's past a thousand.

SM:

You know, can I just mention?

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

I've never ever been on Chopped. Never.

AG:

Why?

SM:

I don't know. I, I will tell you. I have never. . . I don't want to cook but I've never ever ever been asked to be a judge, ever. And I don't know why. It's just one of those odd little things and who knows. But yeah, I've never been asked. Odd thing. But anyway, enough of that. But tell me a. . . . So, you have Chopped, you have The Next Iron Chef, where I know the first time I was judging you, and that's when we first met.

AG:

Yes.

SM:

That's. . . that’s when I told you. . .

[Laughter]

AG:

Yes.

SM:

. . . your . . . your cooking was. . . . You put something green in front of us. I still remember this.

AG:

It was awful.

SM:

I'm not going to come say that. . . .

AG:

Oh, I will.

SM:

But it was. . . it was. . . . And I said, it looked like you'd put Kermit in a blender.

AG:

Yeah, it was not my finest hour. It was your finest hour.

SM:

It was my finest hour. But that was when you didn't get through to the final.

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

And then the next year you went straight the way through. And I mean you cooked for it. But we, we loved what you were doing. And you. . . I think you were with, gosh, who was her. . . what was her name in the final, anyway.

AG:

Amanda.

SM:

Amanda, of course it was. Amanda and she was great, and she'd been cooking so well all the way through.

AG:

Oh yeah.

SM:

But you got there and you took it. And I still remember your food then. And you're doing amazing things. And, and you made it through to the Iron Chef position. And that was. .  and you could tell. . . you could tell in the way you looked, you could see in the way you celebrated that this wasn't a joke to you. This was really proper. This was the IGAs, the NIC. . . what do you call 'em? Sorry.

AG:

I C A G

SM:

I C A G. It was so powerful to you. I could. . . I remember coming down on that and I saw it in your eyes.

AG:

But I. . . I mean, listen. Amanda. Elizabeth Faulkner. There's a whole group of us that. . .

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

. . . it just. . . it still means so much, but you know, I won. And Bobby came over to me and said, the best thing about this is how much you deserve it. And I just thought, who talks like that? You know, who says something so simple?

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

And he said, you know you won and no one can ever take this from you. He said, you won this. And I thought, you know, that’s. . . . I, I still, you know, in moments of, you know, we all have our moments, right, where. . .

SM:

Yeah, absolutely.

AG:

. . . you question everything. So.

SM:

That’s. . . . I mean, I remember, and I, oh, I still remember that, and it's one of the finest moments for me as a judge to be able to go, look, this food is, quite frankly, it's perfect with one or two little things. . .

AG:

Yes.

SM:

. . . that we. . . . And that's what it was. It was perfect.

Now, what I want to ask you is, you know, how, how has your role changed then? Because it has. You’ve. . . you've gone from being, you know, the Iron Chef and you'd get on there and that’s. . . . But you've gone all the way through now. You've got three shows. You've got the Iron Chef. You’ve got, you know. . . They’re all. . . . You’re, you're doing Tournament of Champions, where you come on and judge. So first, how do you think your role has changed there? And secondly, what do you think of the chefs who are now coming on to try and do? Are they similar to how you were or are they trying to get on to be on television now?

AG:

I mean, when I started cooking, you couldn't pick food TV as a career. It didn't really exist, you know. So, I don't know that there was the temptation or the gravitational pull to say, oh, this is what I'm going to do. I would say some chefs are chefs that have worked in restaurants for a long time, and they're coming on the Food Network, and they're, you know, like a genre. I think of us, Simon, as schools of fish.

SM:

Yeah.

[Laughter]

AG:

You know, there's the bass, there's the sardines, there's the salmon. It's just a school of fish. And you subscribe to the school you subscribe to. You know you just say, this is my camp. These are my people. I do think there are people that host, and I think then there are people that do a lot of competing and do a lot of judging the way I did. And then they graduate to becoming a host, or they, you know, they move in a different direction. And I think the path is just not linear. I don't even know how you compare, or compare and contrast because it's, it’s sort of like a giant bowl of fruit, you know. There are a lot of. . . . You can be a fig, you can be an apple, you can be a pomegranate, you can be a pomelo. You know, it depends on what's going on. So.

SM:

I like that. Maybe I'm a pomelo.

[Laughter]

AG:

I, I love a pomelo.

SM:

Oh, me too.

AG:

But I'd say it would be interesting to explore the trajectory of these chefs based on what they bring to the table when they come, or what their formative years were like cooking, and then how that translates into what they end up doing on tv.

SM:

Yeah, it really would.

AG:

Yeah, it's curious. And sometimes I see people and I say, gee, all I want is for them to cook. I see someone else and I say, gee, all I want is for them to talk about food. So, you know.

SM:

We'll wait and see. Maybe I should do an episode and pick a number of them who I know from the. . . and just see how different they are.

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

I think that would be an interesting one. Food. . . I haven't done food. . .  a little bit of food television going back to the ‘50s of Julia Child, and even before her, you know, going back. And we had this woman who was like Julia Child, but a bit more nuts, who was called Fanny Cradock in England, who was completely nuts but used to cook in a tiara. And I always want to think what brought her into cooking. But anyway.

Well, first of all, I'm going to ask you some other fun questions. Hopefully these were fun questions too. But I'm going to ask you a couple of fun questions as well as these. So. And I just want to say now, thank you, thank you, thank you for just being able to do this. This is an hour of your time. . .

AG:

Of course.

SM:

. . . when I know that your time is very precious. But let me ask you some of these just super fun questions.

Now, if you. . . . you know, if Alex Guarnaschelli was a meal, and you've got so many meals that you've cooked and they're so special, I mean, they are. But if you were a meal, what would it be?

AG:

You mean with multiple courses and stuff?

SM:

You could choose a whole multiple course. . .

AG:

Nah.

SM:

. . . or you could choose one dish and you go, this is the dish that sums either me up or it's the best. . . whatever you want. That's the thing. It’s. . . it is whatever people want.

AG:

Well, I mean, you know, I could pick what's personal to me or pick something that people know. ‘Cause, you know, you have all those weird family things that people don't know.

SM:

It could be anything, but it has to be. Yeah.

AG:

I'm going to say it's a cheese souffle from Dione Lucas because my mother made this souffle, and the oven door wouldn't close all the way. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

. . . because it was broken. So, my mother put a chair in front of the oven, and the window was all greased stained. But I would sit in the chair and look through the chair through the stained glass smattered with grease from many a chicken. And I watched the souffle puff up, and my mother was fretting about the oven. And then she took it out and I mean, it was hot, and she was shaking, and she just ran to the table like it was. . .

SM:

Oh.

AG:

. . . like a. . . and I remember the spoon went in and it just. . . it made some noise, you know, like. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

Oh.

AG:

. . . and we ate this. It was like an omelet, and it was funky like a barnyard. And it was acidic because she put a ton of dry sherry and there was dry mustard, and she had put a whole wheel of Brie, Simon, through a sieve without the skin.

SM:

Oh my. . .

AG:

So, it's a very complicated recipe. It has a million ingredients, but it actually tastes deceptively simple, and it's very puffy and warm, but deflates over time. And I'd have to say that's me.

SM:

[Laughter]

Oh.

AG:

Just that and a glass of a Grüner Veltliner with that ice cold. And then, you know, that'd be it. No dessert. See you later. Maybe a salad, some frisée and some sherry dressing. But that's it. And I bet if you asked Geoffrey Zakarian, you know him and his love of souffle, he'd probably say the same. But that dish, it changed my life when I ate it. I just. . . I don't know what happened. Something happened.

SM:

Oh. I, I wrote about Dione Lucas. . .

AG:

Mm-hm.

SM:

. . . way back. We did that episode. We did Julia Child, Fanny Cradock, Dione Lucas and one other person. And I wrote back. . . I can't remember who we wrote out about, but those were the four. I said, the four kind of, you know, original women in. . .

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

. . . food TV and Dione Lucas was just incredible. So that was. . . . When you start mentioning that. . . . And I'd had some of her food, well, not had some of her food, she was long gone by then. But some people created some of her food, and it was oh.

Okay, if you were going to have any meal during history or a meal at a particular point in history, what would it be?

AG:

Oh my God. Hmmm.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

Trying to extract myself from my parental history and not pick something that they would've really wanted me to be at. I've got to say, because I could have almost had it. Maybe I look at it that way. I want to have. . . I want to eat something that I could have almost had but didn't. I’d like a really simple Tuesday night dinner with Julia Child and her husband at home. . .

SM:

Oh.

AG:

. . . where she didn't know she was having any company. I'd like to know what a little, you know, I'd like to have a fly on the wall pork chop dinner with her and her husband.

SM:

Oh. That’s got to be. . . That's, yeah, no, that's got to be just. . . . ‘Cause I never met her. I never. . . . But  her. . . . That's exactly the thing I would say. And it’s, oh.

And finally, and this is an interesting one. Now, if you could choose any great invention in history, what would it be?

AG:

Well, it might be a tie. And mostly because I go to this coffee place every week, and the gentleman, it's called Java Nation. It's in Bridge Hampton. It's unmarked, very unassuming. But inside the gentleman is roasting all his own coffee. And he pours the coffee into the machine. And he says to me, do you know we're just burning sugar. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

. . . off this seed, and that's what coffee is. That's what he said to me two Saturdays ago. And I said, no, I don't think so. And people think it smells divine, you know, because they're thinking that Hazelnutty, wonderful. . . . But, but the burning in the roasting doesn't smell like that. It sort of smells like a five alarm, five alarm fire. . .

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

. . . mixed with sugar. And so, whoever invented the machine to roast coffee beans and turn something so wildly useless looking into this sublime drink, that is God's nectar, number one. Number two, when I lived in France, I worked with Patricia Wells, the great food writer. . .

SM:

Of course.

AG:

. . . and we visited a lot of olive oil producers in Provence.

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

And there's really very little olive oil when you consider the global amount being produced. The amount of olive oil in France is paltry. But I was fascinated by their description of how they would crush the olives with the stones and then smear the paste onto these mats. . .

SM:

Yep.

AG:

. . . and then press down and then just separate the oil in the water by centrifuge. And I thought, who invented these mats that you smear crushed up fruit from a local tree on, and get. . . and then take out the liquid, decide what's useful and what isn't, and create olive oil. In this particular place, they also would use the water that they took. .

SM:

Yeah.

AG:

. . . extracted from the oil, and they would water the trees with it. And I thought this kind of full circle, romantic, I can't take it. I felt sort of stupid.

SM:

[Laughter]

AG:

I can't explain it. What have I been doing with my life when I could have been doing this. So, whoever invented those little mats that they smear the olives on and then press to get the oil, that’s. . . those are my two immediate thoughts.

SM:

Well, I have to say the first one, I'm allergic to coffee, so I'm never going to take. . .

AG:

Oh, I forgot, and oyster?

SM:

And oysters. So, that’s. . . but that's fine, because I think it's one that real. . . . So, I'm never going to. . . . Now, the olive oil, when it was first, I think it was in Israel back in the day, back in, you know, almost scriptural times. And they would push it through mats like that, and they would take the water and that would be used, but they would take the olive oil that came out and that would be used just for the anointment. It was really interesting.

AG:

I did not know that.

SM:

First of all, I do want to say at the end, let’s, let's just give your Twitter and Facebook and Instagram and Threads and TikTok and I dunno what else there is now. Perhaps you could just share your, you know, who you are and all of those first.

AG:

Oh, I'm just @Guarnaschelli. . .

SM:

Okay.

AG:

. . . on all of those. So, you can just. . . if you figure out how to spell my last name, which is worth enough, you can find me anywhere.

SM:

Okay. That's fantastic. And I just wanted everyone to know that, because you are talking today, I hope we'll get even people who don't know you because we have lots of people in different countries. They will want to listen to you now. But right at the end I just want to say thank you. That was one of the most enjoyable thing I've ever, ever had. And we've done a hundred episodes of this show now.

AG:

I'm so proud of you for this. I love it. I can't wait to promote it and get more people aware of it, Simon.

SM:

Well, I hope you will and that's great.

AG:

Yeah.

SM:

We've done about 30 to 40% of them interviews and then the rest is me writing essays where I kind of raw features where I just go, this is exciting. So, I've written about corn this time. I've written about Corn and Cakes and the Chicken, and they're really fascinating. But I just wanted to say thank you. Having people like you on here makes it credible. And I just want to say a huge, huge thank you. I mean, it really is.

AG:

I love it.

SM:

So, thank you.

AG:

Send me all the info so I can promote it.

SM:

Well, I'm going to send it to you and please do. But I want to say at this point, Alex, thank you. Thank you very much.

AG:

Thanks for having me.

SM:

And I know we'll let you go now, but I just wanted to say again, a huge thank you.

AG:

Anytime. I love doing it. You're so fun.

SM:

Thank you very much.

AG:

Alright.

SM:

Thank you. Take care.

AG:

Mwah. See you again.

SM:

Bye-bye. See you soon. Bye-bye.

OUTRO MUSIC

Simon:

Make sure to check out the website associated with this podcast at www.EatMyGlobe.com where we will be posting the transcripts from each episode, along with all the references and resources we used putting the episodes together, in case you want to delve deeper into each subject. Theres’s also a contact button, so please do let us know if there are any subjects that you would like us to cover.

And, if you like what you hear, please don’t forget to join us on Patreon, subscribe, recommend us to your family and friends and give us a good rating on your favorite podcast provider.

Thank you and goodbye from me, Simon Majumdar, and we’ll speak to you soon on the next episode of EAT MY GLOBE: Things You Didn’t Know You Didn’t Know About Food.

CREDITS

The EAT MY GLOBE Podcast is a production of “It’s Not Much But It’s Ours” and “Producer Girl Productions.”

[Ring sound]

We would also like to thank Sybil Villanueva for all of her help both with the editing of the transcripts and essential help with the research.