Are Michelin Stars Ruining the True Spirit of Great Restaurants? Patric Kuh Tells All

0:00 The line in the sand was never take anything for free. My editors had always said, if they recognize you, that's fine. You know, you can't, but never accept freebies. Why? Because it compromises your opinion in terms of what the reader's getting. Sit back and grab a glass. It's Wine Talks with Paul K. All right, welcome to Wine Talks with Paul Callum Kerrien, available on Spotify, Stitcher, Google Play, iTunes, and all your favorite podcast hangouts. Today we are gonna be entertained, fascinated. I don't even show all the expletives I can use. We're talking to Patrick Q, and that's no K on the Patrick, by the way, but a K on the Q. That's right. Yes. And he is a James Beard Foundation award-winning author. I don't know, would you call it cuisine or food or the history or what would, like, what's the category of that book? That's food writing. Food writing.

0:58 Food writing, yeah. So name of that book is, The Last Days of Haute Cuisine. And if you are at all interested in food or the history of food in America, it's a must, must read. I already sent a copy off to my daughter in New York, by the way. Oh, good. Thank you. And, but most recently, the book Becoming a Restaurateur, which I looked at and said, it's gotta be a typo. Isn't it restaurateur? Yeah. No, the end disappears. And I don't know why. So, But a great book as well because they're really a good read for all of us have thought about it one time. I think I can run a restaurant. Yeah. There's something compelling about it and much, well, a lot of money has been lost by— Yeah, that's true. What is it? By people thinking that. What is it? 80% closure rates. There, there are many different statistics, but yes, the, the closure rate's enormous.

1:54 And it's a very risky business. And even though I thought I knew quite a bit about restaurants since I'd been a restaurant critic for 17 years, I, writing this book really made me aware of the demands of the job, which go from physical to emotional to cerebral. Yeah. to hospitable. Every, every, you're challenged in every way. Biteable so you can possibly— Yeah, all of them. But the most dramatic of them all is financial. There is a huge financial risk in opening a restaurant today.

2:38 And you're, I wanna talk about that too, just because of the history of the government involved with the restaurants and how that's affected. Just look at the minimum wage this year. We're gonna talk about that. But let's go back to the beginning briefly so we can understand the experience level because, uh, the story where you're in the kitchen in Paris is hilarious. We'll talk about that. But you, you were in college, you said in Trinity College in, in, in Dublin. I, I attended Trinity College Dublin for 1 year before dropping out. Yeah. But your mom was Irish. She was Irish. She was, uh, was she born in Ireland? Oh yeah. She was born in, uh, Mallow County, Cork. And, uh, was, uh, like, I, I, I'd say beatnik, which was sort of pre-hippie.

3:19 Oh, really? I think they were almost pre-beatnik. I don't know quite. So post-war, Bohemians traveling around Europe. And your father is American? My father was American, born in New York City, um, was in the Air Force in the Second World War and decided that he wanted to be a poet in Europe and got whatever was left of his GI Bill, uh, went to Europe in the early '50s and, uh, and was a poet. That's fascinating. Yeah. So what part of Europe was he in? Uh, well, he settled in Spain, in the south of Spain. Wow. It was, uh, you know, at the time, very little tourism in Spain in the early '50s. So then how'd you end up at Trinity College? Because— Well, because when, when, when my parents divorced, we went back to Dublin and I, so I spent what, what the Irish call my deformative years in Dublin from 8 to 18. I thought maybe it was the only school that accepted you. Yeah, probably. Anyway. So, so you went there and you decided that wasn't happening and I, and the food kicked in somehow. So— Yeah, the, the food.

4:20 I'd always enjoyed restaurants. My mother had worked in restaurants. I'd, I enjoyed food. It was, I, you know, food is a great entry point into a country for many people. So, so when I went, when I went to France, I immediately gravitated towards restaurants and And yeah, and became a, a passably good line cook. When— passably good. I've seen too many, I've seen too many great cooks to think that I was anywhere in there. But a passably good line cook. I could, I could, I could hold my station for— That's great. Well, that's an important feature.

5:01 Yeah. Like my daughter worked the line. She wanted to learn how to work the line, so she worked the line. Okay. But what year was that about when you left school and you decided to go cook? '86. '86. Okay. So, well, and one of the things we, we, we've discussed before here with some other, with some people like Joachim, for instance, when he left Germany, it was, you know, that, that's where Europe is, right? You, you pick a trade typically to go into. If you decide that, you know, school, you just go to a trade tech. So you went to a cooking school, French cooking school. I went to French cooking school for a year, got a diploma. But I've never said I was a chef. Never, never, never. I know too many chefs. I know what it requires. I could hold my own at a station, but I was always writing. Writing is my passion.

5:56 And restaurants allow you to do 2 things simultaneously. There's many people out there who are actors and work in restaurants. I happen to be a writer who worked in a restaurant. Right. So, I mean, a talent as great as Joachim Spieschl is in a totally different realm of cooking than my little corner of it. But it allowed me to earn a living while pursuing writing. Sure, sure. But you got some amazing experiences in the book. The book, I'm talking about The Last Days, is contemporary. I mean, it's contemporary because it's ageless stuff. It's history. with amazing research that allows a person that really doesn't understand the industry and how it came about and the cuisine, the way cuisine has changed over the years.

6:46 You know, I talk about— I always think restaurants do reflect society in many ways. For sure. And in ways that sometimes it's hard to find the words to say how society is changing and restaurants somehow manage to do it just in their vibe and their look and what they're offering and who they're allowing in, you know, and who can experience restaurants. All sorts of much larger social changes are going on that have reflected in restaurants, how you pay for them. You know, the advent of the credit card was something we take for granted today, but dramatically changed who had access to the restaurant experience.

7:28 That was an amazing part of the book. Before credit cards became widespread, you had to have a house account to settle the bill in many restaurants. Yeah. And essentially a house account meant the owners had vetted you socially and were you the right kind of person that they wanted eating in their restaurant. So suddenly the credit card comes along and if you've been extended credit by a bank, you can plop down this piece of in the beginning, paper. Yeah. Not even plastic, and pay for your experience. And that book did come about because of an anecdote, a specific anecdote.

8:14 I was still working as a cook in San Francisco at the time, and Jacques Pépin was a friend of the owner. And one night at an event, Jacques Pépin started telling the story of the day that Henri Souley, who was the owner of the incredible Le Pavillon in New York, kicked out Joe Kennedy, the father of Joseph Kennedy, the father of Jack Kennedy, from his restaurant. And like, I was all ears. Like, that was like fascinating. Yeah. It was fascinating to me. It's like, because people don't realize there's a backstory to restaurants. Yeah. There's all sorts of things that have gone on. And just, let's briefly say, you know, Jack, John F. Kennedy had been elected president and they always ate at Le Pavillon, and he still hadn't been inaugurated. And they were eating at Le Pavillon, the entire Kennedy clan. And there was a photographer in the dining room, and Joseph Kennedy didn't like the idea of a photographer seeing the whole Kennedy clan eating in such an expensive restaurant. And he sort of summoned Henri Soulet and said, you know, kick him out.

9:29 And the one thing you don't tell a French restaurant owner is what to do in his dining room. And Henri Soulet said, no, I'm not kicking him out. And, you know, their relationship was complicated. Some people think that Joseph Kennedy was one of the people who bankrolled Le Pavillon, but that was, that's never been made clear. But in any case, Henri Soulet was not about to be told what to do in his own dining room. The photographer stayed and the entire Kennedy clan got up and, and— And that was it. Left the restaurant. And, and I remember hearing, of course, Jacques Pépin worked at Le Pavillon, so this was like close to the source of restaurant history that I was hearing.

10:15 And when he first came to the United States, long before he became an incredible author and food personality, and I remember just thinking, there has to be a book about how restaurants have reflected American culture. And so that's how I came about to write The Last Days of Haute Cuisine. So you answered my next question. I have to, I'm going to dovetail off for a second. My good friend Joe Kennedy, because he's responsible for all my headaches. And this is what I've determined. How's that? I've determined this. It finally hit me after 30 years of doing this. And that is, you know, he's responsible for the repeal of Prohibition, right, 1933. And he did it by having the responsibility of alcohol sales given to the states, right? So there's 50 states, 50 rules. But it really meant to me, now that I think about it, it was a way for him to give each territory through the government's already delineated state lines alcohol control. So okay, you know, Guido, you get Indiana and you get— and they just divvied it up, right? 'Cause he was the big rum runner of the United States at that time. So it's still in existence today. It competes, you know, the 21st Amendment competes with the Commerce Clause and there's no solution to it 'cause no one's willing to challenge it. No one's willing to take it to the Supreme Court and get a decision. So we suffer through all this. So anyway, that's my connection to Joe Kennedy. Okay. So you, the research in, in the last days, and I, let's, I wanna define haute cuisine for the

11:46 listeners because there are lots of terms around. Yeah. And when I read your book, it became more complicated than just a level of food. It seemed like to me, uh, an actual, included the ambiance, like the terroir of a wine. It included the terroir of a restaurant. It included the, the wine, the chef included sort of like bundle. But is that— tell me what you're— Well, haute cuisine can mean many different things. I mean, as translated, it means high cooking. But there are many, I guess, within the French canon, there are many different types of cooking. There's cuisine de Provence. So that would be the cuisine that's regional cooking. There is cuisine bourgeoise, which is more kind of a seasonal cooking, but— Farmer, village cooking? Not so much more. It's more urban. It's more of a social class, but it's not— it's very true to its roots. It's very market-based.

12:53 It's very simmered. It's thrifty. It's not— it's everyday food, but at a very high level. And haute cuisine is sort of the— how would I say it? The highest level. It's the NBA. It's the— And it's not just from the ingredients, it's from the preparation, it's from the chef who's making it. It's from— There are traditions. There are very much traditions. And Escoffier, of course, is considered the father of it. But in truth, it can be considered a pejorative term, like, oh, that's so haute cuisine, like outdated and sort of obsolete. Yes. Or it can be considered completely dependent on skill, talent, the prime, the best ingredients. Yes. There is a a contemporary version of haute cuisine, and it can feel very— it's what Michelin 3 stars are doing every day. It can be very authentic. Yeah. It can reflect talent, it can reflect seasons, it can reflect place. It can— you very much, when you say terroir, they're from a great restaurant in Alsace, it's completely different from a great restaurant in in Provence, just like a

14:24 great restaurant in New York should be different from a great restaurant in Los Angeles. The thought that— first, I want to define Auguste Escoffier, who wrote his book in 1897, I think. Forgot the name of it. Le Guide Culinaire. Yeah, Le Guide Culinaire, which is the penultimate French cookbook, right? So he sort of— Yeah, it's outdated, but it influenced many a generation of chefs. At that time, he defined sort of this Yes. Baseline of French cooking. Yes. Which Julia Child took to the next level. But the, the idea of what you just mentioned, which is New York has a cuisine and LA has a cuisine. And one of the conversations I've had with different French winemakers and the growth of French wine and regions, as well as Italian, anything European really, where the region has got foods that tend to be paired with the wines they grow. Yeah. I don't think that's an accident. No, exactly. And here in America, we don't have indigenous wine, so we have this And Jacques Ladié from Louis Jadot said this to me. He says, you know, you have this new world to work with, so you get to play and do different things and create a cuisine. And I think that's very, particularly California, a very important facet of the way we eat.

15:36 Yes. But your book was talking about the origins of French cooking. Was there a reason why the French, you know, I mean, obviously it's closest to Los Angeles, but all these French chefs came to New York at this sort of what, the '40s and '50s where they decided to— Well, yes. What was very interesting about Le Pavillon was it was sort of the landing spot for many chefs who then went on to other restaurants. So it was one of those restaurants that is, whose influence is massive because of the people who've worked there and have gone on to other restaurants. There had been French chefs, of course, in the United States before that, but it had never— what Le Pavillon did was not try and dumb it down. They were going for the highest level of French cooking that would've been the highest level in France. They just happened to do it on East 55th Street in New York. Yeah.

16:38 Souley was an imperious character. He would not let men into dinner, never mind coat and tie. Of course, that was given. If they weren't wearing a white shirt for dinner, you had to wear a white shirt. Wow. He was— it was a different version of the restaurant business. You didn't turn the tables. Your table was yours for the entire evening. People, couples ate side by side in a very, you know, it's a beautiful way to eat, as you know. when you're sitting side by side with the person you want to sit side by side with. But that meant, that meant, you know, in restaurant just math, you're giving one table where you could get 2 tables in. Right. For sure. So, so if every table is a side-by-side table, it means you never turn the tables.

17:23 It's your table for the evening. You pay a fortune for that. There was that, there was flowers, there was caviar service, there was, And so he had cooks like Pierre Freinet, who went on to be a columnist at the New York Times, the food section with Craig Claiborne. He had Jacques Pépin. They had restaurants. They went on to open La Caravelle. It was sort of a birthplace of many careers. Souley himself was his own worst enemy. He was constantly fighting with the staff. And, uh, um, by the end of his career, by 1961, when the restaurant finally closed, um, it, uh, you know, he, we, essentially he was not the lo— the great personage he had been when he'd ruled over New York society.

18:20 So you heard this story from, about Joe Kennedy in San Francisco. Is this when you were working as a private chef? No, no, I was just working for a, for a Not George Mardikian. No, I was writing for a, a Basque chef, Gérald Hirigoyen. Yeah. And Jacques Pépin was a friend of his. Yeah. So, so you thought, okay, I'm gonna, this is, this, this is a fascinating story. There must be something behind it all. And you set out now to, 'cause the research, the depth of research, including the credit card part of that, is, is phenomenal. So did you go to New York and just say, okay, I'm gonna start digging deeper? I, you know, writing a book is, is an interesting process and it's, It's a time-tested one. You write a proposal first, and the proposal takes it from, from a vague idea in your head to, okay, well, what is this gonna be? What, who are the characters? What are the themes? What are the chapters? Um, uh, you have to write a sample chapter. Uh, this is if you want the publisher to give you an advance. Sure.

19:20 So, uh, it's a good process because We all have kind of books in our heads and whatnot, but the problem is, okay, well, what's the shape? What's chapter 2? What's chapter 3? Who's going to read it? Yeah, exactly. So it's a good process. I started writing a proposal. I was still cooking in restaurants. I wrote the sample chapter. You don't have to adhere to it. Nobody's going to say to you a year later if you sell the proposal, well, you said chapter 3 was going to be, you know, it's just, you have to convince somebody else that you know more or less what you're trying to do. And so I wrote the proposal, I sold the proposal, and then all of a sudden, of course, it's the moment of truth. Oh my goodness, now I have to actually stop pretending like I know what I'm talking about and actually know what I'm talking about. But with all writing, that was a great anecdote to hear, and it did provide me for that first place where So much in writing is where do I start pulling on the yarn? You know, I mean, there, and so an anecdote or action or something real is a great place to start pulling on the yarn. Doesn't mean your book's gonna start there, but you have something to work with. You have something to work with. Yes. Um, and I haven't gone through the whole thing just so you know, but I, so I'm not, I don't know, I do not wanna know how it ends. Oh, okay. Except that You know, the title is called The Last Days of Haute Cuisine. And

20:51 that's why I thought maybe it had a lot to do with not only just the food, but the whole character. Like, for instance, on Soleil, having, you know, making you wear white shirts. Yeah. Because certainly there are restaurants around that serve, you know, food you would consider— well, I just got done. There's a restaurant in Disneyland, you know, called Royal 21 or 21 Royal. It's $15,000 for 12 people. It's like the most expensive restaurant in America. Where's that? In Disneyland. So I'm hoping that's haute cuisine, right? At that price. But that was one of those. So we have haute cuisine. And then when I was talking to some other folks, we were talking about nouvelle cuisine. Tell me what your definition of nouvelle cuisine would be there.

21:35 Well, just let me preface this by what I'm sort of what I meant by the last day of haute cuisine was the idea of exclusivity of haute cuisine and that only very select people could have the gastronomic experience. I see. And the, the, what, what the United States really said was, well, though, that's not really the way we operate. If you are interested and if you can afford it, There's no reason why your background, your social class, your ethnicity, or anything else should be a reason to not have the gastronomic experience. And unfortunately, all those things had been true before. You know, it was a very closed club of fine dining. So, so in the book, I do follow Chez Panisse. I, I explore Chez Panisse in Berkeley. How did a bunch of people who'd never cooked, who had BAs, MAs, PhDs, and whatever from Berkeley. Mm-hmm. To, you know, read a few books and say, hey, we're gonna do a restaurant. That's nice. And, and turn into one of the most important restaurants in this country. Just like, just like the Pavillon in terms of people who would come out of it, people who would work there establishing a, a whole aesthetic of cooking. I, I went to the early days of the new Las Vegas. I, I, I've, I went when, uh, Sergio Maccioni of Le Cirque opened Le Cirque at the, uh, uh, the Bellagio. Yeah. And okay, what does it mean when

23:08 a guy who's worked at, you know, the Villa d'Este and the, the greatest restaurants in, in Europe and who started Le Cirque in New York, then started, but, you know, ran Le Cirque in New York. Um, what does it mean when he's in a casino? Yeah. Well, it's a good question. So, so anyway, that, but to get back to Nouvelle Cuisine, when it started, it was a, in very broad brushstrokes, it was a reaction against a certain heaviness that had settled into gastronomy in France. And a lot of the dishes seemed to be done by rote, and a lot of the dishes seemed to be there.

23:52 with really to impress people, but not because it was seasonal or driven by a tradition or anything. And certain cooks, notably Paul Bocuse, Michel Guérard, Alain Chapel, the Troisgros brothers. So these are considered the fathers of Nouvelle Cuisine. They said, well, let's turn back a bit to our roots and be more aware of seasonal, be more aware of our regions, be more aware of of dishes that are incredible but are not, you know, impressive or kind of sanctioned by snobbery, or I don't quite know what the term is. Yeah. Now, that argument was oversimplified, and the critics of nouvelle cuisine said, well, it's not so light because every sauce is reduced cream. Yeah. And, you know, butter. Yeah. And butter. So, They may say roux, which is flour and butter mixed, which was the traditional thickening agent for sauces. They may say, oh, that's old school, but reducing a liter of cream to make, you know, 2 spoonfuls of sauce is not exactly light. Yeah.

25:08 So there was sort of, there were, you know, back and forth about it. But apart from how sauces are made, it was more about let's invest French gastronomy with some of its most basic beliefs. And yes, get it away from, from point— I forget, sorry. Get away from escoffier. Get it away from dishes that were invented for Russian archdukes in 1890. Right. You know, get it, get it into— That stuff's fascinating anyway. Isn't that fascinating? Yeah, it's fascinating. But If you were in 1965, you know, you, you didn't need veal chop Orloff. Yeah. Right. Because Count Orloff, you know, had, had, you know, greased somebody's palm. I will say Escoffier's béchamel has reduced salt pork, you know, his, and it's pretty heavy and I love making it. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, I use béchamel all the time when I'm making creamed spinach. Yeah. Because I, I like, I like that kind of billowy, thing that béchamel can do. Well, Joachim said that he was like, he, first of all, he says, you know, I don't understand this nouvelle cuisine idea that's not so new. He goes, in the '70s, I was walking to Nice down to the farmer's market. I'd go get fish right from the boat. We'd buy vegetables from the thing and take it to the restaurant and we wouldn't prep anything.

26:34 We would just, we would start cooking when the, when the bell went off. Yeah. When the service started. And that's when it happened. And that's pretty new. Right? That is, that, that's a fantastic aspect of it. Yeah. Nothing, very little prepped in advance. Yeah. And the great masters of it who could work without a safety net, Freddy Girardet in Switzerland, Jacques Maximin at the Hôtel Negresco that Joachim worked with. Yes. Right. Yeah. Everything, lots of, lots of things were done. They had their mise en place done, but nothing was cooked in advance. And so that was real nouvelle cuisine. Yeah. Very fresh. Very fresh. Very immediate. very— the flavors were very pure, nothing denatured.

27:15 When you started to peel this book back, did you find it more fascinating as it was going on? And just, you wanted to tack more stories in the book that you never got in there because they become— they're just— you would've gone on forever. The Last Days of Herkules? Yes. Writing You, you can, you can have too many anecdotes. You can have too many characters. You can have too many anecdotes. And it's sort of, it's one of the hardest things about writing, cutting. Yes. Um, but you have— I really wanna say this story. I think it's really fun. Yeah. Particularly when it's taken you a lot to research it. Yes. Right. It's taken me months to find that fact out. You know, the amount of calls I had to make, the amount of libraries I had to go to to find that out. But tho— those, those are the hard calls.

28:00 If it's not adding to, if it's not contributing to moving the narrative forward. Yeah. Um, invariably it's better cut. The author, the, the, the reader's never gonna know what was cut. So, you know, you sort of just take one for the team and say, it's gotta go. Yes, I did. Not everything I know has to be in this. I think it was Soleil that was on the COVID of Life, or— He was quoted in Life many times. He wasn't, I don't think he ever was on the COVID There was a cover. One, you, one, you mentioned it in one of the, um, In one of the— He was in Time Magazine. There was a hat. He's got a top hat on. If it's Soleil or one of the other guys that, or maybe it was the critic. Lucius Beebe? Yeah.

28:42 That's him. Yeah. So I'm like, I went and looked it up, you know? I'm like, I gotta see if this is real or what this picture looks like. 'Cause I'm always in antique stores and you see these Life magazines. I know one that'd be interesting to get an article about food. So we met each other at the Arthur J. in in Manhattan Beach, a great restaurant. You know, we love to come there and we sit side by side. Yeah, great. I love it. But that one night we're sitting there and somebody's congratulating you for your book. And then you said, yes, I have a book signing tomorrow, which is across the street at Pages. And I'm like, what book, Patrick? And it's this Becoming a Restaurateur. And I went home and Googled your name. I said, well, this guy's pretty credentialed writer and a very good writer. I mean, I told Sandra, you gotta read these books. Like I said, I sent my daughter in New York a copy of Last Days. Okay. And I've sent her a copy of this already because she's in the business. And so she sees, she sees your stories. Now your stories are, the story in the restaurant tour book is a little bit void of the stress, right? I mean, you convey what it takes to do it. You gotta go to the planning commission, you gotta get, you know, the neighbors coming, they're gonna complain about the parking. All those things are real. Those are real things. I'll tell you a little story. Lisa, my daughter, was here and she's the head baking chef for 3 restaurants in New York. Oh. Jonathan Benno, Leonelli, which is his restaurant in a hotel and also a bakery.

30:10 And while she was here, they made some personnel changes. So when she got back, she was now the head pastry chef as well. And possibly, you know, filling on the line when she has to because, you know, as most restaurants go through that period where you need to be cognizant of wages and, yes, and food costs. So, yes. She's, she's gonna be reading this and saying, oh yeah, we're going through this now. But I did, I wanna ask you this question. I did look up the diner. Did it ever open? It's, I think it's gonna open soon. All Day Baby. All Day Baby. Yes. It's gonna open soon. It's gonna be fabulous from what I understand.

30:52 But yeah, that book, we did meet at the Arthur J. I'm now a manager at a restaurant in Manhattan Beach. That's its own story of how magazines sort of have fallen on hard times. But I love working there. It's taught me a lot about the hardships of restaurants. Yeah. The emotional toll, the physical toll, the Just the hours. How's that changed from when you were in the kitchen in Paris and San Francisco as a private cook in San Francisco? How has it changed much? Well, I think restaurants have become a far more important part of people's everyday. That's true.

31:34 Does Arthur J. have DoorDash? We vary our There's some, we're taking some of them, not taking others. It's a bit of a work in progress. I was just wondering who gets a steak. It's a bit of a work in progress. I'm a hot steak on Grubhub or something. So, but I would, that's interesting to know. Like, but restaurants have become a far more important part of people's everyday. It used to be special occasion destination, save up and go out. Now life has sort of changed and this whole casual dining segment is just because people have long stressful days and having a restaurant meal at the end of it is sort of one of the great pleasures of everyday life these days. It's where people gather, it's where families gather. It's, I mean, it was always the case, but now it's even more so. We make time for each other in restaurants now. I only have— I have— there's a piece of chicken in the kitchen right now at our house that's been sitting there for 3 days because every time we come home, we're going to prepare it. We're like, too tired. Let's go to our favorite watering hole. Right? That's what it's about. And I have this— I know it's crazy, but— and Sandra would never let me do it on my own. She'd think you're nuts. But if my daughter comes back from New York and she wants to open here, I'm all in. I mean, I want to test it. I just really want to test. my skillset to help

33:05 her and maybe apply some business acumen to what she's doing. Right. Yeah. But I'm glad you brought up the magazine thing. You were the food writer for LA Magazine. Yeah. Was LA Magazine part of the Times? No, it was a separate— no, no, no. It was always separate. Los Angeles Magazine. Los Angeles Magazine. Is the magazine gone? No, Los Angeles Magazine is still there, but like every other magazine's having to figure things out with fewer ads and more space to, you know, smaller budget and, you know, the internet. Yeah. has, the internet provides many useful tools in terms of addresses and information and whatnot. And magazines, just like newspapers, have had to sort of— Big changes.

33:47 Well, figure out, well, what is our purpose? And I am a newspaper and magazine reader and lover, and I will always read them. But nobody in the magazine business is would tell you that things haven't changed. Yeah. What, uh, how long were you there? I was the restaurant critic of Los Angeles Magazine for 17 years. Wow. That's, that's quite a run. Yeah. So you must have known Jonathan Gold. Yes. These guys. Yes. The other, all the rest. Wonderful. Great writer. Did you ever have, and I, I, I would think during this book, either book, and certainly as the critic, the ratatouille moment where you sat at a restaurant and you ate a dish and you went, OMG, either this is my, my childhood from my mom being a chef. Yeah. Or this was one of the best things I've ever tasted in my life. Well, many times I had this, one of the best things I've ever tasted in my life. Um, just because the level of chefs in LA is so high. Yes. Um, even though, you know, for many years we were sort of second fiddle to San Francisco and California, but I, I mean, the level of food here is fantastic, and I'm glad that the chefs today are getting the recognition that they deserve. I didn't have the Proustian madeleine, you know, this flavor takes me back.

35:17 Yeah. But yeah, that movie came out when I was a working critic, and it was certainly funny that that was people's version of what a restaurant critic is kind of. Yeah. Well, of course. Yeah. Well, my mom's an incredible cook. She's cooked, you know, I was, my love of cooking myself, I cook all the time. And I was a chef. I was a, you know, I actually worked at a beach diner and loved it. And I was in charge of the whole kitchen and it was an old Italian guy, Mr. Salantino. And he taught me that you must keep this kitchen spotless. I wanna walk in at any given time. I don't wanna see anything anywhere. It's, you use the knife, put it back. Make sure that grill's scrubbed all the time. And I live by that.

35:57 And when I cook at home, I do the same thing. And the rest of my family doesn't really do that. It drives me crazy. And my daughter, who now is the baking chef, used to make the biggest mess there ever. And now she's got the towel over her shoulder when she comes to work. It's spotless. Why? Because she went to French pastry school and she worked in Paris. And you just don't do that. No. The kitchens are— You know, the, the kitchen at RC after 30 years, you'd think they built it yesterday. I mean, I don't want— they gave us a tour and it's like, this is unbelievable. This is RC in Lyon, uh, 2-star Michelin. Yeah. It's a tradition in France that after each service you sand down the range. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. You know, every piece of metal is shiny.

36:40 There's no caked-on food on the range. And so, but Now, let me ask you a question. This— if you— and I, I, I kind of look around now because of that experience, but there's a lot of American kitchens that aren't like that. You know, they just— they weren't trained that way. And when Lisa did her stage days at a couple of different restaurants in New York, she left them saying, no, I'm not working here because the kitchens weren't to that standard. Isn't that an important standard to have in a— Well, every, every, every chef runs his own kitchen the way he or she wants to. You know, you, you could make an argument having, having your teenage cook sanding down the range for 2 hours is— Oh, I had a pumice stone. Yeah. It's not, it's not proper either. I mean, I don't, I don't know what is proper. It's what's, what's, what's proper is a, is a kitchen where standards are maintained, where corners are not cut, where the guests is always, the guests' needs are always considered above everything else and where the team respects each other.

37:52 That said, working in a dirty kitchen, nobody's gonna enjoy that. But they're big, big aspects to running a kitchen. So going back to the original question, it was like a tangent all the time, but we were in Paris, we were sitting at a brasserie somewhere, and I ordered the quiche. And this quiche came, and I was 5 years old because my mom made the same quiche, turkey and broccoli. I forgot, was that quiche Lorraine? I don't know which one it is. Quiche Lorraine has cheese. Cheese, yeah. Onion too. Onion, yeah. This was a broccoli turkey thing. And then I sat there and my wife's like, what's going on? I said, I cannot believe I'm back in Palace Verdi Estates in 1969. you know, 5 with this meal is amazing to me. So I thought, and I, with wine it's the same, you know, our senses are so memorable and you can remember things. There are wines I've tasted years ago that if they bring them now, I will say I've tasted this just by smelling it. Amazing. Because it's, it's such a memorable sense.

38:56 And food I think is the same way. That's why I asked you that question. Yeah. So at the, at, when you're at LA, at LA Magazine, you, your daily job was what did, what did you do as a food critic? I think people would like to hear Like, what else would you really do? I would go to restaurants. I would keep my anonymity. I had credit cards that had different names on them. I would keep track of my reservations and what name I'd used. You know, it was an interesting period because the cell phone came in, caller ID came in during all this time. So— So you were busted. So yeah, you were, there would be times where I'd be giving one name and the, and the hostess would see, you know, my name and the, or, All, there's all sorts of, technology was evolving as I was, you know, doing this. Yeah. The line in the sand was never take anything for free. My editors had always said, you know, if they, if they recognize you, that's fine. You know, you can't, but never accept freebies. Why? Because it compromises your opinion in terms of what the reader of what the reader's getting. You know, if, and I don't say this with naivete because it takes a big budget to pay for somebody to go out to dinner all the time. And if you're working for a very small neighborhood newspaper, there is no budget. Yeah. You either pay for the meal yourself or the restaurateur gives it to you. But I was lucky enough

40:26 to work for a magazine that had the budget. And the goal was to give a reader unbiased opinion of what going to eat at this place was. And if the restaurateur had just given you and, you know, 5 friends incredible meal. Yeah. Just a meal. Your opinion was compromised. Yeah. You could not, It's a good point. Yeah. Really good point. So, so I was very lucky to work in that version of restaurant reviewing where I could, if perhaps not always be, do it anonymously, but always do it with the magazine paying. And you were doing all levels. You were doing diners to taco stands to— I tried to do all, all, all levels. And certainly roundups allowed you to write about small places, give them a few words, you know, 20, 30 words. But I was, I guess it was old school traditional reviewing, which was 3 or 4 pages with pictures about one place and a magazine, our magazine at 12 issues a year. So, you know, I got to weigh in on 12 restaurants a year. Weekly newspaper reviewing is, you know, you have to produce one every week and that's a lot. That's very hard to do. That's a lot.

41:42 I really respect people who, who, who write a weekly restaurant review. It allows you to do a bit more, quite a bit more, but it's still all the restaurant newspaper restaurant critics I know, they certainly keep to the as anonymous as possible and certainly paying for everything that they eat. So that in that time, because I have the Michelin Guide here. In fact, in this book is where I learned that why the Michelin Guide started in 1929 and they wanted you to drive cars to use a the rubber so that they, you'd buy more tires. Right. So they, they didn't review restaurants in Paris. Wow. I see. Really? Yeah. Only in the outskirts, outskirting villages. So, but it was void in Los Angeles for a long time. And, and I, as of like even a month and a half ago or 3 months ago, you could bring up the Michelin Guide. There were no starred or suggested restaurants in Los Angeles. And now they're out there again.

42:36 When you were working with, was the Michelin Guide in? There was a period when Michelin came and went. And I don't think they've quite got LA. And then they've returned recently. Yeah. And I know and admire several of the chefs who've received Michelin stars, and I'm incredibly happy for them. I know it's had a great effect on their business. So that was my next question. The effect on the business is— yeah. Is it dramatic? Huge. Yeah. There's, I mean, the restaurants, for instance, Cali, a great restaurant chef, Kevin Meehan and Drew Langley.

43:28 They got a Michelin star, well-deserved Michelin star, incredible food, incredible wine service. And yes, Chef Meehan was telling me, Kevin, Chef Kevin was telling me the other day, it's completely transformed the business. It gave them a great breath of new blood, new customers, new energy. And it was fantastic. Because When we are— I only trusted that guide. And so when you're in Europe, because it's done internally, there's— it's not Yelp. But I, I mean, I'm sorry, but Yelp and Foursquare and all these other ones, I mean, I don't care what the other— what some guy thinks, 'cause we don't think the same way. But when— but Michelin is all internal. Only they review their own stuff and they make recommendations. And the ones we— even in Croatia, uh, in Hvar, in this little town, we found a recommended restaurant in the Michelin Guide. It was incredible. So I only trust it. And I was really disappointed at the time. I had Molly Hill from Sequoia Grove in here. This is, I don't know, maybe 6, few months ago, 3 or 4 months ago. And I looked at my phone and it wasn't up there. So they had just come on because they're on here now. Uh, LA, Nancy Silverton got a star for Mozza. And yeah, quite a few restaurants got— So I brought up your name. Uh, I was, we were in Manhattan Beach. Uh, we ate at Love and Salt with some friends. Oh yeah. And there's a Krikorian South, uh, pizza. And I looked at that, I go, that's kind

44:59 of strange. And I know Mike well, he's, uh, you know, Nancy's friend. And so I text him, I go, is this pizza yours? I took a picture of the thing. He goes, yeah, that's mine. He goes, I'm a good friend of the chef there who wasn't in at the time. So he, I said, well, and we started talking afterward. I talked to him yesterday about some stuff and he says, uh, I told him I was going to be talking to you today. He goes, oh, say hi to him. He's, he was the, uh, He was— he knew— he knew who you were. You know Mike? Mike was the— I don't know him, but yeah, I know his— He was the gang beat writer for the LA Times. Yeah, he's written quite a few op-ed pieces I've enjoyed, yeah. He's a great guy. Last time I talked to him, before that he was in Umbria with Nancy, and somebody had bought for $50,000 at a charity event dinner for 4 or 8 at her house in Umbria. Wow. And that's when he was entertaining them. So, so what's next for, for Patrick Hugues when it comes to writing, uh, restauranting? Um, I know that, um, well, I, I don't know. I'll, I'll, I'm gonna pursue, I, I'm always gonna be writing. Yeah. I hope, um, um, I, I hope to continue, um, developing in the restaurant field professionally. Um, It's always a challenge, but, and there's evenings that can leave you very dispirited if, you know, if you've missed things that you could have gotten better. But it's also a business

46:31 that you have to shake things off. And tomorrow's a new day. You see all the kinds. And you shake it off and you try and make it better. And that's a pretty good philosophy for life. You know, I think learning to shake things off is good. And always striving to be better is good too. And so I think restaurants in their own way are constantly challenging us to develop good traits and improve. A lot of patience. A lot of patience, a lot of hours. And They're, aren't they like little microcosms of life? Just happens, it happens to play out every night from, you know, from 5 o'clock to 12 o'clock. Well, yeah. You know, a, a, a, a very experienced maître d', while I was re— researching this book, uh, um, um, Becoming a Restaurateur, said to me, you know, sometimes I look around about 8 o'clock at night and everything's going right and it just gives me goosebumps. Yeah. You know, because everything is going right.

47:37 And it's, it's so easy in restaurants for things to go wrong. But, but when things go right, it's, it's magical. And when you see all the smiles of people at the table, it's kind of addictive. You know, it's like, wow, I played a small part and these people are having a great time. It's intoxicating. Yeah. And so, so I love it. So there's an author, her name is Frances Dieckenspiel. She wrote a book called Tangled Vines. It's an incredible story of the wine industry, fraud, deceit, murder, arson, that part of it. Okay. Having actually started in 1750 in Cucamonga. Oh, didn't make its way to Napa until 1850. Okay. So I talked to her a little bit, and this is why I'm gonna bring this up. Talking about books. My dad's story here, he invented this industry in 1972. It's a $3 billion industry.

48:29 And the growth of this company as it's gone through the seasons and the changes in marketing and people's perception of mail-order companies and wine, et cetera, has endured all of it. And now we're in the internet age, which is the most complicated, congested thing. You know, it's one of these things I was telling this to somebody, if you knew all the headwinds before you got into a restaurant, if you knew all the headwinds exactly doing what I have to do today, you'd say, I don't know why bother with that. It's too much work. You know, it's too complicated. Yeah. Along this story of my dad who came to America in 1949 and got his master's at SC, and there's all these fun anecdotal things. He knew all the greats. Robert Mondavi used to come down here and preach, talk, preach, talk his L'Esprit de Vin group. And he knew Bowser, the wine critic for the LA Times. He knew Warren Winiarski, stayed at my home. That's a nice name. I just learned that the other day. I'm like, what do you mean he stayed at my home? I was a teenager. I go, this guy was at my house? Yeah. Jim Barrett was our neighbor. He used to come in the store all the time. In fact, he came to my father and said, you know, please take on our brand in 1971 or '72 after he bought the winery, because I have too many people asking us for donations. I just want to point them to your store. And so I asked Mike to document the story about what happened. And I have this dossier, which I want to give you to read and say, all right, how can I Now parallel this industry, which is, I mean, now wineries without a club

50:02 can't survive. I mean, it's almost impossible to make wine money in the wine business anyway. But if you don't have a direct-to-consumer club where you're getting full retail from, you know, from the cost of goods sold, you know, you almost can't make it. Right. And my dad invented this idea. So I think it's a cool story. I think there's a, there's a, anecdotally, it's amazing what goes on. Oeufs glacés in, in, in Schönberg, and then, you know, people thinking the eggs were undercooked and all kinds of, all kinds of interesting stuff. So I want you to read it. Okay, absolutely. And I'll tell you what my thoughts are and how we— I think I want to go about it, because I think I want to get— he's still, still alive. He's 91, 90s.

50:44 He tells you the stories, he's totally coherent and everything. So, but as far as Patrick Hughes is concerned, it's been such a pleasure having you here, and there's so much we get to continue to talk about it. I'm sure we'll do it again. Well, Paul, it's been a pleasure. Thank you for showing interest in all of my books, but particularly this last one on what it takes to become a restaurateur today. So, it's— the first was The Last Days of Haute Cuisine. It was published like 2001, really. And I got a brand new copy. Oh, did you? Yeah, it was the first copy. And the current book is called Becoming a Restaurateur: By Patrick Hughan. It's under the Masters at Work group. And if you have any inclination or idea or thought process that you're gonna open a sports bar with chicken wings, doesn't matter, or a Michelin-star restaurant, it's a must-read. So thanks very much, Patrick. Good to see you again. My pleasure, Paul. Appreciate it.