Canal Street Dreams

Episode: Greek Easter, Feet & Family Business

Hosts: Eddie Huang & Natashia Perrotti

Date: April 14, 2026

Episode Overview

In this lively one-on-one episode (with frequent drop-ins from “Chris Cam”), hosts Eddie Huang and Natashia Perrotti dive into their creative and family life, blending stories about their evolving East Village restaurant, upcoming cultural dinner collaborations, what it means to run a business as partners and parents, and answering candid listener questions on everything from foot fetishes to intercultural relationships. Throughout, the conversation is unscripted, funny, deeply personal, and packed with insights about food, relationships, and community.

Table of Contents

1. Spring in New York & Neighborhood Vibes
2. Upcoming Dinners: Greek Easter & Russian Turkish Baths Collab
3. Building Community & Third Space
4. Family Business & Creative Partnership
5. Parenthood, Kids, and Restaurant Family
6. Creative Drive & Making Ideas Happen
7. Standing Your Ground & Women’s Voices
8. Mailbag: Love Letters, Feet, Romance, and More
9. Cultural Differences in Relationships

Spring in New York & Neighborhood Vibes

[00:00 - 04:00]

• Eddie, Natashia, and Chris celebrate spring’s arrival in New York and how it boosts their moods post-winter.
• Chris jokes about being the group’s unpaid therapist, while Eddie attributes needing less therapy lately to Chris’s support and "not talking to my mom."
• They trade observations on New Yorkers’ readiness for warm weather:
  • “I saw a lot of just like whole milk, pale legs, men and women in like all the Pacey Boys.” — Eddie [02:14]
  • Natashia talks about “olive skin baddie” struggles: “From May to October, serving, serving. And then the winter? I’m giving green stomach flu.” [02:30]
  • Banter about how everyone tries to embrace the first sunny days, regardless of physical readiness.

Upcoming Dinners: Greek Easter & Russian Turkish Baths Collab

[04:00 - 11:45]

Greek Easter Dinner

• Moving the tradition from LA backyard barbecues to their NYC block; first public celebration.
• Menu highlights: smoked lamb, grilled lamb chops, whole fish, “Natasha Pasta,” burnt garlic chicken wings (a nod to Natashia's mom's preference), Yaya’s red eggs.
  • “No one has ever had Natasha pasta outside the house. This is so OG.” — Natashia [04:44]
• Cultural traditions: red-dyed eggs for luck, Greek Orthodox Easter’s timing & significance, Greek “name days.”
  • “You take your egg and then you have your egg in your hand…whoever at the end of the day has an egg that didn’t crack is blessed with luck for the rest of the year.” — Natashia [05:37]

Russian Turkish Baths Dinner (April 21st)

• “Not collabing with chefs…we’re really interested in the exchange of culture.” — Eddie [08:55]
• Transforming bathhouse classics (borscht, Ukrainian meatballs, schnitzel, smoked fish) through a Taiwanese-Chinese lens.
  • Oxtail borscht noodle soup, Ukrainian veal & pork meatballs in Hunan red cook sauce, oyster bao, Apollo Bagels collab.
  • “The bathhouse menu, which is heavily Ukrainian and Russian and Jewish favorites, we are cooking it through a Taiwanese Chinese lens.” — Eddie [09:11]
• Emphasis on local, neighborhood collabs and connecting real communities: “To have something where these three places you really love…now doing this thing together, that’s really cool.” — Natashia [11:46]

Building Community & Third Space

[11:45 - 15:00]

• Discuss building a “third space” (social gathering spot outside home/work) with their no-reservations approach.
  • “We intentionally don’t take many reservations online each evening…we want people in the neighborhood to feel like they can just walk in and come eat here.” — Eddie [12:52]
• The “exclusivity” of reservation systems and why they bucked the trend.
• Vision: a welcoming, flexible, easy space—especially as weather warms and the backyard/street seating expands.
• Bathhouse dinner doubles as a deepening community: “I only see those homies at the baths. So this is fun to expand our friendship…Maybe we should eat a meal together!” — Eddie [14:34]
• “Fellas, I’ve seen your foot fungus. Let’s SAP a bow.” — Eddie (joking about the intimacy among bathhouse regulars) [15:05]

Family Business & Creative Partnership

[15:36 - 22:04]

• Natashia discusses the reality and joy of working lunch shifts and running both the podcast and restaurant with Eddie.
• Working as a couple: “I think it’s making our relationship stronger and bringing us closer together…we’re like, living our dream. That sounds so corny, but I really do have to pinch myself at times.” — Natashia [16:59]
• Eddie’s vision fulfilled: “I want to have a family with you, and I want to have, like, one restaurant I look after, and I’m just like an old Chinese chef sitting on a stool, looking after everything...I would live this day every single day.” [17:01]
• The synergy: “I don’t think I’ve ever been this happy and in touch with who I am and family.” — Eddie [17:33]
• Addressing the stereotype: “People say, don’t work with your friends, don’t work with your partner...If the love is there and both people want what’s best for the work, it will work.” — Eddie [17:44]

Parenthood, Kids, and Restaurant Family

[18:23 - 22:38]

• The benefits of shared work-life for their son, Senna: he sees both parents at work, gains community, learns independence.
• Practical advice: "I cannot recommend the husband and wife business more…When you work together, there is so much opportunity to have context and, like, live things together." — Eddie [19:19]
• Acknowledges their approach is uniquely suitable for their “cosmically entangled” selves, but not everyone.
• Reflections on other family-centric restaurateurs, e.g., Pia & Davide Baronchini, Nick & Holly.
• The philosophy: their restaurant is more than just a business—“This is not just a restaurant. In our eyes, this is, like, spiritual. For us…this is our living room and backyard.” — Natashia [22:04]

Creative Drive & Making Ideas Happen

[23:51 - 28:58]

• The hosts and Chris discuss relentless work ethic, execution, and building from ideas to reality.
  • “There’s just some people…like, the conviction they have to materialize that idea is so real and so unshakable.” — Natashia [25:16]
  • “No one is out working that man (Eddie) besides you. Like, literally, it’s you and him.” [24:54]
• Eddie’s take on decision-making and not compromising on vision: “If you compromise on the idea, the idea is going to be shit.” [28:22]
• Open disagreement and healthy creative tension in the kitchen: “We disagree…and then we try them…Neither of us is trying to compromise. Both of us are trying to get our dish on.” — Eddie [28:49]

Standing Your Ground & Women’s Voices

[29:00 - 32:26]

• Natashia reflects on how being around Eddie and Chris has inspired her to assert opinions and avoid minimizing herself, especially as a woman.
  • “Women are very conditioned…not have opinions and not take up too much space…be less agreeable and say what you want and say it with your whole ass chest.” [29:59]
• Eddie relates a screenwriting story illustrating how differently women are pressured for likability.
  • “The world makes it significantly harder for women to be blunt and direct…I appreciate a blunt, direct woman.” — Eddie [31:25]
• Major theme: Own your desires, don’t apologize for how you feel or shape yourself for others.

Mailbag: Love Letters, Feet, Romance, and More

[33:16 - 42:17]

• Q&A starts with a laugh over an “in love” email Eddie wrote (Natashia: “It was in my spam folder for multiple days.” [33:54])
• On foot fetishes:
  • “I think for…I don’t know if it’s a fetish. It’s more just like a delightful treat.” — Eddie [34:09]
  • “I just think it’s hot if somebody’s licking your foot…that’s real intimacy for me.” — Natashia [34:44]
• Most romantic things:
  • Eddie: “Last year, when we were down super, super bad…when you got me the Knicks canteen so we could bring water to work…I just thought that was extremely thoughtful…And when my health was really bad, you just started making me soup.” [35:19]
  • Natashia: “Every single morning, you make me coffee…And then, I mean, the second thing would be Come Undone. I mean, you wrote a novel that…I, like, fall back in love with you when I read it.” [36:32]
  • Eddie on publishing Come Undone: “I’m not anxious because I meant everything I said and come undone…This is how I feel.” [38:06]
• Insights on emotional expression:
  • “How you feel is how you feel. Don’t apologize for it either.” — Natashia [39:22]
  • “You cannot tell someone how to feel about something. I’m gonna feel this way whether it’s logical or not.” — Natashia [39:46]

Memorable Moments & Quotes:

• “Fellas, I’ve seen your foot fungus. Let’s SAP a bow.” — Eddie [15:05]

• “All the Pick Misha’s should die and be resurrected on Easter crisis…and arise as people with a point of view who will not be shaken or compromised.” — Eddie & Natashia [33:08-33:16]

• On food and drinks:

  • “Chinese food. I gotta say, Chinese food, kung pao chicken, twice cooked pork.” (Best pairing with Coke) — Eddie [40:26]
  • “Every meal, baby. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner…At a diner, having a steak and eggs Coke.” — Natashia [40:31]
  • “A ramen with a Coke is everything.” — Natashia [40:59]
  • “I can’t lie. Like, sex…A little taste of foot. Roll over. Gatorades.” (Best pairing with Gatorade) — Eddie [41:33]

Cultural Differences in Relationships

[42:17 - 47:18]

• On navigating biracial relationships and blending cultures for their child:
  • “Do the maximum of embracing of the other parent’s culture because it only benefits your child.” — Eddie [42:26]
  • “I don’t think I’ve met a culture that I didn’t enjoy being a part of and experiencing.” [43:13]
  • Humorous takes on the differences:
    • “Your culture has been so much easier to be a part of…the parents love the children…adults just sit outside and smoke cigs…this is a good culture.” — Eddie [44:38]
    • “Nobody had any expectations for me. They were like, you being here and being cute and funny is enough.” — Natashia [45:51]
    • Asian parental expectations: “I remember one time I was, like, showering when I was 14. [My dad] just, like, pulls the curtain, goes, ‘How big’s the dick?’” — Eddie [46:18]
  • The two laugh and reflect on cultural values, family roles, and humor around raising their son.

Final Thoughts

• The episode wraps with gratitude for audience questions and encouragement to keep sending them in.
• “This is really not just a restaurant. It’s a life, a family, a creative force, and a mission in community.”

Notable Quotes Recap:

• “This is not just a restaurant. In our eyes, this is, like, spiritual.” — Natashia [22:04]
• “How you feel is how you feel. And don’t apologize for it either.” — Natashia [39:22]
• “Do the maximum of embracing of the other parent’s culture because it only benefits your child.” — Eddie [42:26]

This summary captures the energy, honesty, and humor that Eddie and Natashia bring to both their food and their life, demonstrating how deeply intertwined community, culture, and family are in everything they do.