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- [00:01]
Progressive Insurance Announcer
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game? Well, with a name your price tool from Progressive, you can find options that fit your budget and potentially lower your bills. Try it@progressive.com, progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Not available in all states.
- [00:23]
Oregon Charter Academy Announcer
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- [01:22]
Michael Malice
Good afternoon. Michael Malice here. Let that be your welcome for the next hour. I don't even know what we're going to be talking about today with my next guest, but I know we're going to have a lot of laughs and a lot of fun, probably entirely at his expense. Joining us today is Chef Andrew Gruel. Andrew, you were a restaurateur and still are for many years. One of the ways you got famous was starting a crowdfunding for people who got lost their jobs because in the restaurant industry, because of the COVID 19 nonsense, people have seen you as a judge and a bunch of Food Network shows. Food Network is currently about to go the way of the dodo because they're trying to sell it along with CNN and other things and no one's buying. And now people have seen you on all sorts of shows doing commentary. I met you on Gutfeld, where we a couple of times were on together, had a lot of fun. I'm just, I don't even know where to start. Like, how did you make that transition from, you know, talking about food to talking about politics and culture?
- [02:20]
Chef Andrew Gruel
I've always been into politics. I was a junkie growing up in Jersey, political junkie, but never thought that it would be anything I'd get involved in. I was, I went to a small liberal arts college up in Maine.
- [02:33]
Michael Malice
Which one?
- [02:33]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Bates. Yeah.
- [02:36]
Michael Malice
Yep.
- [02:36]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Most people don't know. So I don't even say the name of the school because it's got like seven students. And I was basically trained to just protest capitalism up there. So that, that actually pushed me. I only did two years there, ended up in the restaurant industry, but was always involved kind of like politically hardcore libertarian. And when the pandemic hit, I'd been doing all the like Food Network stuff, running businesses. And I Tried to keep my mouth somewhat shut, but it was time. I didn't care anymore. And then when I just thrust myself out there, everyone was like, oh, my God, you're not a crazy, hardcore liberal.
- [03:09]
Michael Malice
This is.
- [03:09]
Chef Andrew Gruel
This is wild. And then, you know, I proceeded to get canceled.
- [03:13]
Michael Malice
Okay, Now I'm. I'm. Every time this comes up, I get triggered because there were so many spots that I loved, and they were destroyed from COVID for no reason. And I'm going to talk about them now. And you could appreciate this, too. When someone opens a restaurant, it means it's. Maybe it's different when you're Gordon Ramsay, but for most people, it's their heart and soul. This is their baby. They're putting everything into. This is their passion. They're trying to make something special. This is their art in this. I don't even think I'm exaggerating. For many people, like, this is how they create something magical. And there's my travel hack. And I've said this before, if you go to any city, go to the weird ice cream store, because that weird ice cream store is probably going to be in the cool neighborhood. So that's a quick way to figure out where you should be hanging out. And I do this in every city, and the best one happened to be New York. It's called Ice and Vice, and it's gone. And a fan sent me a drawing of it. It hangs in my bathroom. It's gone. Zenkichi, which was my favorite restaurant of all time. It's a hidden door in Williamsburg. Children not allowed. Every table looked like an Oriental express train car. And they pull down a little curtain for privacy. It's gone. So it so many places. And the thing is, you remember 2008, all the corporations got bailed out by, you know, both parties, but all these mom and pop and young artisan establishments were destroyed. And it's like, too bad. And for no effing reason.
- [04:43]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Not only were they destroyed, we were vilified.
- [04:47]
Michael Malice
Oh, that's right.
- [04:47]
Chef Andrew Gruel
We were the grand. We were. If you were a restaurateur, you were an enemy, and you were an enemy of the state, and you were enemy of the people. So what if you even brought up. I remember where it started for me. It's funny, right? People knew. People knew my politics, and they kind of knew that I was very much about liberty and, like, very into it within the industry. And there were a lot of people of the similar mindset, especially in food and restaurants, like Anthony Bourdain kind of set a new way for just free thinkers in the restaurant industry. So it was, it was like the punk rockers who then opened restaurants. And then we're in this like weird anarchist, libertarian space. And all of those people supported me and agreed with the same thing, but they were so afraid to say anything. And I'm like, screw this. And I remember posting one thing, all I said is, why is it that we're being vilified as restaurants? And I just got crushed. Like, you don't care about anybody's health. I'm never going to your restaurant. You're the worst business owner in the world. And then all these other restaurateurs were writing me and they're like, it's wild that we're the enemy right now. And. And I said, okay, well you should say something. And they're like, no, we're not going to say anything. Like, heck no, we can't. Nobody would say anything. Nobody would talk. And we just took it. They did. I didn't. I just, you know, I fought back. And now what you're left with is a landscape that's Chili's and Applebee's. And people say, well, there's not a Chili's in my town. Yes, there is, because they're serving you the exact same food that they're serving at Chili's because they're using Cisco and it's own. There's one purveyor now across the entire food space. And we've lost all of the independent ice cream shops as you define them, you know, metaphorically. And it's all the same thing over
- [06:20]
Michael Malice
and over again, you know, and if you care about marginalized people in the working poor, which I certainly do, then you should be worried about restaurants, because who works at a restaurant, it's not going to be necessarily someone who's got this Harvard degree. It's going to be people who work, have the weird hours. It's going to be a mom or dad trying to make ends meet. It may be someone who's not particularly educated on paper, but who's still a hard worker. It is the perfect. It could be. I'm sure there's a lot of ex cons also who work in kitchens and so on and so forth because this is their way to transition to being able to pay rent because other people won't hire them. And I know you have to have a little screw loose to work in a restaurant. Like, we could talk about that in a second. This is kind of a very known thing. So if you care about the working poor, like People who are really have it hard and are trying to make ends meet. That's the first industry, maybe not the first, but it's certainly one of the top five that you should be concerned about.
- [07:09]
Chef Andrew Gruel
We're all in this together. Just go home, stay home, okay? You don't need to work for three or four weeks. Oh, really? Well, where's the money coming from? Well, don't worry about that. It's for the good of society. Well, how am I going to be able to pay my bills? And I'm speaking on behalf of all the restaurant workers. Well, you know, you can wear a mask and you can go to work, but at the end of the day, the restaurant tours, they're the assholes. And then suddenly it was, oh, those big bad restaurant owners who are stealing money from you and stealing your wages. The only reason that we ended up starting a fund called 86 Restaurant Struggle was because when, when Newsom shut down outdoor dining In December of 2020, he didn't even think about the fact that they had misappropriated $50 billion in unemployment funds and was waiting for Biden to take office in January so that he could get the coffers refreshed. But in that two month period, anybody who got fired had no unemployment funds. And they had nothing. They had nothing. They couldn't pay their bills, they couldn't buy Christmas gifts, they couldn't do anything. So we started this fund, which is how we ended up raising so much money to help struggling and out of work restaurant workers. But with. But I was the bad guy, right? I was the asshole.
- [08:17]
Michael Malice
There's a superb book by my buddy Tom woods called Diaries, like, of a Psychosis. Because when people go through a trauma, and I think Covid was very clearly national, international trauma, you tend to forget it. You don't want to think about it, you want to move on. Until you said this, I had forgotten that they shut down outdoor dining. It made. I made absolutely no sense on any level. They don't care. That's the thing, people. There's this idea, I think it's fading, I think it's almost dead. But maybe when you and I were kids, there was this idea that a lot of, like leftists have their hearts in the right place. And it's like, if that were true, there would have been a lot more hand wringing about, like, okay, crap, we gotta close outdoor dining. How are we gonna transition these workers? You know, let's have them stuff envelopes, like, let's literally give them something to do so that they're not screwed. And that wasn't even a concern at all. It was just like, we're going to do this. Screw you. And it made no sense even at the time.
- [09:18]
Chef Andrew Gruel
And furthermore, all. Especially here in Orange County, California, where you have, like, a lot of incredibly wealthy, elite leftist liberals who were going against our campaign, where we were trying to raise funds for restaurant workers because we kept. We kept the dining open in some of our areas where it was really close indoors. We kind of asked the public, we're like, what do you want? And they were like, no, as long as you have a ton of outdoor dining, we're still going to come there. I'm going to support you. Right. So there was campaigns against what we were doing. Don't donate to his campaign because he's still keeping outdoor dining open. And these people could have struck a million dollar check to help hundreds of thousands of restaurant workers in Orange County. But at that time, it was, no, no, no, don't worry. The government's going to step in and help you out. Quit the big bad entrepreneur, get rid of him. Break your relationship with the abuser, the entrepreneur, and come to our nonprofit, come to our government fortress, and we will give you the money that you need. When? Right now? No, in three or four months. Well, how are we going to be able to live until then? You figure that out on your own?
- [10:27]
Michael Malice
Yeah. Yeah. Oh, my God. So is that kind of. Were you nervous about becoming kind of a public figure in this context?
- [10:36]
Chef Andrew Gruel
No, not at all. Not at all. I mean, actually. And I remember too, like, we. I don't. I'd already been a public figure in, like, the business and food media space, and people just didn't. And people were liking me a lot less because I'm white. So, you know, just naturally I was getting a lot of the pushback there. I'm kidding. I'm serious. So I remember when I started speaking out and then we start getting death threats and like the emails and people drove through rocks through the windows of our restaurants. Oh. Oh, yeah. It was absolutely wild because I went on Tucker Carlson at one point right as I was speaking out, and I talked about how, because they were. They were paying people unemployment for so much for so long in California was preventing people from going back into the workforce. And that triggered this commie socialist group to come after me hardcore, right? Because they believed that I was saying that I was shitting on the workers by saying they weren't working because they were making so much money, but it was 100% fact. They weren't People were not working because I had all the workers coming to me and saying, hey, I'll do a little bit of work on the side, but you got to pay me under the table because I'm making so much cash on unemployment. And the. And then they were making money all over through the, the, the stimulus programs, etc. So when that factor, that kind of commie factor came after me, they're very aggressive, right? So it was like a lot of death threats, kill the, Kill the business owner type of stuff. And I remember going to my wife and we had just had our fourth baby, and I'm like, should I, should I shut up? Like, you want me to scale it back a little bit? Because, you know, we're a family operation. She's like, heck, no, double down. She's like, we're out there. Double down. Let's.
- [12:11]
Michael Malice
You know, until you said that, I forgot that they did take care of the workers. I was using that term very loosely. They gave them unemployment, and they were trying to get it on perpetuity. This was their try. This was their attempt to have a UBI back door. It was very clearly in the air that they were like, can we pull this bait and switch to get people on unemployment and keep them on it permanently and have this idea of it's not safe to go back to work. It's not safe to go back to work. And I don't even know how that got stopped.
- [12:45]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Well, it got stopped because there were enough people that were out there talking about the reality, the economic reality, people like myself and taking punches for it. But a lot of business owners were afraid to speak up. So I'm not going to call out names because I'm, I'm not an a hole. But the yes, you are. I had a lot of big celebrity chefs and business owners reaching out to me through the pandemic, saying, thank you for what you're saying. You need to say this. Push this point. And I'm like, why won't you do it? They're like, we can't. We don't have, like, we'll be honest. We don't have the balls to do it. And there was a lot of people that saw what was happening, but nobody wanted to speak out about it. So there was a handful of us that did. But I would remember at the same time that I went on Tucker and I was kind of talking about the government's move to try and create UBI, as you just said, about two weeks later, I went on Fox 11 show with Alex Michaelson. With a big pro UBI personality, actually really nice guy. And we had this big public debate about UBI and he came out and basically said, yes, this is like, this is what we want now. I'm talking about universal basic income and all these other elements of ubiquitous. And we had this like on air debate. And it was congenial, it was very friendly, but that is what they were pushing and they were trying to push into that soft spot.
- [13:59]
Michael Malice
Side note, is that Alex Guernas Shelley lady a total bitch.
- [14:03]
Chef Andrew Gruel
I've never met her. I've never met her.
- [14:05]
Michael Malice
You didn't answer my question.
- [14:08]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, I know I didn't. You're right. But I've never met her, so I can't say she. I think she just. She got dropped, didn't she?
- [14:15]
Michael Malice
It says, I just googled her right now it's season five. Her show is airing in November, so who the hell knows? Can you. So let's just speak about. So let's talk about Food Network. Are you allowed to talk about Food Network behind the curtain?
- [14:31]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, I'm not, I'm not in contract with them.
- [14:33]
Michael Malice
Okay. Just want to know. So that, that I. That that network is hurting really badly after Top Chef became kind of this big hit, which I think was a big surprise because it's hard to watch people talk about food when you're not eating it. You know what I mean? Like, there's only so much information you can garner from watching food. I watched it for several seasons. I enjoyed it. I watched Hell's Kitchen. I enjoyed it. So there's this show called. And like competitive cooking became a kind of thing. And there's this show called Alex Versus America where it's her versus three, like chefs. They're not like random contestants. These are people like running restaurants, like big kind of credentials. And she wins every time. And it. And there's a lot of chatter online where it's just like, come on. This, this is like statistically it's not possible. She's not like two standard deviations above like people who run decade long restaurants. Can you maybe. I know you can't speak to that show particularly, but can you speak to it in general?
- [15:36]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Well, I will say this. Yeah, in general that they, their production definitely tells you who should be winning or should make it to various. I was on a show called Food Truck Face off and I can tell you right now, like, there's definitely influence by production as to how it should end up. And the things that influence, especially for tv, who it should be, is that especially at the Time for me, it's. It's personality traits, right? What they want to use to get good ratings. So I don't know the relationship that they have with her, that's like, hey, I have to win every single episode. But I wouldn't. Food TV is bs. All of its bs, like, it's, It's. It's all fake. Unless you're doing this YouTube, gonzo style filming where it's really live. And it's coming from, like, glasses, cameras, because they got. Think about it. You've got a cut, you've got. You don't have a camera covering every single angle. So it's start, stop. And that's not how it really works in the restaurant industry. And the food makeover shows, those are 100% like, yes, they do go in there and they do piss people off and say, this is ugly. You need to fix it.
- [16:42]
Michael Malice
Oh, you mean like kitchen. You mean like Kitchen Nightmares? Like that kind of show?
- [16:45]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, yeah, okay. All that. Yeah, I hosted one of those. I hosted one on FYI when. FYI got. When. When A and E got bought out, like, Biography Channel. And then they tried to relaunch FYI Network as, like, a lifestyle media show. And we did 13 episodes of a food makeover show. And like, yeah, we made over the restaurants, but, you know, under budget. And then the minute the camera crews left, they just flipped it back to what it used to be.
- [17:10]
Michael Malice
Hold on, hold on. Let's talk about this. So Kitchen Nightmares is the one I'm familiar with, which I'm sure most people are familiar with. It's the show where there's a restaurant that's going under. Gordon Ramsay comes in, he redoes it, and, like, gives them kind of a relaunch. And sometimes it sticks, sometimes it doesn't. But I was on the impression. Now, I don't know if you could speak to that show personally, but I was on the impression that those re. That recalibration actually happened. You're saying they just. It was just. They hit restart.
- [17:39]
Chef Andrew Gruel
If the. If it's a recalibration of, like, the menu and the operations, in many cases. Right. That's consulting. So you take it or leave it. Like, you're gonna make the changes for the purposes of the final episode. But most likely when they leave, like, because there's so many scenarios, especially with, like, Robert Irvin shows, where they go back to the restaurants, like, and they're just back to what they used to be, you know, and they're like, how you didn't listen to us. This is absurd. And look, there's a guy doing cocaine off the back of an. An eggplant in the corner. And the. What's that?
- [18:11]
Michael Malice
Eggplant.
- [18:12]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, exactly. So. So. But on, in many cases, when they do the physical makeovers, like, you know. Yeah. They rip a lot of that stuff down like two days later. Wow.
- [18:25]
Michael Malice
Okay. Huh.
- [18:27]
Progressive Insurance Announcer
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game? Well, with the name your price tool from Progressive, you can find options that fit your budget and potentially lower your bills. Try it@progressive.com, progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Price and coverage match, limited by state law. Not available in all states. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game? Well, with a name your price tool from Progressive, you can find options that fit your budget and potentially lower your bills. Try it@progressive.com, progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Not available in all states.
- [19:09]
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- [19:35]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Grocery outlet bargain market.
- [19:39]
Michael Malice
Let's get back to the show. I'm reading a book by my friend Steven Fishbach. He's been on Survivor twice. He's coming on the show in a few weeks. I think there's. It's kind of interesting because there's more and more awareness of how contrived reality TV is. And I think that spills into politics because people are realizing more and more how much government is like wwe, how they fight in real life. And then they. When I tell people that Hillary Clinton has more in common with George W. Bush or Donald Trump than she does with a janitor who's voted Democrat all his life, no one pushes back on that. It's kind of an obvious thing. It's obvious that 100 senators, you know, even though they can be screaming at each other in public, they're. They're perfectly fine behind the scenes. How could they not be?
- [20:27]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Well, I remember we had, we had Matt Gates over to do one of our episodes and we. Where we were cooking with him.
- [20:35]
Michael Malice
Did you serve him veal?
- [20:36]
Chef Andrew Gruel
He's a pretty good Chef. No, we actually, it was lamb and same thing. We. I asked him that exact question. He was like, yeah, he's like, I've had dinner with Ilhan Omar and her husband. Like, we. Or her brother, whatever it is. Yeah. These people. And he wasn't saying it as, like, I think he's actually a pretty honest guy. Like, he wasn't portending, but he said, yes, behind the scenes, like, you have to get along. Everyone gets along. It's, it's. You're certainly masquerading in this political theater for the, for the masses, but that's not the way that it really is. And that applies to reality television. Yes, the exact same thing. We start, stop, cut, start, stop. When we would shoot, when I did the food truck show, we shot all the studio stuff in Canada in the wintertime, and then we shot the street stuff in, in, like, the cities, like Austin or. Where. Los Angeles, wherever we were. And then we, like, tied it back together in post. And you have to, like, wear the same outfit and pretend like it's all congruent. It was eight months difference in time. And, like, you're supposed to carry the same emotion from the street back into the studio as if we just walked into the studio. Well, the studio's in Toronto, and we're. And that's eight months later.
- [21:45]
Michael Malice
I, I, I, I, my, I watched. I, I used to love Canada, and I've watched, I think it was three seasons of Top Chef Canada, which took place in Toronto. Is Toronto. I love Toronto. I used to love Toronto. Is Toronto as great of a food city as everyone says, in your professional opinion?
- [22:02]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Not for fine dining food. Right? Really? For Chinese food. The Chinese food there is phenomenal.
- [22:09]
Michael Malice
Like, fine dining. I'm not, I'm not doubting. I'm just saying. But fine dining, it's, it doesn't deserve reputation.
- [22:15]
Chef Andrew Gruel
No, no. Canadians aren't good at fine dining, honestly, because, like, they think they just. Their meat quality isn't, Isn't great. You know, they, they improperly handle seafood. Like, tell me a famous Canadian chef
- [22:30]
Michael Malice
from Canada, Timothy Horton from Hortons. Yeah. What is that his name?
- [22:37]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Tim Horton, the guy who runs Hortons, the diner?
- [22:40]
Michael Malice
Yeah. What's it called? What's their, what's their Dunkin Donuts called?
- [22:43]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Hortons.
- [22:44]
Michael Malice
Yeah.
- [22:45]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Like, so, so you, like, if you had to go have the greatest meal of your entire life, where, like, where would you go? I'm not talking, like, hole in the wall places that are also great, but just uber, uber fine dining.
- [22:57]
Michael Malice
Don't I want to go to that place in Italy, the one below that, that Daniel Ballou makes.
- [23:02]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Well, it maybe, but like United States. Right? Like, you could name a bunch.
- [23:07]
Michael Malice
Isn't it that place in Chicago where it's molecular gastronomy, what's it called?
- [23:11]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Alenia?
- [23:12]
Michael Malice
Yeah, that's the one. Right? That's the one I want to go to, potentially.
- [23:15]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah. No, it's those. That type of avant garde food doesn't impress me.
- [23:21]
Michael Malice
Okay, okay. Time to have a nerd off. Okay, so for me, who, like, who's a hipster and cerebral and it's everything high concept when you're making like caviar out of peas or you're making like lollipops with pop rock, like, like lamb chops with pop rocks and like, I don't know, like your smokes and all this stuff, that Willy Wonka stuff, that, that's the stuff I love. Wiley Dufresne, I think is like, considered to be the king of that or at least the progenitor of that. Yeah, yeah. Which I think is closed now. Or was. Was going to be closed. I've never eaten out. Everyone said it's completely overpriced and not worth it. You think it's. That's also like, in a literal sense, smoke and mirrors and bs.
- [24:00]
Chef Andrew Gruel
No, I don't think it's smoke and mirrors. Pun intended. I just don't. I wouldn't pay the amount of money for it that people do. Like, I think in a, in a, in a study of food, like one or two of those dishes on an 18 course menu is great, but like, really with the things that impress me both intellectually and cerebrally is mastering the fundamentals in a different way. Right. So, like, if you're. I want to know, I want you. Maybe you sear a piece of fish and perfect the skin on the fish by using a certain type of sugar or flour or time and temperature control. But you're still getting the end result that's the same. It's just done in a different manner and you've taken it another notch up. It's 10 plus. But like, I don't need you to replace that skin on the fish with transparent potatoes that have been deep fried in duck vagina and have been replaced onto the fish to make it look like it's fish skin. Like, I want the basics done perfect and above and beyond, even using molecular gastronomy or science, just general food science. But I don't need you to redefine food in a playful manner. That's like food museum type stuff.
- [25:05]
Michael Malice
Yeah. That's what makes it worth the cost, because you pay money to go to museum because you're getting a show. I remember this must have been 2006. One of. One of my friends from the Midwest says to me, why do you like things that look like other things? And I don't know that I have an answer, but I think that is. I. This. Oh, God, this is so interesting. You don't think when you're eating something like that, like, holy crap, this is really cool. I do think that it's a cloaca, not a vagina.
- [25:36]
Chef Andrew Gruel
I do think that. I do think that it's. I do razor clams. I do think that it's cool. But I. Maybe. And. And once again, I'm. I'm making this decision within a world in which this is now 15 to 20 years old. So I will say that I have some culinary bias there, but I think that I'm more impressed by the person that uses the fundamentals with absolute precision and perfection within a second. Right. Like a split second can change the. So there's a. There's the. Like the acf, the American Culinary Federation, creates master chefs. They have, like, certified sous chef, executive chef, cecs, and then master chefs.
- [26:15]
Michael Malice
Right.
- [26:15]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Now, Master chef has been used colloquially, like, as just a great chef, but. But master chef by a certification, there's only a handful of them in the world. And the test that you have to go through to become a master chef is so scientific. And. And it. You have to go through all the culinary fundamentals people have trained. There's books written about it. Michael. Michael Woolman wrote the Soul of a Chef, and it's all about somebody studying to become a master chef. And it's like years of training, and then you cut it. You. You. You cut the terrine off by, like, a millimeter of a centimeter. And, like, you don't pass the test, right? Like, that artistic precision, to me is more impressive than using, like, agar agar to make fake caviar. Now, it's funny you said Wiley du Friend, like, he. He was the grandfather. He created this. So did Marcel, actually. Vignon from one of the original top chefs, who's a great, great guy.
- [27:05]
Michael Malice
So I used to own his domain name.
- [27:08]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Marcel.
- [27:08]
Michael Malice
Yes, I gave it to him. Yes. No, Marcel von dot com.
- [27:14]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Oh, really?
- [27:14]
Michael Malice
I bought it. Yeah. I was so impressed with him on that show.
- [27:17]
Chef Andrew Gruel
He. So he's. He. And you remember that season, too, of
- [27:20]
Michael Malice
course, he was robbed by that. What was that jerk snake with the glasses, whatever his name was, he and
- [27:26]
Chef Andrew Gruel
he's since he opened a restaurant in Gramercy right after he won.
- [27:33]
Michael Malice
Marcel. No, the other guy did.
- [27:34]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, I know. No, no, no, that's what I'm talking about. I'm drawing a blank on his name with the glasses. But he's since closed. Like no one's ever heard anything from him.
- [27:44]
Michael Malice
He could, what do you call himself? He had a name for himself. God damn. It was really, really funny. Second. It was the second season. It was, he lost to who's the Winner?
- [27:58]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Elon won Elon hall one. And then didn't Harold get third?
- [28:01]
Michael Malice
I think third was. There was a tie for Salmon Ilia. No.
- [28:07]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Oh, Harold must have won the next season.
- [28:09]
Michael Malice
Yeah, the next season was Miami and it was won by Hung. Hung Hun.
- [28:16]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, yeah, he's, he was actually a pretty good chef. So I actually, I think Marcel's a great chef. He's opened some pop ups here in la.
- [28:24]
Michael Malice
Do you know him?
- [28:25]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, yeah. And I haven't spoken to him in probably five plus years. But I, I, we did stuff, gosh, before the pandemic.
- [28:34]
Michael Malice
Oh, I have to meet him. He's, he's on my short list of reality contestants that I'd want to meet.
- [28:40]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Well, he, is he on the spectrum?
- [28:43]
Michael Malice
He's got to be on the spectrum. No, no, I think anyone involved in like Wiley has to be, there's no question.
- [28:52]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Perhaps. But I think that Marcel just was very studious. Like he saw what was up and coming, he studied it, he mastered it and he jumped on the trend. Like, and he was very good at it. Like he's a phenomenal chef, like by the fundamentals. Right. And that's my judgment. That's how I judge food. Now, others might judge it elsewhere, but I'm not going to drop, going back to your original question, I'm not going to drop $400 on one of those meals right now. And that's why Linea has lost a Michelin star, I think is because now that it's kind of become overdone, it's a little trite. So somebody who can, for example, who can take food science now, but introduce, and which is what we try and do is like utilizing these principles of food science, but just bringing it back to like the basics in food, then I think that's like the perfect, that's where the water kind of settles into where, where now you're getting the best of both worlds. But Canadians, which is what started this, I don't see Canadians as like great chefs. Like, I don't think they Produce a ton of great chefs. And I'm sure that people are going to watch your show, which millions of people do, and they're going to hate me and Canada is going to come after me. But I, I just, I just don't see it now Toronto being a food mecca for international food. Right. Because there's a huge Indian community there.
- [30:05]
Michael Malice
It's very diverse, extremely diverse.
- [30:08]
Chef Andrew Gruel
So you have like, just like San Gabriel Valley here in Los Angeles. Toronto's Chinese food is unbelievable. So, like if I go to Toronto, I'm going to go eat Chinese food there. I'm not going to go have an overcooked burger because it's illegal in Canada to eat a mid rare burger at a, at an American bistro style.
- [30:23]
Michael Malice
Is that true?
- [30:24]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah. You can't cook your meat below, below like 150, 105 degrees.
- [30:29]
Michael Malice
You, you have to get medium or up.
- [30:31]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, I think it's medium well, actually.
- [30:34]
Michael Malice
No.
- [30:34]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah.
- [30:36]
Michael Malice
Holy. Wait, hold on a second. I enjoy my steak tartare and I have a friend who's a doctor and she said if you eat raw beef, the chances of you getting sick are almost impossible. Raw pork, you're in real trouble. Right?
- [30:51]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah.
- [30:51]
Michael Malice
But this from a medical perspective, so. And especially if you're dealing with restaurants, which is anything above, you know, Del Taco, and I'm just using as a bad example, but Jack in the box, let's say, who had that issue, the meat is not going to be this disgusting, you know, disease ridden thing. You're going to be able to certainly serve it rare, let alone medium, medium well.
- [31:14]
Chef Andrew Gruel
So the. Okay, so tartar is, is, is a muscle, a whole muscle cut, either top round or fillet that they dice. Right. So you can eat any whole muscle cut, just eat it completely raw. You're never going to have an issue. The problem with the ground beef, Right. So I'm saying this specific to burgers, okay. Ground beef because of the surface area, if there's any E. Coli, if somebody didn't wash their hands.
- [31:34]
Michael Malice
Oh, I like what you're saying.
- [31:35]
Chef Andrew Gruel
In the grinding process by virtue of that surface area, that bacteria or the E. Coli will spread across the expanse of the meat. So that's why ground beef specifically is the issue.
- [31:47]
Michael Malice
Yeah. But I also know, and please correct me if I'm wrong, maybe my understanding is E. Coli is not as bad as people say it is. You get it. You're going to maybe have diarrhea or throwing up, but it's not life threatening. It's not this kind of thing where like we need to shut down society. It sounds like something else, right? Where, like, if you get it, unless you're like elderly or you know, you know, have other issues, you're going to be fine. It's just going to suck.
- [32:10]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, it's like salmonella or any of the other kind of foodborne illnesses out there. Giardia or what have you. Giardia is actually more from bad river water, but you can still get it that way. Hepatitis. The. You will. If you're immunocompromised, elderly or the young, you can die. But then if you do right, that becomes a huge national headline. If you, if you recall Jack in the box in the 80s or 90s, right. But they had meat that was infected with E. Coli and a bunch of old people died. And then people stopped. So sales at fast food restaurants of ground beef across the country dropped. Millions of people stopped eating ground beef. So that's why these things revertebrate through, through culture and the news.
- [32:51]
Oregon Charter Academy Announcer
Support is available 247 with Verbo Care.
- [32:55]
Chef Andrew Gruel
We're here day or night, ready whenever you need help.
- [32:59]
Michael Malice
Because a great trip starts with the right support. Let's get back to it. So is it the case that. Okay, so my. This is how my hipster brain works. In my book, the New Right, I talk about how innovation occurs at the margins. And like the weirdos and the hipsters find it first. And the first. First to market people. And then you have the cool people who are like kind of the evangelists pick it up and then the corporations find it, they swallow it, and they excrete in a manner where the masses can understand it and consume it. So I was like, there was a moment, this would have been over 20 years ago where my. I don't drink anymore at all. But my cocktail of choice was the aviation. Because getting creme de violette, which was the main ingredient of aviation, was completely impossible. And then it became a thing where all the Wall street douchebags were getting in aviation. And then there were articles like, please stop ordering an aviation. You think you're cool. This would have been cool 15 years ago. So that's when I knew the aviation was over. My point being is this molecular gastronomy stuff now looked on as passe, like au cuisine in the 80s.
- [34:13]
Chef Andrew Gruel
So you just nailed it. Perfect. You said it better than I ever could have said it. So now Applebee's is going to start doing foams is really what it comes down to.
- [34:20]
Michael Malice
Right.
- [34:22]
Chef Andrew Gruel
And, and by the way, so as. As someone who lived in as. As a, A Music and philosophy major from Bates, who then went and hitchhiked around the country, ended up back in Williamsburg. And then when I first moved to California, lived in Silver Lake for three years. Oh, wow. And very vested in the narrative that you just threw out there. My drink, just so you know, you're gonna laugh about this. My drink was Campari and soda.
- [34:44]
Michael Malice
Okay.
- [34:45]
Chef Andrew Gruel
You could find Campari in a lot of bars 20 years ago.
- [34:50]
Michael Malice
Yeah. But now it's ubiquitous.
- [34:51]
Chef Andrew Gruel
The. Like, Applebee's is. I'm going to use the same analogy. Or we'll call it, you know, retto or whatever other Newport beach restaurant is doing. You know, once they started doing Negroni week, right, it was all over. Right. Like Negronis. Nobody knew what a Negroni was. And now everyone and, you know, Campari selling next to prime at the. You know, at the local 7 11.
- [35:14]
Michael Malice
Yeah, it's. You know, it's actually something else that's kind of funny is I. I want to hear your opinion. I. I strongly feel that I would rather eat at McDonald's or Taco Bell than Applebee's because it's cheaper and more. Has more integrity than what Applebee's is trying to do, because you're paying for more money and getting worse quality.
- [35:32]
Chef Andrew Gruel
And once again, I don't really drink much now myself, but I used to go there for the Brutus, you know, which was the. Which was the original place. And especially in Maine, like, the only place you could go to drink with a fake ID was Applebee's. So I was into Applebee's from, like, 1997 to 1999. But I couldn't agree with you more. That's. That's a great point because you're actually. You're right. I'll tell you. Literally, you're getting the same exact food at Applebee's that you're going to get at McDonald's. And by that, I don't necessarily mean the same fries, but like, of the same quality from a similar distributor. Right. But you're just paying more for it because it's owned by private equity and it's being served on, you know, a quasi nicer plate. And one might listen to what I'm saying right now and say, what do you mean? Oh, Applebee's own by private Equity. What about McDonald's? They're corporate people like to shit on McDonald's. Most McDonald's are owned by one unit, mom and pops.
- [36:28]
Michael Malice
Yes.
- [36:28]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Right. Dentists, doctors, schoolteachers who want to be their own boss and want to be an entrepreneur. But have zero creative skill, ability, or juices. And they're like, well, we can do all the fun things of being an entrepreneur, but we'll follow the McDonald's way. And there's a little bit of brand equity. So they buy McDonald's, they're given an operations manual. And that's why some McDonald's are so much better than other McDonald's. Because when you have a McDonald's being run by a mom and pop who works at the store day in and day out, you're gonna get a really good experience at that McDonald's better than you will from an airport McDonald's.
- [37:04]
Michael Malice
It's funny how the principles apply regardless of the scene. Because I'm a denim collector, I've got a bunch of cool denim and people like, oh, blah, blah. You like take a dump on Levi's? No, I have several Levi's. Levi's is trying to do what it does and it does it correctly. In the same way where Anthony Bourdain goes to Thailand and he's eating off a food truck and is jizzing himself. That's sincere. Because the food truck or the food stand rather is trying to do what it's trying to do street food. It's not trying to be fine dining. And if the fine dining was trying to do street food, it would fail. If it's just doing straight up street food and the street food is trying to fine dining, it's still. You hold it to its own standard. So when people think fine dining, I did a book called Concierge Confidential I co authored. And his point was, yeah, I can point you to the expensive restaurant. That's where you have money. But I could point you to the good one, which is maybe 75% the price. That's when you have taste and knowledge. So that's same thing with jeans. You could. I don't have these $500 pair of jeans that you could buy at Barney's if I'm a celebrity. But I do have the $200 pairs, which is not cheap. But it's hardly, I'm going to go broke. I have one 200 pair dollar pair of jeans. Same thing with dining. People think, oh, you have to break the bank. No, that's the scam. That's when you're just demonstrating. I have enough money to eat here, but the foodies are not going to be impressed.
- [38:24]
Chef Andrew Gruel
So people always ask me, what's your favorite restaurant? Or if I have to go to one restaurant, where should I go? And I tell everybody the same thing. Whether you're in the city that I know and I can give you specific recommendations or a random city, always spend your money going out to eat for breakfast. Oh, because breakfast has not been taken over by the corporate chams the same way lunch and dinner has. Most breakfast joints are still single unit mom and pops because the margins are better in breakfast. You only need to be open until 3pm Most spaces in which breakfast does well from a real estate perspective are still owned. The centers are owned independently or at least through, you know, some sort of a family trust. So it hasn't been pushed out of this new economy. Breakfast is the way to go. You're going to always get a much better, freshly cooked meal done the way that it should be done, which is within that box of breakfast, New Jersey style diner than you are at dinner. Like you're going to have a much higher likelihood. Now, don't get me wrong, somebody could come and give me an anecdotal example of why went here and the eggs were horrible. It's like, yes, but just by and large, if I had to throw money at going out to eat, it'd be breakfast.
- [39:31]
Michael Malice
That's, that's, that's really kind of. Because it's also, how do you like, if I'm in a town and I want to have a dinner and I travel a fair amount, how, how do I go about it? Besides messaging you, I use.
- [39:45]
Chef Andrew Gruel
I mean, I hate to say this because I hate the platform, but like, I'll go on Yelp. I won't read the reviews. I'll go on Yelp and I'll look for the three star review.
- [39:52]
Michael Malice
Three star. Why is that?
- [39:54]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Because it's good enough that it kit that it's not averaging one or two stars. But it's, it's bad enough that it's pissing off the Yelp elites, which is what I want because it means that they're not trying to ebb and flow and mold and move towards what the Yelp elites want. Right? So. And in many cases you can see where the restaurant owners have responded and basically said go F off the one or two star reviews. And I'm like, I want to go there. I posted on my social the other day, there was a review where some Chinese food restaurant responded to an elite Yelper and just like lace into her like horrible spelling errors. Like his accent was coming through in the words, you know, he was like hero H E R O like. And the, the. I read the review and I read it to my wife. We were driving and she goes, I want to eat there. And I was like, I know. That's exactly what I was thinking. I want to go eat there.
- [40:49]
Michael Malice
I'm going to tell you a hilarious story that's in Concierge Confidential, which you will really. You will enjoy giving your career. So the guy's a concierge at the Intercontinental Hotel. It was kind of this fancy hotel, and there was this very wealthy lady who later turned out older woman, who later turned out to be literally completely insane. So she calls him up the next in the morning after she checked in, and she goes, I've just finished cleaning up the vomit and bile from the bathroom. And he's like, okay. And she goes, I went to the Hard Rock Cafe, like you had suggested. Okay. And it just cuts to a sidebar of places I would recommend before I recommend the Hard Rock Cafe. And it was all the places I like to eat. So it was like Taco Bell. We missed the bacon cheeseburger burrito, blah, blah, blah. And I included, number one Chinese restaurant in Bensonhurst, get the chicken with garlic sauce. Because I used to get that every day. And when it was an immigrant family, of course, when the book came out, I went there and I gave it to her, the book. And I showed her. She's in the book. I have never seen a human being more befuddled at what was happening than that woman at the Chinese restaurant. Seeing that her name of her restaurant is in this book, she just had no, like, just complete blankness. It was hilarious.
- [42:09]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah. Well, it's funny because in this post that went viral where. And of course, it created, like, the Internet drama. Right? Like, I would never eat at that restaurant. How dare you talk to the customers that way? And then the other side's like, no, I would. They kind of took my approach. And then there was the middle of the road approach. But what was you.
- [42:26]
Michael Malice
I'm with you, by the way. I think a lot of times people. We see this all the time in socials. People want to play gotcha games or they want to just assert dominance over someone for that sake of asserting it. Shut up. Calm down.
- [42:38]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Well, and what's funny is the guy writes, oh, can I find this?
- [42:41]
Michael Malice
What's the name of the restaurant?
- [42:43]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Well, it's. No, it's on my. My X account. I'll. It was. I probably posted it like two or three days ago.
- [42:47]
Michael Malice
I'll find it.
- [42:48]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Right. I think this review is not about the chili sauce because it was so deep and emotional. But let me tell you this interesting point inside the review. He Writes, we don't open a restaurant to cater to your tastes. Restaurant to serve what we like. And everyone's like, oh, it's about you, the restaurant owner. It's for you. No, it's for the customers. And I'm, and I was thinking about it. No, he's right. I'm going there because he knows his style of food better than anybody else. Right. And what he likes from his own country, from what he knows about that food, etc. I don't want to bring my kind of Americanized palate to eat, you know, whatever version of his food is with a lacing of MSG and like hot Cheetos. I want to change my palate, I want to diversify my palate. I want to recondition my palate. So I actually agree in principle. He's opening a restaurant for himself, not for you. And I, I was like, had this kind of mind blowing revelation that, oh my God, am I, am I a wiener as a restaurant owner? Because I change things based on what can I tell?
- [43:53]
Michael Malice
Can I read you what Wang Tullum said?
- [43:57]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yes.
- [43:58]
Michael Malice
By the way, you're also, I don't know if you know this, but you're quoting the Fountainhead because the protagonist of Fountainhead, who's an architect, says, I don't build in order to have clients. I have clients in order to build. Meaning it's about the architecture. It's not about the client. This is the response. Okay, so she goes, three stars. That's great. Oh my God, it was three stars.
- [44:21]
Chef Andrew Gruel
That's my point. That's my point. I say three stars.
- [44:25]
Michael Malice
Nobody wasn't even. She wasn't even saying, this place is terrible. And he's losing it. That's what's hilarious. There's a woman named Florence King who used to have the last page in. She's passed away in National Review called the Misanthropes Corner. And I read one of her books and she wrote a letter to reviewer who gave her a good review. And she goes, you don't know how to write reviews. Here's how to do it. And she's like, I'm confident this is the first time someone got yelled at for giving a good review. So what the woman had written on this restaurant. She's oh, local guide. Ooh, fancy. She's got a badge. We ordered the dandan noodles and the dumplings in chili oil. Frankly, it wasn't spicy. And not her cup of tea. I wouldn't say that it's bad food, but also wasn't spicy. Despite Getting extra chili oil and even adding salt. I don't know. The salt will make it spicier. They use premium matcha powder for their latte and that was pretty great. It's a hole in the wall, but it's got some outside seating. This is. I think it's a very balanced. As far as things go, you've seen much worse. This is pretty balanced. It's hardly an attack. It's just like, yeah, I didn't like this, but whatever. Oh, he's, he's three, four paragraphs. I didn't know we had to have a requirement that our chili. He misspelled chili. He wrote chili like a nice and cold. That our chili oil needed to be spicy. Oh, and Vita's coming. Let's cater to her because she's some Google guide. Three exclamation points. Hurry. Make spicy chili oil. Three exclamation points. Sorry. How about we have some respect that restaurants are loud and should only cater the owner's needs, not just the customers. I know he thinks only means, but the owners make the recipes to their tastes and want to share their taste to the people. That's the point. The restaurant owners make food they love and want to share that love to the community. That's how it should be and always be. We didn't wake up and think of, let's cater our dishes to these self entitled people. Open your own damn restaurant. We don't need to make the dishes spicy. We want to make them balanced. And if we make them spicy, we get more reviews. The dishes are way too spicy. Think before you review and realize no business is responsible to cater to Nvidia. How about open your own restaurant and we'll see what your food tastes like. And the reason we sell ceremonial matcha is because we want to have the best matcha when we drink at a restaurant. So we want the customers taste the best. Same with chili oil. So if we sell top quality Matcha restaurant, that should tell you what our standards are. So we will not be listening to you because we don't cater to your tastes.
- [46:40]
Chef Andrew Gruel
So isn't that great though? Yes. He really made a good point there. That. That kind of pulled me off my own track because my wife and I run the restaurants together. And like I'm constantly reading through the Yelp reviews. They go right to my phone. And then her and I sit. We're like driving and we're arguing about it. I'm like, how did this happen? We did this. I got to change this recipe. And she's the one who always smacks me across the face, and it's like, who cares? Just shut up. We're still four and a half stars. Like, leave the recipe the same. But I'm just so stuck in this world of, like, trying to succeed as a restaurateur coming out of COVID And that's my world. And as a chef, like, we're very sensitive to that. Or as, like, an artist, like, you know this, like, probably not as well as I do. I'm. Because you're probably not as much of a pushover as I am. But when I read his review to Evita, it gave me this. I was, like, empowered. I'm like, you know what, guys? Right?
- [47:32]
Michael Malice
I'm gonna push back a little. I think his review was disproportionate because she wasn't being that condemnatory. But the point he makes really well, that she doesn't get is I think spiciness is so subjective. And I have friends who like spicy food, and they want to feel like they're being tortured. And there's someone like me who can't even handle Frank's Red Hot. So you can't win. If you're going to have chili oil. Some people are going to think this is like. Like, like eating cardboard and. Or some people are going to think this is, like, in a volcano. Like, it's really impossible to find that sweet spot. No.
- [48:04]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yes. You're right on the chili piece. And that's actually why I've toned down a lot of the spice in my food. Although I have gotten hit for, like. Because we had these, like, fiery fish wings once, and someone's like, they're not hot at all. One star. But putting that aside, I actually think that this review was much deeper than a response to Evita. And I think that Evita's kind of pablum here, right? Like, her baby food 3 star review makes the point. I was making about 3 stars, right? Because she went in there. So she took two stars off, right? She took two stars off 40% because the chili wasn't spicy enough. Right? Like, that's kind of a big deal. I think that that just broke him. Like, open your own restaurant. And, like, it was just all of this was behind it. And every now and then, restaurateurs snap. Some of us totally snap, and some of us have miniature snaps. And I'm full of a lot of miniature snaps. But
- [49:04]
Michael Malice
let's get back to the show. Here's what I think everyone wants to know. I. This is something that's a big debate Topic in a Seinfeld way. And I'd like to hear it from that side of the kitchen. Yeah. Sending food back. It happens all the time, I'm sure. Is this, is it okay to do? Is it. I almost. I don't think I've ever sent food back. I know there's certain people who always almost. They kind of, I think get a. They get a kick out of it. They want to feel important, like, you know that as soon as they sit down, they're going to send back no matter what it is. What's the. What's the behind the curtains view on this?
- [49:40]
Chef Andrew Gruel
I'll break it down into three categories. So you've got the perpetual send back, right? The person who's going to send it back no matter what because they want either attention, a discount, or both. Right. And those people, when it happens multiple times in the restaurant, we ultimately try and drive them out of the restaurant.
- [49:55]
Michael Malice
Oh, well, how do you do that?
- [49:57]
Chef Andrew Gruel
We don't do that by throwing them out. We actually just try and like, make sure they have an awful experience so they never come back because.
- [50:02]
Michael Malice
No, but. No, no, no. This is. Look who you're talking to. How. This is. My entire goal in life is to make people have awful experiences. What are the techniques that a restaurant can use to passive aggressively or maybe aggressively make sure someone doesn't come back? You got to be walking a tightrope.
- [50:19]
Chef Andrew Gruel
You don't. I mean, I hate to say this because you know someone's gonna be like, never go to this guy's restaurant. But like, you make him wait a little bit extra. The. Let me, let me, let me change this. There's one time in your entire experience in a restaurant where the entire experience can be ruined. And it's sometimes only takes 30 seconds to do so. And I'll. If you go back and read every single one of my. My negative Yelp reviews. And I say this to my team all the time. It's always going to come back to this one thing. Actually, not always, but 95 of the times could come back to one thing. You were not greeted immediately upon entering the restaurant and you didn't know where to go or who to talk to or what to do. And then somebody else came in and you were concerned that they were going to step in front of you and you were there first and you get anxious and in that 30 second time frame, your whole world is falling apart. Did I miss the table? Was I supposed to see the hostess? Are they going to seat me? Is it seat yourself? What should I do. When you are greeted immediately upon walking in to the restaurant, your anxiety level, you sit down, we got a table. I like the table. I didn't have to wait when you start.
- [51:29]
Michael Malice
Hold on. Let. Let me interrupt here, because this. It's amazing. The Venn diagrams between different worlds. I used to work at Goldman Sachs in 25 years ago. I was doing tech support. Right. And if you did, people call if they have a problem. It's like a lightning round. I have to have an answer on the spot. A lot of times I didn't know the answer. And if you got did a good job and they send an email unprompted, you get something called a kudo. And I had more kudos than the rest of my team put together because I realized that person calling me doesn't want an answer. They want their anxiety resolved.
- [51:58]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yes.
- [51:59]
Michael Malice
So if you tell them, hey, give me five minutes, I will get to the bottom of this. Their brain has outsourced it. They don't have to worry. It's in capable hands and it's resolved. Whereas if you're there, like, gee, I don't know. You're just riling them up. Tell them. Because the thing is, if I don't know someone, the team will know or the Internet will know. He doesn't need to know that. I don't know. He needs to know that or to feel that I'm on top of. Which I was. And now he can let out a deep breath, release his squid ink, and it'll be fine. And it's exact, exactly what you're talking about. It's like, even if they said, please give me five minutes, I'll be right with you. You're fine. I've been acknowledged.
- [52:35]
Chef Andrew Gruel
And especially if you put your name down, right? So in restaurants, it's all about. Because human nature is. This is what I hate about travel, right? Getting off airplanes, all those things where you think there's kind of an organ. There's just this understood organization. When people get up on the airplane and go in front of you, oh, my God, when we're deplaning like, that drives me up a wall. Absolutely. Up a wall. And I'll tell you what's funny too. I think it drives everybody up a wall. But we had to get on a plane the other day, and we had a connector. So right when the plane stopped, I like, had the kids. I'm like, I'm gonna race through because I need to go make sure that the plane doesn't take off for our connector. It was like, eight minutes. So as the plane lands, I. And I rarely do this. I literally yell to everyone. I'm like, I'm only getting up because I have a connector. I never do this. Right. But everybody was, like, friendly with me about it at that point. But you know, when somebody just gets up and starts jostling a couple rows, it makes people so mad. Yeah, makes people so mad. And it's the same thing with the restaurants. So when people walk in and they think somebody else is trying to, like. And so two, two, two tops walk in at the same time, they're going to start punching each other out if somebody doesn't say something. So our staff, I read a review and it was like, yeah, I walked into the restaurant and there was nobody there to greet me. But then they finally sat us down. And when we sat down, it took like 45 seconds to get water. And then everything is this little complaint. So afterwards I'm looking at it and I'm thinking, you know, I don't think they were upset about any of those things they put in there. I think it all goes back to the. The waiting in the beginning. So I go back and I look at the cameras. Not only they wait. It's exactly what you said.
- [54:15]
Michael Malice
When I eat at a grill restaurant, I'm under surveillance.
- [54:17]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Oh, you are under full surveillance. Hey, you go to the bathroom, you're under surveillance.
- [54:21]
Michael Malice
I've been stealing all your silverware.
- [54:23]
Chef Andrew Gruel
You people do, by the way. Of course they do. Silverware plates. We had somebody leave the other day with a whole wine holder that was like this big. Like people. Now they'll take everything. They're going to take the fryer pretty soon here.
- [54:38]
Michael Malice
Yeah.
- [54:39]
Chef Andrew Gruel
But I went back and I watched and when the. When the two top came in, two other two tops came in at the same time and. And tried to cut in front of them, but they didn't put that in their review. But the amount of anxiety that created fell on our shoulders.
- [54:54]
Michael Malice
So. Okay, so. But again, what. So your. So what is your mechanism for driving people away? We're talking about three types. People send food back.
- [55:01]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah. So the first person, I want to drive them away and make them stand at the host, to stand immediate like, and. And make them wait and feel.
- [55:08]
Michael Malice
You will tell the hostess. How. How will you she know that this is a problem person coming back?
- [55:14]
Chef Andrew Gruel
If it's a problem person, the whole staff already knows, and that's how I know about it. And I don't like when people mistreat my team members and they do a problem Person to me is somebody who mistreats your team members. So they'll, they'll make you do all this extra work, send the food back hundreds of times, and then they give you no tip. Now, my team also knows if they get a zero tip, I cover 20%.
- [55:34]
Michael Malice
But like, hands down, I'm just save some money.
- [55:38]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah. However that works, however, that also works against you. So if that happens too many times with a team member, then I'm like, you know, you're getting shortchanged on your tips a lot. Maybe you're not performing properly.
- [55:48]
Michael Malice
Right.
- [55:48]
Chef Andrew Gruel
So it kind of cuts both ways.
- [55:50]
Michael Malice
How common is that?
- [55:51]
Chef Andrew Gruel
People not tipping more very common in California because people short pay, not just under tip. They short pay.
- [55:57]
Michael Malice
What do you mean? Sure, pay.
- [55:58]
Chef Andrew Gruel
This is a thing here in California. Ever since Prop 47 passed. And I only noticed it after Prop 47, the mindset was, well, if that guy can get away stealing 47, explain this to people.
- [56:09]
Michael Malice
I'm not following this.
- [56:10]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Prop 47 was the bill that made any theft under $900 a ticket a missing.
- [56:15]
Michael Malice
Okay.
- [56:15]
Chef Andrew Gruel
It. It's not a crime anymore. They decriminalized theft. And then what that did was that essentially in a. On a periphery basis decriminalized a lot of things. And it kind of brought down the standards of like our, Our. Our moral behavior, of course, a lot of time. So then we started getting short paid all the time.
- [56:35]
Michael Malice
And what does that mean? Like, literally, like the bills.
- [56:38]
Chef Andrew Gruel
113. You leave a hundred.
- [56:42]
Michael Malice
No.
- [56:43]
Chef Andrew Gruel
And you leave.
- [56:44]
Michael Malice
No. Oh, you're joking.
- [56:46]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Left and right. And eventually I caught a guy. Right.
- [56:51]
Michael Malice
Hold on, hold on. I really want to pause here because this is something that's by now is just you rolling your eyes. This is common nature. I never heard this. And it's just unconscionable to me because who are you stealing from? Like, I can wrap my head around stealing from Walgreens maybe because it's this giant faceless corporation. This is some guys. This is a waiter. Like, what kind of person are you? And also if you're going to steal, steal. What's the dine and dash? Like? Dine and dash makes more sense than if I have 100, I have 113. Like, what do you like, for $13, you're just going to be a scumbag. Like, what kind of person are you?
- [57:27]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Prop 47 allowed people to intellectualize breaking certain moral codes.
- [57:34]
Michael Malice
Holy crap.
- [57:35]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Because it's very much the. It's that. It's that diffusion of responsibility.
- [57:40]
Michael Malice
Yeah, yeah.
- [57:41]
Chef Andrew Gruel
And well, if that guy can Steal and just get a slap on the wrist for $900, or that guy can go riot and burn a car and blow things up and make money. Well, okay, so I shortchanged you 13. No big deal. I'm not the bad guy here. They're the bad guys.
- [57:58]
Michael Malice
Holy crap.
- [57:59]
Chef Andrew Gruel
So, and also, just so you know, that goes back to the first point we talked about. Well, look who you're stealing from. You are a smart person. And you know that in everyone's mind, if you're a restaurant owner, you're an, you're a rich aristocrat. By the way, you remember the aristocrats?
- [58:15]
Michael Malice
Yes, of course. But I, I, I, I don't think, I think there's been once when I didn't tip, and I always tip 20% minimum, because this is, this is this person's livelihood. You know what I mean? And they're not wealthy. Like, I can understand screwing over the restaurant, maybe, but screwing over the wait staff, like, maybe this is where my anarchist hat comes in. In terms of, like, when you are, like, yelling at someone who's in a service position unless they really, you know, were egregious. What kind of is this, Is this who you want to be? Like, it's just really. There's a scene in Amelie where one of the characters, they're giving, like, a little blurb about, like, he likes whatever artichokes and he hates when men are berate in front of their kids and that. I don't know that just to me, when, when you're that Karen, it's just like, it makes me, it makes it, it's just. And the fact that that person has to sit there and smile and nod, it's so gross to me. It is so gross to me.
- [59:16]
Chef Andrew Gruel
It's the ultimate test of somebody's, Somebody's like, who they're gonna be in 20 years.
- [59:23]
Michael Malice
It's such a low hurdle to clear.
- [59:27]
Chef Andrew Gruel
It's difficult for a lot of people. And sometimes it's not even really just being outwardly rude. Sometimes it's the, the mindset of they're
- [59:35]
Michael Malice
the help, I have a buddy, but they're also a person, so you could treat them cordially. I, I, my producer's not allowed to make eye contact with me, but doesn't mean I'm gonna talk down to it. What the,
- [59:54]
Chef Andrew Gruel
The way. That's why everyone says to me, what do you do? So I went on a, I went on my first date with my wife, and she was incredibly kind to the service staff. She'd worked in the service industry. And so I knew. Right. Right then and there. Plus, she was beautiful. And we. And she agreed and laughed at all my jokes. So I said, this is it. Like, no reason to do this any longer. And then in six weeks, we were married.
- [60:16]
Michael Malice
Holy crap. Wait, so let's talk about the two people. So there's the. To send food back.
- [60:21]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yep.
- [60:22]
Michael Malice
Where the other two.
- [60:24]
Chef Andrew Gruel
The. Well, no, no, you. I said there's. There's. Oh, thank you. So the other one. There's your wife.
- [60:30]
Michael Malice
I'm actually listening to you.
- [60:31]
Chef Andrew Gruel
There's. There's the ass. There's the. Who send food back. Right, right. And then there's the.
- [60:37]
Michael Malice
You.
- [60:38]
Chef Andrew Gruel
You genuinely screwed up. Right. Like, I ordered the salmon and you gave me the sea bass. So that's an easy one.
- [60:42]
Michael Malice
Oh, yeah, that's.
- [60:42]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah.
- [60:43]
Michael Malice
Yes.
- [60:43]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Then there's the preference send back. So the preference is, oh, you know what? I want my vegetables cooked more or I want this or that. I don't like the third send back. The third send back is. This is how we do it now. We will adjust it according to what you want. But if you had such a specific demand that you wanted, then you should have said that in the beginning.
- [61:03]
Michael Malice
Right?
- [61:04]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Right.
- [61:04]
Michael Malice
And you're okay with that, aren't you? Oh, can you make sure my fries are burnt? Like, you're fine with that?
- [61:07]
Chef Andrew Gruel
I'm always. I'll always cook the food the way you want. If you're like, I'm a weird person with a lot of my food. Right. And I rarely make those requests in a restaurant. But if I know the chef or I know the restaurant, I've gotten to know them well. I'll be like, hey, can you just like, burn the edges of the eggs a little bit in the omelette? Whatever. Right? But I would never ask with it if I didn't know them. Those types of preferences and those types of demands I'm okay with. It's the first one that I am just disgusted by. And the second one can quickly become the first one.
- [61:38]
Michael Malice
I've had it when I order something. So something, apparently that happens in restaurants now because it's happened to me several times to me. And please correct me if I'm wrong, they will purposely, or maybe not purposely, they undercook the meat because it's easier to cook it up than to cook it down. So I order it medium rare or medium, and I get it rare, and I have to send it back because I can't eat rare.
- [62:01]
Chef Andrew Gruel
I think. I just think in general, we have a really uneducated and I don't mean that as a pejorative like uneducated and meat temps.
- [62:11]
Michael Malice
Okay, okay, so that's. That's not on purpose. It's just they're actually screwing it up.
- [62:16]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Yeah, like, steakhouses have been taken over by corporate chains, and corporate chains have buttons and numbers on the way in which they cook. So, like, you know, I used to be able to get the line cook at the diner who knew how to cook, who knew temps on all foods, but now I get the line cook from Applebee's who knew to press 136 for a medium rare steak.
- [62:35]
Michael Malice
Right. Okay, okay, Understood. So, okay, folks, head on over to malice.locals.com where Andrew took questions from supporting listeners and you can join yourself for just five bucks a month. Andrew, we're running out of time. What has been your favorite part of this interview?
- [62:52]
Chef Andrew Gruel
Getting into the food detail. No one has ever been able to get into the food detail with me the way you have. So this is fun. This is like you're. We're in a little sandbox right now, but we're building some castles.
- [63:04]
Michael Malice
You are welcome. With its two juicy beef patties and three slices of melted cheese topped with tangy Big Arch sauce.
- [63:23]
Chef Andrew Gruel
The Big Arch is what happens when you start making a McDonald's burger and never stop.
- [63:28]
Michael Malice
The Big Arch, the most McDonald's McDonald's burger yet.
- [63:31]
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