Burnt Hands Perspective
This is a raw and unfiltered look into the pu$$ification and state of the restaurant industry as a whole, powered by longtime friends Chef/Owner Antonio Caruana and former bartender turned News Anchor/TV Host Kristen Crowley.
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Burnt Hands Perspective
Discovering the Culinary Heritage of South Carolina with Chef Chris Williams at World Food Championships
Join Chef Chris Williams as he takes us on a captivating journey into the depths of Southern cuisine and the cultural heritage that shapes it. With a blend of personal stories and culinary wisdom, Chris shares insights on what makes South Carolina’s food scene truly unique.
• Introduction to Chris Williams, a chef and restaurant owner from South Carolina
• Significance of Gullah Geechee heritage in Southern cooking
• The importance of history and family in culinary identity
• Chris’s experience competing at prestigious food championships
• Insights on how to find inspiration and adapt in the kitchen
• The message of passion, heritage, and community in the culinary world
Don't miss this enriching conversation!
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All right, Chris. And here we are again, Chris Williams, right here in this place to be what's up. And here's the thing. Here's the thing Right away. I saw you hooting and hollering when you were down on the thing yesterday when you were competing. You were getting the crowd hyped up, weren't you? Yeah, man, that's what it's all about. That's what it's right, because if they're here watching, they're Tell us what you do. My name is Chris Williams. I'm from Columbia South.
Speaker 2:Carolina. I am a chef and restaurant owner of a restaurant called Roy's Grill. Type of food Well, we specialize in barbecue, burgers, cheesesteaks at the restaurant. Okay, but as far as other types of cuisine, I mean, I can do whatever you need as far as catering goes. Your only limitation is your imagination. That's right. We can do just about anything. Been doing this all my life, man. Been getting paid to cook almost 30 years. Right, I know I might not look like it. Yeah, you look young, but I've been getting paid to cook for a long time. My grandfather passed and I had the opportunity to name the restaurant, so I wanted to name it after him to kind of honor him. You know what I'm saying. Okay, that's a good name. Good, I like that. Yeah, I'm also a South Carolina chef ambassador too.
Speaker 1:Okay, right on. What does that mean exactly?
Speaker 2:Well, that is an honor that once a year. They award maybe three to five chefs every year with the honor of being a South Carolina chef ambassador. What that really means is we represent our state and we represent the governor at cooking engagements, speaking engagements, cooking demos, you name it.
Speaker 1:media, press-related stuff Nice, Just kind of getting the word out about South Carolina culinary and about our chefs man, that must mean that he knows a lot about the South Carolina traditional cuisine dating back in history.
Speaker 2:So you've got to have some sort of a knowledge of that as well.
Speaker 1:Huh, I'm not a historian, but growing up in it.
Speaker 2:I saw, I know it, I lived it. I breathe by experience. You are somewhat of an historian, by experience, I mean, I don't lead with that title, you know, of course that.
Speaker 1:But I'm sure there's historians out there that would track you down to get information to create to keep their historian status going. Finding people like you who are rooted right, because the traditions, the actual culinary now, when you live there, grow up there, have roots there and go back there. Your palate speaks for that. It does. Now you can try and replicate it right. I can go to. I can go to asia and learn asian food right with the best of them, but I didn't grow up in that. So to have the root of that, to have that that part of my blood is different.
Speaker 2:That means something man.
Speaker 1:That's where it comes out of your hands, that way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and there is no American history or American food scene or history without South Carolina history and South Carolina food.
Speaker 1:That's correct. Charleston Cleary, that whole area, played a big part of that. That's it. Everything came through there. Everything, everything came through there, everything man, you said it right there is no Southern cuisine without South Carolina Period, no cuisine Period.
Speaker 2:We got drinks coming. We got drinks coming in. You're drinking. We're not drinking alone. People, let's go, thank you.
Speaker 3:Thank you, Cheers man Cheers, cheers to it.
Speaker 1:Cooking and booking baby. Booking them appointments, book, booking them clients cooking all day.
Speaker 3:So, let's talk about the competition too, because we're here at the World Food Championships. You obviously had to get a path to get here. So what did that look like? Where did you do your qualifying for the golden ticket? What category are you in? What did you make? Give us all the details.
Speaker 2:Well, as far as qualifying, I didn't have to do the qualifying route this year because I competed last year and I got second place in my category.
Speaker 1:So if you make it that, automatically brings you in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if you make it to the top ten, you automatically get grandfathered in. So I placed second in sandwich last year. I placed fifth in sandwich the year before and second place put a bad taste in my mouth. Man, I'm not going to lie, so I'm just going to switch categories all together. I switched to rice this year. Yeah, so you know I didn't make the finals, okay, which probably tells me I probably should have stuck with sound.
Speaker 1:It was a good experience and I wanted to do rice because I wanted to do something that meant something to me.
Speaker 3:Right your rice look.
Speaker 2:Content was all there and I really think if I had the opportunity to really explain conceptually what I did on the plate, it would have made sense Because, to a judge me, just turning in a plate and I got Spanish moss and cotton and okra and all this stuff on it and shrimp Like what the hell? Why okra and all this stuff on it and shrimp like what the heck? Like what, why? But those are things that mean something to me and to my folks and to my history and my heritage.
Speaker 1:Um, historically, you're not representative of where you're from.
Speaker 2:It's indigenous, indigenous stuff, exactly exactly, I'm from the low country in south carolina, you know what I mean. And uh, gulagichi is our heritage and that's what's left over from our West African slave, our ancestors. Yeah, they brought that over and the descendants of those West African slaves were Gullah Geechee. So what that means to eat Gullah. To eat Geechee means to eat what you can catch, eat what's fresh, what can we grow living off the land? So we eat a lot of okra, we eat a lot of tomatoes, you know what I mean. We eat a lot of game, you know. And rice before, before, this country was growing and profiting off of cotton, tobacco and indigo. Rice was the cash, the first cash crop of this country. You know charleston, south carolina, is actually called the city that rice built. So that's why I wanted to choose uh rice and I actually used carolina gold rice.
Speaker 2:That's the rice that my african ancestors actually brought and on top of that, bro, here's to not being a historian yeah, yeah yeah cheers to not being a historian, just taught us like carolina gold rice was brought over here with my African ancestors during the Middle Passage. They would braid the grains of the Carolina gold rice and the seeds of the okra in their braids so that the slavers wouldn't find it. And when they got here, the ones that made it fortunately they were unbraided, unraveled the hair and sowed their seeds.
Speaker 1:So that's how they were able to bring that African grain of rice here, you know what I mean and, like the, that's such, that is such important history. It was purposeful. Right, it was purposeful, because that is not what you're saying right now is something that we think is so American. No, carolina cold rice, everybody thinks that's American no, I think that's so. American. That's an original.
Speaker 2:African grain right.
Speaker 1:So so that was brought here and then put down in the ground, and now it's American Right, but it didn't start from America.
Speaker 2:No, it didn't.
Speaker 1:A lot of Southern cooking was robbed of that. Yeah, we can talk about a lot of things, and I'm a huge advocate of this I am. One of the shows I was working on is just that literally calling out the theft of Southern, especially black, american or soul food cooking that was robbed, and just take it. But it's chefs like you, though, that'll bring it back to light and educate. So that's why we have to show the burnt-hands. Perspective is to cover all avenues of the restaurant industry and all the shit that comes with it.
Speaker 2:And I think it's dope what y'all are doing bro.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you, bro, I appreciate that.
Speaker 2:And I think it's dope what y'all are doing, bro. Yeah, thank you, bro. I appreciate that. I think it's dope, man, because a lot of people don't get to hear those stories and a lot of people wouldn't have gotten to hear me say what I just said to you guys.
Speaker 3:Sure, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:And we're barely cracking the surface of what we're really talking about, when we're really just scratching the surface. We just scratched the head off the pimple.
Speaker 1:The puss ain't even losing out yet that's not even coming out the gate. So you have just given us a lot of insight as a historian, right? So, going back to the roots of your cooking, your taste, where you get influenced, what influences you when you're cooking or creating, coming up with something for your restaurant? What's your biggest? When you're down in the dumps, when you get a writer's block, what do you call it right, what? Where do you go? What? Where do you go find your inspiration to come out of that?
Speaker 2:home, home, home. I'm from bamberg county, south carolina, a little rural town called olah. You know what I mean. My subdivision is bigger than my neighborhood, bro. Wow, I grew up on the dirt road. We raised chickens, pigs, cows. We grew our own vegetables. So, like when I get in a block and I don't know what to do but I go back home, I think about some of those crops being my, I would help my grandfather. So sure, I think about some of those fields I helped them plow and then someone yeah, it puts it on your mouth you have a real, actual farm, right like you grew up.
Speaker 2:I mean, I think about watching my grandmother make them buttermilk biscuits, you know what I saying and fry that chicken in that skillet. And learning the technique, which I didn't know it at the time, but I was learning and living Gullah Geechee heritage in real life. You know what I mean Exactly Before, farm to table was a fad. That's what I'm saying, bro.
Speaker 1:It's a necessity it's so refreshing to hear you say this because it goes back to my thing is, if you cook what you truly lived, your food is going to be famous, if you will, just because you're representing something that no one else can capture. A lot of people have eaten, a lot of people have cooked, a lot of people have farmed. A lot of people understand the lifestyle, but not a lot of people know how to put it all together at once Exactly. You know what I mean and that's what you're doing and that's what we do. I do the same thing with my Italian here, yeah, so I'm doing a lot of regional stuff. I get inspired. I'm American-Italian, so I was born here. My family's all from Italy.
Speaker 2:I was born American proudly, but I go to Italy when I need inspiration for different regions for the same reasons, I get the history and all that stuff when I go home.
Speaker 1:I'm from New Haven Connecticut originally. I go there when I want to get inspired by other Italian American cooks so going home is where it's at.
Speaker 2:Going home is where it's at man and staying tapped in to the culture and staying tapped into the food scene, because I mean, like, coming here, you see the innovation and the excitement around all these chefs and the things that they're coming up with, bro, and it's refreshing. You know what I mean. It gives you a breath of fresh air, like I get inspiration from other chefs. Every day Just watching some of the things that come up. I'm inspired by you right now.
Speaker 1:I'm inspired by you right now, what you're telling me gives me inspiration to go back now and learn more about my heritage, if I can, because you're inspiring me to do that. So if we don't inspire each other, man, we're sitting here drinking beer like fools. You know what I'm saying We'll drink beer, but we ain't fools no, not by a long shot, not by a long shot. So you have a really unique chef coat.
Speaker 3:Let's hear about this.
Speaker 2:Tell me about this Well, I wasn't in the military. My brother was. Okay, my brother's an Army veteran. He passed away a couple years ago.
Speaker 3:I'm sorry.
Speaker 2:You know, and my girl, Ms Ave, she's also, she's a service member as well. She's here today, Okay. So happy Veterans Day to her and everybody.
Speaker 1:To his veterans and Veterans Day to her and everybody. That's a veteran.
Speaker 2:But the history of this jacket is she had it made for me after my brother passed. You know, I think she gave it to me as like I don't want to say a birthday or Christmas gift and just surprised me with it. She took some old uniforms and just had it made, and in memory of James Michael Carter man, you know, that's when he rose, that's when he fell, so I have a hat, that kind of matches.
Speaker 2:But you know I'm a rep bro, I'm a rep my team. You know I try to bring him with me to all of my competitions. A lot of times when I compete I'll bring a little candle and I'll light it. You know what I mean. He's here with you, he's here with me, bro.
Speaker 1:That's a great story, bro. Keep it going, man. Yeah, bro.
Speaker 2:So that's what this jacket is all about. And shout out to all of I don't know who I'm looking at, but shout out to all of our service members, whether it be Army, navy, marine, coast Guard, space Force, whatever that is. Shout out to you guys too. But without you guys, we wouldn't be able to do what we do.
Speaker 1:Exactly, and I'm a veteran myself. So all to the veterans. Happy Valentine's Day to you too, bro. Thank you, my man. We appreciate your service man. Thank you guys. Let's do something fun. Real quick, what's up? Let's do something fun.
Speaker 2:Let's get it. Let's get the list.
Speaker 1:First thing come to mind type deal first thing come to mind all right, they're not all that crazy. You can take them as crazy as you want. Go crazy with them. Let's spend a little bit, let's turn it up a little bit yeah, we do, we do, we go all over the place.
Speaker 3:All right, the one kitchen tool you can't live without, besides knives a cast iron skillet I watched you cook yesterday with that skillet.
Speaker 2:I can't do it without it. You make some of the best cast iron in the world in South Carolina. Smithy, shout out, smithy in Charleston South. Carolina.
Speaker 3:I want a Smithy now we need a Smithy let's link up after this alright cool. What puts you in the mood? More the smell or the visual? Ooh, ooh, we're talking about cooking. If we talk about something else, more the smell or the visual Ooh, ooh, we're talking about cooking.
Speaker 1:If we're talking about something else, it ain't gonna be the smell, unless it's good. It'll take you out of the mood. Take you out of the mood, that twerk when it's different though Alright, we got off track.
Speaker 2:Could you repeat please?
Speaker 3:Yes, let me repeat the question what puts you in the mood? More the visual or the smell of the dish To create the visual man, the visual all?
Speaker 2:right, because I may add something to change the smells, you know, what I mean I may go to a different region of the world with it.
Speaker 3:Okay, I like it. Cool, all right. The worst position in the kitchen.
Speaker 1:Cook-wise, work-wise, work-wise.
Speaker 3:Cook-wise.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I told you, these things have angles, man, these questions.
Speaker 2:Fuck On a weekend. Yeah, I'm going to say the salad guy, bro, either salad or the prep guy, okay, not prep. I'm going to say it's a tie between salads and apps, man, okay.
Speaker 3:They're getting their head beat in Every time.
Speaker 2:Nothing goes down without them.
Speaker 3:Alright, so the best position in the kitchen.
Speaker 2:The best position in the kitchen. I'm going to say point Whoever's quarterbacking the line, expo.
Speaker 1:That seems to be the crowd favorite.
Speaker 2:I like Expo man because the flow and the tone of your kitchen depends on the Expo. Yeah, you know what I mean. That seems to be the crowd favorite. I like Expo man because, like the flow and the tone of your kitchen is depends on the Expo, sure, the kitchen is as strong as he is.
Speaker 1:That's right, you know, he knows how to sell around what and all that other shit.
Speaker 2:So Expo bro, I like it.
Speaker 1:Word All right, your favorite ingredient, and it could be a it doesn't have to be so much of a spice.
Speaker 3:Any ingredient. What do you like to work with the most? One thing you could not live without Rice, bro, just rice, yeah, I love that Is that, or I was going to pull out okra.
Speaker 2:Yeah rice, yeah rice. I mean, I can live without okra inside of rice.
Speaker 3:You know what I mean? Yeah, you know, but like I, gotta have rice, bro.
Speaker 2:I got to, I love it.
Speaker 3:We know what your roots are, so what other cooking method intimidates you the most?
Speaker 2:intimidates nothing, it is less style ranch or style. None of it. All of it excites me. I like doing the shit I don't know how to do. The shit I don't understand is the shit I want to learn and conquer. Okay, so like I'm not afraid, like ask me hey, what's your favorite thing to cook? That's my answer to shit. I don't know how to cook. You know what I mean? Teach me something. The day I stopped being a student is the day I need to figure out something else to do.
Speaker 1:Sure, so I'm going to answer that question. Yeah, but it also scares me to cook. Want to know why, though? What's that? Because I can't fucking speak it. I don't know what the hell it is. I don't know how to talk that language at all. So the ingredients and the way to say them is what intimidates me, yeah. But the food itself and the process nah man, so it's not the food. It's the language. Announcing this stuff is like shit, Tong, tong, tong.
Speaker 2:I don't know how to say it no, yeah, right, so it's, I love it.
Speaker 1:Thai food has me on another level, when I eat Thai food, bro, I'm going to tell you what them flavors Right.
Speaker 2:And that heat, yeah, and that acid?
Speaker 1:Oh man, I'm getting hungry.
Speaker 2:Just the combo bro, like to say legit might be a question. All right, let's see.
Speaker 3:All right, well, we'll see, we got a few more left. All right, your favorite fast food restaurant.
Speaker 2:Rush's Okay, rush's R-U-S-H apostrophe S. That's a local burger spot we got at home.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:So it's a local joint. Man Rush's is probably going to be my favorite fast food spot Love it.
Speaker 3:Okay, if your kitchen was a car, what kind of car would it be?
Speaker 1:Your kitchen at work.
Speaker 2:If my kitchen at work was a car, what would it be? 84 Chevy Monte Carlo SS with the T-tops? Baby, oh nice, you went deep. You know your kitchen well. I love that kitchen With the T-tops.
Speaker 3:That kitchen is fun.
Speaker 2:Right with the T-tops, we might have 412s and 215s in that thing. I like it. It's bumping.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, that's it, man. I gotta get to your kitchen. Bro, let's go Between that and the cast iron. It's a wrap.
Speaker 3:We're going there, all right. Baking, yes or no? Yes, okay, I like that. I love baking man Really.
Speaker 2:I'm not a baker, but I have a certain amount of desserts and things that I think I do exceptionally well and I like to make them.
Speaker 1:Okay, I love it. Hit me off with one. Yeah, what's your favorite?
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm glad you said that. Well, with me being a South Carolina chef ambassador, they paired us. They paired each chef ambassador with a farmer so we could do our promo video, and they paired me with a peach farmer the largest peach farmer in the Southeast.
Speaker 1:Hold on one second During the harvest next year. If you're with this guy linked up, I want to get with you when I'm coming down there.
Speaker 3:He loves peaches South.
Speaker 1:Carolina peach In that season to me is one of the most delicious things you can have Off of vine it starts around.
Speaker 2:I want to say June-ish.
Speaker 1:What's the best?
Speaker 2:time for that Peak season, that's sweet running down your face. I want to say in the summertime, man. I want to say in the middle of the summer, with the watermelons bro, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:I'm talking about peaches, though.
Speaker 2:I mean around July-ish. Okay, good, so I'm coming. Okay, he wants to.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 1:I want to come down there with the podcast with the crew and do a show on South Carolina cuisine, because we found our guy, let's do it.
Speaker 2:We found our guy Because peaches South Carolina. You know who's considered the peach state Georgia. All right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but I don't agree.
Speaker 2:We grow more peaches than Georgia.
Speaker 1:But I don't agree with that, because South Carolina peaches are fucking proper.
Speaker 2:Bro, we got the largest peach farm in the Southeast. Wow, the largest peach farm in the southeast, maybe, maybe, maybe this is, I think it might be the second largest in the world, next to some uh farm out west so georgia does have its place in the peach world. That's not even play, of course it does the south?
Speaker 1:carolina peaches to me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I know I tell you what I love that so so back to your original question either a peach cobbler I can make with peaches or my. One of the desserts we make at the restaurant is a façade bread pudding with a spiced rum drizzle that we make. But for that chef ambassadorship, when they paired me with my guy Jason out of Titan Farms, I took some of their peaches and I kind of caramelized, bruleed them and baked them on top and into my dessert and that's actually on my chef ambassador card, like my promo card. Yeah.
Speaker 1:That dish is on it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's that dish, so it's funny. You asked me that we need that. That was a good question.
Speaker 1:We're going to South Carolina.
Speaker 3:Hey team we're going to South Carolina. Hey, south Carolina.
Speaker 2:Who. I'm looking at. I keep receipts. You said you coming.
Speaker 3:I keep receipts. Man, we coming, we come with them, all right. So random Gloves, or wash your hands.
Speaker 2:Potato, potato.
Speaker 1:Totally random. Wash your hands, man, that's what I'm talking about Wash your hands.
Speaker 2:I'm old school. Wash your hands, man.
Speaker 1:Keep your hands clean.
Speaker 3:Do you know the owner?
Speaker 2:Yeah, gloves, go to school. Wash your hands, man. Keep your hands clean, do you know the owner? Yeah, gloves give the misconception of cleanliness, you know how many people I see wear gloves and don't change them.
Speaker 3:And don't change them they change them no difference.
Speaker 2:And their hand is white dripping sweat, and they're scratching it and putting another pair of gloves on?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's right there. It's trapping it in and people don't get it. That's no good. Yeah the question do you know the owner?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm him.
Speaker 3:So what about that? When they come in your restaurant? When they come in your restaurant?
Speaker 2:how many people? Oh, I know the owner Well, I mean, at my restaurant it's like a family cheers type of thing. So everybody.
Speaker 3:They kind of all know you anyway.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like 50-75% of the people. They know me, whether it be from a magazine article they saw, a news station they saw, or being here or just the things I do in the community.
Speaker 3:But they don't know you like that.
Speaker 2:They don't know me like that.
Speaker 1:That's what I get a lot. I get a lot of publicity as well yeah, rewards and all that stuff. And they come in and they think they know you a. Then you go out there, this person knows you. They want you to come to the table I drop my.
Speaker 2:I drop my tongs, I go out to the table and I don't know that and I turn the coin, I'm like, no, I'm not, I'm not, I'm busy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I don't know because you don't know what to say and I really got to cook I really really do you want your food right?
Speaker 3:yeah I got a job to do, all right. And if you could cook with anyone, who would it be? Who would it be?
Speaker 2:Doesn't have to be famous. Nah, I know what I want to say. I'm just trying to pause before.
Speaker 1:I cry up here in front of y'all my grandmother.
Speaker 2:I would love the same thing. I will go into detail, but I might start.
Speaker 1:We'll catch you at the next round.
Speaker 2:Listen to me, we're going to do that. When we cash in on that receipt, south start. Yeah, we'll catch you at the next round. Yeah, let's keep going. Listen to me, we're going to do that, but my grandma.
Speaker 3:When we cash in on that receipt South Carolina yeah, we'll do that, then We'll go into that.
Speaker 2:That's right, that's where that comes in, but my grandma man, let's be a show like that. Well, I inspiration my elevation. All of it man. All of it Good.
Speaker 3:Well, I love the history. I love the history. I think that's stuff that people need to know more about.
Speaker 2:They do, man we have historians in Virginia.
Speaker 3:We've had an episode that'll be out.
Speaker 2:in the four years that we went over a lot of things in Virginia, you Right after us, it was Virginia as far as the population of slaves imported into this country.
Speaker 1:So Virginia's important too. Tidewater area, all watershed, All the oysters, the whole deal yeah.
Speaker 2:And it's oyster season back home now. Like I had oysters on my turn-in tray, so like they really needed an explanation as to why they saw what.
Speaker 3:They saw what the combo was. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Everything that was on that plate was regional to where we are. I picked Spanish moss out of the trees in Charleston.
Speaker 3:That's amazing.
Speaker 2:I literally picked cotton out of the fields in Orangeburg. You know what I mean. I had Jefferson red rice, tiara, black rice, some Carolina gold, some charred okra on there.
Speaker 1:I'm glad you're saying that I'm a final round judge tomorrow and the next day for all the final rounds. Okay, dope, it helps me get the perspective to look at these plates and wonder. Okay, there's Spanish moss in here.
Speaker 2:Maybe there's a reason why, Well, look at the whole story Like look at it as a picture I personally collected that I'm in somebody's field picking their cotton.
Speaker 1:No one's watching right now. They can't see. But see all those people down there in the red right there, yeah, yeah, your food comes down the red carpet and that's where the judges sit. They're judging your food.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's blind judging. They don't know. They're just looking like what. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:The final round, judges were up on the stage and you get to explain it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you get to talk. This year is different and years prior. I don't feel bad about it, but just the fact that I was able to come here, I was able to compete, Do it and I was able to share myself, my history, my family and my heritage with essentially the world. Like I won, bro, you did win.
Speaker 1:We both won. Because I'm inspired by this, I'm really looking forward to working with you a little bit and feeling your roots and learning from you, man.
Speaker 2:Really Moe, we can do it.
Speaker 1:Because I teach people all the time. It's my job. I own two restaurants, I have 85 friggin' employees in the back of the house pretty much, and I'm constantly trying to pass on the education. Yeah, I can't do this forever. No, bro, you know what I mean, and nobody the people before me couldn't do it forever.
Speaker 2:And now I'm there forever.
Speaker 1:They're past there forever now. They're where they were when they told me I can't do this forever. They're past that now.
Speaker 2:Now they're right, they're not doing it anymore.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but they're counting on here right now because we can talk all day. Man, you've got a lot to say.
Speaker 2:I swear bro.
Speaker 1:So I want to end this right now by saying what do you have to say to anyone coming up in this game in the restaurant world? And I'm not talking about everyone who has that dream of being this big, fancy chef. I'm talking about the motherfuckers in the struggle right now, trying to bear with the fact world and they're questioning it. But you know they shouldn't, because they got it. Yeah, what do you tell them?
Speaker 2:Sometimes it's not about quitting, it's not about giving up bros. It's about learning how to pivot, like what you're doing right now. It might not be working right now, but you may need to switch it up a little bit. Don't give up on it, like if you have some dreams and some ideas not dreams but if you have some ideas you were thinking about when it kind of on the fence on. If it's in here, bro or ma'am, if it's in here and you feel it and it resonates with you, follow it, because that's when you start to gain momentum, that's when you start to get money.
Speaker 2:Don't, don't chase the money. You know what I mean. Chase your passion for and your love for this business, for this industry, for this game, because if you don't have a passion for it and if you don't love it, it's not going to work, because it's hard, it's rough, it's difficult. You know what I mean. You need a good support system. You need all of those things. So stay focused, keep going, learn how to pivot and lean on your support system. You've got to have one.
Speaker 1:Right on, bro. I appreciate that and that's exactly what I tell people. We feel the same way and that's why we are where we are and pivoting is the hugest thing in this industry, because this industry is always pivoting on your ass. Always, bro, and if you ain't paying attention it's going to pivot you right out the back.
Speaker 2:The automation, the AI, is coming guys. It started to hit the kitchen, you know what I mean, but it's really going to start to come full circle here in the next five to ten years, man.
Speaker 1:So they really start to get serious about what you're doing, man pay attention to your hands pay attention perspective for a reason automation, ai, they can't get burnt, and if you don't get burnt you don't learn. We can always stay ahead. By that we can beat. Animation we can do it. The automated we can beat because these hands have to do it. You do and, like you said, all that history you talked and all the history, I know what she knows in her industries. Everything, everything we talk about comes from here in the heart.
Speaker 1:And, like you said, don't worry about the money If your passion is what you're following the money's going to come.
Speaker 2:It'll come.
Speaker 1:It'll come. Don't worry about the money.
Speaker 2:Yeah, chase the vision, chase your heart. Chase your heart and your vision, man.
Speaker 1:My man pleasure meeting you.
Speaker 2:Cheers man. We're checking out right now. It's a pleasure.
Speaker 1:Thank you. We'll see you in South Carolina, bro. We're going to catch up on that we're coming down.
Speaker 2:I got that receipt. You can hold me to it. We're going to South Carolina.
Speaker 1:Skyler's over there saying we're going Right, all right, cool, all right. Ciao for now, guys. Thank you.
