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the jurogan experience while i was playing music actually i i turned the studio certain nights a week into a little poker room so i'd have like friends over and we'd play cards the house but uh while i was uh touring uh i eventually decided because when i when i decided to stop going to school i said to myself if the music doesn't work i'm gonna go to sushi school so uh the music thing did work and a couple years went by and um actually my godmother owned a uh catering company and so uh in between tours i didn't really want to keep working at like jambo juice or starbucks or anything like that and so i uh asked her if i could work for her and so i invited over her her over to the house i cooked dinner for her and she said well i'll introduce you to my chef and if my chef wants to hire you then you'll be hired and so i went to uh to her um catering company met the chef uh the first thing was like okay you're making family meal today and so i cooked for the whole staff and she said i'll hire you as a dishwasher oh jesus uh and was that because that was the only job they had available looking back at it i was offended and angry but i didn't care because of what she said after that which is um you don't get to start being a cook you have to start as a dishwasher so you can have respect for um you know what it is that the dishwashers do and she said here's how this works the faster you clean that dish pit the more i'll teach you so whenever that dish pits clean you come and find me and i'll give you a task but if there's ever any dishes that's what you're doing so it kind of gave me that that bit of work ethic of like all right i'm gonna work my way into that that next position that seems to be a theme with great restaurants and when you talk to chefs this work ethic theme because it seems like
when you know you talk to people that have worked in restaurants one of the things that they will almost unanimously discuss is the amount of hours and the grind and how difficult it is yeah and that development of work ethic almost is like kind of a boot camp for chefs it is it's um i mean it's not so much anymore laws have changed culture has changed but it was you're spending like a 16-hour day was not even a really long day i dated a girl once who went to college for restaurant and hotel management and then she got a job at this restaurant and i remember i would go visit her and she was [ __ ] miserable i mean miserable she couldn't believe the hours that she had to work but you have to love it yes that's an industry you have to love well she just wanted a career you know she'd went to school she graduated from school and then she had this this job that was like and then she had this boyfriend who was a fuck-up who's a comedian so it was like very very weird for her because like i had most of my day completely free and she was working you know 14 15 hours a day at least yeah i mean it's it's one of those things where if you really want to take food seriously and cooking seriously you're going to have to you know make a lot of sacrifices yeah you know just the time mm-hmm you're not there for birthdays you're not there for anniversaries you're not there for for for uh valentine's day for sure because you have to work because you have to work yeah yeah because someone has to cook at all those restaurants you go to yeah yeah people listening if you are thinking of going down this path yeah it's a fantastic path but you have to understand what it's like and i think the reason it worked for me or the reason i loved it so much is it really felt like being on tour except i got to sleep in my own bed
well be like playing music you spend all day getting ready for the show that night um and there's something to getting to the restaurant and prepping all day getting ready for the show that night um and so i feel like the camaraderie of being on it like being in a crew is much is a lot like being in a band um the hours are a lot like being in a band um and then the shenanigans you know after hours are a lot like being in a band the boozing yeah you're talking about yeah that's the other thing that i learned from bourdain i didn't know how hard people partied yeah i mean when i was younger there was a lot of nights you just don't go to sleep you just get out of the restaurant at 1 30 in the morning you go to the bar then you go somewhere else then you go back and open the restaurant the next day that doesn't seem good for you no it's terrible i had i had to um and that's where the red bull comes in well no i quit red bull earlier than that but um uh thankfully i never i never gotten a drug so it wasn't that but i would drink a lot and i actually had one time uh where i finished service took two steps and just collapsed just hit the ground whoa yeah at the end of the day at the end of the day it was pulled an all-nighter i think two or three days in a row yeah oh jesus but i was like 21. two or three days of no sleep at 21 yeah maybe like an hour and a half sleep here and there jesus but um yeah i mean when i i my first sous chef job i was on the schedule it said next to my name all seven days said op-ciel open to close we did breakfast and we did dinner service so i would open the restaurant at about 7 a.m and i would leave around 1 32. so when you open the restaurant at 7am what time are you actually arriving uh man this was like this a long time ago but i'm i probably was getting there i was probably getting there on seven 6
45 7. when i say open i mean i would get to the restaurant open the door not that we were so there was someone there that was already prepping yeah i'm trying to remember because we were at this um in this sort of like uh the restaurant was a lunch and dinner restaurant but we served breakfast and as like a commissary to like there was like it was like in a building complex um so i really wasn't responsible for breakfast um so there would be i think there was people there before i would get there building like an office building complex yeah so they would just grab something quick yeah yeah like so i would get in there and the dishwasher would already like he'd be making like ham and cheese sandwiches or something like that but um and so you were there from seven a.m and then what time would you get out of there usually i mean i probably won 130. and nowadays with labor laws you really couldn't schedule that right well i was on i was on salary oh interesting but that salary would have to be you know 3x at this point yeah because because now they've changed the rule a couple years ago salary is no longer a uh a contract between you and i salaries have to fall into a certain you have to qualify so you can't just be like oh i'm gonna not give you overtime by giving you a salary to have you work when i ask you to right now you have to pay them pay everybody a specific dollar amount and they have to have hold specific responsibilities in order to not uh accrue over time yeah i think that's good because i think there's a lot of employers that are abusive but i also think there's something romantic about this story of you almost dying [Laughter] you know what i mean i feel like i do appreciate like long hard work days there's something to that because like i hear that and i know you got through it you became very successful so i'm like
see it works look when i think margarita in my first date was at that restaurant and it was uh i mean people ask me all the time how did how did you get her and it's food it has to be that's hilarious um well you're a cool guy don't tell yourself short and plus you're kind of cute appreciate it jeremy i'm top three in this room for sure um top three i would say so um but uh so because of that schedule i couldn't take her on a date um and so i remember the very first date we had was at the restaurant i told her to show up at 12 30 after i sent everybody home and i had spent all day secretly prepping a special menu and she showed up and i sat her in the dining room that like overlooked the kitchen and i would make a course bring it out to her sit down with her have a sip of wine and then uh uh go back in the kitchen make the next course oh wow yeah what did you think she did during the time when you were in there cooking uh well i told her to bring a friend with her because i told her that i'm gonna you know otherwise she's there for 20 minutes in between each course that's that well listen man that's a clever move look it worked yeah clearly yeah that's a that's interesting i mean i would imagine that that's probably one of the most difficult occupations to date in yeah um i i sacrificed a lot of um uh relationships prior to that one yeah i can only imagine