This Is TASTE

Annie Shi is the co-owner and beverage director of the West Village’s French-Italian restaurant King and its uptown Rockefeller Center sibling Jupiter. Now she’s opened a spot of her very own: Lei, a Chinese wine bar on the historic Doyers Street in the heart of Manhattan’s Chinatown. Lei is such a special and singular spot, and it’s great having Annie in the studio to talk about growing up in New...

Akhtar Nawab is today’s guest, and we dig into his influential career in New York City dining. He’s the chef-owner of the terrific restaurants Wayward Fare and Alta Calidad in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, and he previously ran the kitchen at La Esquina. Akhtar moved to New York in 1998 and worked under chef Tom Colicchio at Gramercy Tavern for several years. He was part of the opening staff of Craf...

Today on the show we are talking all about one of the world’s great foods: Maine Lobster, harvested directly from the cold waters of Maine, which give it its unique and sweet taste. First up is a great conversation with Ham El-Waylly. Ham is the chef-owner of the buzzy Brooklyn restaurant Strange Delight, and he tells us how Maine Lobster has been a big part of his culinary career. We talk about h...

Jess Eng is a food writer based in New York City. She’s a regular contributor here at TASTE alongside a great roster of publications like the Washington Post and the New York Times. It’s so fun to have her on the show to expand on some of her favorite stories, her latest experiments with home fermentation, and her recent reporting trip in Fuzhou, China. And, at the top of the show, it’s the return...

Matt was so excited to invite his friend Maurizio Leo to New York City to walk the streets and eat a lot of pizza. Maurizio is the author of The Perfect Loaf, an incredible cookbook and online community dedicated to all things sourdough. Matt and Maurizio visited seven pizzerias and, along with lead producer Clayton Gumbert, tasted their way through the city’s best (and maybe not best) slices. So...

Have you ever eaten prune whip pie? How about pickle cheesecake? Well, B. Dylan Hollis absolutely has. The popular TikTok and YouTube creator has racked up millions (and millions) of views by baking his way through vintage cookbooks that fit his “three Ws”: wacky, weird, and wonderful. Dylan is back with a new book, Baking Across America, which had him visiting dozens of states to track down recip...

Marc-Kwesi Farrell is the founder of Ten to One, a contemporary Caribbean rum brand. Born in Trinidad, he’s passionate about broadening and celebrating global perceptions of rum through premium blends and storytelling, including drawing from his experience as the youngest vice president in Starbucks history. Today on the show, Marc goes deep on rum distillation and culture, bringing on the legenda...

It’s the return of a special video podcast series: Food Writers Talking About Food Writing. It’s available on the TASTE YouTube channel, so make sure to subscribe and check out the video version of this podcast. Every couple of weeks, Matt invites a journalist to talk about some favorite recent food writing as well as their thoughts on the industry as a whole. On today’s episode, we have an amazin...

Jodi Moreno is a chef, culinary consultant, and food stylist based in Mexico City. She’s the author of the James Beard–nominated cookbook More with Less and a new cookbook, Simple Pleasures. It’s so fun to have Jodi on the show to talk about developing Simple Pleasures in Mexico City, the joys of summer salads, entertaining, and more. Also on the show is Tim Spector. He’s a professor of epidemiolo...

This is such a great conversation with Max Shapiro, co-host of the Air Jordan podcast and a guy who knows what he likes. We’ve enjoyed Max’s very active, and sometimes blessedly candid, Instagram reviews of restaurants around the world. While he’s based in Los Angeles, his recent trip to Spain, particularly a dozen stops at legendary restaurants and new places around San Sebastián, got us interest...

Leo Schaltz is a cofounder of BonBon, a Swedish candy store with five locations in New York City (six total) and a cult following on TikTok. The pick-and-mix bulk candy selection is entirely imported from Sweden, from salty licorice to sour strawberry cream skulls. Today on the show, Leo talks about growing BonBon’s candy empire, meeting viral demand, and building a candy library. And before that,...

Hailee Catalano is a trained chef, a former restaurant cook, a recipe developer, and one of our favorite voices in all of food. She is the author of a great new cookbook, By Heart. In this episode, we talk about her early years in Chicago, growing up in an Italian American household, and her later years working the line as a cook before launching her social media account on a lark. If you follow H...

Aimee France is a cake baker and internet personality based in Brooklyn. Her distinctly bumpy cakes and elaborate eating habits have won over many fans online, and it’s so fun to have her in the studio to go deep on her singular perspective on food, from her three-drink-minimum breakfasts to her unexpected sources of inspiration. And, at the top of the show, it’s the return of Three Things, where ...

Jerry Williams Jr. has performed under the pseudonym Swamp Dogg since 1970 and has been described as “one of the great cult figures of 20th century American music.” I would agree, and it was an absolute honor to welcome the R&B singer, songwriter, and record producer to the studio to talk about visiting restaurants on the road while touring in the Jim Crow South and working with iconic artists lik...

Norma Listman and Saqib Keval are the chefs and co-owners of Masala y Maíiz, a Mexico City restaurant rooted in a mestizaje exploration of culinary traditions from India, East Africa, and Mexico. It was great to have them in the studio to talk about creating a more equitable restaurant that puts their workers first, expanding into a new location, shooting an episode of Chef’s Table, and their favo...

We’ve all long been major fans of Ligaya Mishan, who last month was named co–chief restaurant critic at the New York Times. Working alongside Tejal Rao, Ligaya will be reviewing restaurants in New York City as well as around the country—and compiling the now iconic (and much-debated) 100 Best Restaurants in New York list. So what does it feel like to take over for Pete Wells? We went right to the...

Eddie Huang hardly needs an introduction, but here’s a shot. Eddie is a gifted writer, rap encyclopedia, film director, podcast host, best-selling author, and a pretty nice chef, too. Matt has known Eddie since his days coming up in New York City in the 2000s, running the iconic Baohaus and shaking up the food writing world in the process. Today he’s back living in New York after spending years in...

Today on the show, we have a great conversation with Austin Tedesco. Austin is head of business development at Substack, but we think of him even more as an infinitely curious restaurant superfan. He’s worked as a line cook and dines out with the frequency of our best critics. He writes about it all on his own Substack, Bangers & Jams, and we talk about his journey from NBA reporter to restaurant...

It was a lot of fun having Bill Oakley in the studio. Bill is a writer and “professional food enthusiast,” as he says. He’s also a former head writer for The Simpsons and has also written for The Cleveland Show and Portlandia and created the series Mission Hill. We loved talking with Bill about all kinds of food topics and his latest obsessions. We discuss writing food into memorable episodes of T...

Kelly Mencin is the pastry chef and co-owner of Radio Bakery, a cult-followed destination for filled croissants and focaccia sandwiches with two locations in Brooklyn. Radio’s offerings—and its lines—are legendary, and today on the show Kelly talks about opening Rolo’s, transitioning to Radio, and their continued efforts to try and meet demand. Get your tickets to our live event on July 23 at the...

Noor Murad is a Bahrain-born, New York–trained, London-based chef and the author of the wonderful new cookbook Lugma. You may know her recipes from her time running the Ottolenghi Test Kitchen and contributing to the books Falastin, Shelf Love, and Extra Good Things. Now it’s time to get to know Noor herself through this delicious collection of traditional and re-imagined dishes from Bahrain and b...

It was so much fun having Chris Morocco in the studio for a wide-ranging conversation about cooking, media, and his nearly two decades working at Condé Nast. Chris is the food director of Bon Appétit and Epicurious, overseeing the test kitchen team and the recipes they develop. In this episode, we go back to Chris’s early career working at Vogue before landing an assistant job in the BA Test Kitch...

Dan Giusti is the founder and CEO of Brigaid, an organization bringing restaurant chefs to school cafeterias and senior centers. Formerly the head chef at Noma, he’s now dedicated to providing delicious and healthy meals to 40 institutions across the country. This year alone, Brigaid expects to serve over a million meals. It’s so special to have Dan in the studio to talk about growing up on Italia...

Today’s episode is really special: an eating and drinking survey of the wonderful city of Portland, Oregon. Matt visited recently and shares all his dining experiences, which span regional Thai, tasting menus, incredible pour-over coffee, and some ’90s nostalgia. He also catches up with two legendary Portland chefs who share why their city is one of the nation’s best. First up is Gabriel Rucker. H...

Rebecca Firkser is a writer, recipe developer, and food stylist based in Brooklyn. Her debut cookbook, Galette!, celebrates the highly riffable, always buttery pleasures of free-form tarts. In this episode, Rebecca and Aliza go deep on developing foolproof pastry recipes for nervous bakers like me, making a debut cookbook after years of working on others, and more.  Also on the show, Matt catches...