back to indexAnya Fernald: Regenerative Farming and the Art of Cooking Meat | Lex Fridman Podcast #203
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The following is a conversation with Anya Fernald,
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cofounder of Belcampo Farms,
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that was founded with the purpose to create meat
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that's good for people, the planet, and the animals,
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specifically treating their animals as ethically as possible.
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In this, she sought to revolutionize the meat industry
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from the inside out.
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She's also a scholar and practitioner
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of regenerative agriculture,
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and she's a chef who has appeared many times
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as a judge on Iron Chef.
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Plus, she has one of my favorite food related Instagrams.
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On top of that, she's also a longtime friend
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of Andrew Huberman, which is how we first got connected.
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Quick mention of our sponsors,
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Gala Games, Athletic Greens, Four Sigmatic,
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Check them out in the description to support this podcast.
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As a side note, let me say that I got the chance to visit
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and spend a few days with Anya
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at Belcampo Farms in Northern California.
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I met many animals there, from cows to pigs,
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and saw the amazing land on which they grazed.
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I butchered meat, I watched Anya cook many amazing meals,
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I ate raw meat and cooked meat,
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and spent long hours at the bonfire talking with friends
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and listening to the sounds of nature.
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I hiked, swam in a cold mountain lake,
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and slept in a tent underneath the stars.
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It was an amazing eye opening experience,
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especially in my first ever visit to a slaughterhouse.
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The term slaughterhouse is haunting in itself.
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The animals I met lived a great life,
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but in the end, they were slaughtered,
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in the most ethical way possible,
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but slaughtered nevertheless.
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Seeing animals with whom just the day before
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I made a connection be converted to meat
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that I then consumed was deeply honest to me.
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This ethical farm, Belcampo,
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represents less than 1% of animals raised
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in the United States.
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The rest is factory farmed.
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I could not escape the thought
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of the 40 to 50 billion animals worldwide
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raised in terrible conditions on these factory farms.
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I've spent most of my life thinking about
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and being in contact with human suffering,
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but the landscape of suffering
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in the minds of conscious beings
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is much larger than humans.
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I must admit that I still am haunted
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by human suffering more than animal suffering.
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Perhaps I will one day see the wrong
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in me drawing such a line.
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Either way, the visit to Belcampo Farms
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made me realize that I have not thought deeply enough
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about the ethics of my choices
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and the choices of human civilization
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with respect to animals.
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And more importantly, I have not thought
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or learned enough about large scale solutions
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to alleviate animal suffering.
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Belcampo is paving the way on this
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and is the reason I wanted to show my support
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for their and Anya's efforts in regenerative farming
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and ethical treatment of animals.
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This is the Lex Friedman podcast
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and here is my conversation with Anya Fernald.
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If you're watching the video version of this
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and are asking yourself why we're in nature right now,
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there's actually a beautiful mountain in the background.
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There's an incredible vast landscape.
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We're sitting behind a table and nevertheless,
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I'm wearing a suit and tie amidst nature.
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We're at the beautiful Belcampo Farms.
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We're going to talk about that,
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this incredible place you have here,
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but you cooked some meat yesterday.
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It tasted delicious.
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So I'd love to talk about just the science
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and art of cooking first.
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You as a chef, when you think of cooking,
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is it a science or is it an art?
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Art and service together, probably.
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Art to me because it's about creating something of beauty
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and being responsive and creating something
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that's expression of creativity and love.
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Cooking also has a very strong element of service
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and it doesn't mean necessarily service to another person,
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but like service to health, wellness, environment.
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There's an element of supporting through food
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in how I approach cooking.
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So it's bigger than just like how the ingredients
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come together to form a taste.
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It's the whole pipeline.
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Like the fact that there's a lot of work
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that went into bringing the ingredients together
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and then giving you the ability to make the meal
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and then who gets to consume the meal and the whole thing.
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And you see that as service as opposed to just the taste.
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Yeah, I also think of food as one of the key ways
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that we interact with our environment, right?
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It's the part of our environment
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that goes inside us most visibly, right?
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Of course, we interact with our environment.
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We could have skin creams that have certain things in them
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or our clothes can then be absorbed.
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There's things in the air.
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There's our water and there's food, right?
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It's like how we're engaging in the world.
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Physiologically, it's the most significant way
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we engage in our environment.
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We're extracting resources, calories, energy
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from the environment in various ways
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in order to preserve our bodies.
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There's also so many feedback loops
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that I don't think we know the beginning of
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that our bodies are picking up on around nutrients,
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available nutrients, immune response.
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Like there's deep levels of sensory evaluation
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that lead to health and alertness and wellness.
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You hear about this a lot with babies that, you know,
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if there's a risk of an infection
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that a mom's breast milk will help the baby
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develop a resistance, like there's this way
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that our bodies can tune into health
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and can't extrapolate from that in any specific way,
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but think about that as an example of the many ways
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in which our bodies are reading available nutrients and food
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to signal other aspects of wellness and health.
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That said, the final product of cooking is,
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when done well, is really delicious.
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And what we ate yesterday was really delicious.
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So that aspect of it, bringing the ingredients together
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in a way that tastes delicious,
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do you see that as a science or art?
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That's the art of it.
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I mean, the art is like creating temptation
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and indulgence and giving people pause,
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you know, like creating experience that's like so sensual.
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And like, I love that about when I make something
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really simple and beautiful and delicious
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the way that, like there's that moment of silence
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And that to me is the moment of art, like appreciation.
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What about the buildup?
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I mean, we got to watch you make the stuff over a fire.
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So the calmness of the air, I mean, that's an experience.
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We don't often get to see that experience of the preparation.
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It's the anticipation, like you said.
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Maybe that's the most delicious part of a meal
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is the anticipation of it.
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That's something that I'm glad you bring up
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because it's an element that with eating so many
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of our meals, like out of a bag and you know,
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the instance where you start to eat the meals
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when the delivery shows up and you might smell something
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when you open the bag, right?
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And no judgment on that.
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That's something I do too, right?
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But that does take away a whole element
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of surprise and delight.
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And also I think of your body's ability to prepare for it.
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You know, you think about our most common memories
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of childhood for those of us who grew up in homes
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with parents who cooked is smell of things cooking.
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And it's not the eating of it.
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It's the smell of things cooking.
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So why is that so memorable?
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It's an anticipatory piece of food.
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That's what you remember about your experiences of food
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is the moment of like sweet anticipation
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of this great sensual experience.
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It's gonna be really gratifying on these emotional
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and physical levels.
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So I think we're also resonating on those memories
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because it's like, it's an experience of food
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where the sensuality of it is kind of extended.
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So it's a long kind of arc of buildup
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and then you're eating it and it's amazing.
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Then you're enjoying it and your body feels good.
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So all those pieces together,
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it's a much more memorable experience
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than just grabbing the cookie out of a bag, right?
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So look at our own and just revisit in your mind
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like the memories of food, the most compelling ones.
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It's the smell and then the experience
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and then sometimes how one felt, right?
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Yeah, and the people involved with the smell.
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So like somehow it's all tied in together
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whether it's family or people close to you
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or even if it's just chefs.
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There's something about the personality of the human
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involved in making the food
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that kind of sticks with you in the memory.
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And for me, I recently did a 72 hour fast
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and there's a kind of sadness after you eat
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I think the most delicious part was the,
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I went to the grocery store and just actually walking around
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and looking at food with like everything looked delicious.
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Even like the crappiest stuff looked delicious
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and I missed that.
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I really enjoyed that anticipation
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and then I picked out the meal.
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I went home and I cooked it
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and the whole thing took, I don't know,
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maybe two, three hours, like the whole process.
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And that was the most delicious part
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and the first taste of course.
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And then after it was over, there's a bit of a sadness
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because the part I remember is the buildup, the anticipation
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and then once you eat, it's over.
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We kind of focus on the destination
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but it's the whole journey.
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The whole like, even if you go to a restaurant,
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it's the conversations leading up to the meal
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and the first taste of the meal.
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That's where the joy is.
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And if you get to watch the making of that meal,
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that's incredible.
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That's where the smell, the visual,
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how the ingredients come together
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and especially as we were looking over the fire,
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like watching it, the fire play with the raw meat
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and over time bring out the colors, bring out the,
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I don't know, like you can visually associate the flavor,
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you know, how it becomes a little bit burnt on the outside,
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you know, it has a crispiness to it,
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it starts to gain that crispiness
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and immediately your past memories
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of the delicious crispiness of various foods you've eaten
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are somehow mapped into your,
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immediately you start to taste it visually.
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I don't know, yeah, that experience is magical.
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It's, and of course, maybe it's the Russian thing
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but I'm almost like saddened when it's over.
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I think fasting is gaining in popularity
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because we're having to relearn the importance
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of being hungry in anticipation and delight.
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We have such a fear of hunger
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and that's really functional in evolution, right?
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But we have this deep fear of hunger
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and part of the great American experience has been
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that we don't have to be afraid of hunger at all
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because there's food everywhere and it's really cheap.
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In all that abundance, we've lost this edge of hunger
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and we don't let ourselves get hungry.
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And that's one thing that I learned
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in part of my journey as a cook and chef has been,
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you know, moving abroad was the first time
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when I lived out of the US,
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was the first time that I regularly experienced hunger
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because the time between meals was really long
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and that was just what everybody did.
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And so I was hungry for two hours before lunch.
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And that was the first time in my life
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that there hadn't just been readily available snacks.
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So I wonder if the intermittent fasting
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and part of the popularity around it,
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I'm sure there's all these amazing metabolic things
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that are happening, but also people might also feel better
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because they're really anticipating and enjoying food.
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And then if you look at the feelings of fullness,
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there's a really interesting thing that happens
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when you cook and your sense of fullness,
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which is if you cook and you're hungry,
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the experience of being around the food,
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smelling it, touching it, sampling it,
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you'll take your hunger down by 40%.
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And this is my own observation.
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But as, I mean, we've all had the experience
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of cooking Thanksgiving and the cook
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never kind of wants to eat that much Thanksgiving.
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That's an extreme experience.
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But when you really dive in and you're cooking
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for a few hours and you're smelling
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and smelling and smelling,
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it totally changes your threshold of satiety and fullness
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because of other sensory things that are happening.
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And for those of us looking to maintain weight
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and something to consider in this is that cooking
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is also part of what your appetite,
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when you're hungry, what are you hungry for, right?
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So we tend to think about calories, but when you're hungry,
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you might also be hungrier for a wider range of things.
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And it might be smells, it might be stopping.
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There's other elements and that's something,
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I think as a cook, that it's powerful to explore
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and be with and observe how your hunger changes
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when you're cooking.
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Well, let me ask the romantic question.
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When did you first fall in love with cooking?
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Me falling in love with cooking
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was about solving a problem in my family.
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And it had to do with my mom feeling very anxious
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about cooking and overwhelmed frequently
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when it came to meals.
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And I'm naturally very good at juggling a lot of things.
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And it was just something I could dive in and help
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and help my dad, who I'm very, very close to.
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So it was a very functional role where I would see
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this kind of crescendo of anxiety around meal times
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as a kid and would be able to dive in and solve things.
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And I also loved women who cooked.
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Like my father's mother was a great cook.
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She was, I remember her telling me as a kid,
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I was asking her about church and why she went to church.
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And she's like, I mostly go to church
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because I get to cook for the potlucks.
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And so there was an openness around that,
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but she just loved to cook for people
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and there was this real tenderness
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and expression of that love.
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So seeing women in my life who had this real tenderness
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and love that they shared through food
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and then also being able in my own home
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to kind of pitch in and add value
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and help my mom and dad was really powerful for me.
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Cause I felt like I had a superpower.
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I felt like, oh man, I just made this stressful thing
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It's kind of interesting.
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I don't know if you can comment on,
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especially for me growing up in Russia,
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it's probably true in a lot of cultures,
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maybe every culture.
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That food, and especially like in a family,
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the mother that cooks is the source of love
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and like ties the family together.
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It creates events where everyone comes together.
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It's one of the only chances of togetherness.
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The thing that bonds a family is like dinner
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or food, eating together.
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And I don't know what to do with that.
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It ties up with like dieting and so on.
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When I was on stricter diets,
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especially competing and cutting weight and stuff,
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it felt like I was almost like losing opportunity
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to connect with friends and family.
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It's almost like cultures,
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we cannot fully experience love and family without eating.
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And on the flip side of that,
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eating enables us to experience love and family.
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I don't know what to do with that.
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Cause there's lots of layers around kind of gender roles
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and families changing and things.
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I'd say I agree around the alienation
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and I've done carnivore diet
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and I've tried some of these extreme protocols.
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And I too, I suffered from loneliness.
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It was like doing carnivore
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and not being able to eat what my kids ate
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and talk about it at the same time.
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Those pieces are real.
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And I wonder with all of these diets,
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if that structure is actually helping
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or just taking away from people's
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kind of sensual understanding.
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But I think that there's some rigor
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around that that helps people discover
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what's good for them by eliminating
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and then growing towards more intuitive food
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is a good evolution from that base.
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I love to cook for people.
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I love to pay attention to their way of being
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and read what they'd like to eat.
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And it's my purest way of love.
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And that's for everybody in my life.
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I actually love to cook for people I love.
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I would struggle to be putting out food all the time.
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It's like something for me, it's a real act of caretaking.
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So I definitely have that in my makeup.
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And I definitely notice in times of real stress,
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that's the piece that drops off.
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And it's like, if I'm unable to care for myself,
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I have a hard time cooking.
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So for me, it's very emotional.
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It's very connected to love.
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And individualistic.
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So like focused on the particular individual.
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It's almost like a journey of understanding
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what that person is excited about
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in the landscape of flavors.
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Like figuring that person out, what they like,
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what they love to eat.
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Yeah, I see cooking from, I mostly cook for myself.
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So I see that as almost, this is gonna be like
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the worst term, but like an act of self love.
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This is gonna be clipped out.
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But that like, it's almost an exploration
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of like what brings me joy.
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And it's surprising, because I usually don't share,
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because the things that bring me joy
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are the simplest ingredients.
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Like I'm one of those people,
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I don't know if you can psychoanalyze me,
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because you also like basic ingredients.
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I like a single ingredient to ingredients,
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because I feel like I can deeply appreciate
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the particular ingredient then.
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I get easily distracted.
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You know, people who are really good listening to music,
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they can hear a piece of music,
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and in their mind, extract the different layers,
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and enjoy different layers at a time.
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Like the bass, the drums, the different layering
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of the piano, the beats, and all that kind of stuff.
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That's what it means to truly enjoy music,
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to listen to a piece over and over.
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Like almost like as a scholar.
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In that same way for food, I just can't do more
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than like three, because then it's just,
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I have to give in to the chaos of it, I guess.
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But when it's just a basic ingredient,
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like just meat, or just a vegetable, like basic grilled
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without sauces, without any of that,
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that I've discovered is what brings me a lot of joy.
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But that's boring to a lot of people.
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So I usually have to be kind of private about that joy.
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So, but that's mine, so yeah, I figured that out.
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I guess as a chef, you have to figure that out
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about everybody that you care for.
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Well, also for you, you're very interested in things,
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and interested in things being done well
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and appreciating them.
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So the single ingredient also allows you to control
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for perfection in cooking that,
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which is probably really appealing to you.
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And I think sometimes I see people also in the beginning
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of their journey of culinary trying to do too many things.
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So there's another piece too, that you'll notice,
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if you recall last night, I grilled us a salad,
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and then I did all those pieces separately.
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And that's something in general to be really attentive of
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when you're building flavor,
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to make sure you pay attention to every piece separately.
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The idea that you can, okay,
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with a soup or something or a stew, there's workarounds,
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but like to make a great dish
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that's got four or five vegetables in it,
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cook them all separately to their optimal deliciousness
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and then combine them.
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So that's another way to approach that,
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is that you may also be able to look
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at the different ingredients separately
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and still have that sense of understanding of it.
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But there's too often that we're layering together
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like four or five things and then cooking them all at once
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and then surprise that it's not delicious.
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Cause you can't really optimize on multiple variables
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at the same time for peak awesomeness.
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And that's actually, the number one way you see this
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is roasting a whole chicken, which is a really difficult,
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it's the simplest dish, but it's very difficult
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because you have the breast meat, which is bigger chunks.
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You have the thighs and drums,
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which are smaller and they cook slower.
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To optimize that and pay attention to it
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and do it all right,
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you're actually solving for different outcomes.
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So there's one example, but oftentimes food
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is less delicious with multiple ingredients at the start
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because we're not able to pay attention
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to how each one needs to end up.
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So there's a way to parse that apart
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and achieve a better outcome.
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I don't know if you've seen Jiro Dreams of Sushi.
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It's a documentary about, yeah.
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So there's an obsession that that particular,
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first of all, set of humans,
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but also the particular cuisine
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that focused on the basics of the ingredients.
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What do you think of that kind of trying to achieve mastery
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through repeating the making of the same meal
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over and over and over for like decades?
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Like, do you find beauty in that journey towards mastery
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or do you think it should be always an exploration
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to where you're always trying things,
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you're always kind of injecting new flavors,
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new experiences, all that kind of stuff?
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I think you have to decide on a palette.
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You know, if we're talking about an art,
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it's equivalent to saying, am I a sculptor or a painter?
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That, the sushi lexicon thing,
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that's a very, very narrow, small canvas
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that you're painting on.
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And that is a beautiful road, right?
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There's a beauty and a perfection to that.
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It's like, I mean, there's many things culturally
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around that that you could extrapolate
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for specifically for Japan.
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But I encourage people on the journey in food
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to choose like kind of a language
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that they're working within.
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And if you wanna step out of that occasionally
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and have one or two dishes,
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but if you wanna get mastery with food,
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you probably aren't gonna be able to get more than say,
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20 ingredients that you use regularly
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that you really understand.
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And so we often see, you know, I see the American pantry,
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it's got tons of sauces and tons of spices
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and tons of spice blends.
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And then really people only use just a couple of things.
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And the idea that you can sort of splash out
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and do Korean one night and then tacos the next night,
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you can absolutely, but to get in a regular cadence
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of specific ingredients,
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you're probably gonna get more mastery with that sooner.
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And I think as much as you can do
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to get an understanding of the basics around salt and acid
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and understand your palette,
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like for me, it's lemon and usually sherry vinegar, right?
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So that's my acid palette.
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And my fat palates, you know, suet and butter, olive oil.
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So you can sort of choose your language,
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what you're painting with,
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but I wouldn't splash out and say, do I use sesame oil?
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Yeah, every once in a while,
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but that's not part of my base palette, right?
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Can you say again what your fat palette is?
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It'd be butter, suet and olive oil.
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And olive oil, so not, why olive oil?
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Is it your roots in Italy?
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I like the flavor for finish
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because of the bitterness that it adds.
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So I like the bitter and acid contrast on meat
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and vegetables, which is mostly what I eat.
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And so I love that way that the bitterness
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and astringency complements
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and allows the flavors to come out.
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What do you think about coconut oil?
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I recently discovered that there's a, I don't know,
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there's a sweetness or there's something to it
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that I really enjoy, maybe because it's new.
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It's good with heat.
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And I really love it for some reason.
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As a chef, do you ever try it?
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What do you think about it?
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I like it in coffee.
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I like it as a treat a little bit.
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I find the flavor a little bit challenging in foods.
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I also find that it's difficult
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on the quality of that ingredient.
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So I've found often that I buy a high quality coconut oil
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and there's rancidity in it.
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And I don't totally know why.
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I think it's just the cold chain
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and how that product's packaged.
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So I've had some issues with product quality in that.
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But for me, it's a little bit too much sweetness
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in my foods, but then again,
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I don't cook in like a Southeast Asian palette.
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I try to not have much sweetness in my foods in general.
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So I, just because of the palette that I like to cook with.
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So for me, coconut's got a little bit too much
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of those high notes and earthiness,
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which is a nice combination, but it's more like a treat.
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Yeah, it is almost like a treat.
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It has a flavor of its own that almost stands on its own.
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Like I could probably just eat coconut.
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That's probably the only oil I could enjoy by itself.
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It sounds weird to say,
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but it feels like fat is often a thing
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that enriches the flavor of something else.
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Coconut can almost stand on its own.
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You might also be responding to that.
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It's a complex flavor.
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So there's also, there's an analogous,
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you know, if you look at butter, for example,
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a lot of the butter that we eat in the US
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is just sweet cream butter.
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It's not cultured.
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If you explore like a cultured fermented butter,
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maybe a grass milk, grass fed and finished butter,
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you're gonna get a ton more complexity.
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And so you may also just be responding
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to having fats with more flavor,
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which is the journey in the US
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has been towards refined foods that are very neutral.
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And then you have to combine more of them
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to make things taste like things.
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And so if you're coming from a background
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of using mostly just generic butter
link |
or let's say canola oil to cook with,
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those are very neutral oils.
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So you can also take some of your favorite fats
link |
and look for versions of them that are more flavorful.
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I mean, I love olive oil as a treat in a spoon.
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Like a good California extra virgin olive oil.
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I'll just like have it as,
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I'll eat a piece of butter as a treat.
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That's like, or butter with salt on it.
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Like good fats can, all of them can be,
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if they're minimally processed
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and they're fabulous and it's so delicious, right?
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But there are things that you have to like look for
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a version of them that's got that full palette of flavor.
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Well, for me also the flavors are inextricably tied
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to the memories I've had with those flavors.
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So for better or worse,
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back when I used to eat a lot of ice cream,
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I for some reason had a lot of pleasant experience
link |
with coconut ice cream.
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So that particular flavor just permeates
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throughout my life now.
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Like I'm stuck with it for better or worse
link |
as a flavor that brings up pleasant memories.
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And as I have a few such flavors,
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I have such relationship with all kinds of meat too.
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Like it's just so many pleasant memories and that's it.
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Like you're almost tasting the memories.
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And that there's no way to separate the flavor
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from the memories, I suppose.
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And that's a powerful thing.
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What's your favorite meal to cook?
link |
I'll roast a couple of chickens
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and then I'll poach them, like I'll boil them
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and let it cool down.
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It's a complicated one.
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I'll let them cool down.
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I'll pull all the meat off, put the bones back into the pot
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and then cook that for like three or four hours
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and then add in like shiitake mushrooms
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and all the chicken meat.
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And I'll throw in a bottle of white wine
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into the stock as well, a bunch of thyme and garlic.
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And I love it because it's the way the house smells.
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It's very laborious.
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It's soothing for me to spend time picking apart meat
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and chopping things up.
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There's like a lot of manuality around it.
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So I'd say from a personal, like, I mean,
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I love grilling a steak and doing those things as well,
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but there's something about making a stock from scratch
link |
and the way it smells, the way I feel,
link |
the time it takes, the kind of checking in on it
link |
that I really, really love.
link |
There's many things I love to make
link |
that I don't even love to eat.
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I think you see this a lot in like baking and bakers,
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people who bake a ton and they love the process of it,
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even if they don't eat that many baked goods.
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So anything for me that's really like enjoyable
link |
is typically things like making cinnamon buns.
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I don't eat very many cinnamon buns,
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but I love making them because it takes all the sort
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of like futzing around and taking your time and watching it
link |
and the way it smells, the way the house smells.
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All of that stuff is like,
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it's like almost like a meditative exercise for me.
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Is there a science, is there an art to cooking meat well
link |
and the different kinds of meats?
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Is there something you can convert it towards
link |
in to say ideas, how to bring out the best of it
link |
out of what particular meat,
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whatever steak we're talking about,
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whatever beef we're talking about?
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Is there something that can be said?
link |
The basic approach to cooking any type of meat
link |
beyond the artistry of it is pretty scientific.
link |
And it's what type of muscle is it in the animal
link |
and what's the surface area to volume ratio?
link |
Okay, so let's look at those two questions.
link |
So the first piece is what's the type of muscle
link |
What's the functionality?
link |
You don't necessarily need to know that to evaluate it,
link |
but you need to understand, is it a tender muscle
link |
that's not used very frequently in the animal?
link |
Or is it a big load bearing muscle
link |
that gets a lot of action, like the cheek, right?
link |
Or the shin or those pieces?
link |
The muscles like those along the spinal cord
link |
that make up rib eyes and New York steaks and things,
link |
those aren't very exercised.
link |
They're right next to the spinal cord.
link |
Spinal cord's doing most of the work there.
link |
They're kind of like stabilizing muscles
link |
around this big functional piece of skeletal structure
link |
Other muscles, like the ones around the diaphragm
link |
with the flat iron steaks and skirt steaks and things,
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those are really functional muscles
link |
that are doing a ton and moving.
link |
And if they're moving a lot, what happens?
link |
Well, functionally, they've got lots of muscle sheaths
link |
because muscles that move frequently
link |
have to do a lot of like complex contraction.
link |
That's why there's, in the cheek, for example,
link |
there's tons of visible fiber
link |
of like collagenous connective tissue.
link |
That connective tissue is everything in how the meat cooks
link |
because connective tissue doesn't respond to high heat
link |
with becoming more tender.
link |
Muscles do, right?
link |
They can get a sear on them.
link |
You can cut them and eat them.
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The collagenous tissue will glom up and get really tough.
link |
So you either have to liquefy it
link |
with really low, slow heat with moisture, right?
link |
Or you have to barely cook it.
link |
And so that's the major piece.
link |
So that's the question of like,
link |
why wouldn't you just throw a brisket on the grill?
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It's not about the fat.
link |
You can cut the fat out.
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The reason you're not gonna throw a brisket on the grill
link |
and cook it hot and fast
link |
is it's got too much collagenous connective tissue in it.
link |
Those are these giant muscles that have all this collagen
link |
and these fibers and tendons in them effectively.
link |
So you're never gonna be able to just cook that up
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So that's the first piece.
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It's like, where's this muscle in the architecture
link |
And then what does that mean for what's going on
link |
And that's actually more important than fat content.
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We get really kind of,
link |
we pay a lot of attention to fat content in muscles.
link |
You can make a steak tender
link |
if it doesn't have a ton of fat in it.
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It actually has more to do if there's collagenous
link |
and connective tissue in it.
link |
That's fascinating.
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I never even thought about that.
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I just, I thought it kind of universal.
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I mean, it adds to the texture of the meat,
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the chewiness of the meat.
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But you're saying it's also adds to how the meat is cooked.
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How heat, how it reacts to heat,
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how the entirety of the meat reacts to heat.
link |
And the fat is not as important to that as the collagen.
link |
The fat will make the flavor more delicious, right?
link |
Like it'll add unctuousness and mouthfeel
link |
and things like that.
link |
But all the connective tissue in meat
link |
and in some of the cuts,
link |
like that we ate at a skirt steak last night,
link |
you could see a web of that collagen sheath on the outside.
link |
On a ribeye, that same collagen sheath is this big.
link |
It goes around the outside, okay?
link |
Cause it's just that muscle, there's one large muscle fiber.
link |
So that specific, it's a myelin sheath, right?
link |
That material needs moisture
link |
and low and slow heat to become tender.
link |
The other side of that is that when it becomes tender,
link |
it liquefies and it adds all this beautiful
link |
gelatinous consistency.
link |
That's what bone broth is.
link |
That's why like a slow cooked pork shoulder is so delicious.
link |
It's not that it's full of all that fat.
link |
That fat's also great.
link |
But a lot of that mouthfeel comes from that really
link |
beautiful dissolved collagen.
link |
So when you're looking at like,
link |
how do I understand how I'm gonna cook a piece of meat?
link |
That first fork in the road is,
link |
how is this gonna respond to heat?
link |
And what's the appropriate cooking technique?
link |
Then the second piece is that surface area to volume ratio.
link |
And that's important because the heat is gonna impact
link |
the meat through the surfaces of the meat
link |
that are in contact with the heat.
link |
So if I have a steak that's three inches thick,
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I'm gonna cook it extremely differently from a steak
link |
that's a half inch thick or three quarters of an inch thick.
link |
And that's the major, and that's the truth.
link |
If I have a piece of pork shoulder that's cut into cubes
link |
versus having a whole pork shoulder,
link |
that surface area to volume ratio,
link |
that's gonna totally change how I cook it.
link |
And same things like pot roast and a beef stew
link |
would be the same cut of meat, right?
link |
But how I cook them is gonna change
link |
based on the surface area to volume.
link |
Because you've gotta let moisture and heat
link |
work its way into the center of the meat.
link |
And that's gonna be determined by the amount of surface
link |
of the meat that's in contact with whatever cooking liquid
link |
or heat you've got.
link |
Is there different sources of heat to play with?
link |
Like a big flame versus a small,
link |
or maybe even like almost no flame,
link |
like over coals, all that kind of stuff.
link |
Is there some science to the source of heat
link |
in how it plays with the meat?
link |
Well, there's indirect heat and direct heat.
link |
And that really is mostly about temperature
link |
in more than actual, I mean, smoke is important as well
link |
that can permeate, but really the smoke
link |
doesn't go into the center of most cuts that you barbecue.
link |
It'll come in like the smoke ring.
link |
It's a maximum like half an inch on the outside,
link |
maybe a little bit deeper on a really long, slow cook.
link |
So they, but the smoke, that does create a ton of flavor
link |
on the surface of the meat.
link |
But that's, so the indirect allows you to have
link |
smoke contacting it and then a very,
link |
very low and slow heat.
link |
And what that does is indirect heat will be low
link |
and slow enough that the center of the meat will get warm
link |
at the same time as the exterior of the meat.
link |
And it'll all cook equally and all get equally tender.
link |
If you go very hot and fast,
link |
you risk the interior of the meat not getting right.
link |
You kind of create a shell on the, on it.
link |
And you slow down the interior of the meat,
link |
which you actually want to do with something
link |
like a steak where you want to keep it rare on the inside.
link |
So it's really indirect versus direct.
link |
Then once you get into direct heat, right,
link |
look at in that category, there's wood, charcoal, gas,
link |
right, that's about it.
link |
And those are meaningfully different.
link |
They're meaningfully different.
link |
Charcoal and wood, that's more of,
link |
there's more poetry and wood.
link |
There's a little bit more flavor,
link |
not functionally very different,
link |
but gas versus charcoal wood is very different.
link |
And that's because of the actual scent of the,
link |
of the cook, right, the scent of the flavor.
link |
And then there's a,
link |
I think an evenness of heat distribution
link |
that comes off of charcoal that's different from gas,
link |
because no matter how awesome your gas grill is,
link |
you do have hotter and cooler spots.
link |
So gas grills are typically,
link |
you can kind of control for that
link |
if you just are going really hot and fast,
link |
which is why gas grills are fine
link |
if you're just like throwing that steak on,
link |
get a hard sear on it, those burgers put a crust on it.
link |
Gas is fabulous for that.
link |
When you're doing things that do better
link |
with a low and slow cook,
link |
like let's say a whole tenderloin or chicken thigh,
link |
that's going to be a little bit less elegant on gas
link |
than on charcoal versus wood.
link |
So when you have more,
link |
more kind of nuance in the low, slow cook
link |
over the natural fuels.
link |
Talking about like smoke and flame and charcoal versus gas,
link |
it also adds to the experience and the smell
link |
and the whole thing of the cooking,
link |
like versus just like the taste it creates.
link |
There's a certain experience too,
link |
like when there's a bit of smoke,
link |
maybe I don't know what the chemistry of it is,
link |
but I feel like with smoke,
link |
the smell is distributed more effectively.
link |
I don't know if that's true,
link |
but there's a smell and a visual aspect to the experience
link |
that's almost enriched with a bit of smoke
link |
or like an open flame.
link |
Like if you can see the flame, there's magic to that.
link |
And it goes to the experience piece
link |
that we were talking about before.
link |
We were talking exactly about that,
link |
like the nuance and the beauty of like that long, slow cook
link |
and your house smelling like something.
link |
Why do people freak out about barbecue?
link |
Because you go in and it smells bomb.
link |
It smells so good.
link |
It smells like heaven, right?
link |
It smells fatty and delicious and the smells everywhere
link |
and everyone's smelling the same smell.
link |
So there's like this collective experience.
link |
That's, I mean, I think that's why barbecue
link |
is so sticky for people.
link |
It's like so yummy
link |
and you get this huge like anticipatory thing about it.
link |
It's like, cause it smells incredible.
link |
What was that incredible grill that we used yesterday?
link |
What is that about?
link |
That's called a Sea Island Forge.
link |
It's a wood fire grill that's inspired
link |
by like a South American style of cooking.
link |
So it's like, it's big.
link |
It has also the things with the crank.
link |
It allows you to control the distance from the flame.
link |
It's really key with the wood fire.
link |
So when we evolved from cooking over wood to charcoal,
link |
right, when that became more popular,
link |
the reason that we did that is that allowed us
link |
to skip the whole part of making our own charcoal, right?
link |
So when you're cooking over wood,
link |
all you're doing is making your own charcoal.
link |
You don't ever cook over wood with the red fire.
link |
Like we don't like throw a steak on
link |
when the flames are orange and leaping up
link |
because you're just gonna get, you know,
link |
carbons like char all over your meat.
link |
So you're, when you're cooking over wood,
link |
you first cook down the wood,
link |
you create the coal base, the natural coal base,
link |
and then you cook over that.
link |
So you saw yesterday, I built my fire,
link |
I let it burn down, added some fresh wood
link |
so I could reinforce my coals with new coals coming in.
link |
But then I was actually cooking over the embers.
link |
You shorten that cycle with charcoal, it's more efficient.
link |
But what you lose is that whole cycle of, you know,
link |
that really beautiful experience of smelling.
link |
Now, if you're cooking on a Traeger,
link |
you're gonna get awesome smoke smell.
link |
You know, like there's plenty of ways to do this.
link |
It doesn't always have to be wood fire.
link |
And I love all the different ways, right?
link |
But I really like the experience of the campfire.
link |
And I love that kind of just like sitting by it,
link |
building it, having to take the time.
link |
I like building the fire, going inside,
link |
preparing all my meats, bringing them out, cooking them.
link |
That whole experience start to finish
link |
is really just like something that it's my favorite.
link |
It's my favorite way to spend time, you know?
link |
So I think, and why is that?
link |
Is the food that different than cooking it
link |
in a more conventional grill?
link |
Probably not, you know, like in a pure experience.
link |
But I think the actual experience is super memorable
link |
because you are outside, you are still in your role.
link |
You're enjoying this, you know, you're just taking in,
link |
you're watching, you're anticipating.
link |
I love that whole experience.
link |
Does the origin of the meat itself make a difference?
link |
So we're here at Belcampo Farms
link |
and we'll, maybe you could talk about what your vision,
link |
your dream is in terms of like food,
link |
in terms of where food comes from,
link |
where meat comes from, but food broadly,
link |
and how that affects the entirety of the culinary journey.
link |
On the question of where does it come from
link |
and does that matter, I'd say the way that meat is raised
link |
is massively important for flavor and for how it cooks.
link |
I think most cooks who try cooking grass fed
link |
versus corn fed, that's the first moment
link |
where they realize that, right?
link |
Where corn fed meat cooks much more slowly,
link |
it's got bigger veins of fat that slow the heat transfer
link |
throughout the muscle of the animal,
link |
compared to grass fed, which is leaner,
link |
heat moves through it more quickly,
link |
those steaks will cook much, much faster.
link |
So there's very kind of technical reasons why,
link |
how meat is raised that we're aware of.
link |
And there's other things that I've noticed,
link |
like that slower growing poultry
link |
has a very, very different musculature and fiber to it
link |
than fast growing poultry, that's confinement animals.
link |
It's just, it has to do with the way
link |
that the muscles are built.
link |
They tend to be finer and thinner and more tender
link |
and a little bit more susceptible to heat.
link |
So the character of the meat's radically different.
link |
It's also much more flavorful
link |
when it's grown more naturally.
link |
And I think some of the reliance in the US
link |
on like sugary sauces and lots of salts
link |
and flavors and things like that's actually based
link |
on having the broadly available meat out there
link |
is pretty low on flavor.
link |
And so we're adding in a lot to compensate for that.
link |
So to your point of like enjoying things very simply
link |
and with like salt and nothing else,
link |
like the more flavorful that product is,
link |
I think the more people will find that enjoyable.
link |
Let's paint a vision.
link |
I mean, you're a visionary.
link |
You have a vision to have basically meat in every store
link |
that comes from a farm like Belcampo
link |
that's basically doing regenerative farming.
link |
How do we get there?
link |
It's about a network of smaller producers
link |
working together with shared values.
link |
And it's true that there's a limit on regenerative farming
link |
in that it requires more human knowledge.
link |
So regenerative farming is more difficult to scale
link |
in a single operation.
link |
It'd be really challenging to have a regenerative farm
link |
that was like 200,000 acres
link |
because of the amount of manpower needed to pay attention.
link |
Can you first, and I apologize to interrupt,
link |
but can you say what is regenerative farming?
link |
So if you're looking at scaling regenerative farming,
link |
it's a traditional system of agriculture.
link |
Regenerative farming is how we used to farm.
link |
We used to farm with an eye towards the longterm.
link |
You might be on the Friedman farm thinking about your heirs
link |
five generations from now farming that same land.
link |
Are you gonna leave that land nutritionally empty?
link |
No, it's a longterm thinking.
link |
Also in traditional ag, you don't have inputs.
link |
That are very convenient. You can put some chicken manure on,
link |
but you can't spray or dump something that massively
link |
increases the growing potential of the land.
link |
That was not available until the past 60 years.
link |
So regenerative agriculture is an approach to farming
link |
where you're increasing soil fertility through your farming.
link |
You increase soil fertility by feeding the soil.
link |
You feed the soil through carbon.
link |
That's why regenerative farming is better
link |
for the environment.
link |
It sequesters carbon and puts carbon into the soil.
link |
Now it's interesting.
link |
Plants need carbon and put it into the soil
link |
when they're going through growth.
link |
So if you have a beautiful field of grass
link |
that's just waving in the wind,
link |
that's where you're gonna get the most
link |
of the carbon that's going into the soil.
link |
That's not sequestering as much carbon
link |
as plants that have been damaged and are regrowing.
link |
Plants that have been damaged and are regrowing
link |
are repairing and they're doing that
link |
by drawing down carbon as one of the nutrients
link |
To damage the plants effectively,
link |
that's what we're doing with regenerative grazing.
link |
So the cows or, you know, lambs or whatever out there,
link |
they're eating and taking the grass down
link |
and that then cause a regrowth cycle
link |
that sequesters carbon.
link |
There's a limit to it.
link |
because if those plants are so damaged
link |
that they can't regrow,
link |
then it turns into a dirt patch
link |
and that doesn't sequester any carbon.
link |
So it's a balance.
link |
How do you find that balance?
link |
That has to do with like the frequency
link |
and the scale of the grazing essentially?
link |
And so you have to find the right balance
link |
and that connects to both the grass.
link |
I mean, is the ultimately the focus here
link |
is on the life cycle of whatever is grazing,
link |
whether it's cows or lambs or so on?
link |
That's why the scalability question.
link |
So all that stuff that I just talked about,
link |
like think about all the actions that that requires.
link |
Somebody's out there looking and paying attention
link |
and understanding how far the grass is,
link |
remembering what happened in that field last year.
link |
There's a huge human intelligence need
link |
and human kind of availability of attention.
link |
Now, industrial farming has done a great job
link |
at de skilling agriculture.
link |
Industrial farming has taken agriculture
link |
from being art science to being entry level employment.
link |
So that's the limiting factor on regen
link |
and that's why I think...
link |
It's a human intelligence piece.
link |
I don't know if you think about this kind of stuff.
link |
I mentioned to you offline
link |
that I spent a bit of time with some robots
link |
and Boston Dynamics.
link |
Do you think there's a way
link |
to use artificial intelligence to help?
link |
So data collection,
link |
so automating some of the things that makes humans special,
link |
make some of that decision,
link |
some of that memory that's then utilized,
link |
converges to knowledge to make decisions
link |
about the crops and so on.
link |
Is there a way AI can help?
link |
I mean, that would be incredible.
link |
That's one of the ingredients
link |
that could help with the regenerative farming.
link |
A number of discrete decision points
link |
that could completely be automated as well
link |
in order to supplement and work with somebody,
link |
like a farmer in managing it,
link |
about the performance on land.
link |
And a bit of that's being done right now
link |
with some aerial mapping,
link |
but that type of AI would be huge in this.
link |
I mean, there's estimates that if the damage
link |
and underutilized rangeland in the world
link |
was converted to regenerative agriculture
link |
somewhere between like 20 and 40% of the world's carbon
link |
could be sequestered.
link |
So there's a huge potential.
link |
The problem is cultural.
link |
We've like lost the generational thread of knowledge
link |
about how to do this.
link |
It's kind of been two generations
link |
that haven't farmed this way.
link |
Also the science around it is limited
link |
by the scale and longevity.
link |
So the data collection around regenerative farming
link |
is also limited by the fact it's kind of piecemeal.
link |
There's small operations that are doing it.
link |
They're learning and developing as they go,
link |
and they haven't been documenting it
link |
and doing it for too long.
link |
Is the ethical treatment of animals
link |
a part of regenerative farming?
link |
So in the way you do things at Belcampo,
link |
that's a huge part.
link |
Is that necessarily part of the life cycle?
link |
So like the things that you're trying to measure
link |
is like the way, like not damaging the land too much,
link |
make sure that the sort of the land
link |
is constantly healthy and is producing,
link |
and then the grazing process,
link |
and also the carbon piece,
link |
the fact that it's a carbon neutral or something like that.
link |
I mean, are all of those pieces of the regenerative farming
link |
or is this an extra part to your vision
link |
that you're thinking about?
link |
It's all implicit and regenerative.
link |
I call it out separately because we are certified humane,
link |
which is another layer of welfare
link |
that has to do with density and a couple other things.
link |
But regenerative, I mean, think about it.
link |
If you're a cow and you're in a regenerative operation
link |
where the whole life cycle of the pasture
link |
means that you only eat the top six inches of the grass,
link |
and then when there's whatever, a couple inches left,
link |
then that field is left dormant.
link |
That's a better experience, right?
link |
So just think about it kind of functionally that way.
link |
Well, grazing period is a better experience, right?
link |
And that's not what's done in,
link |
I mean, that's the grass fed piece, right?
link |
That's the other piece with certified organics, amazing.
link |
There's plenty of certifications
link |
that grass fed and finished is also great,
link |
but there are workarounds for those.
link |
You can have certified organic feedlots.
link |
You can have grass fed and finished,
link |
which is an animal fed a grass seed pellet.
link |
Those aren't things that we do here, right?
link |
And regenerative captures that.
link |
Because if you're, it's like anything,
link |
you're isolating these very specific certifications,
link |
it doesn't have a holistic approach.
link |
Regenerative though, unfortunately, isn't certified yet.
link |
We've gotten USDA approval to use that word
link |
based on our carbon sequestration data,
link |
but it's not a regulated term.
link |
So that's kind of the mix right now
link |
is to figure out how to document it.
link |
And it's not totally clear what it means
link |
like for pigs and chickens, which are omnivores.
link |
It's very clear for ruminants,
link |
which are animals that have a rumen that eat grass.
link |
For omnivores, which is like what we are,
link |
they eat primarily grain in farming operations,
link |
and that's a little bit more complex.
link |
So it's kind of a moving landscape,
link |
but regenerative as a word is the better definition
link |
of the whole life cycle approach
link |
of letting animals and nature work together.
link |
Is it true that it's possible to have a farm
link |
that doesn't produce, sort of is carbon neutral?
link |
We have been third party verified
link |
to be carbon impact negative.
link |
So Belcampo's 25,000 acres and the animals here,
link |
all of the carbon, including from our shipping
link |
on our mail order is all offset
link |
by the amount of grazing that's happening.
link |
Also that encompasses our partner farms.
link |
We buy a number of live animals in from other partner farms.
link |
That's their impacts also incorporated in that.
link |
I mean, first of all, that's incredible.
link |
And second of all, is that possible to scale?
link |
I don't see why it isn't.
link |
I mean, it's complex to scale,
link |
but I mean, we're putting people on the moon
link |
and you have a robotic dog.
link |
But that's less about scale, that's more about innovation.
link |
So like in many ways what Belcampo has done
link |
is innovative at a small scale.
link |
The question is whether that innovation can be scaled.
link |
That's where I feel like we in the industry need more help.
link |
You know, the AI piece, the intelligence,
link |
the thinking about ways to do things differently
link |
is where we need more support.
link |
And I think it's been a, you know,
link |
a kind of a swing in the past couple of years
link |
where it's like meat's a mess, it's terrible.
link |
So let's ditch meat and opt for these hyper process,
link |
you know, plant based solutions.
link |
And I am saying there's a way to make meat
link |
a part of the solution.
link |
And it's gonna mean eating less of it.
link |
It's gonna mean paying more for it.
link |
It's gonna mean that the farming systems
link |
are more complicated.
link |
It's not the easiest path,
link |
but I think in the long term it's the better path.
link |
And it's also better for human health.
link |
Can you comment on the certified humane piece?
link |
So how do you run a farm?
link |
Like what does it mean to raise an animal
link |
from the beginning of its life to the end of its life
link |
in a way that's ethical, that's humane?
link |
I think the first piece you need to just be comfortable with
link |
is that making an animal into meat, you know,
link |
is something that you're comfortable with.
link |
Cause I think that's the biggest question, right?
link |
And so certified humane actually goes all the way through
link |
the death of the animal,
link |
how it's killed and handled at processing.
link |
So I put that out there just to say,
link |
well, this is all about producing an animal to die for meat.
link |
And that's not necessarily,
link |
that's something people struggle with with the word humane.
link |
And I understand that.
link |
Like I have space and empathy for that.
link |
It's a complicated decision.
link |
And when you have to be comfortable with at the outset
link |
to say, this is an animal that's gonna die to feed me.
link |
Yeah, so we should pause on that
link |
cause I actually just the two days ago read a paper
link |
that argued that, you know,
link |
the killing of an animal period cannot be humane.
link |
So it's impossible.
link |
And so, and that's an argument just like you're saying
link |
we could make, but if we now on the table kind of
link |
take as a starting point, the idea that
link |
it's possible to kill an animal for food in an ethical way,
link |
if we take that as a starting point.
link |
So we won't argue about that.
link |
It is worth arguing about it elsewhere.
link |
And it probably will.
link |
I will probably talk to a few vegan folks
link |
and we'll talk about the vegan diet.
link |
I'm fascinated by it as well.
link |
So I'm torn in the whole thing.
link |
But if we just take that as a starting point,
link |
what then is an ethical humane way to treat an animal?
link |
I look at ethical humane animal treatment
link |
as the major phases of life.
link |
So conception, birth and mothering,
link |
diet, those are kind of the major touch points of life.
link |
So what we're looking at is evolutionary approach,
link |
which means is the animal eating
link |
what it evolved to eat primarily?
link |
Is the animal primarily outdoors,
link |
which is how all animals evolved,
link |
given when the climate's appropriate for it.
link |
There's certain times when you can't have animals
link |
fully outdoors, like here on our ranch,
link |
we have had issues with cold weather and things.
link |
But so if you have appropriate weather conditions,
link |
does the animal outdoors?
link |
Is the animal able to nurture and engage with its young?
link |
Those are the kind of key touch points,
link |
but it's really the birth of it.
link |
Let me start this one from the scratch.
link |
Okay, so when I'm looking at,
link |
or when I consider what's humane,
link |
setting aside the death part,
link |
I look at the evolutionary diet,
link |
access to the outdoors,
link |
and ideally spending the majority of its life outdoors,
link |
low density, so animals spread out,
link |
and engagement with young, social interactions,
link |
and that's all kind of simplistic.
link |
Social interaction is a cool one.
link |
I mean, I also read an article that like,
link |
cows, for example, have social, like they have friends.
link |
That's fascinating.
link |
I mean, that piece with the young,
link |
social interaction with young,
link |
social interaction with each other,
link |
that at a basic level,
link |
I'm sure that interaction is not as rich as humans,
link |
but that piece seems to be part of the humane picture.
link |
And you said also, just a quick comment,
link |
evolutionary diet, meaning the diet
link |
that they were evolved to have.
link |
And that's pretty simple.
link |
You can look at the physiology of the animal
link |
and figure that out.
link |
So ruminant species are lamb, goats, and beef,
link |
and they have five stomachs.
link |
They evolved eating really low calorie, high fiber foods.
link |
That's why they've got all the stomachs.
link |
They need a lot of processing.
link |
You or I were to eat grass, we die in a week, right?
link |
Our physiology can't handle it.
link |
Cows were built and evolved to eat this very low calorie,
link |
very high fiber, very low density food.
link |
And they walk around slowly,
link |
they're moving constantly and they're eating it.
link |
When we put them on a corn fed diet,
link |
that's the opposite of their evolutionary diet
link |
and their systems really struggle with it.
link |
Now, pigs and chickens are different.
link |
Pigs and chickens are omnivores
link |
and pigs will happily eat chickens, for example.
link |
Our pigs on the farm will hunt and kill rattlesnakes
link |
They enjoy all of it.
link |
They're omnivores.
link |
So that you often see,
link |
and I've seen people try to raise like a grass fed chicken
link |
and that doesn't exist.
link |
I mean, they need a higher, omnivores eat everything.
link |
They're what's called monogastric.
link |
They got one stomach
link |
and that one stomach needs higher density nutrients.
link |
So in the case of chicken,
link |
if you're to do, look back in American history
link |
and in the 1950s, it took,
link |
commercial chickens took like 54 weeks
link |
to come to full weight.
link |
Now it's two and a half weeks in confinement farming
link |
on our systems, it's like eight to 10 weeks typically.
link |
you have to give them some amount of nutrient density,
link |
but there's the idea that no grain,
link |
because that's a misinformation
link |
for any type of commercial operation,
link |
free range, regenerative, pastured, everything,
link |
you're gonna have to have a grain feed to get any type of,
link |
it's actually, I think for the case of chickens,
link |
unless you're in a place with like tons of natural seeds
link |
and grubs and worms and stuff to eat,
link |
really challenging for the chicken.
link |
So you gotta give them some high density,
link |
high calorie food different from that.
link |
That's the evolutionary diet is a really key thing.
link |
That's the fundamental thing for health.
link |
And it's also interesting
link |
because the evolutionary diet ties to human health.
link |
I've looked at the nutritional analysis
link |
on all of our products and it's,
link |
the evolutionary diet is for the case of beef and lamb
link |
gets their omega three to six ratios,
link |
the same as wild game.
link |
So it's not like beef is really radically different
link |
from elk, a ruminant species, right?
link |
If you feed beef an evolutionary diet,
link |
their nutritional profile is the same as wild meat.
link |
There's a wild ruminant.
link |
I got a chance to witness Neuralink,
link |
I don't know if you're familiar with that company,
link |
the brain computer interfaces.
link |
And they have, I got a chance to see in person
link |
just a bunch of pigs who had Neuralink chips implanted
link |
Those pigs are so happy with life.
link |
I don't know, I've never seen a happier animal.
link |
I mean, cause they get to eat,
link |
cause you were mentioning sort of diets and stuff.
link |
Pigs seem to love a lot of stuff.
link |
They're easily made to be happy.
link |
I don't know if you can comment on your thoughts
link |
of exploring the capacity of the pig mind
link |
through some of this testing with Neuralink,
link |
whether that's exciting to you,
link |
whether maybe on the humane side,
link |
it's a little bit concerning,
link |
if there's something to be said on sort of like,
link |
yeah, I don't know if it's even the ethical side,
link |
but just because of your connection to meat
link |
and to nature and understanding these living beings.
link |
Well, pigs are incredibly intelligent.
link |
So I'm not surprised that they're a subject matter
link |
They're smarter than dogs
link |
and they're empathetic and emotional.
link |
And we'll go look at our pigs afterwards and see,
link |
but they're kind of like joyful and exuberant
link |
when they're in good health.
link |
And so that makes sense.
link |
I'm interested and open.
link |
I feel that the kind of bleeding edge agriculture movement
link |
that I'm on the edge of in some ways,
link |
we're a larger operator,
link |
but we as a movement have to get into the game.
link |
We have to move forward in a way that allows us to scale
link |
if we wanna be viable.
link |
So I think there has to be openness to how that can happen.
link |
And I also think there needs to be more thoughtful
link |
and noisy data about how regenerative ranching
link |
can sequester carbon.
link |
I mean, thousands of American ranches
link |
are selling carbon credits right now.
link |
The data is that valid.
link |
And they're not selling carbon credits from like grassland
link |
that just got a fence around it.
link |
They're selling carbon credits for verified data
link |
from animals assisting in carbon sequestration, right?
link |
So there's got to be a way to get the tech community involved
link |
in ways to help regenerative agriculture scale.
link |
In different creative ways.
link |
And actually, that'd be interesting
link |
if like Neuralink somehow has,
link |
and especially because Elon Musk is involved
link |
and Kimball Musk has his whole effort and appreciation
link |
of regenerative agriculture
link |
that I wonder if Neuralink has a role to play,
link |
like exploring the neurobiology of the animal,
link |
if that somehow will create innovations
link |
that lead to improved scaling of regenerative agriculture.
link |
That'd be interesting.
link |
But you're saying you should be open
link |
to all those possibilities.
link |
I don't think, I don't know the landscape to know what.
link |
But my sense is that it's very hard.
link |
And our farming operation to scale,
link |
it's been incredibly complex and challenging.
link |
We now work with partner farms.
link |
I see their operations, they're incredibly complex.
link |
You know, it just seems like there's got to be a way
link |
to make some of these things simpler and easier
link |
to share information.
link |
I don't know what that answer is.
link |
You know what would be cool
link |
is if we can understand deeper ways
link |
to measure the happiness of an animal.
link |
Because then we can optimize,
link |
like certified humane could be literally
link |
an optimization problem.
link |
Just make sure, as opposed to kind of using our,
link |
projecting our own human values,
link |
actually measuring what the animal is happy doing.
link |
That could be, so understanding the pig brain
link |
might help us understand pig happiness
link |
and reframe what it means for a happy animal.
link |
And then maybe it's a lot easier to make a happy animal,
link |
to make the animal happy than we think.
link |
And it might have to do with a variety of delicious food
link |
in the case of the pig.
link |
Is there something you could say about grass fed meat?
link |
Is it all, just out of my own sort of curiosity,
link |
whenever people say sort of grass fed meat
link |
is better for you,
link |
are all grass fed meat made the same?
link |
Is there different like,
link |
it's like the word organic.
link |
Is there a lot of variety within that?
link |
Like the way Belcampo does it,
link |
will the others do it?
link |
Just more color if you could add to this whole word
link |
and what it means.
link |
Grass fed beef has been on grass its entire life.
link |
And you wanna look for the words 100% grass fed
link |
or grass fed and finished.
link |
Now, the challenge with feeding beef grass its whole life
link |
is that it gains weight more slowly.
link |
Although beef didn't evolve,
link |
eating corn and things, it can eat them.
link |
And in eating them, it gains weight more rapidly
link |
and has like a version of like an inflammatory response.
link |
If you actually look inside the rumen of the animal
link |
inside the stomach,
link |
it's like black and shiny inside compared to grass fed
link |
animals like greens, smells like compost.
link |
So the animals themselves, their whole physiology
link |
is damaged by that food,
link |
but they also gain weight really quickly
link |
and they put on a lot of fats.
link |
Like if you or me were to eat a bunch of processed food
link |
compared to eating a bunch of greens,
link |
it's the same impact, you're gonna blow up.
link |
So the problem for grass fed
link |
is getting the animals to gain weight.
link |
They're getting a ton of exercise,
link |
they're eating really clean, right?
link |
And they're super chill.
link |
So that's different from the animals that are kept still
link |
eating really nutrient dense foods
link |
and under a ton of stress, which is a confinement animal.
link |
So are all grass fed meats created the same?
link |
The diet, yeah, nutritional profile broadly,
link |
but the length of time that the animal lives
link |
is extremely important for the flavor of the meat.
link |
We're taking our beef to 24 to 26 months,
link |
conventional is around 18 months.
link |
So I'm always looking,
link |
and if you're evaluating grass fed animals,
link |
you wanna get animals that are typically
link |
allowed to live for longer
link |
because their flavor is gonna be better,
link |
there's gonna be a bit more fat
link |
and their omega ratios also vary very differently.
link |
And I've seen omega ratios,
link |
in our firm everywhere from one to three to one to one,
link |
ideal is one to one game is typically one to one
link |
or one to two omega three to sixes.
link |
But in operations where you don't have year round grass,
link |
it's more complicated, you know, you're feeding hay
link |
and you don't get that three to six ratio.
link |
Omega threes come from green grass,
link |
they're the fat in greens.
link |
And so they're scarce and costly, right?
link |
So you can have grass fed and finished animals
link |
that don't have that perfect ratio
link |
because maybe they're in a climate or for whatever reasons,
link |
we've had to do it too, during the droughts do hay finishing,
link |
it's not optimal, it changes the ratio a bit.
link |
So there's a little bit of variance within it.
link |
I'd say though, the variance is a little bit higher
link |
the variance within grass fed is still small
link |
compared to the variance between conventional
link |
and grass fed, right?
link |
So there's definitely things to look for within it,
link |
but the real difference is between those two.
link |
Also thing to notice is that it's not a verified word, okay?
link |
So grass fed means animals that have been on grass
link |
at some point in their life.
link |
The way the cattle industry is in the US,
link |
there's segmentation.
link |
So there's cow calf operations,
link |
then those calves get sold to stocker operations
link |
which raised animals in their teens basically,
link |
and then those get sold to feed lots.
link |
And so those three phases,
link |
that first phase of the cow calf is always on grass.
link |
It's mother cows and mom cows are amazing.
link |
They can thrive on anything
link |
and still put all their nutrients into their baby
link |
and their babies will be healthy.
link |
So you never are putting mother cows
link |
on really premium pasture.
link |
So it's usually just kind of like okay pasture,
link |
dirty lot, if you ever see kind of like,
link |
scrubly lots with lots of cows and calves on,
link |
that's a cow calf operation.
link |
So there's also a loophole, unfortunately,
link |
where people use the term grass fed,
link |
and they're actually referring to animals
link |
that at some point in their life had grass,
link |
but that might be pretty far in the rear view mirror.
link |
So you need to look at that grass fed and finished
link |
or grass fed 100%.
link |
That ratio of omega three to sixes,
link |
it changes in like a week on grain.
link |
So it's radically different.
link |
Unfortunately, it's the same thing for you and me.
link |
You can eat clean for a month,
link |
you eat junk for three days, you're garbage, right?
link |
It's not like you can just like coast on that, right?
link |
We know what that's like.
link |
Same thing for animals, our physiology changes.
link |
Food's the number one way we interact with our environment.
link |
And our body changes really rapidly and dramatically.
link |
So we know Belcampo and just the way
link |
sort of this regenerative farming approach of Belcampo
link |
and the sort of high humane is good for the land,
link |
is good for the animal.
link |
Can you comment on ways it's good for the human
link |
that eats the meat?
link |
Is this meat better for you?
link |
Yes, and this is where they kind of focus on the joy
link |
and animals doing yoga and all this sort of like
link |
cynical stuff about this type of agriculture.
link |
So just like set that aside,
link |
it really is better for your health.
link |
It's got a better fat ratio, it's less inflammatory,
link |
it's got higher protein, it's just better product.
link |
In the case of beef, it's lower in fat
link |
and that fat has a better quality and it's higher
link |
in poultry and pork, it's also higher in protein.
link |
So all the nutritionals are better.
link |
It's got higher density of vitamins,
link |
it's got higher density of minerals.
link |
And none of this stuff is radically different than,
link |
it's not like the product is black and white,
link |
but every metric meaningfully is better
link |
in the right direction across the board.
link |
So why wouldn't you?
link |
I hesitate to take anecdotal evidence
link |
as like final scientific conclusions,
link |
but it does seem I've eaten quite a bit
link |
of belcampo meat, for example,
link |
and it's just my body seems to respond,
link |
like it's less bothered by it.
link |
Meaning like less inflamed, I just feel better.
link |
Because I mostly eat a meat diet
link |
and it does seem to be a little bit of a difference
link |
what kind of meat I eat, where it comes from.
link |
I don't know if that's my own psychology also.
link |
I mean, there is an aspect to like,
link |
when you know that the meat came from a good place
link |
and all the ways we've defined good,
link |
you feel better about it.
link |
And that has an effect, like decreased stress.
link |
So I'm a huge believer in that,
link |
like outside of just nutrition,
link |
how you feel about the whole experience is a huge impact.
link |
But it does feel like the meat itself
link |
is actually just leading to less inflammation for me
link |
or like less, like the bloated feeling
link |
and all those negative effects that could come with meat
link |
versus like certain other ground beef that I eat,
link |
like store bought chicken breast or steak,
link |
all those kinds of things.
link |
My body's a little bit more,
link |
works a little bit harder to process that food,
link |
I don't know if there's science to that,
link |
but sort of anecdotally, that seems to be the case.
link |
Omega sixes are a big part of that,
link |
for in the case of the beef.
link |
You eat a lot of beef, you love beef.
link |
And so in a conventional beef product,
link |
it's a one to 30 ratio of omega threes to sixes.
link |
And sometimes one to 20, one to 30,
link |
but that's the wrong direction.
link |
In our beef, it's as low as one to one.
link |
So that and the omega sixes are what's part of inflammation.
link |
Now, the magic in animals
link |
is that they're incredibly efficient processors.
link |
And in the same way that the body can process
link |
and take out tons of things that are toxic
link |
out of the environment,
link |
I mean, animals bodies can do that too.
link |
So the beauty of meat is that it can be pretty clean.
link |
Things like Roundup and stuff don't end up in the meat.
link |
When we have antibiotics in our meat,
link |
we're not worried about getting like tetracycline
link |
from the chicken breast.
link |
What we're worried about
link |
is the workers getting tetracycline,
link |
the chicken growing faster than it should,
link |
the meat being chewier and not as high quality.
link |
But the actual antibiotics don't,
link |
the animals great at filtering that, right?
link |
They get that out.
link |
So you have to think about meat not as like contamination
link |
of like, oh, there's gonna be some of that garbage
link |
they used in the farming in my meat,
link |
but it's the more subtle things.
link |
It's the fat ratio, it's the protein density.
link |
And there's also just, I think in my experience,
link |
there's just more complex flavor
link |
and things that taste more complex.
link |
This is, science backs this up, they fill you up faster.
link |
So if you're looking to limit,
link |
to eat for fullness and, but not eat as many calories,
link |
more complex foods are the way to do that.
link |
And that hit, you hit your satiety,
link |
help you hit that satiety.
link |
So things like, I mean, all the key amino acids
link |
that help you feel full, mostly from meat, right?
link |
So those are, that's part of it, like it,
link |
but all meats have those.
link |
Then there's other kind of micronutrients
link |
and things around that complex flavor
link |
that help you feel full faster.
link |
Forgive me for this question,
link |
but it is kind of an interesting one
link |
that people are curious about.
link |
What does it feel like to be a,
link |
or what does it take to be a woman CEO of a meat company?
link |
I mean, you're no longer CEO of Belcampo,
link |
but you did, you ran, you cofounded Belcampo,
link |
you ran it for many, many years.
link |
Is there something that you could say
link |
in terms of challenges associated with that?
link |
And how did you personally overcome it?
link |
So to be a female running a meat and livestock operation,
link |
it felt very alone, a lot, you know, for a long time.
link |
I felt very, like everybody waiting for me to fail
link |
or watching and assuming that I was like,
link |
just good at marketing or whatever else.
link |
And so it's taken me a while to not internalize that.
link |
I think the only reason I'm here
link |
is we have our own supply chain in Slaughterhouse.
link |
And I think had I really been playing
link |
in the broader meat industry,
link |
it would have been a shorter journey.
link |
You know, it would have been very hard
link |
to make it even get to this phase.
link |
But I do, you know, I think the mission is my life's work.
link |
The mission of cleaner ingredients that tastes so amazing.
link |
You don't need to do too much to them.
link |
You know, I like creating food
link |
that's in support of good health.
link |
And then secondary to that, it's the environment,
link |
but I want healthy food to be a joy to eat, right?
link |
And that's, you know, creating innovation in the space
link |
for this company has been about building a brand
link |
that people understand and is transparent
link |
and that people believe in in an industry
link |
that's broadly perceived of as pretty corrupt.
link |
So those are things I feel enormously proud of.
link |
So you focused on the mission and the pushback,
link |
all the mess of the industry.
link |
You try not to internalize it,
link |
trying not to let it affect you and focus on the mission.
link |
You know, and it's in the joy of it
link |
and the part where it's gotten fun for me
link |
has been returning to what I love about it.
link |
And I've only had the privilege
link |
of doing that pretty recently.
link |
So I think for me personally, you know, starting,
link |
I host these events on the farm called Meat Camps,
link |
where I cook and teach people to cook
link |
and, you know, taste and talk about flavor
link |
and all the like sensual aspects of it that are my fire.
link |
Like, thank goodness I did that stuff
link |
because otherwise it was just such a beating.
link |
You know, so there were parts of it
link |
where I got to feed my fire.
link |
And then now in the, you know, the past year,
link |
since resigning, I've been, I do all the recipe development.
link |
I shoot all the content.
link |
I, you know, taste product.
link |
I'm developing all of our new products.
link |
I launched our meatballs.
link |
I'm just about to launch our chicken meatballs,
link |
doing a high protein bone broth.
link |
Like those are, that's why I did this
link |
was to be able to build this great product
link |
that I could build on.
link |
So I'm kind of at that place now,
link |
but it's taken a lot longer.
link |
And I think, you know, looking at the landscape
link |
of what to do in food, this is definitely,
link |
we tackled the most complicated problem.
link |
That I can imagine, you know, I did it like
link |
in the most old fashioned way, right?
link |
So it's been super complex.
link |
And then I also look at it and I'm like, yeah,
link |
and it's been messy and it's gonna continue to be hard,
link |
but I'm proud of having tackled the hard problems.
link |
So the hard problem here is not
link |
in the space of technologies.
link |
It's in the space of bringing something
link |
that we've done for a long, long time in our human history
link |
and scaling it in the face
link |
of all the other economic pressures.
link |
Like doing so successfully,
link |
also communicating to the rest of the world
link |
that this is a powerful solution.
link |
So inspiring the rest of the world that regenerative farming,
link |
like running a company in this kind of way
link |
that's humane for animals, good for the land,
link |
good for people, even if it costs,
link |
like if there's an increased cost to the meat,
link |
even if that, if you have a broader vision
link |
that means eating less meat overall,
link |
that that is like inspiring the world
link |
that this is a future we want.
link |
And just taking that on and getting that done.
link |
Got a chance to eat a little bit of cheese,
link |
which is a good opportunity
link |
to talk about your experience in Italy.
link |
You spent some time, or as south of Europe,
link |
I'm not sure if it was Italy.
link |
Yeah, I lived in Italy, but.
link |
And there's cheese involved, right?
link |
Like what did you take away from that experience,
link |
both as a chef and as a human being?
link |
I moved to Europe right after my early 20s
link |
and I worked as a cheese maker.
link |
And I lived in really small rural farms
link |
in the countryside.
link |
And I got up early and milked animals, made cheese.
link |
And I got to live in a traditional agricultural society
link |
and learn how they ate.
link |
So it shaped me as a cook
link |
because it was a chance to have incredible ingredients,
link |
learn how to cook very simple food.
link |
I had been immersed in thought
link |
that I wanted to be like a chefy chef, right?
link |
Because I love food and I love cooking
link |
and I was just drawn to that world.
link |
But I don't like the experience
link |
of that sort of like fancy food experience
link |
is not what is exciting for me about it.
link |
So I loved working in that environment
link |
because I got to eat lunches and dinners
link |
and everything with the farm that I lived in.
link |
The farm that I lived on
link |
and just very traditional, simple way to eat.
link |
The other piece of it is I went to high school in the 90s,
link |
child of like the low fat generation, right?
link |
And it was just really liberating and amazing
link |
to eat tons of super fatty foods
link |
and olive oil all over the place
link |
and bleak slabs of bread and salami
link |
and being this like vibrant health,
link |
like be leaner, you know, happy, no skin stuff,
link |
you know, stop getting split ends.
link |
Like I stopped having flaky nails,
link |
like just stuff that had bothered me my whole life,
link |
including like just moodiness.
link |
And that all just changed.
link |
And granted, I was also like living on a farm in Italy
link |
and getting up with the sunlight.
link |
And like there were lots of great aspects of my life as well
link |
that happened in that time.
link |
But I was just immersed in this diet
link |
that I realized like, man, this is so simple.
link |
And I also loved that I had like, you know,
link |
you'd have dinner and it was just like some ricotta cheese
link |
with some olive oil, some bread
link |
and like a bowl of fava beans.
link |
It's like, that's dinner.
link |
And it kind of broke down my assumptions too
link |
about like dinner always has to be this, you know,
link |
a protein and a vegetable and, you know,
link |
being more fluid and more seasonal was exciting for me.
link |
So I just learned kind of a lot about paying attention
link |
to food, simple preparation
link |
and the vibrancy of health that I personally experienced
link |
kind of made me double down on that.
link |
Our mutual friend, Andrew Huberman,
link |
mentioned something offline to me
link |
about something involving the mob.
link |
Is there something you could share or is this,
link |
or are people going to hurt if you share this?
link |
It's far enough in the rear view mirror.
link |
I mean, I was hired by this group in Sicily on,
link |
and this is, you know, I was all of like 21 years old
link |
and to get a permit to work there,
link |
you have to show that you have a competency
link |
that nobody else in Italy has.
link |
And that competency for Anya Fernald at the time
link |
was cheese expert.
link |
So it was like, stupid American girl being like,
link |
going to the consulate.
link |
So I already knew that it was like,
link |
there was something wobbly about this organization,
link |
but I wanted to work for them.
link |
And my boss from that time did end up in federal prison
link |
for corruption many years later, embezzlement primarily.
link |
But, so I was definitely in an environment
link |
that was answering to multiple masters.
link |
That's a nice way to put it.
link |
It was, I couldn't have asked for a better way
link |
to kind of get with life and understand
link |
how things happen in the world though.
link |
You know, of learning as somebody who tends
link |
to be super direct and not very subtle,
link |
it was amazing to be in this world
link |
where like everybody communicates in multiple levels.
link |
Like we're going to lunch with my boss,
link |
with somebody we're gonna do a business deal with
link |
and by the, they ordered a glass of wine
link |
and with that order communicated like, disappointment.
link |
Because that, the father of the person
link |
who had made that wine had offended that other guys.
link |
I like that level of stuff, like nothing happened directly.
link |
I'm like, what are we talking about afterwards?
link |
I'm like, what happened that lunch?
link |
It's like, oh, I just, you know,
link |
I told him this by ordering that, whatever.
link |
You know, that kind of thing.
link |
So understand that there's different ways of communicating.
link |
But it was also, you know, it was interesting to see.
link |
And I think I, you know, it's kind of the struggle
link |
that I've lived again and again in my life.
link |
Fundamentally, what we were doing in that operation
link |
was there's a very traditional cheese
link |
called the Raguzano cheese in Southeastern Sicily
link |
where I lived, Ragusa.
link |
And it was about scaling that operation.
link |
So it was European Union money
link |
that my boss was also unfortunately using for other things.
link |
But fundamentally it was to take that,
link |
this type of very small scale cheese,
link |
get them exported, help them scale.
link |
And it was really challenging.
link |
And I learned a lot about the safety issues
link |
and collaboration issues
link |
and creating groups of farmers for scale.
link |
So it's kind of been doing the same thing again and again.
link |
But Sicily, it, you know,
link |
it was also just the first place
link |
where I would regularly forage for food.
link |
You know, like there I'd go to friends houses
link |
and we'd like go out and pick nettles
link |
or go out and pick wild asparagus.
link |
So every season there were stuff that you'd be gathering.
link |
And that was just part of how you lived.
link |
And it was part of your health.
link |
So that was, I just learned a ton in that time
link |
about like simple eating and really that healthy food,
link |
the simpler it is, the better, right?
link |
Like this sort of sense that healthy food
link |
isn't in a tiny package, granola bar,
link |
lots of labels, lots of powders.
link |
It's like the more simple, essential,
link |
closer to the land can actually lead to optimal health.
link |
You've learned to appreciate the simplicity of food,
link |
the beauty within the simplicity.
link |
I think it's because it was the first time
link |
that I had amazing food quality.
link |
Cause in the, where I grew up,
link |
there wasn't that food quality.
link |
Like I had some stuff from my garden and things
link |
that were great, but that's the kind of place
link |
where when artichokes in season,
link |
all of a sudden there's guys selling artichokes
link |
on their bicycles in the street
link |
and they're just fresh picked and you'd get that one thing
link |
or the torpedo onions or they like,
link |
so there's a seasonality and celebration of things
link |
in their peak moment.
link |
And you would just have that one thing.
link |
And that was the first time I'd ever eaten in that way.
link |
You were a judge several times on Iron Chef.
link |
How do you judge a good meal, like what your own,
link |
other people's, like what rating system is good?
link |
I mean, I go on experience and think about how many
link |
of your like most memorable, fantastic meals
link |
are like three star Michelin meals.
link |
It's more about the experience, right?
link |
It's more about that slow down, who are you with?
link |
And some of our best meals are like the most simple things.
link |
So Iron Chef, those were fun experiences.
link |
It's a lot of sous vide though.
link |
It's a lot of sauces.
link |
It's a lot of powders.
link |
I mean, it's kind of like magic food.
link |
So that's not, I mean, it's incredible
link |
to watch it as science, but I don't know
link |
if those are my most memorable meals.
link |
So the experience is how you judge a good meal.
link |
For you personally, if you were a judge
link |
of the entirety of the human experience
link |
in terms of the culinary journey,
link |
that would be like the people you're eating with,
link |
the environment, like how you feel,
link |
the journey, the building up to that meal, the whole thing.
link |
You can't separate it out.
link |
When I was learning as an apprentice cheese maker in Greece,
link |
one of the best meals of my life
link |
is like a bowl of cold sheep milk yogurt
link |
with like a crust of cold fat on top.
link |
So like the way that these fatty,
link |
sheep milk can have double the percentage
link |
of fat than cow milk.
link |
So like there's the yogurt and then there's this crust
link |
of fat and then they pour the fresh honey over the top
link |
and you just eat like this bowl of probably top five meals
link |
of my life, right?
link |
I mean, that's the simplicity, it's just the best thing.
link |
And it was the fact that it's in Terracotta
link |
and I'd had this amazing day
link |
and all of these things come together,
link |
but I still remember that feeling.
link |
And I think most of us have those like really great
link |
sensual memories of food and they're not about necessarily
link |
that one fancy over the top restaurant or something.
link |
It's really about the cold context of enjoyment.
link |
Maybe you can help me with something.
link |
So I think Offline said that we're both introverts a bit,
link |
but I certainly find joy in repetition.
link |
So I kind of hide away as an introvert
link |
and eat the same thing over and over and over again.
link |
But at the same time, I had this conversation
link |
with Tyler Cohen, who's an economist,
link |
but he's also a food critic.
link |
He writes these incredible posts about different foods.
link |
And we had this conversation about
link |
what his last meal would be.
link |
If he had to choose, like what is the best meal
link |
he's ever eaten that he would want to eat?
link |
And he had a good answer about it.
link |
It had to do with experience, I think.
link |
For him, it was a particular Mexican restaurant
link |
and it had in Mexico because of the ingredients,
link |
because of the experience, because of the work it took
link |
to get there and all those kinds of things.
link |
But it also made me realize, like when I was going home
link |
after that conversation, that I couldn't answer
link |
that question myself, like what is the best meal
link |
Because I really haven't experienced much.
link |
And so it almost was like a challenge to myself.
link |
Like I feel like I should journey out a little bit more
link |
in this life and try stuff.
link |
And to try to see like what is the best meal
link |
for me in the world?
link |
You know, like both the experience and the taste, right?
link |
So I was kind of wondering, first I'd love to ask you
link |
like what your last meal would be
link |
or what is the greatest meal you've ever eaten?
link |
But also, and you're still very young,
link |
and so there's still more experiences to be had, right?
link |
And for me, like how do you go about finding
link |
the best meal in the world?
link |
Is there a device you could give essentially?
link |
There's that sense of anticipation, right?
link |
So if it's the best meal, I'd say for you,
link |
it would need to be on the heels of something
link |
where you'd pushed yourself with a fast
link |
or with an athletic event, right?
link |
Or something like you would be coming into it
link |
with a sense of anticipation because of deprivation.
link |
You'd be hungry for it in a bigger sense of the word,
link |
like hungry for deep nutrition on your soul level
link |
as well as your belly.
link |
So I'd say that you'd have to think about it
link |
as a phase of things, like multiple things.
link |
And then I also think, you love meat, you love cheese.
link |
You have to have some things that come together, right?
link |
Like there's gotta be some specific elements
link |
of just your favorite flavors in that.
link |
But there could be flavors yet to be discovered.
link |
That's a whole other thing because I just emotionally
link |
and physically feel good on meat,
link |
but that doesn't mean like maybe like a rice based dish,
link |
like sushi or something like that,
link |
or Indian cuisine where it's like sauces
link |
and the breads and whatever.
link |
I love that stuff too.
link |
So we're not talking about like a meal is an experience
link |
that could be like a one night stand,
link |
but with a piece of food, right?
link |
It could be a totally different
link |
than what actually makes you feel good
link |
when you eat it every day.
link |
Completely, completely analogous.
link |
I mean, you also though, there's elements of comfort
link |
and love and those different pieces for you.
link |
But I think you gotta look at like,
link |
where would you go somewhere?
link |
Like would you go to a place where you could hike in Japan
link |
and then end up in a little place where you eat something?
link |
That's where I would think you were gonna have
link |
that magic moment.
link |
Maybe someplace you go to Mongolia
link |
and you're in a really extreme environment
link |
for three or four days,
link |
and then you come back and you're in a farm
link |
and you get something on the table that's a surprise
link |
and you're hungry.
link |
Like that's gonna be the moment where you're gonna explode
link |
in the instance of like the culinary level
link |
for Alexa levels up, right?
link |
That's the journey for you.
link |
But it has to be, I think from understanding you,
link |
like a combination of that pushing yourself anticipation
link |
and something about the, exactly, and the environment.
link |
Well, I definitely, definitely,
link |
like some fasting is part of a great meal for me.
link |
So like 24 hours is like the minimum.
link |
You're more sensitive to the richness of any experience
link |
for me when I fast 24 hours.
link |
And so that's a requirement.
link |
For a good meal is 24 hour fast, I think.
link |
It's just like you're able to taste,
link |
I don't know, maybe it's psychological,
link |
but you're able to disassemble the various flavors
link |
in a meal as simple as like even a chicken breast.
link |
There's all kinds of flavors going on.
link |
Because like when you cook a chicken breast,
link |
there's like the outside, the inside.
link |
I mean, the volume of the meat tastes different
link |
as you eat like the different fibers.
link |
And you can like tell all those differences as you're eating
link |
when you're fasting, and you can appreciate that.
link |
And of course, you're right,
link |
part of the journey is important.
link |
It makes me think like whether restaurants
link |
is the right place to explore or what.
link |
I'm envisioning it on a farm for you.
link |
And I'm envisioning it in a place
link |
that's like really into ag and food.
link |
You know, like even a place like Romania.
link |
You know, like they have incredible farms, right?
link |
Where it's not gonna get any like fancy restaurants there,
link |
but you're probably gonna have some amazing little cheeses
link |
and cured meats, and you might go to some, you know,
link |
have some experience and end up in a place
link |
with like four things on the plate
link |
and each of them blows your mind.
link |
You know, like, or Japan is another place like that.
link |
I think Vietnam, Laos, like, I mean, those are countries
link |
where there's like these incredible niche ingredients
link |
and this essentialism around food.
link |
That's fascinating.
link |
Or maybe it's in Russia with Putin.
link |
That might be the best meal in the world.
link |
With him on the farm.
link |
Yeah, that'd be, it's hard to reproduce that.
link |
If that is in fact a good meal, it'd be, you know,
link |
it's hard to get them out to the farm,
link |
but maybe one time they'd be the best meal.
link |
For me, like it's the ingredients that I associate
link |
with like indulgence, like be fresh bread
link |
with like my favorite cultured butter on it,
link |
be food of my childhood.
link |
I grew up in Oregon.
link |
We always had salmon and I smoked salmon or salmon eggs,
link |
like really good salmon eggs.
link |
I love goat cheese.
link |
I love all kinds of cheese.
link |
There'd be cheese.
link |
I love meat, obviously.
link |
I'm imagining it's sort of like an abundance
link |
of like 10 things I love.
link |
You know, it's like all the yummy things.
link |
All of your indulgences on the same plate, yeah.
link |
And there isn't like, for me, there's not like a big cake
link |
or something super like that.
link |
It's like really yummy things that I love,
link |
like really fresh, crusty, delicious bread that's warm
link |
and it's got a bunch of butter on it
link |
and I can put some salt on it and eat a big slab of that.
link |
That's just, that's where I'm at.
link |
And so meat to you is not like one of those indulgences?
link |
There'd definitely be steak there too.
link |
I'm just imagining not like there isn't a specific dish.
link |
It's like eight or 10 things, right?
link |
It's the fresh bread.
link |
It's something like fishy, yummy,
link |
probably be really good fresh berries too.
link |
There'd be a steak or a pork chop
link |
or something like meaty and delicious and savory.
link |
There'd be some cheese,
link |
just a bunch of different things that I love to eat
link |
that like all kind of check boxes for me
link |
is probably what would make me happiest.
link |
I'm afraid of variety.
link |
I like the focus when you can just,
link |
this is all you have,
link |
the scarcity of just this is the one ingredient
link |
and really appreciating it or maybe one thing,
link |
like one full complex flavor, whatever the heck that is.
link |
It's like the distraction,
link |
the serial dating nature of having a bunch of things
link |
on a plate is, yeah,
link |
for some reason that prevents me
link |
from fully enjoying any one of them.
link |
I don't know why that is.
link |
The more healthy way to do it is the variety.
link |
Your way is the healthier way to do it.
link |
Is alcohol involved?
link |
I don't drink very much.
link |
I like red wine, but I just don't really,
link |
I love red wine with good food.
link |
I also cofounded a rum business that's an organic rum,
link |
so I love that product,
link |
but that's not, for me,
link |
it's like I'm more interested in the food, I'd say.
link |
Is there some connection between your chef life,
link |
cooking and music?
link |
Does this music have a role in the experience?
link |
I love artistic expression,
link |
and that's always had a role in my life
link |
in the same way I love to paint and draw
link |
and all the different things.
link |
I was a professional musician when I lived in Sicily,
link |
by definition, technicality,
link |
because I played in the municipal band.
link |
So I would march around the town with all the funerals.
link |
I get like 50 euro every time I'd march in a funeral
link |
playing my oboe, so it's given me,
link |
I like that because I like to,
link |
like you were talking about going to farms,
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like what I quested for was experience and connection,
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in places where I could learn things.
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That's been the through line of my learning journey.
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I've learned things and sought knowledge
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that I can't get in any conventional learning environment,
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and so what are the tools that let me do that?
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It was like being adaptable and comfortable
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in different cultures,
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but also having common ground points
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that allow you to connect with people,
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so music's one of those things.
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So I love music, but I also,
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there's any number of enjoy of food,
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being able to pitch in and help in the kitchen,
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you know, like cards,
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like those are when you're dealing with
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getting into like farming communities and stuff,
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that stuff really helps, right?
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So I basically have cultivated tools
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that let me drop into places where I can learn,
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and so those are all kind of a piece.
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Those are just tools to get in there.
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That said, we did listen to Justin Bieber earlier today.
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I need to get more into him.
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I need to understand the full complexity of the Biebs.
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You're trying to achieve what hunting stands for,
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but at a much larger scale,
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which is what kind of Belcampo stands for,
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but what are your thoughts on hunting as a source of meat?
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It's amazing, 100% pro hunting.
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I think the reason that hunting flips the switch
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for so many people is because it's the first thing
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they've had clean meat in their lives.
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Okay, so I think that the hunter's journey,
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when people get so turned on by hunting,
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they're just like, oh my God, I'm never going back.
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I'm saying that's great if you've got access to that,
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or if you know the guy who'll give you the backstrap,
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awesome, but that's not achievable for most of us,
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and I do think that talking to hunters
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about their experiences, what they love about it,
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many of them are just outdoors,
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and I say that because most of them are men,
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but most of them love the outdoors aspect of it
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and being out in the wild,
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but a lot of them, it's because of how they feel
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when they eat the meat, and it's because they're eating,
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I mean, 99% of meat in America is made a very specific way,
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and it's in a way that is pretty inflammatory,
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not incredibly delicious, and when you're on that extreme,
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and then you toggle to having
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this totally different style of product,
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it feels radically different in your body,
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so of course you're like, I'll never go back.
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So when I talk about us being on that spectrum,
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it's like, well, it's, hunted meat's,
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I mean, I can never on any commercial operation
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create the variety of the biodiversity of species
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that an elk gets when it's wandering around of its own,
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I mean, there's no way you can do that on a farm,
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so there's always gonna be that extra five or 10%
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that those wild animals are gonna have,
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and those wild animals also fast for longer,
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so they go through periods of starvation,
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and that creates an even slower growth for musculature
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that's gonna create even more unique flavor
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and characteristics, so that's why there's that extra
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in the hunted meat, but you can come a lot closer
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with regenerative traditional farming
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to that flavor and health
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than with any other type of farming I know,
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so that's where I see it on the spectrum.
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I love that people are getting excited about game,
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because it's better for your health,
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it's got all the same characteristics
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as regenerative farmed meat,
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and it gets people turned on to simple, delicious food.
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You know, you shouldn't have to cover food
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with sauce that's got corn syrup and soy,
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a bunch of junk in it to make it palatable.
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If you gotta put sauce on your food,
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you need to look at your ingredients.
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You need to revisit what you're starting from,
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because if you have to put a bunch of things
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to mask flavor onto anything you're eating,
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you're trying to basically fool your palate
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into doing what's not best for your body.
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We're trying to tell our palates,
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like, just make it through this plate
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so you can get the calories in,
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and we're masking the fact
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that we don't actually find it very appetizing.
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So we're kind of teaching ourselves
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to overcome our instinct with food.
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We're saying, here's this kind of bland base substrate,
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not very interesting, I'm not like sparking to it.
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Awesome, put sugar and salt on it.
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This up the hyperprocess flavor profile.
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And then you're sparked to it.
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That's a very short road,
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and that's, I think, a lot of the health problems
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we have now is because we're masking flavors
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and basically trying to get ourselves
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to move down this path of the same way
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we behave around all hyperprocess foods.
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And that gets us into a mess with our health.
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So if we can get things like game
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where people love the flavor out of the gate,
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but it's natural, simple, mentally processed,
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Yeah, it reverses that hyperprocessing trend
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that we're on as a human species.
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And that's the promise of regenerative farming,
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that's the promise of hunting.
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Obviously, the former can be scaled,
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the hunting, I think, cannot be scaled, right?
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But in many ways, the hunting inspires the world
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that this is the right way to eat.
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And that naturally leads to then
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the humane farming, regenerative farming idea,
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which is this idea that hunting represents.
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How do you scale that?
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Well, if you look at, we're talking about
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people use this sort of marketing language
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of happy cows or that kind of thing.
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You're talking about the happiest animals,
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it's wild animals, right?
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So if you wonder why these practices are good,
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You're talking about animals that have lived
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in their evolutionary capacity, right?
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Who have played their role in the ecosystem,
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who've lived their meaning of life, right?
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And that's a very powerfully different kind of role
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than livestock production.
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So I think if we can make our livestock production
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as similar to wild as possible,
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then we're a lot of steps closer.
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So you said the animals are happiest in the wild
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and that's where they find meaning.
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What about us, the human animal?
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What's the meaning for us, do you think?
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You've monitored the life cycle of a lot of living beings.
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You ever look in the mirror and think like,
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why the hell are we humans here?
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I mean, thriving, reducing suffering, creating goodness.
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I mean, those are the things I see in animals behavior.
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They're mostly interested in reducing suffering
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and nurturing, right?
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Those are the things that I think evolutionarily.
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And we humans are just clever
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and we wanna be able to try to do that
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at a bigger and bigger scale.
link |
As much as possible, reduce the suffering in the world.
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And somehow that alleviates us of our own suffering.
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That's the Russian thing, life is suffering
link |
and somehow helping others alleviates it
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and come up with creative solutions to do that.
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That's really interesting.
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It's almost consciousness is the thing
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that led to suffering, but it also led
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to the desire to alleviate the suffering.
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It's a feedback loop.
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Consciousness creates suffering
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and the desire to alleviate it.
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Is there yet a pretty nonlinear life?
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Your parents were professors.
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You have done a lot of sort of incredible things
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that many would say kind of like,
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how the hell are you gonna get this done?
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Is there advice you can give to young people today,
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like high school, college, about how to do,
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how to live a similarly nonlinear crazy life
link |
and accomplish, be as successful as you have been
link |
about whether it's just their career or life in general?
link |
The greatest gifts I've been given
link |
have come from pursuing curiosity.
link |
Just trying to understand the thing you're curious about
link |
and allowing yourself to be curious about it
link |
and just going with it.
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And also pursuing things that are like deeply joyful for me.
link |
Not what society wants, but you just personally,
link |
just on your own, you're happy that you did it.
link |
And that's something that in the times
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when I strayed from that, my life has been harder.
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So it's fundamentally, what are we on earth to do?
link |
To live and thrive.
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And so pursuing things that are curious
link |
and satisfying and interesting and joyful
link |
and allow me to grow.
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So I made a number of choices to do things
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that were more complicated and not considered cool
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Although now it's cool to work on farms.
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It wasn't when I started my career in animal agriculture.
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And it was like, but just deeply interesting to me.
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And I felt like there was just lots to learn.
link |
And so that's been the path for me
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is like going for something that's curious and hard
link |
and sticking with it and being open to it.
link |
And growing elements that give me joy through that.
link |
So I also, for people who are starting out
link |
in their careers and want to do something different too,
link |
it's like, get out of your comfort.
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Go to a place that you've got something to learn from
link |
and let it teach you that.
link |
And you'll get beat up.
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Like I got beat up by that experience.
link |
Like it was really hard.
link |
I laugh about now working in Sicily for,
link |
and the funny experiences I had there, but it was hard.
link |
I was lonely and cried a lot.
link |
It was like, it was hard.
link |
It was really hard.
link |
And when you're inside of it,
link |
you didn't know how it's going to turn out.
link |
You didn't know it's going to turn out well.
link |
And I'm like, why didn't I get a job doing something
link |
that all my friends are doing?
link |
And I didn't speak the language yet.
link |
I had to learn foreign language and learn how to function.
link |
And it was very lonely and very challenging,
link |
but then that's where my resilience started to grow.
link |
So the things I learned, they helped me grow.
link |
So the things I learned there ended up just being
link |
about resilience and understanding the language
link |
of subtlety in meaning.
link |
So that's something that's carried me through my life.
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But it was a curiosity about cheese making
link |
and about like just living in a village that was there.
link |
I'm like, wouldn't it be amazing
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to just live in a really rural village.
link |
And you just went with it.
link |
And I just like, this seems incredible
link |
and have a place where you can,
link |
the people seem interesting, the food seems good.
link |
And let's just like try this and see what I can learn.
link |
And that like putting yourself out of your comfort zone
link |
in a place where you have a chance to learn
link |
and grow is the secret.
link |
Because it's, you grow through discomfort.
link |
People think that you grow when you get
link |
into this environment where everything's
link |
like kind of sailing along,
link |
but like growth actually comes through pain.
link |
It's like growth comes from being cut down
link |
and beat down and having to regrow and double down.
link |
And so that kind of opportunity,
link |
you have to seek it out.
link |
You have to put yourself in the line of fire a bit.
link |
If the situation sucks,
link |
it's a sign that you might be doing something right
link |
in the sense that you're on the path
link |
at the end of which you'll be a better person
link |
if you allow yourself to grow in that way.
link |
Like as opposed to resisting it,
link |
just going along with the journey and persevering.
link |
And that ended us up in this incredible place.
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This whole conversation, I'll probably overlay a video.
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I'm looking at a gorgeous mountain
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and it's an incredible farm.
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Thank you so much for a meal yesterday.
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That was incredible.
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The cheese, the fish eggs,
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just everything about this place.
link |
Looking up, you can see the stars.
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The stars at night are beautiful
link |
and there's a peacefulness to it.
link |
I had a pretty hard week actually,
link |
just emotionally in many ways.
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And just coming here, it's immediately,
link |
so much of it is lifted.
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So I really deeply appreciate Anya
link |
that you would invite me here
link |
and that you have this conversation.
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This was really awesome.
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So thank you so much.
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Thanks for listening to this conversation
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with Anya Fernald and thank you to Gala Games,
link |
Athletic Greens, Four Sigmatic and Fundrise.
link |
Check them out in the description to support this podcast.
link |
And now let me leave you with some words
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from the ancient Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu.
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Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.
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Thank you for listening.
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I hope to see you next time.