Alton Brown (Chef, TV Host)¶
Published on Mon, 10 Dec 2018 18:31:00 +0000
If you somehow managed to miss it, we hosted the HODINKEE 10th Anniversary Weekend (H10 for short) in New York City this weekend. There were a number of amazing panels and events, which you can stream right here, including an incredible episode of HODINKEE Radio recorded in front of a live audience. Our guest? The inimitable Alton Brown. We had a casual conversation about watches, food, and what you really shouldn't be putting on Instagram. Enjoy.
Synopsis¶
This episode of Hodinkee Radio, recorded live at Hodinkee's 10th Anniversary weekend in New York, features guest Alton Brown in conversation with hosts Stephen Pulvirent and senior editor John Boughes. Brown, best known for Good Eats and Iron Chef America, is also a chef, pilot, musician, and passionate watch collector who previously appeared on Hodinkee's Talking Watches series. The conversation explores Brown's deep connection to watches, beginning with his first Timex Marlin as a child—a gift from his father after learning to tell time—and extending through his collection of vintage tool watches, particularly GMTs and Tiffany-signed pieces. Brown explains his philosophy that watches, like food, carry profound emotional value beyond their technical specifications, though he appreciates both the mechanical intricacy and the human stories behind timepieces.
The discussion weaves between Brown's worlds of food and watches, exploring themes of authenticity, patina, and the passage of time. He shares insights about his approach to both domains: preferring well-worn items that tell stories through their scratches and aging, valuing quality over quantity, and understanding that emotional connection drives collecting behavior. Brown discusses his current projects including relaunching Good Eats as "Return of the Eats" and creating Good Eats Reloaded, where he revisits and updates episodes from the show's 14-year original run. The conversation touches on how media, the internet, and Instagram have transformed people's relationships with food—creating more educated consumers who paradoxically may lack basic cooking skills—while emphasizing that hospitality and shared experiences remain food's true magic. Throughout, Brown demonstrates his characteristic blend of technical geekery and heartfelt philosophy, whether discussing fermented ingredients, pressure cookers, vintage Patek Philippe references from the 1970s, or why he chose to wear a simple Timex to the event.
Links¶
Transcript¶
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| Unknown | I gotta say, this week's episode of Hodinki Radio is a big one for me. Our guest is Mr. Alton Brown, a man who's tough to define in a word or two. He's a TV food personality, best known for his show Good Eats and Iron Chef America, but he's also a chef, a pilot, an actor, a musician, and of course, a watch collector and a talking watches alum. I'll try not to fanboy out too much, but I basically learned to cook by watching late-night food network marathons of Good Eats in the days way before Netflix binge watching. Alton's the kind of guy who believes that it's ultimately the emotional value of something that makes it special, whether that's food, watches, or well, anything else really. But he's also a big nerd at heart, and he wants to understand how and why things work the way they do. We ended up talking about everything from a shared love of vintage tool watches to a very unconventional way to cook a spatchcocked game hen to a super funky nineteen seventies Paddock Philippe that he's totally obsessed with right now. This is one of the most straight-up fun episodes of Hodinky Radio yet, and the fact that we recorded this in front of a live audience at the Hodinki 10th Aniversnary weekend in New York only makes it all the more special. Get yourself a cup of coffee or a glass of Japanese whiskey, settle in, and buckle up. I'm your host Stephen Pulverant and this is Hodinki Radio Live. This week's episode is brought to you by Tag Hoyer. Stay tuned later in the episode to learn more about a new Hoyer Octavia. You can also visit tagwar.riercom to learn more |
| Unknown | . Here we go. Here we go. Live, so don't mess this up. Yeah, please don't be nervous, don't say anything. Be natural. I'll be good. |
| Unknown | Look at all the phones. Yeah, wow. You guys want some pictures? First off, I just want to thank everybody for coming out. I have to say I've been involved with Hodinky for I guess about six and a half years now. And to see everybody out here showing their support, we've got people I've known the entire six and a half years I've I've been involved and some people I just met last night, some people I met earlier today. It's really incredible. And I can tell you really from the bottom of all of our hearts at Hodinky, this is this is incredible. This is amazing. There are no other words for it. I think uh Steven nailed it. Yeah, this is fantastic. So happy to be here. So I think uh I think we've got a pretty good show for you today. We've got uh Hodinki senior editor John Bughes. Very happy to be here. We've got uh I guess International Man of Mystery Brown. Yes. Like that. International mana. I'm gonna put that on my business. And talking watch as alum. I am a talking watch as alum. I had a great time that day. And uh I'm your host Stephen Polvern, and uh this is Hodinky Radio Live. Let's do it |
| Unknown | . So it's like a really bad you know, bars where oh you you know like in the 70s you go in a bar and all the guys look at all the girls' butts. But now we're just guys that are looking at each other's wrists. Which is much safer in the Me Too generation. And all the stuff we're looking at is from the 70s. So Most of it, except some of us kind of prefer the stuff from the fifties, which isn't creepy. It's not creepy, but it's not, so yeah. I should |
| Unknown | go, shouldn't I? So people here might know you from your episode of Talking Watches, but you've actually been a member of the extended Hodinky family for a lot longer than that.. Yeah I bec |
| Unknown | ame a fan when you guys first started selling really awesome sway-distressed watch bands |
| Unknown | . Which is how I knew that you were a part of the family. So in the old days, if you bought a hodinky strap or one of our Drake's neckties or anything like that in the early days, uh Ben or myself put it in a USPS envelope and printed out a PayPal label on the WeWork printer and prayed that we had enough packing tape and packed it up and sent it your way. And one day I had a stack of labels and I saw one that said Alton Brown. Do you remember what year it was? Because I was talking to my wife and I was trying to remember when that was. |
| Unknown | I thought it was maybe but I I remember though the the watch that I was buying for was a uh Tudor snowflake. Okay, cool. And I bought uh a brown uh uh distressed suede band and it was so boss. It was like, yes. But ears. You guys really kind of started that revolution of saying, look, we're gonna buy vintage watches, we need awesome straps to put on them. Yeah. And we need to change those straps out on a regular basis. Yeah. You know, we need 12 NATO straps and 15 suede straps. And you guys started that and the qual |
| Unknown | ity was fantastic. I mean it really started organically. It was like, you know, Ben wanted straps, and it turned out other people wanted straps too. And now we've got a whole amazing team over there in the Hodinky shop. I know I'm gonna shoplift three before I leave today. I'd love to hear that. Um for you, you're allowed. Um don't tell them. I'm not sure they don't know. But uh I remember them maybe six months later sitting on my couch, I was living in Brooklyn at the time, and seeing on an episode of Iron Chef America, you stepped out at the beginning and you were wearing our Drake's tie. And I remember completely losing my mind. I mean, I'm uh uh to to fanboy out for a second. I learned to cook from watching Good Eats, huge Iron Chef fan, really like genuinely just a big super fan. And I remember seeing it and immediately like pausing the GPS. Yeah, immediately. Uh and I think I probably called my mom first. It's a little embarrassing, but uh probably. She's like Alton Who. Yeah. Definitely no. She's also watching today. My family is more excited to be watching you than to be watching me on the live stream, but that's okay. Um But yeah, so you've been you've been a member of the family for the five yeah I've been for a long time. Quite |
| Unknown | a while. You know, I think that's because um watch collecting used to be this really lonely thing um and and there wasn't really uh there hasn't been that that much community uh around it. And I think that what you guys did on top of making great products is you also started to kind of create that community uh that that we needed because we're geeks and nerds and nobody likes us by and large. So |
| Unknown | And absolutely. And uh so since talking watches, you know, what what has you you've been a very busy man since talking watches in I guess what, summer 2017? No, gosh, he was uh 16. 16. Okay. So since then, |
| Unknown | what's been what's been going on in the life of Walton Brown? Megan uh trying to make TV shows. We're actually relaunching the show Good Eats is going to start all over again next year. With a show called The Everett. That's gonna be called uh Return of the Eats. Okay. We were gonna call it Son of the Eats, and then I wanted Revenge of the Eats, but then we argued about well, should be Revenge or Return of the EATS and so we just problem is EATs is already plural so you can't just make it Eats. Yeah, but no you can't. We could, but it's too minimal. So it's yeah it's it it doesn't really work. Just EEETS could be a a lot of things. And then this year we also uh relaunched a a series called Good Eats Reloaded where I went back and it's like some of the really that show is on for I ran it for 14 solid years without stopping. So I look back at some of the original shows and I'm like, oh crap. The haircut's a lot. Um yeah the haircuts, the clothes, uh but also just a lot has changed in the world of food and so I had to go back and fix them. So it's like Food Network was like, well we want you to make them again. I'm like, I gotta go make some repairs first. So uh that has been really successful. We're doing a second season of reloads uh next year as well, and I'm doing another live tour show, although this this one will be for the holidays. You also just released an album of music, we released a CD last year. Yeah. We did, which uh made uh the Billboard comedy charts a couple of times, which is no big deal because there's only like three comedy records made last year, so it wasn't a big deal. Um but yeah, and then it was a lot of fun |
| Unknown | . So what's it like to go back to your work that that a lot of people consider seminally important work? Painful. Ye |
| Unknown | ah? Yeah. It's like, who's the chubby kid with all the hair? Oh, that's me. Um no, it's it's difficult because I had I I I don't'm about process, so I don't sit around and fawn over the product when it's done. When I'm done making it, once it leaves the edit room, a lot of the shows I never saw again. So now to go back, I'm like, oh crap. So so awkward. Awkward and kind of painful. And so you've got to learn how to how to actually walk onto a screen with a version of yourself that's 19 or in some cases 20 years younger and make total fun of that ass hat because I'm sorry. You're a loud. You're allowed. It's all adults here. But painful and strange, but also exhilarating. You know, coming full circle on anything when you realize God, I've been around long enough now for work to be 20 years old. You know, because the the first episodes of Good Eats premiered in July of 1999, but we actually shot the pilot episodes and the only reason I'm not talking to you is my microphone works better on him. Alright. Sorry, John. We actually shot those shows in the fall of um nineteen ninety-seven. And just to show how old we were, we shot the original pilots on film. Oh wow.. Yeah Because we didn't most of us were from commercials and movies and music videos. We didn't know anything. So they were really old. So kind of facing that was painful, but now I'm kind of like glad I got it over with. And because not many artists get a chance to go back. It's like remastering an album that was okay |
| Unknown | but could have been a lot better. Yeah. So you said the world of food's changed. How would you describe what's changed kind of on a large scale in the world of food? You know |
| Unknown | , I think there are two things that changed um the world of food just no, three three things changed uh food immeasurably just in the time that I've been making food shows, which is okay, one the internet, it's kind of a a which was baby when when we started in 97. It was you know dial up, you know. It was like, okay, I'm on to Amazon, it's this new bookstore. Anyone remember when I was totally I I remember those days. Amazon was just a bookstore. And so that uh certainly food network changed kind of a lot. And then Instagram changed a lot because now we don't care how food tastes, we just care how it looks. And people will Instagram food without tasting it, which I don't understand. It's like it's it's beautiful, but it tastes like crap. So we've got to work that out. But but but because of those things, because of media, in other words, everything in food has changed radically. And our relationships with food, what we expect from food. You know, I I know folks that live here in New York who are like, well, I don't like this risotto because that's clearly Iranian saffron and the crop this year sucked. Oh wow. But they go home and it's like, I gotta boil an egg? How do I do that? So we we have this whole generation of people that are very, very educated about food and have great uh experience with food but can't cook. And I think that that a lot of that is media |
| Unknown | . Interesting. Do you think the the sort of most people's relationship to food and kind of experience of food is better today than it was 20, 25 years ago, or do you think it's it's worse or just different? |
| Unknown | It's both. Um and it's and it's both for a few reasons. Um our exposure is clearly so much more than it used to be. Um things like Amazon have made it possible for us to get great spices very quick. We can get any ingredient. You know, twenty years ago we couldn't make shows that had fish sauce in them because nobody could get fish sauce. Now people are like, fish sauce? I get that at Dwayne Reed, you know? So uh in a lot of ways it's it's so much better. We have more exposure to cuisines, we have more exposure to ingredients. The problem, I think, is that our our relationship is is not so good as far as sitting down at the table and experiencing hospitality with other people. We're a little shaky on those grounds, I think. And I think some of that comes from media. The fact that, you know, the real miracle of food is being able to sit down at a table with people and have an experience with with those people. And we don't pay that much attention to the people at the table anymore because we're too busy Instagramming, oh my God, look at the Parmesan curls. You know, okay. I I I trained under a French chef who was uh Parisian and you wouldn't have heard of him and it doesn't matter but uh one night when I was I was training under him when I was just out of culinary school and I'm working the grill station and I'm like freaking out. It's like between Christmas and New Year's and it was a restaurant near a ski resort and so we're being slammed. And he like stopped the entire line. Everything stopped. Stop everything. Everybody put everything down. And he comes up to him and he says, Alton, there's only two kinds of food. There's good food and a bad food. And in twelve hours, they're all sheet. And then he started the lineup again, and I'm like, what just happened? But I knew that it was somehow important. You know, in the end, the food is all shit in 12 hours. But our experiences with each other as we eat are priceless and memories last forever. So hospitality is the hospitality and civility, which by the way we suck at at this country right now. Being civil to each other and showing each other real hospitality and also being able to accept hospitality,. you You know you give me a piece of food, I need to be able to graciously take that food and consume it and be grateful to where it from where it came from, instead of just plopping my MX down and expecting you to go on your way. So I think we we've come a long way, but we've also regressed in a way, and I I and I we've gotta work that |
| Unknown | out. I think one of the you know, to kind of pivot toward toward watches a little bit, one of the bits of of Goodyeat's lore is is that on each season of the show you wore a different watch for the whole season. True. Including on one season you wore a watch for about |
| Unknown | half a season that was broken, right? Yes. And the reason that I did that, one being a watch fanatic, but also so that uh at any moment if I saw a show on I would be able to figure out what season it was. Ah, okay. So I used it as |
| Unknown | a visual marker. Okay. Yeah. And so for reloaded, I've watched a few episodes and it seems like you're wearing a 5508? Is that? I'm so b |
| Unknown | ad with reference numbers. You know, I wrote I write everything down. Hold on, hold on. I've got this. I have this. I have all my reference numbers. Alton Brown carries reference numbers in his pocket. I do. Hold on. Hold on. Okay, okay, okay. So you know, it's like you're gonna be a watch collector, you have to be able to do reference That is a 1953 6205 Gilt. Okay. Gilt dial. It's my it's my most expensive watch. And I only wear it when I'm making shows because I'm scared to wear it outside. I mean it's insured, but I'm like |
| Unknown | still terrified. So if there's an episode where you're grilling something outside, it'll you'll take it off or something? No, I I won't take it |
| Unknown | off during a show. I won't. But I'm really careful, like the watch. Uh yeah, that was because it it's from the the first reference that actually said submariner on the dial, so it's special. Um and it's gorgeous. And and so yeah, that's the first time that I've worn a watch straight through one one one |
| Unknown | whole pass like that. Okay. And then for next season of reloaded, what are you gonna be wearing? Have you decided yet |
| Unknown | ? Oh because I'm gonna roll this guy um outside later on after today I'm gonna have his uh his uh journal chrominette au blue which is what i'll wear next eat so just wanted to go ahead and tell you. Um sorry Paul. In Georgia where I live they sell tasers like on the street. So um if he needed a a guest assistant he said no not No, what you did is you said I could wear I could wear uh your your 1655 uh up here and I was like dude I've got one. I left it and brought the Timex in |
| Unknown | stead. So Yeah, so can you tell us why? You know, a lot of people I know, it's a hodinky gathering, everybody wants to kind of sh you know flex and show. They they have a watch they want everybody to see them wearing. Sure. And I asked you upstairs in the green room what watch you were wearing. And you're wearing a Timex. I'm a Timex for very good reason |
| Unknown | . I am, I'm wearing a Timex Marlin in the burgundy uh face. My my wife, Elizabeth, who's back there, hi sweetheart, um knows that I was like looking at the safe and I was telling you guys, trying to decide what do I wear, you know, this paddock or this. And I was like, heck no, I'm going to Hodinky, I'm gonna rock a timex. And the reason is that ultimately why I'm in a gathering like this and why I like hanging with you guys is all emotional. To me, watches are incredibly emotional things, and I remember learning how to tell time. I wanted a watch so badly. I was I've been in love with watches ever since I was really young, and my dad promised me that he would buy me a watch if I would learn how to tell time. But I had to pass a test. You know, I had to like, he had a time test me. And I remember, I mean I wasn't, I was four probably. Okay. And I this like my first one of my first memories is taking this this test. You know, as he was like, okay, say this two different ways, you know, is it 945 or 15 to 10? You know? And I remember taking the test, and I passed the test, and he gave me like an early 60s Timex Marlin. And it was like, it was like I was being knighted. You know, the this the this device was one step towards I don't know, immortality. I mean what is it? You know, it for for me, for he and I, it was it was very much a bond of father and son, which I know a lot of guys have with the watches of their fathers or the grandfathers, great fathers, grandfathers. You know, need I say, Christopher Walk and Rolex, we all know what I'm talking about. Or perhaps not. Um But to me it's it's very emotional. So I wanted to wear a watch that had an emotional backstory. So, you know, you can you can chase references and you can chase calibers and you can chase all these things. But in the end, why are you really doing it? And I think it's really great to have a touchstone of why? Why am I doing this? Why am I so obsessed with this little bunch of whirling gears and springs and balances and turbulence if you've got a lot of money. Um why are why are we so fascinated by that? And I think that it's just one, we're obsessed with the passage of time, as we should be, but then I I think the other is is strictly emotional, strictly limbic system stuff. Nice. And good nice. No, I was going to say I think it's a good choice. I think it's good looking watch too. But you guys did a fabulous write-up on these. Yes, I think. I think you did a wonderful story on these. And one of the things I love about that is you guys are not snooty about this stuff because you understand that watch collecting it covers an entire wild range of things, you know? And how many of us actually had the Casio calculator watch? Who still wears it? You know, so I so I think that um that's one of the things that's so great about you guys is you don't turn your nose up at things like that because you know that there's this massive range of of movements, a massive range of makers, a massive range of buyers. And I talk to new collectors all the time, as I I know you guys do. And I'm like, look, you can spend less than a thousand dollars on a watch that will stay in your collection for the yeah. For sure you can. Absolutely you can. And so it makes sense. So thank you for your write-up on the Marlin |
| Unknown | . you know your work in in the food world as well is this combination of you know real deep human emotion on one hand and then just total geekery on the other right you're you're somebody who loves little technical things and kind of the the science behind things, but also it has to kind of matter on a human level. And how do you think about balancing those two things out? Because they can sometimes feel a little kind of at odd. It's really funny that you mentioned that. |
| Unknown | I I tend to shy away. I'm emotionally shy. I don't, I'm not a sentimental person. And I so I I think that I I flirt right up against the edge of of emotional uh the stuff that connects us, or the stuff that connects us to family. This stuff, you know, you can't deal with food without dealing with emotion because everybody has emotionally charged. Everybody in this room, I'm betting, has one childhood memory involving food that is very emotionally important to you. I'm gonna bet. I mean, can I show of hands? How many people can like life? So the majority of us, you know, it's it's emotional stuff. And and but I think that if you get, if you dwell on that, it gets really modeling. And I think it makes everybody a little bit comfortable. We, you know, it's it's kind of like there's a relative, but I don't want to look directly at that relative. I'm gonna have that relative right over here. Um and so I think that you balance that with, okay, what we're gonna focus on are these uh technical details in science, because that's clean and that's easy and that doesn't make me cry when I go to bed at night. Um and so there's always just a balance and that's storytelling. But all storytelling is about tensions and the balance of tensions. And you know, as you guys know, as you talk about what you do, storytelling has to play all those all those different dimensions. So for me it's just a balance. If you play all emotion, you lose people because you go emotional a lot of people have bad emo we all I also have bad emotions about food and I don't I don't want to go that deep so it's it's a it's a a little dance of details. It's a dance between humor, science, details, and emotion. Because you know, the funny thing about food is you know, we we can't taste it through the television. We don't, we still don't have lickable screens. So it is still a secondhand experience. Not yet. I hope you're working on that. Smell of vision will happen before taste of vision, I'll tell you that. Okay. You heard it here first. No, it's totally true. It's totally true. Like YouTube. Um anyway, so to to me it's it's all a it's it's balance. And and and when you get it right and when you don't get it right, is just all f feel. There's no equation. But you guys probably know. Yeah. It's like, why does somebody that doesn't have that much money run all over the planet saving all their pennies to pick up one specific reference of one specific watch because for some reason they've locked onto it? Is there a reason for that? Because it doesn't actually make sense. We should all just be wearing, you know, Apple watches here, right? And calling it a day, but we refuse to do it. There's a reason that we refuse to do it. And so is your watch collecting also a kind of balancing act for you of this? Sure does it technical? Absolutely. I do not understand myself as a collector at all. I do not get it. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know why I make the decisions that I make. I will up and sell uh three years well, I got divorced back in 2013, 14, and I sold my entire collection. I don't know why, but I just did. It was kind of like I just dumped everything. And then I slowly started buying the pieces that mattered again. And I think that if if you're a collector, the interesting thing is to be introspective enough to try to understand why you're doing what you're doing. You know, what you're wearing, you know, which as we were talking about, it's kind of the the perfect the perfect watch, you know, the explorer one and 1016. You know, why do we why do we chase it? Why do we want it so gosh darn bad? You know, I don't know why I why I want what I want. It feels good, it's right. But in the end, don't we, we men at least, you know, women are do have a different because they can wear jewelry and they are defined by stones and they're defined by, you know, diamonds and things. We don't have that. And so we want to have these things that identify us to ourselves. I'm this guy. Yep. I'm a 1016. You know, and we do it with cars too, for sure. I'm a 1983 Portia S. Citarga of 911. That's me. Hell yeah. My wife fights me for it every day. I tell you I bought her a fabulous race car Mercedes just so she'd stay out of my Porsche. Now you know, sweetheart. But we do them because we want to identify and see we want our reflection. Right? We want to see ourselves. This is how I'm going to identify. This is how I'm going to find. Some guys do it with tailoring, some guys do it with watches. I don't know about you guys. What's the first thing you look at when you meet a man? I guess probably a watch, yeah. Yeah. I'd probably be bad at my job if I didn't know. First thing. And how many of you immediately it's okay to say it. If it's quartz, do you downgrade them? Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. It's not a good thing. You shouldn't applaud that. Don't applaud that. That is a horrible prejudice. But the truth is, the the first thing I look at is a watch. And if they pass the watch if they pass the watch, where do you look next? Shoes. Shoes. Yeah. We look at shoes. You know why? Because they speak of caring for things. Yeah. Yeah. I'm wearing a a ten year old pair of Doc Martin Chelsea boots that have never been polished, so I suck. You guys look awesome. Um |
| Unknown | I mean the fact that they're ten years old I think is telling. You look you look at things that are lasting that people tend to hold on to. You know what's funny, well |
| Unknown | the thing about watches and shoes and to some degree clothing and certainly leather goods, I want to see the wear of I think maybe it always was. I mean, I'm 56 years old, so I certainly have the where of time on me. But um when I look at, you know, one of my fascinations with the 1016 reference, is finding tropical dials and finding these faded, you know, Rolex dials fade in a way that cannot be replicated. Nobody's been able to figure out how to do that. And I understand that there's now a company in Japan that's doing nothing but creating patina faces for old Seiko dive watches. And I'm like, good for you, but you're never gonna pull that off, really. So this question of authenticity arises because only through time passage and where does authenticity become an option? Whether it's a great piece of leather, a suit that was made properly 20 years ago, or an automobile that is worn in perfectly right. I'm also a pilot, so I see it in airplanes. People are like, you you'll fly an airplane from the 60s? I'm like, hell yes, I'll fly an airplane from the sixties because they proven themselves. They have these great airframes. So I think maybe in the end, all of it is a search for authenticity. Yeah. Of representation of ourselves, a reflection of ourselves, and the things that are around us |
| Unknown | . And now a message from this week's sponsor. Hi everybody. I'm Hodinki editor-in-chief Jack Forster. In 1972, self-winding chronographs represented the very latest in cutting edge innovation in watchmaking. Taghoyer's remarkable Caliber 11 was one of the very first of the new breed, and in 1972, this revolutionary engine found its way into one of the most instantly recognizable Hoyer chronographs of all time. This was the famous reference 1163, whose signature red accented dial and hands have been brought into the present in the latest version of the Hoyer Ottavia. The new Otavia updates the timeless appeal of the 1163 with Taghoyer's own in-house, self-winding, column-wheel-controlled caliber 02. It's not just a piece of history anymore. The new version is being offered by Taghoyer right now, and if you order early, you'll get a copy of the book Inside Track by the first American ever to win the Formula One Drivers Championship, Phil Hill himself.com. And now, back to the show |
| Unknown | . You talked about this a little bit in your Talking Watches episode, but you're somebody who likes a really well-beat-up wat |
| Unknown | ch. I beat them up, I wear the crap out of things, and I don't mind scratches. I don't ever buff things out. Every scratch, every piece of wear is a little is a is either a memory or a little mark in time that I'm |
| Unknown | gonna have. Yeah. I I think the the only scratch you really that bothers me anyway is the first one. And then it's like, okay, then now you own it. And after that, let what will happen happen. The first scratch is rough. That is a it is the the most rough. The roughest |
| Unknown | . But you know the first scratch is the first evidence, physical and visual evidence of it being yours. Exactly. We live lives. You know, and we um we we use things and things that are well made. You know, it's funny in our culture, anything of real quality should be used. You know? I I remember having somebody say, oh my god, you're wearing a Burberry trench coat to ride a motorcycle. I'm like, it was invented for trench warfare in World War One. I think this will be okay. You know? Or or you know, I I have this this this old uh Louis Vuitton duffel bag and I drag it on the ground through the airport. I'm like, you know why? Because it can take it and it's not gonna fall apart and it'll look awesome. So I I think that fine things should be used |
| Unknown | . Well used. And so since your episode of Talking Watches, have you found any new watches? And not modern watch it, but anything new to your collection |
| Unknown | that you're just obsessed with. My you know as I've I don't understand my collection and I don't understand why I obsess over the things I obsess over. Um because I'm a pilot, I've obsessed over GMTs almost to the point of madness. Um and I I suddenly got off on this subset of I'm only going to fixate on GMTs that are Tiffany cosines. I don't know why. I it just happened. Um Tiffany signed GMT is a cool thing. It's there's no reason. It's an awesome thing. So you know I've I've added uh uh GMTs all the way back to nineteen fifty-eight. Uh I've become obsessed with the replacement bezels and bakelite and the colors that they take on. My wife is a is a designer, hi Elizabeth, you're right back there. Designs restaurants and and uh furniture and we talk constantly about patina and how things wear. And so like the bakelight bezels on on GMTs I'm kind of fixated on and judging those finishes. So since I was with you guys, I put on a few more GMTs. I sold a couple of paddocks. I picked up, oh, you know, I was I was telling you guys, I have to look up the reference again, was it the 135 1357? Uh that I'm I've gone crazy for the paddock. Sorry, 3579. The paddock 3579. If anybody has one here in the house, it's from the 70s, I'll buy it. And I guess it's running, I don't care it's not running. Uh I have the I have the silver face. I need the blue face. It is a very simple watch. It makes the calatrava look like a brightling, all right? So it's like nothing at all on the face. It almost doesn't have any hands. So uh I'm I'm really, really into those watches from the 70s. And and paddock, I'm sure, would shrink at having even made it because it looks a little trendy. It does not look like a paddock. It doesn't look like a paddock, does it? Well I don't even know |
| Unknown | what it looks like. I mean it's it's kind of a tonneau 70s. Yeah I guess anyway. Almost like a C sh-shaped case kind of |
| Unknown | . Kind of. For people listening after after not live here uh we'll link it up in the show notes so we'll we'll have an image of that. Oh my god I just drove the price of this watch up. Shit. |
| Unknown | Yeah so you should go it's crap. I hate that watch. You should go buy them before this runs. Buy them before this runs. Everybody make a run but for some reason, uh it's it's it's funny, I I bought one of these watches. Um I got um Elizabeth and I got married in September, and if September is like, I have to wear the perfect watch to get married, and I need it I need another watch to represent this new phase of my life, and I found this paddock uh from the 70s that was so unique and I bought it and I wore it to get married and and I found myself, you know, you you ever had a watch that you just can't stop looking at it. Oh my gosh, you look at it, you know I had a friend that actually wrecked a car looking at his watch. We do not endorse that by watching. No, we're not suggesting that we're doing that lawyers will really love it by save the same thing. The more I've gazed at this watch, the more uh kind of fixated I've become on it. I don't know why. I don't need to explain why to myself. It's just uh that's |
| Unknown | And is there another watch that is like further down the line, something that's your your grail, the thing that you you Yeah, his Jern |
| Unknown | chronometra blue. Um to me I'm really sorry. So so you know, I I collected diving watches for a long time because I mean I'm a diver, but I grew up on a steady diet of of Jacquesot. And so any watch that I saw, anyone wear on the calypso was was game and I wanted those watches and as a diver I wanted those watches. And that turned into a fascination with like 25,000 leagues under the sea. And and and Jerns look like that to me. They're very of that period, very machine age. And I love those designs. I think those are the most beautiful watches being made right now, frankly |
| Unknown | . Amazing. Well, we're gonna open it up to questions from the audience in just a minute. Uh while we get some mics set up around the room. Um if you just raise your hand somebody will come to you with a microphone. But I have a question I want to ask that's sort of a non sequitur at this point. But uh it's a good eats question.. Ask away You are familiar. You are famous as a as a gear nut for disliking things that only do one job. Correct. What do you think are the most useful and the most useless things that somebody can have in their kitchen. W |
| Unknown | ell first I want to say unitaskers vul uh versus multitaskers. I waged a war on unitaskers, but then I relented a little bit because I realized that perhaps that was only my lack of imagination with that particular tool. Because other people have come and say, well, I use this for this. And I'm like, oh, alright, I was wrong. I don't like tools that only do one job, but I have found that if people use their imaginations, actually tools do all kinds of jobs. It just depends on on the mind. You know, for me, I am constantly um surprised by how often I reach for a panini press. Okay. Totally. I have never made a panini in a panini press. I will do that between two hot cast iron pans. But I will do a lot of other things in a panini press. I make the best uh cornichins in the world in a panini press. I cook things in there all the time. But I don't define. You spatcock it and put it in a panini press? You said spatchcock. I did say spatchcock, yeah. I told you, I watched the show. Yes, I spatchcock it and throw it in there, and then I put a bunch of weights on it and squeeze the ever living crap out of it. But I cook all kinds of things in there. So I I think that any any tool any tool that puts your imagination into play and you start thinking, ah, I could use this to do this, is a good thing. It could be a steamer basket, it could be, it could be any anything, any any tool that you can buy. So what's a what's a unitasker really? I think a unitasker is defined by the person. If you buy a tool that only does one thing, you better be using it all the frickin' time. It's like, cause somebody's like, okay, I bought a robotic, and this actually exists, a robotic donut fryer. Oh wow. Now that doesn't do a whole lot of things, but it does one thing really well. And and I knew per a person in uh Seattle who would bought this old vintage. They used to set them up in storefronts, and it was a thing that would take the dough and it would squirt it, and it would actually was like an assembly line robot for donuts. Yep. It was like it's a unitasker, so I'm gonna have to get rid of it. And I said, uh uh uh let's cook some calamari in that bad boy. And then we made we made robotic donut line uh calamari. We had to throw out the oil because it tasted kind of greedy. But but the point is that you know in the end, the best thing that kitchen tools can do for us is to get us to play. You know, the kitchen's a laboratory and a playroom at the same time. So the things that are in it are toys, aren't they? Right? So we're making food, but we're also expanding our minds, we're expanding our imagination. So whatever you can pull off, do it |
| Unknown | . Great? Not a great answer to your question. That's a fantastic answer. Um let's see who would like to start with questions. The |
| Unknown | passing of the microphone. Hey, so you uh you mentioned fish sauce as something that was practically unheard of, at least in this part of the world twenty years ago and is now everywhere. And I should say for white people. Right, yeah |
| Unknown | . Yeah. So unheard of white people were like So what's this stuff? This smells |
| Unknown | like ass. So what do you think the next ingredient is that maybe billions of people are eating, but we aren't uh right now and maybe will be uh popular in twenty years. Just the sort of question you expected to |
| Unknown | get you're not talking about like a trim, like what's gonna be hot next, like we're all gonna be eating that you can something that one culture has been eating for thousands of years but we don't eat but maybe we just um I would say that it will be in the realm of fermentation and it will be something like fermented yak butter out of Nepal. Americans, white people, are just really getting our feet wet when it comes to the ta the flavors of fermentation. And the thing about fermentation is that it's so smart because it creates amazing flavors and it's a great way of making food last. I mean, let's face it, there aren't that many like Midwestern Americans that had had kimchi ten years ago. Um and that's a shame because the stuff's freaking awesome. So I I think it'll definitely be more fermentation. And we're seeing leaps and bounds made in that certainly in Scandinavia. There's a whole lot going on with fermentation in Asia certainly. So I think it'll probably be funkier flavors that we're going to accept. And things like fermented butter and butter tea and things like that will be there. You know, we're getting better. We finally accept bitterness, really. You know, we will eat our erodicio. We drink our coffee black and strong. So Americans weren't into bitter even 10 years ago. So I think now that we we we've gotten ourselves around bitter, we're drinking a morrow. How many people drink drink a morrow here? How many people are, oh my God, come on guys, a morrow really? Jaegermeister. Come on. How many? Yeah, okay, that's what I thought. Um, you know, we're we're we're into more complex flavors, and I think that now we're gonna now that we've gotten used to complexity and bitterness, we're gonna get funky |
| Unknown | . Great? Uh we have somebody up front right here. Yes, ma'am. Does your view of uh unipurpose |
| Unknown | and multi-purpose things extend to the knife collection? Knives knives uh get a free uh free pass simply because I'm obsessed with them. Um however um the problem with knives is that uh folks at least in the United States I think want to have twenty crappy ones instead of two good ones. And I think that it's kind of like a watch collection in a way. You have to start identifying what real quality is and understanding its effect on how your cooking is gonna go. The truth is there are very few things more useful in a kitchen than a high quality knife with good steel that has been ground correctly. And it will change your world very much. So that's a case where I think that fewer pieces of high quality greatly exceed a bunch of knives. You don't need three boning knives, you know. You need a pairing knife, you need a serrated knife a chef's knife and a boning knife. You need four knives. That's all. And if you really like oysters, get an oyster knife. Or a screwdriver. Because a good craftsman flathead screwdriver is better than an oyster knife. But make them high quality. You know, people will be like, I'm not gonna spend $350 on a knife. I'm like, yeah, if you've got it, you really ought to think about that. And by the way, my favorite knife maker in the world is uh Cut Brooklyn in Brooklyn, New York. They're making the best knives on the planet here in New York. So congratulations. |
| Unknown | Cool. Uh we have a question right up here. Hi. So you mentioned watches having significant emotional impact with you. Yes. Do you remember the watch you picked out to wear the first time you went on a date or met your wife |
| Unknown | . What was she wearing? She wasn't. And it distressed me. My wife was not wearing a watch uh uh on our our first day. She is now though. Uh she's she's definitely I do. I and I I I I remember what I was wearing and and and why I picked it. Yeah. And it's the watch she's wearing now. What's that, honey? I was wearing an omega. Well y yeah you're wearing you you're a big omega fan, but we've gotta get that thing fixed, honey. That that movement's a little scrappy right now. Which might explain why you were 45 minutes late. I don't know if it was I'm kidding, she wasn't late. She was completely on time. But you know it's funny, you know, I think guys, we always wonder is is a is a woman gonna notice because it shows such a huge part of our personality and things that we don't even know how to talk about. You know, a guy is like, okay, am I gonna wear an IWC Portuguese or am I gonna wear an omega 300 C master. What am I wearing on first date? You know, what am I saying about myself? And and people that can read that, you know, and there's nothing more wonderful than having a woman notice your watch. You're like, yeah. And I don't need a 44mm case, by the way. Um so I'm sorry, but bridling is compensating for something. Uh because nobody's used the Nava timer the last 20 years. It's just, you know, pilots don't do that. Uh but that's a great question. When do you d as as a member of the lady class, uh, how much attention have you put into the watches that you've worn on dates? I do I remember when I met him, he was wearing our first day, he was wearing a Tudor with a camouflage strap and I asked him. That was a hoodinky strap. That Cami strap? It's awesome |
| Unknown | . With him because it was camouflage, and I asked him if he was doing a refined redneck looking. And he responded, well, actually, the people who make this are the same ones who make the ropes for the Vatican. And I learned so much about |
| Unknown | it with that result in the big wow you pulled that out on date one |
| Unknown | this by the way is Ryan, one of our engineers, a a extremely valuable member of the Hodinky team who not enough people get to meet. So let's get a round of applause for Ryan |
| Unknown | . Mat these guys last night. You should still should have bought it a Cartier, but we'll talk about this later. Um anybody else? Yeah. This guy's had his hand up for quite a while. Hey, I'm a huge fan. |
| Unknown | I was just wondering uh what's one food or beverage or maybe just cooking process where you think of |
| Unknown | uh time as being the magic ingredient. Time is the magic ingredient for barbecue. Southern barbecue is defined not by smoke but by time. And there's no way around it. There's no way to cheat it, there's no way to replace it, there's no way to circumvent it. Time is absolutely true. And in a lot of meat cookery, time, it's funny, we and even I have perpetuated this kind of myth that temperature is the most important factor when actually time is more important. And it's the one thing that Americans don't want to give their food. Time. So no pressure cookers? No, I love pressure cookers. I love them. They are the TARDIS of the food world. Absolutely the tar space, except it's not bigger on the inside. If I had a pressure cooker that was bigger on the inside, that'd be awesome. Um I love pressure cookers and uh work with them often uh to to fold space and time. But that's not something that can be done with barbecue because the other factor within barbecue is evaporation and the the loss of of moisture during that, which you're not going to get in a fish cooker. So but that's that's the one thing. |
| Unknown | Great. Oh, perfect. Thank you |
| Unknown | . Hi. Hey. So uh when I was growing up, we grew up eating a lot of like boxed cake for birthdays. And then when we started making stuff from scratch, I noticed everyone was much more amazed eating the frosting. It's so much better than the stuff you can buy in a can. But less so on the cake. So let me ask you, what is a food that you think making from scratch is way better than the store-bought version? And what's something you think is |
| Unknown | n't much better when you make it at home? This is a fantastic question. I'm gonna explain why this is the truth. Frosting, okay. Dare hear what he said? Okay, box cake, nobody can make a scratch cake as good as boxcake, but frosting you can. And you know what? You just had kind of encapsulated the entire mystery there, which is that frosting is something that has very few ingredients. I mean, it's really the essence of candy making, which is the control of sugar and the crystallization of sugar and the flavoring of that. Cake is completely different because boxcake manufacturers have have access to modified starches and industrial products that we can't get off the shelf. And even if we could, we wouldn't really know what to do with them. Which is why I cannot make a better chocolate cake than Duncan Hines. I have tried. I can't. I can add cognac. Okay. And and I and you know what? Very often it's like you buy like a Betty Crocker cake and it says to put in a third of a cup of oil, get the white cake and use olive oil instead. You're a freaking genius. But the truth is is when it comes to almost anything that includes starch, the mixes will beat us every time, because those starches, those actual products have been manufactured to make that cake successful. And it's incredibly difficult to do from scratch. The things that people don't realize that they can do, that are always better, and I fall back on this: marshmallows. Oh my god, homemade marshmallows are like the best thing ever. And when you make homemade s'mores with your own marshmallows and you put a little bit of blue cheese or gorgonzola in the shmore and then serve it with a cold muscat. But you know, can I make butter better than Kerigold or or Vermont Cheese and Butter Company, which has a fermented butter? I can't. I can make butter, but it's not gonna be better. And I can make cake, but I will never make a devil's food cake as good as Duncan Hines. It's just not possible because I don't have access to the materials. But I can beat their frosting hands down. Good question. Thank you. Yeah, very good question. Well |
| Unknown | done. Uh who else? So we've got one in the back. Hey, uh so |
| Unknown | um I think a lot of us just in our childhood have a certain dish that we just always retract back to no matter how extensive our palate gets over the years. What's something from your childhood that you will always love that other people might not? Gainsburgers dog fo |
| Unknown | od. How many people were alive in the 60s? Okay, so you and me, camera guy. Um so in the in the 60s, there was this dog food company called Gainesburgers, and they made this dog food that looked like a raw hamburger patty. Okay? It was like the shredded meat product, and they wrapped it in cellophane, and you're supposed to like you, you kind of uncrumble it, you crumble it in your dog's bowl. I became obsessed with this stuff as a child. And would often trade my food to the dog to get the Gainsburgers. And even I remember one night I I announced to my parents that I was gonna make dinner. And I'm like, five. I'm like five. Like, I'm gonna make dinner. And my parents like, yeah, that's great. Okay, fine, go do that. You know, and I go, fine, I will, god damn it. You know, and I I was Stewie Griffin even then, you know, and I was like, I chose it, come on, Brian. And we trundled off to the kitchen and I made I I got out these hamburger buns and I got out pickles and ketchup and mustard and lettuce and Gainesburgers, dog, dog food in the in the in the uh the the patty and and I and I built these hamburgers right and I go out and I like serve my mom and my dad and they're like our child is Mozart. Oh my god, this is amazing. And we're sitting and we and I get him e to eat and we're sitting and we'reating and my dad's eating. You know, and I'm eating and my mom's not eating. And my dad looks over, my mom says, her name was Phyllis, so he called her Phyllis. Like, what's wrong, Phil? And she said, I didn't buy any ground beef. And my dad's chewing. And he looks down, and the dog is sitting right there, looking up at him. And he looks at the dog, and he looks at it, and he looks at me. And in the only testament of love I remember from the man, he went right on chewing, swallowed, excused himself, took his scotch, went and watched TV. Gainsburger Scotch food. |
| Unknown | We should have time for one or two more. Uh any more hands? Oh, |
| Unknown | right there. Uh just going back to uh single task machinery versus multi-purpose machines and and how that extends to watches, uh you know you mentioned your interest in a in a very simple time only uh watch earlier. Uh how does that extend to to your watch collecting and and what if any complications do you find most useful not only in in the kitchen but in your your daily life |
| Unknown | ? Good question. I have always had a propensity, although I talk about simplicity a lot in watches, if you were to look at my collection, you would see a lot of professional tool watches. As a pilot, I used to be obsessed with flying watches, with pilot watches, and only to find that you know after a while, you know, E6B calculators like we have on the Nava Time or the Bridling series, we don't use them anymore, but we do use stopwatches. And um when you're in a holding pattern, everything is determined by one-minute legs, and the easiest thing to hit is is a stopwatch. So I will very often, when I fly, wear a uh flyback chrono, because I want it to pop back and reset every minute. So I wear those a great deal. Oddly enough, in a kitchen, and I've talked about this, chefs typically are very often watch fanatics, and they'll wear something that has some form of elapsed timering, because what we want is something that can get really wet, really beat up, but that we can time with. And using a bezel-based timer, like on a submariner, whether it's counting down or counting up, as you know, some watches do, are are very, very useful. Because I have hosted a lot of television shows that have been competitions with timed rounds, I have always used that as an excuse to write off watch purchases. And I find in that case, watches devised for the racing world are very, very useful. So bring on the Monacos because the Carreras and the other hewers because they are really great for that and very readable for for timing 30 to 60 minute increments. And then of course there will always be the Speedmaster. Um we were talking about those earlier, pre-pro uh moon watches, which are also incredibly readable and easy. As I get older, I've got to be able to read those little bitty click, click, click. Uh which is why I also still use uh an IWC uh Portuguese quite a bit when timing shows, because it's crap for timing long periods, but great for short periods. So great? |
| Unknown | Excellent question. Do we have one more? Anybody? Going up, right up here |
| Unknown | . Um Elton, you're a guy with um with very strong opinions, I and I love that. So what is um your one favorite thing in the watch industry or the one you know least favorite thing in the watch watch industry you can share |
| Unknown | . Um my most favorite thing in the watch industry and my least favorite. Oh okay. I uh don't understand, didn't understand the trend that we got into in the 2000s towards watches the size of Frisbee's. I don't have a wrist that can support that. To this day, I will try on a panorite, and it's like, hey Sonny, where'd you get your dad's watch? Um I also like it when watch companies find a way to progress and evolve while maintaining faithfulness to their DNA. When a watch stops looking like a company. I have a problem with it. And I I think that in engineering and design, the real great thing about watches is when they you look at a line and you see a clear transition and a clear loyalty to their to their DNA. And and I I really respect that because I think that's harder to do than than a lot of things. |
| Unknown | Yeah, I mean I think that that makes a lot of sense. I I agree. I think there's uh a tendency to want to push things and always do that next that next thing, and I think having some restraint there is a valuable |
| Unknown | thing. You gotta know who you are, right? Yeah, I mean I think if in the case we mentioned Panorai, in the case of a brand like Panoraye, I think having that larger case is is who they are. That is it's always who they are. |
| Unknown | I mean you put on one of the original Panorai's and it still looks like my dad's watch. So they they've always stayed true to that. Um but but other companies, I mean, bridlings, I think, are really great example of somebody who just went pimp. I can't wear a pimp watch. Guy Fieri can wear pimp watches. You know, Brightling is the official timepiece of Flavortown. I |
| Unknown | I'm gonna shut up now. Thanks guys. So we're we're gonna close the same way we close every episode of Hodinki Radio, which is with a cultural recommendation. Sweet. So I think considering who you are and kind of where we are and the fact that we have lots of people here from out of town. Um let's keep it to restaurants. So what is a New York City restaurant that you think everybody should go try? Barb |
| Unknown | udo. Okay. I think of Barbudo as the quintessential, right now at least, you know, West Village Italian restaurant. And one that I find myself recommending over and over again. Is there anything there you think everybody should try? Chocolate frickin' pudding |
| Unknown | . Alright. Yeah. Never had the chocolate pudding there. Then you're just wrong. Yeah, obviously. My wife is also in the audience. We're going to barbu. Chocolate pudding. |
| Unknown | Yeah. Um all right, perfect. John? Uh if you like Japanese food, I'll recommend uh see nayoki, which they have a very good kaiseki, and I think it's for what it is very reasonably priced. Um and you probably could get in tonight if you wanted to. Yeah. Um and if you want, if you're here tomorrow and you're interested in lunch nearby, um just go across the street to Otto. They have very good pizza, you can get pots to be in and out very quickly. The pizzas are fantastic. Yes. Yeah. |
| Unknown | Great. I'm gonna go a little bit different. Uh and I'm gonna say there's a place, Takeria St. Mark's, uh over in St. Mark's place. Uh I grew up in Austin, Texas. I grew up eating Mexican and Tex-Mex food multiple times a week and when I moved to I went to c school, to college in the Midwest, and then moved here. And not having good tacos was painful to me emotionally. We talk about food that carries great emotion. I finally found a great neighborhood cheap taco place. The bartender is a big hodinky fan, which helps. But yeah, it's just a great neighborhood taco spot. So if you want some tacos, it's like a 10-15 minute walk away. What's it called again? Tacaria St. Mark's. Taco Rio St. Mark's everybody. And they actually have a place up in Gramercy now too that they just opened. I haven't been to LA style like sh you know streetcart tacos. It's fantastic. So yeah, great. Well, thank you guys both for being here. Thank you, Alton. It's amazing. Thank you for having me. Like I said, you've been a longtime member of the family, so it's great to have you here. Proud to be here. What a great event. Awesome. Thank you guys. Thank you. Thank you again to Alton and John for joining us. We'd also like to thank everyone in the audience who came out to show their support and ask questions. Please remember to subscribe and rate the show, it really does help. Thank you, and we'll see you next week. |