Episodes

  • 842: Danny Meyer on the Pain of Eater Deathwatch; Playing Cat and Mouse with Sam Sifton

    842: Danny Meyer on the Pain of Eater Deathwatch; Playing Cat and Mouse with Sam Sifton
    Sep 23 2026
    Danny Meyer built Union Square Hospitality Group on a promise: he’d never close a restaurant. Then he closed one, and it changed how he thinks and writes about leadership. Twenty years after the release of his influential book Setting the Table, Meyer returns with a terrific new memoir, What Could Possibly Go Right?, and he joins us to talk about failure, scaling culture across 700 restaurants, walking back his progressive no-tipping experiment, and what it feels like to hand the reins of his own company to someone else. Subscribe: ⁠⁠Apple, ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠, ⁠⁠YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
    Show More Show Less
    54 mins
  • 841: Carla Hall Doesn’t Need a Holiday to Bake Something Special

    841: Carla Hall Doesn’t Need a Holiday to Bake Something Special
    Sep 21 2026
    Everybody loves Carla Hall. Carla Hall is a chef and TV host who has appeared on many of our favorite food programs over the years, from Bravo’s Top Chef to Fox’s Next Level Baker. Her latest cookbook is also her first baking book—Carla Bakes: Sweet, Savory, and From the Heart. Today on the show, Carla stops by the studio to chat about all things baking, and what makes this book so special. Subscribe: ⁠⁠Apple, ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠, ⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
    Show More Show Less
    39 mins
  • 840: Mohamed Attia Sold Street Smoothies in Times Square. Now He Shapes Vending Policy.

    840: Mohamed Attia Sold Street Smoothies in Times Square. Now He Shapes Vending Policy.
    Sep 19 2026
    Mohamed Attia spent nearly a decade running a food cart in Times Square before he became the person fighting to change the law that made carts like his semilegal in the first place. As managing director of the Street Vendor Project, Attia helped lead the campaign that, this past January, finally broke a New York City vending permit cap that had been frozen since 1979. He talks with Matt about his own path from vendor to advocate, and we go over so many great carts to visit in New York City. The fifth annual Street Heroes gala takes place on Tuesday, October 6 at MoMA PS1. Get your tickets here. Subscribe: ⁠⁠Apple, ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠, ⁠⁠YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
    Show More Show Less
    51 mins
  • 839: Olivia Tiedemann on the Perks of Private Cheffing and Making Crab Cakes for Martha Stewart

    839: Olivia Tiedemann on the Perks of Private Cheffing and Making Crab Cakes for Martha Stewart
    Sep 18 2026
    Olivia Tiedemann is a chef who began creating videos while working as a private chef in the Hamptons. Her signature deadpan delivery and no-nonsense techniques have won her millions of fans. Now she’s sharing her highly craveable recipes in a debut cookbook: Eat (Like) the Rich. Today on the show, Olivia talks about why everyone is fascinated by private chefs, making crab cakes for Martha Stewart, and more. And it’s the return of Three Things, where Aliza and Matt discuss what’s interesting to them in the world of food including Matt visits Philadelphia with stops at Middle Child Clubhouse, the Southeast Asian Market in FDR Park, Supérette, and the newly opened Manna Bakery. Aliza stops by Cafe Kestrel and Sake Bar Asoko in NYC, and has high praise for the new Apollo Bagels bagel chips. Subscribe: ⁠⁠Apple, ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠, ⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
    Show More Show Less
    55 mins
  • 838: How Apollo Bagels Took Over NYC… and Tokyo with Joey Scalabrino

    838: How Apollo Bagels Took Over NYC… and Tokyo with Joey Scalabrino
    Sep 16 2026
    Joey Scalabrino is the cofounder of Apollo Bagels, a new-school bagel shop rooted in old-world techniques with nine locations across New York City and Jersey. He started making bagels in the kitchen at Leo, the Williamsburg sourdough pizza restaurant, and built Apollo through thoughtful pop-ups, design, and collabs. Today on the show, we chat about building up Apollo Bagels, its recent mega-popular pop-up with Dean & DeLuca in Tokyo, and its brand-new bagel chips. Also on the show Aliza and Matt preview some exciting cookbooks from the busy fall season, including: The Kitchen I Came Home To Nixta Taqueria Presents: From Tacos to Tahdig Radicchio: A Celebration of the Beloved Italian Vegetable Fundamentals of Flavor Korean Soups East to East: Recipes and Stories from Mumbai to New York The Little Green Book of Chartreuse The Little Book of Olives Today We Are Cooking . . . Subscribe: ⁠⁠Apple, ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠, ⁠⁠YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
    Show More Show Less
    56 mins
  • 837: Caper's Dana Brown Thinks AI Can't Touch Food, Eater Lost the Plot, and There's a New McNally Worth Betting On

    837: Caper's Dana Brown Thinks AI Can't Touch Food, Eater Lost the Plot, and There's a New McNally Worth Betting On
    Sep 14 2026
    It’s the return of Food Writers Talking About Food Writing. Every couple of weeks, Matt invites a journalist to talk about some favorite recent food writing as well as their thoughts on the industry as a whole. Dana Brown was a fixture of Vanity Fair’s Oscar-party machine and Graydon Carter’s inner circle for more than two decades before writing it all down in his memoir, Dilettante. He returns to the studio with a new job: editor in chief of Caper, the scoop-driven media start-up applying a Puck-style power-and-money lens to restaurants, chefs, and the food business. In this episode, we talk about economics at The Grill, the Keith McNally legacy, and what’s good in the world of Caper. Featured on this episode: McNally Family Values [Caper] Where Did the Italians of Carroll Gardens Go? [Curbed] How Eater Lost Its Bite [Caper] ⁠There Is a Misconception that The Grill Is Absurdly Expensive⁠ [Feed Me] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 14 mins
  • 836: Ruth Reichl: Five Memoirs, One Hot Substack, No Filter

    836: Ruth Reichl: Five Memoirs, One Hot Substack, No Filter
    Sep 11 2026
    Ruth Reichl reviewed restaurants for the Los Angeles Times and the New York Times, ran the country’s most legendary food magazine, and wrote five memoirs about all the meals enjoyed and life lived. Today she’s doing it again on her wonderful Substack, La Briffe, unfiltered and endlessly curious. Recorded live at the Traverse City Food & Wine festival, Matt talks with Ruth about her University of Michigan years, her passion for memoir, and her take on where food criticism stands today. Also on the show, I have a great conversation with Martin Sorge, author of the terrific new book Great Bakes. Read Ruth’s savage New York Times review of the Box Tree restaurant from 1998. Subscribe: ⁠⁠Apple, ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠, ⁠⁠YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 37 mins
  • 835: Naan Pisses Him Off. Vada Pav Gets the Medal of Honor. Meherwan Irani Returns!

    835: Naan Pisses Him Off. Vada Pav Gets the Medal of Honor. Meherwan Irani Returns!
    Sep 9 2026
    Meherwan Irani has been sharing wisdom about Indian street food since first appearing on this show in 2019. That would be vada pav’s genius, naan’s overratedness, and his mom’s three-lentil dhansak. Now it’s all in his debut cookbook, No. 1 Best Indian Cookbook in the World, alongside the two decades’ journey of building Chai Pani, Botiwalla, and Spicewalla. In this episode, Matt catches up with his old friend (and recent India travel companion) about auntie holdbacks, striking a balance between tradition and invention, and what he means about his strong stance on naan. And it’s the return of Three Things, where Aliza and Matt discuss what’s interesting them in the world of food including food in the movie “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma” is really fun. Plus: check out the movie box office podcast, B.O. Boys, from our producer Clayton. Also: Matt returns to Traverse City, Michigan and visits Farm Club. He also drops by Penny in NYC for another amazing meal. Aliza has great rice rolls at Sun Hing Lung in Manhattan’s Chinatown (and check out the Chinatown Records live streams), and visits Conwell Coffee Hall in the Financial District. And speaking of coffee, Matt checks out Heist Coffee and its ¼ caffeinated glory. Subscribe: ⁠⁠Apple, ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠, ⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
    Show More Show Less
    1 hr and 11 mins