Ep.240 Eat, Drink, Laugh, Write (Jessica Dupuy-Author, Writer, Speaker)

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Where'll you be going?

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Texas. Damn, son. Where'd you find this? Go on, make it happen. And now here's Steve and Michelle.

SPEAKER_04 0:11

Welcome to Mallet and Michelle. We're funny, occasionally informative, and apparently think about food 90% of the time. Steve and his chicken vejitas, and Michelle and her kids' menu at a good bourbon old fashioned.

SPEAKER_02 0:26

I don't know how you come up with these every week. You do such a great job with those.

SPEAKER_04 0:29

Well, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_02 0:31

Well, hey, uh, we we're rolling out a new thing this week. Uh our YouTube channel, which we get, what, three people a week go to our YouTube channel. It's me, your mom, and Steve. Yeah. That's right. Uh, but we want to get some more people checking out our YouTube channel. So for an early glimpse of the episode that we're gonna release on Apple Podcast and Spotify, you can go a day early now to our YouTube channel and and uh watch the uh watch the podcast uh not live, but on YouTube. So that'll be released every Monday, and then the uh the Apple Podcast and Spotify comes out on Tuesday.

SPEAKER_04 1:08

So wonderful.

SPEAKER_02 1:09

Go subscribe to our YouTube channel.

SPEAKER_04 1:10

You can see our face live. That's right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:14

Hey, sponsors, gotta thank the sponsors. Cannot do the show without these wonderful sponsors.

SPEAKER_04 1:19

Deep Eddie vodka.

SPEAKER_02 1:21

Back to school is coming. Spend the rest of your summer sitting by some water with a cold Deep Eddie vodka in your hand. South Star Bank. Your South Star banker is your access to the best loans and banking advice in Texas. Stop by today to meet your new best friend in the banking business. Kim Watson is awesome.

SPEAKER_04 1:40

Awesome. Oh, you know what? Kim Watson broke her little arm. Oh, I didn't know that. Yesterday, I saw that. Poor Kim. Somebody bring her some flowers. Oh, we should bring her some flowers. Black slate construction and black slate roofing.

SPEAKER_02 1:52

Did your roof spring a leak or your kitchen look like grandma designed it when she was 20? Call Black Slate today and get started on that dream remodel or let them help you with a beautiful new 30-year shingle roof.

SPEAKER_04 2:06

And Mallet Integrity Team.

SPEAKER_02 2:08

Mallet Integrity Team. In the old days, you hired the best realtor, not the one with the best dance moves or the heaviest Instagram filter. Ignore the noise, hire experience. Mallet integrity team.

SPEAKER_04 2:20

We could put you in a bikini and hit you on the Instagram.

SPEAKER_02 2:23

That would get a million views. Or unfollow us. Well, hey, we are very excited. Today's guest is someone who has built a career exploring the flavors, stories, and people behind great food, exceptional wine, fine spirits, and unforgettable travel. Based right here in Austin, Jessica Dupuy has almost messed with Jessica Dupuis has authored cookbooks including The Salt Lick Cookbook, Uchi the Cookbook, Jack Allen's Kitchen, United Tastes of Texas, and United Tastes of the South. Along with her acclaimed wine guide, The Wines of Southwest USA, she spends her time uncovering what makes destinations worth visiting and meals worth remembering, and then tells those stories in a way that makes you want to book a trip or make a reservation immediately. Jessica, welcome to the podcast. Welcome.

SPEAKER_04 3:16

Thanks for having me. Whoa, that was a big intro.

SPEAKER_02 3:19

Yeah, yeah. Well, it's true. I know. You've done some stuff.

SPEAKER_01 3:23

Yeah, it's been a busy few years. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:26

How'd you get into this in the first place?

SPEAKER_01 3:28

Oh, goodness. So, I mean, my master's degree is in magazine publishing. So it goes way back to like education. Um, and you know, I actually started out in publishing on the business side. So I did advertising sales for Texas Monthly magazine. But over time had gotten to be friends with um the editor, uh the food editor at Texas Monthly. And one of the things that um they needed at the time was recipe testers. Because if you think about magazines like Southern Living or Food and Wine, a lot of the recipes that are printed have to be fact-checked, you know, so that the average home cook could do the thing that the chef is wanting to share. So she said, Hey, I I know you like to cook. Would you be willing to do some of the recipe testing for us at your home? Because, you know, let's say Thanksgiving, we've got five chefs all over the state that are going to submit a recipe for what they like to cook for Thanksgiving. And then we would get those recipes, and then the guy the idea is, can you actually make them at home? Yeah. Um, and a lot of chefs, you know, are used to working, they're used to working on a large scale in terms of writing recipes and stuff. They're not normally writing it down, one, at all. Yeah. And two, if they are writing-most chefs do it just by feel? Um it's not so much that. It's just that they don't document in the same way, right? Like it's not going to look like what you would see in Southern Living or something. And so the the and and even how they measure things, right? Like we're used to cups and tablespoons at home. Aaron Powell, Jr. And they measure by instinct sometimes, right? Instinct or it's grams, ounces. It depends on what they're because they're using things on a larger scale. So it's something that I learned to do early on by like going home and saying, okay, I think what he wants is this. And be based on what he's written here, or she. Um and so as she kind of uh as my editor got you, you know, comfortable with how I would come back with those recipes, I would do exactly what the chef would say, and then I would make an adjustment and how I think it might work better at home. And then we'd kind of comp taste and compare and you know, do all of that together. Um so over time that evolved into I eventually started doing um some writing for them. And then um eventually she was like, Hey, we don't ever really um write about wine because that's not my area of expertise. I wonder if you could tell us about Texas wine, maybe go out there and see what's happening. This was over 15 years ago and um close to 20. And she's like, I don't know anybody. I don't, you know, maybe you could just kind of figure out what what the situation is. So I was like, I can report anything. That's that's what I'm trained to do. Um, but you know, like I I didn't have the expertise in wine that I think you need to be able to put Texas in context with the rest of the world. So because I'd been working with the different restaurants over time, um, I was able to work with the someliers at those restaurants, and they all offered to help train me on tasting wines from the world and um helped me study for different certifications. So, like I'm a certified sommelier and now I'm in a program that's in a whole different ballgame. But um it's it's helped me to get that education and understanding of wine. And all along that same time, I had made relationships with the chefs, obviously, for the the different things I had been doing. So I started doing cookbooks for them. I like those larger, deeper projects where it's like someone's got a story to tell, but how do we put it in a book format? Um, and so yeah, it's just it's evolved, it's one of those things where it's relationships, being there at the right time. And as a journalist, um, I say this a lot to students when I speak for them, um, like at universities. And that is you really have to teach yourself to get out of your own way. Like so many people will say, like, I've always wanted to be a food writer, I've always wanted to be a travel writer, I've always, and it's like, that's great, but you are not the subject. Yeah, the person or the place or the fit, you know, it's definitely not you. So you have to figure out how to communicate well, but it's it's not you.

SPEAKER_02 7:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:36

So anyway.

SPEAKER_02 7:37

That's a that's a hard thing to learn because everybody wants to write about their experience, and you can't do that because then it makes them, like you say, makes it about them.

SPEAKER_01 7:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:46

What did your dinner table look like growing up?

SPEAKER_01 7:49

You know, I mean, my parents are not trained chefs or anything like that, but they've always liked to eat well. And so both of my parents um cook very well. So my mom's more of the indoor cook in terms of she's gonna be making sauces or you know, um different honestly, she grew up with Southern living in her house. Oh gosh, she did it. Yes, exactly. Yeah, it's your Bible. Exactly. So basically it was dog earring all the recipes from that and like, oh, I want to try this or I want to try that. She's great at baking, she, you know, all of that stuff. And then my dad kind of taught himself outside. So the grill, smoking, all of the different things that we uh treasure in Texas. And so, um, and they were divorced when I was young. So that actually put him more at the seat of, okay, well, when my kids come when they're visiting me, I don't want to just get pizza. I want them to have good meals that are healthy and and balanced and everything. So he they've both really kind of stepped up to the plate when it came to cooking. And um, I'm grateful. I I like it to, you know, share that with the rest of the world, I guess you could say, because some of the other cookbooks I've done actually include a lot of the family recipes.

SPEAKER_02 9:00

You don't have any formal training as a chef.

SPEAKER_01 9:03

I have no formal training as a chef. I'm self-taught. Uh when I was in college, I kind of followed in my mom's footsteps. I had Southern Living, but I also subscribed to um Gourmet, Rest in Peace. Yes. Um, and uh Bon Appetite magazine. And my goal was to cook um one recipe from each of those every month. And then I'd have friends come over and um into you know to our apartment and and we'd see how but it it was so that I could try to understand more than what just my family had cooked, but like how do you follow, how do you adjust a recipe? Do you have to follow it all the time? I'm definitely creative. So um so yeah, that's it, you know, I've always had a fascination with it and I understand the language and and everything, but but never went to a a class.

SPEAKER_04 9:49

When I became um a for when I first started staying home with my kids and I had, you know, three children, and my Southern Living books were my Bibles. And so they were all color coordinated, and I love I still my favorite cookbook still is that Southern Living. It has a yellow cover on it, and I still have earmarked recipes in there that I go back to. No, I'm not a chicken and dumbly. It was usually like a like southern like a southern shrimp boil or there's some good stuff in there. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:20

So tell me about the uh the experience learning about different wines. So you said the these people that worked in the restaurant started helping you, but then you had to get certified. Is it really hard to get certified to be to really understand?

SPEAKER_04 10:34

Because they're kind of snobby too, right? Like to be kind of come out, be as an outsider and come in.

SPEAKER_01 10:39

It's it's well, I you know, to to speak on behalf of most of my sommelier friends, we I promise we are not snobby. We we are very fun people, but um and uh but when you have the extra knowledge of certain things, it becomes it's just like a doorway into something, right? So the deeper into some into any topic you get, the more you're kind of like, okay, wow, when I started at this level with certain wines, now I drink this level of wines. And it's not even about level in terms of price, it's more just knowing more, right? So when you know, when you know what's on the retail shelf at like an H E B for $10, and then you know that you can get some really cool um $10 Portuguese red blend at a boutique uh wine shop, then it's like, okay, well, I'm curious to explore more into something that's less, less known, you know? So um that's just an example of yeah. It's the you know, knowing more is that key that unlocks the door to the rest of the world.

SPEAKER_02 11:40

And there isn't it isn't that the more you spend on a wine, the better it is. That's exactly.

SPEAKER_01 11:45

That's the the biggest message to get across. I mean, yeah, you can spend a lot on a wine that's not that great.

SPEAKER_02 11:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:51

And a lot of that happens. I see that a lot.

SPEAKER_02 11:54

I imagine there's probably some people that are at, you know, if it's I don't know, I'm I don't know much about wine, but if it's $275 a bottle, they're like, well, I gotta have that for my collection. Probably doesn't even matter what it tastes like. They want to have that on the shelf just as a matter of pride.

SPEAKER_01 12:08

Yes. I mean, and this is how we shop in general, right? This is how as consumers, we do that with clothes, we do that with all sorts of things. Um wine's different. It's an agricultural product. And so you have to start asking yourself when you get into wine, what is it that I'm looking for in wine? Is it for this wine to express the place from which it is grown? Or is it to experience um a winemaker's special touch on how he likes to make wine, in which case you might be looking in two different directions. And so that's important to understand because if you like big, robust, smooth, sexy, voluptuous, soft red wines, then you're a lot of words. That's a lot of words, but you know what it means? It's they had to take a lot of money to spend on oak barrels to soften and make that wine all sexy and voluptuous. That is a wine of process. That is a wine of a lot of time and a lot of effort. And then, yeah, it takes a lot of money to purchase these really nice barrels, right? So, versus a wine that maybe you're using older barrels because you're wanting the fruit to really show itself more than the oak, um, that which imparts all sorts of beautiful, like vanilla soft characters. So uh, in the way that burb, you know, bourbon uh is made in that way, right? So that's the thing, is it's it's there are multiple paths. Do you remember those books that you could read that were called um choose your own adventure? That's kind of what it's like with wine, where you're like, okay, let's start with like the Cabernet Sauvignon grape. What do I want from this grape when I'm sitting around enjoying a steak? What do I want out of it? And so it's choose your own adventure if I if I want something as I described in both of those different situations, then you have different choices to make. And some of those are more expensive and some of them are not.

SPEAKER_02 13:57

Have you ever sat down with a bottle of wine that you expected to be really, really good and you were just incredibly disappointed?

SPEAKER_01 14:04

More than not.

SPEAKER_02 14:05

Yeah. But you know, part of what about the opposite of the opposite.

SPEAKER_01 14:12

And then you're surprised. Yes. Um, part of that's because of who you're with. To me, wine is not about it should not be a product in a vacuum in which you just sit a bottle down and just start chugging it. Um, because really wine is meant to be on the table. It is listen, ladies, out there. I mean, you can't, I'm not judging, but if but if you are really wanting to understand, you know, and you are spending that money on the bottle, like I think it's important to kind of think about it that way. Like, okay, I I had, and I'll use a Texas wine example. I was with a a good friend of mine, uh, Ron Yates, who owns Ron Yates winery, and he makes some good wines, um, but he loves to focus on Spanish varieties. And I'll be honest, I'm telling the world, Tempranillo, which is a grape that's grown pretty widely in Texas, is not my favorite grape. I don't love Spanish versions of it. I don't love Texas versions. It's not because of anything anyone is doing. It's not because of the winemaker or the winery. It's just not my preference. You know, it's not my favorite. Um, and so he and I always have this joke. He's like, All right, I'm gonna let you try this, but I know you're not gonna like it because it's Tempranillo. And I'm like, all right, great. Um, and last, like a few weeks ago, I was out visiting him and he poured this wine. He's like, I'm gonna pour it for you. I know you're not gonna like it. And I'm like, okay, fine. So we were talking and everything, and I kept going back to that glass and I kept tasting it and smelling it. And I'm like, I I can't believe you, but you got me, Ron. Like I actually like this wine. He's like, Don't say that too loud. Like, there's other people in the tasting room, you know. And I just in terms of like me being, you know, like it would have been, it was, it was amazing. And and I think that is because we were having a great time. And I I did take that wine home and like taste it on my own later, just to, you know, because I think there is an there is an example of people that'll be at a tasting room with their friends or whatever, and they buy a case of wine and they come home and they're like, I mean, this is good, but I remember it being, yeah, you know, and I think again, um, the social aspect of of what wine can do um is is really it adds to that.

SPEAKER_02 16:12

The the uh atmosphere and the experience affects the taste. I've never thought about wine that's actually fascinating to me.

SPEAKER_04 16:20

So I I think I read somewhere that you collect soil from is that is that I read something about that?

SPEAKER_01 16:27

Well, so I do bring home a lot of or you like you're you're not like you're not just collecting dirt, just random dirt. Well, I mean, that's what's funny. I do bring home a lot of dirt. Yeah. So does TSA ever like stop you because you have like bags of dirt in your suitcase? Uh that's a good question. No, they have they often ask, you do have well, especially when you used to fill out the form. I'm I've got global entry now, so I, you know, I just I don't fill out anything. But there used to be like, okay, did you were you on any farms while you were here? Well while you were well, yeah, in most European countries, like they don't call it just a vineyard. It's usually a farm that you're on. That's how they're perceived. And so yeah, there's a lot of like, mm. I just have some soil. Just some rocks. Yeah. What's the purpose of that? Um you know, we all collect different things. I know it sounds really strange. I don't collect shoes, I collect dirt. No, it's because as you're studying wines um of the world, you start to learn about, you know, the soil has a great impact on what you ultimately get in the glass. And I won't get go into the science of that. You don't actually taste the dirt in the glass, but um, it has an impact on how those grapes are grown. And so when you go to different, when you're reading about it, you're like, okay, well, there's, you know, certain slate soils in this region, or there's this this region is known for the chalkiness and this particular lime volcanic soils are really important. And so there's something about it, like when you've read about it and tasted the wines, and then you go to the place, you can take pictures all you want. But for me, bringing a piece of the place back and being able to really think about like, okay, yeah, this is volcanic. Like this is a wine from Aetna in Italy and in the Sicilian, on the Sicilian east side. Um, I think about that, that, that wine as this is a result of these vines being grown in this rocky, unlikely, unfertile soil. And yet they're some of the most talked-about wines right now um in the market.

SPEAKER_02 18:23

So is that what your book is about? It's Italianity? Is that what the new book is about?

SPEAKER_01 18:28

Yeah. So I have a new book out called Italianity, uh, the culture of Italian wine. And it's not about soils. In fact, we actually thought maybe that's the direction we would go in is creating this academic exploratory um wine book. But I have a co-author. He's an Italian winemaker and agronomist, so uh vineyard expert. Okay. And um we, when we started to come up with this idea, it became more about, you know, there are a lot of academic books out there already that are well written and give you the idea of, okay, I'm in Chianti Classico. Here's the soils, here is the climate, here are the people that you, you know, the wines you should go buy. So we decided we didn't want to do that. We actually decided to share the stories. And why is it when you're in a place like Piedmont, they're eating a certain type of food? Or why is it that Barolo is known as like this iconic wine of kings and it's sold for these high dollars and everything like that. But when you're talking to the people, the families that actually live there, they're not drinking Barolo on a Tuesday night, you know. What do they drink? They drink dolcetto or barbera or paloverga. And so we wanted to kind of share stories of people so that if you ever go visit these places, you're like, okay, white beans in Tuscany are actually more important than I realized. And they're not just a simple throwaway in the same way that with Tex Mex, the refried beans or the charo beans, like that's part of the meal. Like you have to have it on the plate, right? Um, so we give insights into like if you're a sommelier or someone in the wine industry, you might see something a little deeper where you're like, wow, you know, I already have this context. Um, and now I know this about this particular winemaker that no one's really known about yet. Or if you're like my mom, who just lightly knows about wine just because of me, she's like, Well, I didn't know that this is how you're supposed to take coffee when you're in Italy or that this is what you should order, or we all love the Aperol spritz, but when is it appropriate to order an espr a spritz and when is it not appropriate to order a spritz?

SPEAKER_04 20:30

Well, one of the things that I wanted to ask you is does the glass truly matter on what you're drinking your wine out of? Because I love a good little water cup. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 20:43

Yes. Okay, so that's an interesting uh it's an interesting question. The answer are is yes and no. So, you know, when I when I got married, I actually bought these these straight little, they look like juice glasses, and that's kind of what we use them for now. But it, you know, on the Italian, like basic restaurant table, right? Like nothing fancy or whatever. I mean, this is what people drink their wine out of. Um and yet you've got Riedel, which is an amazing brand that has spent so much time and science and effort into creating glasses specific to each grape. Like this is how you should appreciate Burgundy, this is how you should appreciate Bordeaux. And yes, I mean, maybe I I haven't really tasted every single glass that they've used with every single wine. And so no offense to Riedel, but I also don't have the space or the money to get all of those glasses. Um to me, it's it's again back to how do you want to enjoy the wine? If you're just sitting outside on the porch with a friend, one, you may not want to break a glass. So go for plastic or something that's not going to break. Um, and then the other thing is if you're smelling something that's aged and you're in like it's an older wine, and that needs to have interaction with oxygen if it's been bottled up and tight for so many years. So it does help to have a glass that. Can help bring that process along so that as it's in your glass, maybe over 30 minutes, you're smelling it one way and it starts to open up and develop a different way over that design. That's a big fat one. Well, it can be, yeah. So the bowl a bowl is helpful, right? Like a it's if it's bigger at the bottom and then it narrows at the top, what's happening is it's it's bringing you those aromas first. So that even as you're holding the glass, if you're like a Sauvignon Blanc, like if you're holding it down from your chest, the aromas should be hitting you before you even get to your like very long before you even get to your nose. Um so those glasses are many of them are designed to help you with that. But if you ask me at home, I have a universal. I don't do white and red glass, I don't do Bordeaux, burgundy glass. Again, if I had a massive kitchen or no, if I had a massive um cabinet for space, right? Like, closet, yes, then maybe I would. But I like a universal glass. I love Gabriel, I love um, you know, I mean, there's there's nice and there's there's, you know, you can also go at a at a decent rate where you don't have to spend so much.

SPEAKER_02 23:07

So much more complicated than I every time I sit with somebody that knows about wine, I, you know, I I hate to admit this. I'm the guy that goes into ATB and goes, oh, that's a cool label. I that's a that's my depth of knowledge about wine. Yeah. But I so it it's fascinating to me to uh hear about all this. But you also write about food, right?

SPEAKER_01 23:26

Aaron Ross Powell, Jr. Yeah. So I mean the food part it will never leave me. It's what I started out in. Um as the wine uh as the wine assignment, the Texas wine kind of became my beat. You didn't hear about beat reporters covering and as that happened, I started to learn more about the world of wine through the certifications, and that evolved into traveling all over the world. So New Zealand, South Africa, you know, Argentina, like I've been kind of everywhere at this point. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 23:54

And those are do you normally target places that have good wines?

SPEAKER_01 23:58

Aaron Powell Yes. So usually so I'll get invited as a journalist to come and explore the region and get to get familiar with the different producers and see that soil so I can pack it in my bag and take it home.

SPEAKER_02 24:09

How much are we talking about? Are we talking about a little baggy or are we talking about 10 pounds? No, just a little bag.

SPEAKER_01 24:14

Like I have like all these little jars. But it's and so so as that happened, I also I'm a freelancer, so I write for a lot of different publications now. And what happened is because I was doing the cookbooks, I started to move away from writing magazine stories about food because it became to me a conflict of interest to like let's take Uchi as an example. For me to write a story about Uchi as a journalist from an object when you're supposed to be objective. And then you're writing a book. And then I've already written their book. So I know the ins and outs of Tyson Cole and all how he started that business and everything. And I don't feel like that is um objective any longer. So I pulled back because I liked doing the book work, but I pulled back from writing magazine work on food and went straight to only writing about uh wine for magazines, et cetera, or online publications. And then cookbooks were were where I can dive deep with someone and help them tell their story, you know. So Jack Gilmore of Jack Allen's or you know he has a fascinating story for sure.

SPEAKER_04 25:16

I've I've eaten at every restaurant that you've written about. So I love them all. But I want to talk about the Austin scene, the Austin food scene and how it has really evolved and almost even taken over by Gen Z food influencers. And so I I you know follow them them on either their socials, TikTok or Instagram. And you talk about subjective versus objective, I feel like a lot of these, they're not authentic anymore. And um the food or the influencer? The influencer. Yeah. So, you know, they're they're they're going into these places, they're obviously either getting paid or or if they if they didn't get their meal paid for, they're gonna write some crappy review about them. You know, I mean, there's like this whole food influence scene. And now with the introduction of the Michelin stars that are here in Austin, what are your feelings on that and how how Austin has kind of changed and evolved, I guess?

SPEAKER_01 26:16

It's a big I'm not usually at a loss for words, and I promise I'm not currently at a loss for words. I have a lot of thoughts, but I want to figure out the best way to share it. So, you know, food journalism has evolved significantly from the time when you would be a restaurant critic and cognito, right, with a hat on and no one knew who you were, and you would get your reservation under a different name and show up and no one was supposed to know. Um that still happens. Um, I can definitely attest to that. But um when I started writing about food, for instance, it's when blogging was a really big deal, right? And so, like, remember like the movie Julia and Julia came out and everything, like and blogging was fascinating. That was the early food influencer, public flu food influencer movement, right? So no longer showing up in a in a cap and in, you know, in disguise. But hey, I'm a blogger. Um, I'd like to take pictures of your food and put it on my blog and maybe, you know, and then there was kind of like the expectation of and maybe you they'll give me free food, like I'll get a free meal or whatever. Whereas like real restaurant criticism, they're not supposed to know you're there. They definitely shouldn't be giving you free food, and you, your publication or whomever you are should be paying for it out of your own pocket. That's objective, that's how it's supposed to be. And the goal is you're trying to give your audience, consumers, a real experience of I showed up here, I didn't have any special favors, and this is what you can expect when you come to this restaurant. I know I'm old school, but that's how it should be. I think that is how it should be, yeah. Um, but with the influencer world, um, you know, I'm I'm not gonna cast any judgment, but I think we have to ask ourselves why we're doing what we're doing and why we're consuming as visual consumers of social media, why we're choosing to consume it. And so technically there are FCC regulations that say that you're supposed to disclose if you were given anything for free or if you have been paid to make that post. A lot of people know this and they will say this is a sponsored uh post on social media, or this is in promotion with, or this is in partnership with. That's the law, that's what you should be doing. Is everybody doing that? No. No, absolutely not. Absolutely not. So I'm not coming after you, that's not my job, but I will tell you that if you are a consumer of that type of media, you need to pay attention to where your media is coming from. That's the case not just for food or wine, it's the case for every other piece of news we're getting. Um but it it does bother me as someone who is a journalist by training, and I believe deeply in the fact that that we should we should be true to what our job is. Um that's changed over time, and I can't be the policeman of it, but I definitely care about where my information comes from.

SPEAKER_02 29:02

So if somebody's come into Austin and they know you and they reach out and they say, hey, you know, we want to find out all the cool places to go with all the best food, uh, you know, where where should we go find that information? Where do you send them? Besides your stuff, obviously.

SPEAKER_01 29:16

Um I do still believe Texas Monthly does an uh a job of integrity with not all with all of their reporting. They do still have a fact-checking department, which doesn't exist in a lot of publications anymore. So I actually know the names of the fact-checkers there. They're legit.

SPEAKER_03 29:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:32

Um but also I know how they do their restaurant reviews. And I know, again, having worked for their editor who's now retired, but I know the new editor, um, they care very much about the process and how things are done. And they do pay for all of their food, and they do not announce that they're walking in.

SPEAKER_02 29:50

And I'll follow up on that. So if somebody's coming to Austin, they reach out to you and they say, We're coming to Austin, Jessica. We we need you to show us around. Where do you take them?

SPEAKER_01 29:58

Oh, that's a hard one. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 30:00

So to get an overview of food in Austin. Where do you take them?

SPEAKER_01 30:05

So that's funny. So this actu actually happens a lot, especially uh most recent was uh my my co-author for Italianity. Uh he's he's from Italy. He had never been to Austin, he had never been to Texas. And so that's the question is who's coming and have they been to Texas before? You know? So I I have to be honest, like, and this is not objective, so I'm gonna say it, but like people always ask me, like, what's your favorite restaurant in Austin? And I usually answer, well, other than Uchi slash Uchi Co. Yeah. And then I go into, well, this is kind of cool, or this is new, or this is really if you're looking for this, this, you know. So um, I usually start with Uchi. Okay. And I have to say, for as great as Austin is over the past 10 to 15 years and the way that it's grown with all these new restaurants, all these great chefs, all sorts of amazing things. So yay, yay, plus plus, plus. Um, Uchi's been here for over 20 years and they are still packed. It is still hard to get a reservation. So very hard. Um, and that's because hospitality means everything to them and quality of food, where it's coming from, creativity, never sticking to something stayed and old, but always pushing boundaries. So that's there's my advertisement for for them. I am not being I have not worked for them for years.

SPEAKER_02 31:23

So I'm ashamed to say I have been there.

SPEAKER_01 31:26

He's never been to Uchi. What are you doing next week? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:29

Yeah, can you jump me in? It sounds like it's hard to get a reservation. It's hard.

SPEAKER_04 31:32

So I have a very interesting question. What is the most beautiful meal that you remember that had absolutely nothing to do with how the food tasted? You you kind of described about Uchi was like, you know, the atmosphere and everything else. And it's like, okay, the food wasn't the most memorable thing. Maybe the presentation, the atmosphere, the people that you were with.

SPEAKER_01 31:54

Oh gosh. I all sorts of memories just flooded my brain. So now I'm like trying to unpack them. Um, I will say, uh, since we're on Uchi, I will say like that the first time I ever ate there, I had no idea what I was doing. And it's before I'd ever met Tyson. We were just there with friends and they had told us about it, and they were like, you gotta try this place. And so when they went there, they were like, okay, so here's a roll that would be good, and here's, you know, this particular sashimi. But it was pretty much the stuff that you're used to ordering, you know, what that that's familiar enough that you might be used to ordering at a at a regular sushi restaurant. But then they bring you the hot rock out, you know, and they're well they did they did do the hot rock. And so we happen to have, and this is pretty much every server at Uchi that was good at kind of being like, yes, we should definitely have these things. These are so great. We would like, you know what? The chef is working on this new dish, and we'd love your opinion on it. Um, and if you like it, I can actually bring you a couple of other things that you might be interested in as well. That was I'm like push paws brilliant salesmanship because what they were doing was like, I know exactly that you're not familiar with with sushi. I know you don't know what you're doing, but I'm gonna make you feel like you have all agency here and we're gonna give you something for free that was their like we just want you to taste this and get your feedback. But then I trusted that person. Yep. And then I was like, you know, I mean, we literally that experience, we were like, yeah, bring me a couple of other things like that. That was amazing. And of course, we paid for those things, but that was them saying, we are not gonna intimidate you, we're not gonna make you feel stupid for not knowing this cuisine yet, but we are gonna open the door for you and you are gonna come back. And believe me, I have been back.

SPEAKER_02 33:46

It's really hard to keep a culture like that in a restaurant for 20 plus years because you know, uh employees come and go. And I know in the restaurant business the staff turnover is huge. It's really hard to keep that.

SPEAKER_01 33:59

Well, and and consider that in Austin, this is a transient city, this is a university town. Now, granted, more people come and they don't want to leave and they're coming and coming and coming, and they've grown and grown and grown. But um, that is what our service industry has been built on is people moving in and out of this city. Um and that's changing. So now you've got people that um are constantly wanting to stay in Austin. But for a long time, a lot of the restaurants here had I I would see a server at one restaurant, and then like a couple months later I'd be like, Oh, now they're working here, or you know.

SPEAKER_04 34:32

I have I I have a question about that because we one of our favorite places here to eat locally is Summer Revival and Becky. We love, love Becky. She's just the sweetest thing. And we had a conversation with her yesterday about, you know, the closing of Oakwood Market and the and how these restaurants here in the Texas Hill country really cannot survive. And she said something that was very interesting to me. It said that the culture of eating out here in Dripping Springs is so different than in Austin, is that people are just used to staying home. Remember, she said they they stay home, they cook meals, and she says, if we can get people used to going out to eat, and I said, Well, we're kind of unique because we don't we not only live here, but we work here also. So we're I'm not gonna go eat a Taco Bell every day, you know? I mean I'm not gonna eat a Taco Belly. No, you're not at all. And we eat it, we eat at Pig Pen every Tuesday. I mean, you know, because we're right here, right here in the office. And so I I don't know. It's like Do you think that it's just this area, this Texas Hill Country area? Are you starting to see that kind of across the country that people are just staying home nowadays and not eating out?

SPEAKER_01 35:42

So, yes. I mean, ever since COVID, um, you've had a transition where people could just be like, well, I can just bring it home. I'll go pick it up and bring it home. I mean, think about local, locally pious. After, I mean, of course, they pivoted great and figured out a way to like, we can still get you pizza, but you're gonna have to come pick it up, right? And during COVID. And then they were like, after COVID, it took them a long time to open their doors back up because they were like, actually, this business is doing great this way. Why do we want to have a sit-down? Um, but they eventually learned because people actually really like going and sitting. Go do and eating. I like that experience.

SPEAKER_02 36:17

I had never thought about this, but if I go to a restaurant and get a meal, I enjoy it so much more than if they put it in a box and I drive five minutes to my house and sit and eat it at my kitchen table. It tastes so much better in the restaurant. I never thought about that until you were talking about wine. But it is the experience of the experience makes a difference in how the food tastes.

SPEAKER_04 36:37

Todd and I, we one of our favorite places, and it's been around Austin like a hundred years, used to be Madam's, and now it's it's SAPs, and you know, you go in there and it's you know, it's dingy, and it's just like I but I love it. I love the taste. And sometimes we'll order the Uber Eats or whatever and get it delivered. But there's nothing like sitting in that restaurant where these parasols hanging from the ceiling, just kind of eating because it again, it's all about that experience.

SPEAKER_01 37:03

Right. As well. You know, I think right now our economy is in such a state that it's like I think people are thinking about do I really want to go? It is expensive to eat out. My husband and I, we have crazy expensive. Yeah, where I'm just like, wow. I mean, we I'm not gonna mention the restaurant, but it was out here and dripping, and it was like, wow, what this dish is being is listed as a $32 chicken dish. That should not be a $32 chicken dish. I'm sorry. It has, you know, like when you break it all down. And as a food writer and someone who's understood the restaurant industry from the inside and also the wine industry and the margins that you need to make on those foods to be able to stay in business, um things are a lot more expensive for restaurants right now in order to get you good food. And therefore they've had to mark things up. So if you're if you're eating at home because it's too expensive to eat out, there's there's a reason for why it's too expensive to eat out. It's not because restaurants are just rolling in cash.

SPEAKER_04 38:01

It's also also the culture of um Cisco, where you're eating the same thing at every different restaurant. If I'm ordering vehicles, it's the same ding veitas that are marinated from Cisco. Depends on the restaurant. It depends on the restaurant. But you know, when I was at Mats Al Rancho, which, you know, again, like a staple, and you know, there's like people that say, Oh, Mats Al Rancho. But I I love it, you know, I love the atmosphere and everything. But I heard the waiter next to me on Friday say, I want to tell you that this isn't Cisco, these are not Cisco fajitas. These are our own specially marinated fajitas. And I paid attention to that. And the people were like, they kind of, you know, poo-pooed on him. They didn't, they didn't really understand what that meant, but I appreciated that. I understood that. You know, there was love that went into those.

SPEAKER_02 38:46

There's probably people that go to Matt Cell Rancho, though, not because the food is so great, because it's an Austin icon. It's an institution you have to go to.

SPEAKER_04 38:54

I mean, it's not so much about the food, yeah. It's about the margaritas.

SPEAKER_02 38:57

Jessica, I want to ask you about the cookbooks. And uh you've written like five or six.

SPEAKER_01 39:04

I've written eight books, include with the uh with the new one, Atelianity, having just come out. But yeah, before that, yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 39:10

And so the process of doing that. So somebody uh what's his name from Jack Allen's? Uh Jack Gilmar. Jack. Calls you and says, Hey, we're doing a cookbook.

SPEAKER_01 39:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:20

And what do you what do you what's the first thing you do, and what's that process to write that book?

SPEAKER_01 39:24

Aaron Ross Powell Well, in the case of Jack, uh he didn't call me and say, hey, we're doing a cookbook. I actually pitched it to him. And he had been thinking about it for a while. He was like, okay. But um but then he would he liked the idea. And um the thought is basically for Jack Gilmore, I had he has quite a rep uh quite a history in Austin cuisine. So like the restaurants um he's worked, he'd had to be. She right? Is that weird? C Taehouse. Z Tay House, sorry. C T house. Sorry, go ahead and like that's where I had my rehearsal dinner, was it? Chaos. Like I grew up and I am from Austin. Like I grew up here. I knew all the places. And so um, and he is also not a trained chef. He is a cook, and he'll tell you that to this day. His son, Bryce Gilmore, which I just want to plug, Bryce's restaurants, Odd Duck and uh Barley Swine, you will never see a Cisco Chuck at either of those places. Um local farming, blah, blah, blah. And Jack is too. And so when we were talking, one of the things I loved about Jack Al Allen's concept, I was doing a story about him. So just uh, I think for Tribeza magazine years ago. Um, and he talked about how it was important for him to do farmer relationships, have these farmer relationships, get his pork from here, get his spinach from here, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I said, you know, Jack, you spend so much time in the farming community of Central Texas. If you were to ever do a cookbook, I think you should do it not as like a typical, you know, appetizer salad, entree dessert book, but more like I am, it's fall in Texas. And this is what, when I'm at the farmers market, this is what I'm buying and this is what I'm cooking. And so we designed that book. You'll see him, he's on the cover, looking like, you know, some rock and roll star to me. But like there's a beer tractor. Yeah, there's a tractor, and he's standing in a crop full of, I think it's the spinach crop. But um, he he really is true to that. And it's like, what is he cooking in spring? What is he cooking in fall? And and this came out of the idea that like at Zitahas, which they ended up bringing over to Jack's, there's the Navajo taco that they make. It's the Indian fry bread. Yes. Um, with the and they he makes this crispy fried spinach that's just to die for.

SPEAKER_02 41:45

I've never had it. I knew that.

SPEAKER_01 41:46

Well, you can only have it in the fall because he only uses uh he only uses spinach when it's in season and they put it on as a special. Oh, okay. And so that's an example where I was like, people know you for this Navajo taco. Like, and and we anyway, the conversation turned into let's make a book where it's your recipes for the fall, your recipes for the winter, your recipes for the spring. So that book is color-coded, where it's like when you're in the, I don't remember the orange section or the red section, whatever. Then you can tell what part of the season. So if you're going to the farmers markets, which is what he encourages, this is what you should look for. You may not get tomatoes in in the wintertime, right? You shouldn't be getting tomatoes in the wintertime. So here's what you should be getting.

SPEAKER_04 42:31

He kind of introduced to me uh when he first opened Jack Allen's um the farm to table concept. When um I was like, oh, well, what let me deep dive into that. What does that really mean? And and and I started really caring about where my food came from and what I was eating. And what I really loved about it was, you know, kind of you were talking about Uchi. You first go there and they they bring you something for free, like you know, like not like chips and salsa, but you have this little pramino cheese and these little crackers, and you're like, what? And then they you can buy their vegetables and a little mason jar. And it's like that was that was pretty cool. That's he's a he's a great.

SPEAKER_02 43:07

Have you been to Daymaker down there?

SPEAKER_01 43:09

Yeah, yeah, the the the brunch or breakfast place. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:11

Yeah, man, that's cool. Salt Traders is great. Yeah, we go to Salt Traders. Yeah, we've been we I have a running group downtown on Saturday mornings, and more often than not, after our run, we end up at Daymaker. That's a great place. Good food. But the so the process on the cookbook, so you pitched that to Jack and he was in on it. And then did you like interview him and then write it? Or how did how what's the this how did you get each part of that book all in one place?

SPEAKER_01 43:37

Collaborative projects like that. So with Jack, um, with Uchi, so Tyson Cole for that, and then for the Salt Lake, that's owner Scott Roberts. Um so it was more about the you have to be willing to spend a lot of time with this person, and they have to be willing to spend time with you. So um, you know, and a lot of it's it I wouldn't Call it like psychology sessions, but a lot of it's as a journalist, knowing how to ask questions and just get them comfortable with you and then figure out. And we, you know, I would record the sessions, it'd be once a week for about four months or so to really get what we needed and the story and how we were gonna process it. Um, and then I I'm also kind of this project manager in which I'm like, okay, now we've talked about all this stuff. Here's how, or in the case of Jack, I knew how I wanted it to be organized, but it was like, now how do we present it well? And so um then you need a team, which I was fortunate to work with some really great, uh, a really great team here with designers and people who know how to lay out. And all there's a whole, there's a whole team. It's not just me or the chef.

SPEAKER_02 44:45

It seems like a lot. So I would imagine you have to have a team.

SPEAKER_01 44:48

Yeah. So each of those books were from start to finish about a year in terms of like doing the interviewing, the writing, the design, photography, layout, printing, and actual release.

SPEAKER_04 45:00

Aaron Powell Who finances all like when someone's writing a book? Are you is Jack financing the book or are like are you financing the book?

SPEAKER_01 45:08

How does that so it depends on the the the publication? So of the eight books that I've done, half of them are published through actual conventional publishers, right? So like Time Inc. or which is now dot dash Meredith, which is anyway, they've all been purchased over time. Um, or like my book um from uh call the Tex Mex book that I have with Chef Ford Fry, that's through Clarkson Potter, or um so those are books that are established publishers, like you've heard of Penguin, Random House, all of those, right? So when that happens, they're paying you a stipend to be the team. Even though they're spotlighting a chef, they're basically saying, okay, chef, we're gonna give you this budget. You go hire your writer, you go hire your photographer, et cetera. And they are fronting the cash, and then they receive the sales. And after a certain percentage or a certain number of sales have been made, then you might start receiving royalties off of that. Oh, okay. Um, but so for those, then I'm hired as the writer, and it's just a set fee, and that's what I take. Um, in the other cases, those were self-published. So Uchi, Salt Lake, Jack Allen's, those were self-published. And then Italianity is self-published. And the idea is that whomever came up with the concept, so in this case, Jack or Tyson or Scott, myself, um, you say, I want to pay for my writer, my photographer, my editor, et cetera. And I will pay for the printing and I will pay for the distribution. And all of the money that gets made comes straight back to me. That's right. So it's a it's a business decision. When you go on that path, you have to decide. And a lot of times the chefs or people that I've worked with that wanted to do self-publishing, you have more control. So when you're working with an editor, yes, you may say, Oh, we want to do this book on Tex Mex and we want this and this. And the editor may say, Well, that's great, but why don't you have shrimp tacos in here? Why don't you have burritos? And this is a conversation I've actually had with an editor, uh, because burritos are not from Texas. Yes. That's why we don't have burritos and the Tex Mex cookbook.

SPEAKER_04 47:14

Are they trying to make you put beans in the chili?

SPEAKER_01 47:17

That is also that is also not okay. Um, but but that is where, you know, like so, so a lot of chefs are like, I don't want some editor telling me what I have to do. They want more control. Um, and and that's great. So then you need to pay for that control. If you want someone else to publish it for you, you need to be willing to let go of some of that control. Those are decisions, they're just business decisions. Yeah, that's right.

SPEAKER_02 47:42

How has AI affected all of this?

SPEAKER_01 47:45

Uh, it's a good question. So um I don't know the answer in terms of what's getting published now that's written by AI. I think I would I would suspect that especially for people, there's so much more opportunity for self-publishing. Now you can self-publish through Amazon, you know. I don't know the answer in terms of how much more of that's happening. Um I do think, and I as a journalist, um, I actually speak about it um to aspiring journalists, et cetera, et cetera, um, that AI can be an absolute excellent tool, and it should be an excellent tool, and you need to learn how to use it as a tool, not to write your content. And if you're doing that, you need to ask yourself how who you want to be, you know?

SPEAKER_02 48:32

You're not really a journalist if you're plugging in a concept and saying, write this article for me. You're not a journalist.

SPEAKER_01 48:38

But there are really great tools. So, like one that I use, and I'm I'm very open about this, is Grammarly. So um I used to, when I first started out, um, I am really I I don't even know if I would say I'm a great writer, but I'm a writer, right? I think of the story, I organize a story, I interview the people and I insert the quotes and I write the story, right? But I'm actually not really great at copy editing. I'm not great at commas and um finding where I've made an error. And and you're using one side of your brain to do something. And honestly, copy editing is a different side of your brain. And so I used to have my husband actually, before I would turn in a story to one of my editors, I'd have him, I'm like, can you please just read it and make sure I've got no errors? Because I didn't want to look you want to be as good as you can be, right? I wanted to turn something in. And honestly, when Grammarly came on, he was like, Can you please use this? I bought it for you. And Grammarly has become more robust. So I what I like about it is the nuts and bolts. And you you specifically say, look, this is my thing, this is my voice. I don't want you to change the writing. I just want you to do the copy editing. Where are their errors? And what I like about Grammarly is it'll pull it out first and show you, and you get to say, I want to accept your change, or I don't want to accept your change. Um with wine writing, that's really important because a lot of stuff I write about in wine, Grammarly doesn't know wine. So it might say, like, oh, when I say an Italian wine region, right? Uh it might say, like, well, you've used the word region a lot. So can you say Italian wine area? I'm like, nope, that actually doesn't work. It still needs to be region. Don't take creative liberty. Exactly. But it but it does ask you to approve. And so I like that collaborative, whatever, collaborative experience with the AI. Yeah. Um but it has helped me because I use it what to in an um a high integrity way, as I like to say. You know, like where I know what I'm doing, I'm still turning in my content, but I've had something look at it that is allowing my editor to see something that's clean.

SPEAKER_02 50:40

Yeah. Um, it's like it's sort of like an advanced spell check. We've relied on spell check for 25 years. Which is AI. Which is AI, right?

SPEAKER_01 50:48

So if don't lay-if you're a purist, don't tell me you're not using AI. I've never thought of that it is. The little paperclip guy in Microsoft is AI.

SPEAKER_02 50:56

I'm the same. I will I will write something and I will put it in Chat GPT and I'll say, don't change my tone, but check it for spelling and grammar. And it'll because if you just say, hey, what how's this sound to Chat GPT? It'll change it up completely.

SPEAKER_04 51:11

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 51:12

Not in a and not in a good way most times.

SPEAKER_04 51:14

And then I'll read it and like, that's dumb.

SPEAKER_02 51:16

Stupid.

SPEAKER_04 51:17

That's dumb. Um so you built kind of a career off of having it a sophisticated or educated palate, also. What is something that you'd like to admit here today that people would be like, what, you eat that? Like for me, barbecue corn nuts or like stopping at Bucky's and having a barbecue sandwich. That's a good one. You're like, okay, I can't believe she eats that.

SPEAKER_01 51:39

No, I mean, people should totally support me on this, but like I so I eat out a lot for for my job. I do fancy things all the time. The fact that you do not weigh 400 pounds, I would like to for with with that comment, I I appoint everyone to a Texas Monthly article that Pat Sharp wrote called The Skinny Bitch. And she was a James Beard Award-winning writer. In fact, I think she won a James Beard Award for that article about how you can be a food critic and stay skinny. Um so everybody read that. Okay. Um, but for for me, like because I'm around all over the place, I don't like to eat fancy all the time, right? And I, especially middle of the day, my least favorite meal is lunch because it stops me from what I need to be doing. So I I do a fold over peanut butter and jelly sandwich more than you might know. You know, I'm not afraid of that. And like it's it's okay. Um, and that's something people a lot of times will be like, oh my gosh, you know, she'll they'll go over, we go over to someone's house for dinner, like, I don't know what to cook for you. I don't know what to, and I'm like, please don't do that.

SPEAKER_04 52:41

Like Or do your do your kids eat boxed macaroni and cheese? Okay, no, we don't do that.

SPEAKER_02 52:46

Um What about the same question on wine? Do you have people over sometimes and you pull out a bottle of wine and it's whatever, nine dollars at some store and you go and they go, Oh, really? But you but it ends up being really good.

SPEAKER_01 52:58

I love to bring wine. That's my favorite thing. And I'm not always bringing like some creme de la creme or whatever. I'm like, oh, you've got to try this. I just found it. Yeah, it's this is nine dollars and blah, blah, blah, blah. Or this is what I always have in my refrigerator, or this is, you know, that's my favorite thing because, you know, I like to be that sommelier that's like, hey, this is not pretentious, actually. I think you're gonna love this stuff based on what you're serving us tonight, and you can find it here for blah, blah, blah, blah. Or, you know, and so that's one of my favorites. And yeah, I'll do, I'll do that too. When people come to my house and we're serving, I usually break out a lot more wine than we're planning to drink. Like, I'm not a heavy drinker, but I'm like, they're here. They should experience something fun, maybe something they've never tried before.

SPEAKER_02 53:42

So we might open like eight or nine bottles for and so you're doing like a third of a glass or a quarter of a glass of.

SPEAKER_01 53:49

I always encourage people, please don't pour a full glass. I'd love for y'all to taste a bunch of things. So pour just a little bit, or I'll get multiple glasses out of setting and like you can try different things.

SPEAKER_02 53:58

Aaron Powell Because by the second glass, the taste doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_01 54:01

No. That's exactly right.

SPEAKER_02 54:03

Uh uh talking about food trends. What's a food trend you wish would disappear tomorrow? And what's a food trend that you hope has some staying power?

SPEAKER_01 54:13

Food trend that I would should disappear tomorrow.

SPEAKER_02 54:16

Probably something to do with social media if you think about it. Food influencers.

SPEAKER_04 54:20

Yeah. Look, no, oh my gosh. Uh you know what I hate is when they are on the video and they do this like little thing and they oh the sounding oh yeah, that should go away.

SPEAKER_01 54:31

Gosh, I, you know, I have family members that will walk out of a theater at a movie if people are crunching their popcorn too bad. Um, you know, I will say that, like, look to all influencers out there, we all have to make money somehow. And we're, you know, a lot of people are doing a really great job of making things look really pretty and all of that stuff. Um, my hope is that we are just being like honest about what it is that we're talking about. Like I have been to some of the restaurants where they've gotten a lot of great play on social media, and then I'm like, this is a boring meal, or this food is not that great. Um and yeah, maybe I'm judging that from someone who knows how to judge it, but like I I would rather see less like food images of food porn and more, hey, this server like made our night. And I'm coming back here because that person made it so fun. And I don't even remember what I ate.

SPEAKER_03 55:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 55:27

Um, that to me is why we should be dining out, is because we are experiencing hospitality and we are experiencing a great time with our people. Um, and it's because a restaurant has taken and made the effort to get that for you.

SPEAKER_02 55:41

Yeah, I feel like that is a a uh disappearing uh skill, you know, where you go into a restaurant and the experience with the person that helps you is really, really good.

SPEAKER_01 55:52

It's hard to find good help. And I actually think that for the smaller towns that are growing in population, so dripping springs being an example, the reason it's hard to keep restaurants afloat is because you need good service. Yeah. And it's hard to find good service. Um I think everybody should wait tables. Everybody should wait. I agree. It's hard to do and it's hard to do it successfully. And it's and you know, you have people that we all need to be nice to people too. Yeah. You know, we need to be nice to servers and um and they also need to love their job. And so there's a big circle there, right? Right. Like they need to be treated well from both their staff and but they also need to be trained well.

SPEAKER_02 56:30

Because you could tell like when you go into Jack Allen, I've never had bad service. That's right. Jack Allen. Jack cares about service. High standard, and they all carry that. So I think sometimes you go into a restaurant and the they go, okay, that table's yours right there. And they okay.

SPEAKER_01 56:44

Or here's the QR code, let me know when you're ready to order or whatever. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 56:49

They need to be trained properly. I think that is in some cases, that's the missing step with some of these restaurants. They don't spend they might spend half an hour kind of telling them what to do where they really need like an all-day training to really understand how to do it.

SPEAKER_01 57:02

And it doesn't have to be haute cuisine. I have the best of Chick-fil-A. I was just gonna say Chick-fil-A. Like those guys smile, they're always helpful, yeah. That is training at its best.

SPEAKER_04 57:13

There was a m there's a manifesto, believe it or not. I used to, I was the marketing director of Chick-fil-A, and there's a whole manifesto that you had to follow. I know. I want to ask you, are you encouraged by this new Maha movement and the um the exposure of what is in our food and and what we are feeding?

SPEAKER_03 57:34

Healthy means.

SPEAKER_04 57:35

Yeah, what healthy means and and the food pyramid and and how we're what we're putting in our kids' bodies.

SPEAKER_01 57:42

Um so I won't talk politics, but I will talk about how you know, in my job over the years, obviously I've been exposed to doing things right when it comes to food. Like we've talked about Jack Gilmore, Bryce Gilmore, his son. Like these are people, and Tyson, all these are people who care very much about the quality of the food that you're they're eating. And it's not so they can be uh it's not about healthiness to them as much as it is the uh it's the byproduct of choosing to eat that way. Does that make sense? They're not, it's not like they're sitting there like counting their calories or things like that. They're more just like, this is just better for you. So I would say like once a once a year, every summer, um, my family and I, we go and we live in Europe. Um, or actually we're we're moving on to other countries. This, but but the idea is because I can work remotely, my husband is a consultant, he can work remotely. We try to give our kids different um experiences in different cultures. So we've lived in Ireland, we've lived in Spain, Italy for a couple of summers because of the um book I was writing. Will you adopt me? Uh in this past summer, we did uh France, uh a little town in the French Alps called Salange. And this is to answer your question, the shopping there is just 100% different. And the experience of the food that you're eating is a hundred percent different. They have a lot more restrictions in those countries on what can even be sold in the supermarket. Okay. Now we can talk whether or not it's okay to have so many restrictions from your government, but at the same time, those people are eating better because there are so many things that are not allowed in their food system that is allowed in the American food system.

SPEAKER_04 59:26

I totally agree. And I don't, you know, I think it even transcends uh politics. That's not you know, eating healthy has nothing to do with your red, white, blue, or yellow. I think it has to do with just knowing transparency.

SPEAKER_01 59:37

Yes. And that is what we don't know. Our our consumer base here does not know as much about what is allowed and what is not, and nor the money and the lobbies behind it. And that's what's so sad.

SPEAKER_02 59:47

Trevor Burrus, Jr.: So when you're in Europe and you go out and you shop and you eat and you cook and you eat with your family, do you notice that you feel better or you just in general?

SPEAKER_04 59:57

I could eat a whole baguette of bread and I've heard that from so many people.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:01

Like you have pasta in Italy, it's completely different.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:04

Well, the f the f yeah, well, yeah. So the grains that they're growing there are different. But as an example, in France, you know, we go to H E B probably twice a week here and buy our bread. And we do actually, we don't buy uh brand bread, we'll buy it from straight from their bakery. I'll buy it from other local bakeries as well. Um but the point being it lasts for a while on the shelf. Right. Whereas every day in France we were buying our bread every day because the next day it wasn't good.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:34

It was yeah, it's stale. It's yeah, it's almost not edible.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:37

Exactly. You use it for cooking, so I would make croutons or I would put it in soups or I would whatever. Like I still use the bread, or we toast it and use it for something else. But in terms of like fresh bread, eat it that day, make a sandwich with it, that was happening daily, and that's the that's how it's supposed to be.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:53

Yeah. I lived in Spain when I was a k when I was younger in my early teens, and I would go down to the bakery and I'd buy a it's not a baguette in Spain, it's a pond. Uh-huh. I can't remember. Anyway, I would get a thing of butter and that loaf of bread, and I would sit out on the front porch and I would just dip it in the butter, and just and that would be my lunch. So it was it was so good. I've never had bread like that in the United States. Or butter.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:18

The butter is like life-giving.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:20

Oh, I've I have become a butter, a butter aficionado. Yeah. Like I'm I'm really digging the butter. I have so one of my last questions for you is it's very technical and it's gonna have to dig deep down in into your soul. Is queso a condiment or a side dish? Either way, it's a requirement. It is a requirement.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:43

I want to talk about something very near and dear to my heart, uh, and especially this is an Austin question. Tacos.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:50

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:50

Where's the best tacos in Austin? What's your favorite place to go for tacos?

SPEAKER_01 1:01:54

Oh my gosh. Oh, that's hard. Okay. So, first of all, I have to claim a little bit of ignorance because I've been traveling a lot the past couple of years. So me staying on top of what's the best is probably not a fair question for all the people that do do this on a regular basis. Um, I think, you know, oh gosh, I'm gonna blank.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:14

I'm gonna actually like are you a Fonda San Miguel girl or are you a taco trailer? Or like I like habaneros. Habaneros on Old Torf is my favorite.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:22

What about taco deli?

SPEAKER_04 1:02:23

I hate taco deli. I hate taco deli. I hate trudies. I it's commercialized, it's gross.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:29

I like torches for a while, but now torchies is not the same as it used to be.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:33

But yeah. Okay. So if we're going in that direction, um I I prefer Taco Deli actually because of the way they source their food. Yeah. Um and um I mean I love Fonda San Miguel, but that's a whole different that's a whole different genre, right? Like Fond de San Miguel in itself is a visit. You know, like that is a you're you're kind of leaving the country at that point. Um so that's interesting. I do but I'll do it all, right? Like I love a great, you know, taco truck or um it I yeah, it's so funny. I I have zero um like I I don't keep just one bar. I'm like it ha it ha again, it has to be with people. It has to be yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:12

Yeah, it's funny. I'm the exact opposite. I find a place I like, I'm like, that's my go-to. And that's where I go every time.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:19

Do you remember where I used to say that my favorite tacos were? Do you remember? Dairy Queen. Dairy Queen. I love Dairy Queen. I love Dairy Queen tacos. It was like it's part, it's back like one of those things, you know, the the the memories when I was a kid. Yeah I lived down in the valley, even though there was tacos everywhere. But Dairy, I'd go to Dairy Queen, I would never get a hamburger, I'd get their tacos.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:41

Tacos. My mom, I so I didn't really grow up with this, but um I remember she would always talk about the Jack in the Box tacos. Oh, Jack in the Crack. Yes. Yeah, yeah. They had some taco deal. I never have actually had one because by the time I was what in that like they didn't serve them in the city. No, you got it.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:58

The best time to have a Jack in the Crack taco is like two or three o'clock in the morning when you've been out with friends and you've already had the fancy meal and you're just one of those then because we're not staying up for two o'clock until two o'clock.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:11

Well, so I want to go circle back to your book, Italianity. Is it out yet?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:16

It is out. We released um this late spring, so it's been out for a couple of months.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:20

Where can people find it and find out more about it?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:22

So Italianity can be, you can go to Italianity.wine if you would like to order a signed copy, which I uh actually have to fulfill a few of those today. Um so Italianity.wine um is where, and we we created that site because we had people in Italy ordering it. I should mention it's bilingual. So on the left side it's English, and on the right side it's in Italian. Oh, that's cool. Um and then the idea behind that was like if you're reading this, this is an invitation to get to know Italy better, the culture of Italian wine, and they speak Italian there. So um plus, because a lot of it's for Italians, we wanted the Italian population and the people in the Italian wine industry to be able to enjoy it and not have to wait for like a translation later. Um so yeah, you can get it, you can get it on Amazon if you would like. But have you done book signings in in Italy? We did, yeah, we did some book signings in it in Italy. We're going, I'm going back in September for a presentation of the book, and then we're doing we've been doing book signings all over. I think we're we might be doing one at Vintage Soul in the fall. Oh wow. Um, okay Yeah, like just before the holidays because she carries my other book, The United States.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:31

No, that's where I've purchased all of them.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:33

Yes. Um, and then I'm doing them all over. So like I've got something in uh Lubbock area, Houston, uh like all over. And it's because it's just fun to it's more fun to talk about the book and then buy it, you know what I mean? But um, but also like, and it's a great gift. This is a the way we designed it is yes, it's content heavy. There's a lot of stories in it, but the photography is just beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:54

The cover is beautiful, just cute itself. Yeah. It's really pretty.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:57

Um it's the goal was like this could. Be a coffee table book, and it's something that you don't need to read cover to cover like a novel, but you could read an essay and then set it back down, and then maybe a week later you're like, I want to read another essay. So it's all essays, maybe a thousand words. That's cool. And so it's short stories, in and out, um, but it looks pretty on your coffee table. So, you know, it's a great gift.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:19

Italianity. I will.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:23

I'll sign it. Um and you know, send it to you. It's yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:27

And where else can uh the other books that you've written, where can people find out about those?

SPEAKER_01 1:06:31

I would suggest going to my website, so jessicadupy.com.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:36

Uh dupuy, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:38

Dupuy. And uh and but then all of those are Amazon. I will say the Jack Allen's cookbook, for instance, um, and the Uchi cookbook, you should go to the restaurants. I know Jack had sold out and they just re-released. They just did another. So uh I would if you don't have that book, you should get it now. Yeah. Um Salt Lick, I think, still has some at their site. I mean, at their um location. And I think they sell it at the airport because they have Salt Lick at the end of the yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:04

Is your best-selling book the United States of Texas?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:07

United Tastes of Texas is the best-selling book. They I have a second one, United States. Sorry, it's the state. No, that's okay. They they made it up and it's it's sold like hotcakes. It's crazy. Um so I did a second follow-up book to that with Southern Living called The United Tastes of the South. Um, and it released during COVID, unfortunately. So it's less known. But if you like the United Tastes of Texas, it is one that so United Tastes of Texas is all instead of because I'm a little more creative, as you can tell with the Jack Allen thing, um, we didn't do appetizer salad dessert. We did regions because when Southern Living came to me, they said, hey, we want to do a book on Texas, and so let's just do Tex-Mex. I'm like, oh no, no. You would be isolating so many people.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:52

That's right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:52

And there's different kinds of Tex Mex. We've talked about this a lot. The South Texas girl that I grew up in, the Valley Tex-Mex, and you go to Dallas, you're like, what's different?

SPEAKER_01 1:08:01

It's different. That's exactly right. And so I explained that to them. I was like, it'd be better. I mean, Texas is bigger than the entire country of France. And they eat one way in Bordeaux, that's very different than how they eat in Alsace. And the same on the Mediterranean coast is different than how they eat in Normandy on the Atlantic coast. Same in Texas, we have to understand how we were settled. So if you think about that, then the foods are different. If you understand that the East was settled by really that's the deep south still, whereas West Texas is cattle and ranching, right? So we divided that book into five regions. So it's the coast, the west, south Texas, um, and then East Texas, and then Central Texas, which has that German Czech influence, right? And then same that did so well that we came back around and did the South. So we have Appalachia, we have the Atlantic Coast, we have the Gulf Coast, and we have the Southwest. And these are all recipes that are more regionally driven. Um and so, and then little notes and tips about the history of those areas so you can kind of get an understanding for why people eat the way that they do.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:03

Well, I'm gonna have to go get that book now too.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:05

Because when you do those books, does you or your team do you test all those recipes?

SPEAKER_01 1:09:11

So for the Southern Living books, I tested all of those. Uh I should say my mom helped me. She's an amazing cook and she did a lot of the recipe testing, thank God, because it was a lot. Um but then for the the chef books that I work with, we usually work with one of their staff members to test the recipes. They'll provide me the recipe, I'll edit it and say, okay, a home cook needs it to be more like this. Can you test it? And then we check it off.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:35

That's very cool. Well, I I could sit here and talk to you for hours about all this stuff. I'm hungry. I know. I was I was just thinking that. It's like it's lunchtime. I know, I know. Yeah, you you are so knowledgeable about this. I feel like we've just scratched the surface. Yeah. Yeah. We're uh very lucky to have you join us here today and tell you tell us a little bit about what you do. I've very much enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:57

I think the next book for Texas should be called No Beans and Chili. That's that's a whole book on it. I agree.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:03

There could be a whole book on chili.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:05

I think it should be called Texas Tacos.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:07

Texas Tacos, yeah. Not burritos. Not bad. Not burritos. There's the byline. Not burritos. Not burritos. Jessica, thank you so much for joining us. We so appreciate it. I mean, you I I didn't even know that I knew who you were, and I have given this book out as a gift several times. And so thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:28

I really appreciate it. It's great to talk to local people, and we love being in Dripping Springs, so this is great. Well, thank you.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:34

Thank you for joining us. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:37

Deep Eddie Vodka just gave your espresso martini a serious Texan upgrade.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:43

Introducing the highly anticipated Deep Eddie Espresso vodka, made with real espresso, pure cane sugar, and 10 times distilled 80-proof vodka.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:54

You'll taste rich, roasted coffee, smooth vanilla, and toasted caramel.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:59

Serve it chilled, pour it over ice, or shake up the easiest espresso martini you've ever made.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:05

Deep Eddy Espresso Vodka.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:07

Bold coffee flavor.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:08

With absolutely no intention of helping you behave. Available nationwide.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:15

South Star Bank has remained true to its Texas roots for over 100 years. A commitment to the people and communities they serve, along with flexible financial solutions, allow their clients to shine. Mortgage loans, checking accounts, or complete business solutions. South Star Bank is your financial partner. South Star Bank, trusted by professionals, backed by tradition, built for Texas.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:41

SouthStarBank.com, member FDIC, an equal housing lender. NMLS 410-624. Texas weather doesn't mess around, and your roof takes the hit.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:52

Hail, wind, heat, it all adds up fast, which is why you don't want to guess when it comes to your roof.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:58

Black Slate Roofing handles everything from inspections to full installs.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:02

They keep it simple, they keep it honest.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:05

Repairs, replacements, whatever your home needs. Done right with no shortcuts.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:10

Because your roof is your first line of defense, and it better be a strong one.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:15

Black Slate Roofing. Done once, done right.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:18

Black SlateRoofing.com.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:22

This show is brought to you in part by the Mallet Integrity Team, serving Dripping Springs, Austin, and the surrounding areas of Central Texas since 2004. When you need the best real estate advice and service, give them a call at 512-829-2062. Or email them at malletintegrity team.com. And now here's Steve and Michelle.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:44

And we're back. Jessica Dupuy. Wow, she is a fountain of knowledge.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:50

On a wide range of subjects.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:53

Yeah, yeah. I actually think, and she mentioned it, that she might want to come back and we could do a whole episode about wines because that lady knows some wine stuff.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:02

She does, but um, I just want to talk about really quick what happened in between us walking her out to her car. Okay, I'm gonna set the scene, people. Okay. So we're inside. She went to go get another book so she could sign for Steve, and I hear screaming outside of our building, and I don't know what it is. I was like, what the heck is it? I walk outside and I see this lady screaming at the office next to us, and she's holding a dog, and the dog has a bird in her mouth. At this same moment, Jessica is walking back with her book, and she's like, What is going on? And Steve ends up coming out, and I match Steve. I was like, Hey, go go help. Go help. And he heroically helps. He goes, Is the dog gonna bite? Yeah. The dog, and he heroically helps and lifts the dog's the jaw.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:53

And um Yeah, that that dog was gonna choke to death on that bird because that bird was bigger than that dog's head. Yes. Yeah, it wasn't a very big dog, but uh yeah, I tried to talk real nicely to it so that I could get the bird out of his mouth. Anyway, yeah, I was uh that's a story I'll have to tell Holly when I get home. She'll be very sad about the bird because the bird did not survive, but we saved the dog.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:16

Well, the bird was already not uh We think the bird was already dead.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:19

It probably flew into the window and killed itself. But the d the diabetic dog, by the way. So I guess this dog is diabetic and can only eat at certain times of the day, so it walks around hangry all day long and it saw this bird and took it out on that bird.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:35

Well, poor Jessica, she's gonna remember this podcast because she said that's the that's the strangest thing that has happened to me today. And I was like, today?

SPEAKER_02 1:14:43

But I told her I emailed her earlier or after that and said, Well, you got a great story, but it's definitely not dinner conversation.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:50

For sure. Well, bloody mess. If people in Austin are making pigeon, because that's what, or was it a pigeon? Was it a duck? What's the heck of it? Okay, so we talked about this before a little bit about the Michelin stars, right? And how how Austin has some Michelin stars. Well, the Michelin Guide does not um expand into new US territories anymore. Um, and the state of Texas, Texas, and the Michelin Guide has they entered into a $2.7 million partnership. I did not know this when I talked about this before. It's a three-year contract with Austin, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, and San Antonio, and visit Austin, which is their tourism department, like you know, the destination of dripping. They contribute ninety thousand dollars annually towards this agreement, and they get it through the hot tax, apparently, heads on beds, okay. Yes. So ultimate the ultimate goal is to drive international tourism, is what they're saying. But um, it was very interesting. When I started reading about that, I was like, well, okay, I could see that it's part of our tourism and it's kind of spread all over the major cities over Texas. But um Austin holds the record for the most Michelin stars right now in the state of Texas, in the state of Texas. Um, while cities must pay to bring the inspectors to the region, money does not buy stars. But for example, Fort Worth, they're part of that five major city um agreement. They paid the exact amount as Austin, but they have zero stars. Oh, really? Okay. So Austin, they're saying that Austin kind of really changed the Michelin uh landscape by having barbecue as part of their Michelin stars. And when we had talked about it, um, and they recognize the extreme technical mastery, wood fire control, and flavor consistency involved in Texas barbecue. But I don't know if the smoker has gone the same that I have seen it over my entire life, whether you're making cabrito or or brisket. But all I've really known, it's like a 12-pack of Miller Light, and you're staying up till three o'clock in the morning to cook a brisket. To cook a brisket. Um, focus on sustainability is what they have done here in Austin. Austin, strong farm to table culture, which we were talking about with Jack Allen's also. Local sourcing network allowed restaurants like Daidu, I think I'm saying that right, Emma, Emmer and Rye to lock the coveted Michelin green stars, which is like it's not a one-star, it's like kind of like a recommendation.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:31

Whenever Michelin stars, I always thought that was like fancy. Like it the food was good, but it was also fancy. But now what I'm hearing is it isn't all it was about the fancy, it's more about the food and the atmosphere.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:42

Well, there's the one, the two, and the three, and then you have the green stars, which are recommended. Now, I've been to a couple of Michelin star restaurants, and they have been very fancy. And it's like the one I went into Mexico, I think it was no lie, Steve. It was 15, 16 courses of meal. I could not just sound miserable. Well, they're bite-sized, like toppest, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:18:02

But my eyes were okay by the like the sixth or seventh course, I'd be like, damn, this is starting to feel like a job.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:09

I was I was losing my mind. So, anyways, there are, like I said, Austin is number one. So Austin has seven starred restaurants, Barley Swine, Kraft. Which Jessica talked about. Yeah, Barley Swine, um, Hestia. I'm probably gonna just butcher all these names. Hestia, uh, Interstellar Barbecue, La Barbecue, LaRoy and Lewis Barbecue, and uh Ola May, an upscale contemporary classic on southern cuisine located near downtown. Houston has five, San Antonio has three, Dallas has two, and Spring, Texas has one corkscrew barbecue.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:48

Wow, that's surprising.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:50

So uh yeah, you know, they said that Austin's culinary, we we talked about this with the food influencers and how everything has changed, but then really over the last 10 years, Austin's dining scene has really evolved into like, you know, from the hula huts and chewies and and and and torchies to high-end kind of precision dining experiences. Uchi has always kind of been that way. I went to Uchi years and years ago when they first opened. I love Uchi, but I mean it's pricey. Yeah, but it's it's really good. But think about like this sophistication versus like a food truck. But uh my favorite, favorite, favorite food truck actually just closed and it had been around for 15 years, and it's was at Lamar Street. Um I'm sorry, not Lamar Street, Lavaca Street Bar, and um it was called Turf and Surf Surf, and it used to be a a freestanding food truck, and then they moved into Lavaca Street, and literally they closed overnight. They went to uh into Lavaca Street, and I think it really kind of kept that bar open. We would go there just like on a Wednesday night to go eat there. And uh he packed his stuff up and he's moved to Rockport and he's opening a place up in Rockport. I think he's probably sick of the taxes and everything else.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:06

Yeah, all the stuff that the city makes you do to have a food truck, too. It's like what you know, that makes no sense, but yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:12

It's uh you know, we have some really good restaurants here in in Austin and even in dripping springs. You know, we were talking about summer revival. Uh again, we were talking to Becky about, you know, the loss of Oakwood and nobody sell no good restaurant tour is going to celebrate the closing of a lot of people.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:35

She said, No, anytime a business like that goes out, it's not good because people don't when people go out, they need to have a selection of things to go eat from. And if there's less selection, then they tend to just stay home and cook. And we talked a little bit about that with Jessica. But so yeah, I love Becky. She and she's a true business person. She didn't get into that restaurant just because she likes food and wine. She is a she's a real business person.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:58

She's a people person, too.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:59

She's definitely a people person. And the food, we went there yesterday. We were talking to a client and they said, We're going to lunch. Where should we go? He said, Summer revival. I said, Damn, that sounds good.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:09

Yeah. I had the they have the best egg salad when it is there. And I wish she she needs to bring back that um Willie's, or no, what was it? The Matthew McConaughey uh tuna salad. Oh, yeah, that was that was delicious.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:22

Yeah. Oh God, we just ate lunch. I'm already so. I know.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:25

Where'd we eat? Where'd we eat?

SPEAKER_02 1:21:28

Pig pen barbecue Tuesday. That's what it was. Uh last week you and I were in Wimberly. We were looking at a new property we have listed.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:35

I was like, we were? Yeah, I guess. Yeah, we were.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:38

And remember, it was that day that with the with the heat index, it was like 110, 112, and it was, I don't know, 11 o'clock, 12 o'clock in the afternoon. We were down there, and we were leaving, and we went by the high school. And remember it was.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:51

Oh, we saw the dance team or something like that, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:21:53

Or the volleyball team or maybe the marching band, and they were out running in their parking lot. And I thought, damn, it's really hot for that. I hope that they're not making them run a long way. Well, my story today is about the UIL just announced some new uh mandatory outdoor safety uh rules starting August 1st.

SPEAKER_04 1:22:12

It is about time. As a mother of a dedicated uh former football player, I have seen that kid and many a kid almost drop from the.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:22

You know, it used to be a thing where uh it was sort of like a rite of passage. You went out and you played football across country and it was super hot and then it was supposed to make you tough or whatever. Throw up. Yeah. Well, uh in August of 2025, 15-year-old Preston Malone III died after uh doing conditioning exercises, and that's what kind of started the UIL talking about.

SPEAKER_04 1:22:44

Wasn't that around here? Was that around here?

SPEAKER_02 1:22:47

He was in Lancaster.

SPEAKER_04 1:22:48

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:49

Um and so the UIL has been coming up with this. Um he was actually uh inside when he overheated. He told the coaches he wasn't feeling well, and uh they they immediately had they had some protocols that they weren't as ex not as uh efficient as what the new protocols are protocols are, but that he uh they put him in cooling water, but they ended up taking him to the hospital, and two days later he died of a massive heart attack.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:16

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:16

So have you ever had heat stroke?

SPEAKER_02 1:23:18

I have, and it's horrible. It is horrible.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:20

I remember laying in the bottom of my shower, and I you know, to this day I cannot I can't be out there when it's super, super bad.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:27

Well, and the older you get, the less tolerance you have to the heat, too. So yeah. So these new UIL rules, which start August 1st, um, it affects high school sports teams and and the marching band. Oh. Because you know, not a lot of times the marching band's out there in the middle of the afternoon.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:43

I know in a in a asphalt parking lot where it's coming up and they've got these instruments strapped to them.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:50

The asphalt, if you put your hand on it, it's probably 140 degrees. You burn you. So here's some of the things that they have. Uh the the new rules. You have to have unlimited access to cool water, you have to have shade structures or tents on the sideline to allow for athletes to get out of the direct sunlight, fans or misters to allow for evaporated cooling, ice towels and sponges, lengthening, lengthening halftimes to allow for more complete cool down and hydration refueling process to occur, having resources that allow athletes to refuel at halftime by providing appropriate snacks. And then they also have to have like a cooling tank, basically like an ice plunge. So if somebody gets really overheated, that's a way to cool them down very quickly, is to put them in an ice plunge. Oh, wow. But I, you know, we've the sports nutrition, sports medicine now is to the point where we know how these things affect the the human body, and it's about time. I you know, I'm glad that you we don't need any more sick or even you know kids that pass away because they are out on a football field at two o'clock in the afternoon and get completely overused.

SPEAKER_04 1:24:57

No, absolutely. And and just like they evolved with the um helmets and and the concussions and concussion protocol that they have to follow, I totally agree. And so I know that there were times there were you know, two a days, three a days. So I'm wondering how that's going to affect. I mean, maybe they're going at five o'clock in the morning now. I don't know with the dripping springs tigers. Maybe we should ask Clip C and C.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:19

Even at five o'clock in the morning, though, it's 75 degrees and the humidity is you know 85, 90 percent.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:24

So so what were the the temperature requirements again? It was 90?

SPEAKER_02 1:25:28

Uh I they're they're gonna use a new thing called uh I wrote it down, wet bulb globe temperature monitoring that takes into account temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, and solar radiation. So it's a combination. They measure four.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:44

So it's not just like if it's 105 degrees, it's not that.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:47

It's actually uh because it can be 85 degrees, but if it's 98 percent humidity, that feels way hotter than 85 degrees with 70 percent humidity. So it takes and then you know, if it's 85 with 95 percent humidity, but the wind's blowing 20 miles an hour, then you know it's different than if the air is completely still. So I'm glad they're taking that those into account. And if it if when they do this wet bulb temperature monitoring, if uh you know they hit these certain marks, then they have to give the kids more rest for for the amount of work that they're doing. So the the workload versus rest load ratio changes. So I mean it's good. Uh a lot of times these kids are being pushed to the point where they're not getting anything out of it anyway because they're their bodies are breaking down to the point where they're harming themselves more than conditioning themselves.

SPEAKER_04 1:26:38

Well, uh let's just let's just think of this little um angle also. Those coaches, they're not spring chickens either. And they're out there in the heat, also. So you're a 40, 50-year-old coach and you're out there running around, you know, running those kids. Now, granted, you don't have the pads on and and everything else, but you're still standing in the sun most time. Yeah, it's just I've seen an O-line coach run up and constantly up and down. So Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:03

So uh it's past due, but I'm glad to see the UIL is putting that in place. It's gonna save some kids a lot of headache and a lot of school's uh heartache.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:11

So well, hopefully. And then and then uh let's get some uh champions out of them too so they're rested and they and their brains, their brains aren't rotted because they were so hot. That's right. Speaking of rotting. Oh my god. Oh my goodness. So scientists have officially identified the cause of what we politely call old people's smells.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:32

And this is not a scratch and sniff episode.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:34

No, Steve, do you think you smell like an old person?

SPEAKER_02 1:27:36

I probably am getting to that point. I try really hard not to, but I probably am getting that.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:41

Well, um, it's old people's smell is actually real, and there's a compound called too it's too noninial. Too non-ineal. And which sounds like something you'd find in a skincare aisle or something. But researchers show that it shows up when you are around 40. Years old.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:00

So Steve, you've been smelling like both have old old person.

SPEAKER_04 1:28:04

Well, you've been smelling like it for 20 something years. 40. 40. Is old smell eligible now? When they can because now the kids are saying, you know, back in the 1900s, whatever. Excuse me. But as you as you age, your skin oils, they they change, and the these oils oxidize, right? And boom, two non-enials shows up like, ugh, you smell. And this the smell profile, what does it smell like? You're asking. And you know exactly the smell that I'm talking. It's greasy, it's musty, it's waxy. It's a little smells like my grandpa's attic or or me Ma's purse. Yeah. No, no, no.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:43

So can you do anything about it?

SPEAKER_04 1:28:46

So it doesn't necessarily mean you're dirty, right? And it also doesn't mean that everybody is going to have an old person smell. It's just like the chemistry of your body. And I think also it's like what you eat.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:59

You know what part of that though is as you get older, especially when you get maybe around retirement age, you're not taking a shower twice a day, probably. You're just like, you know, oh, I'm gonna run to H B. You may not have had a shower since the night before, and you were out in the yard for a little bit. I don't think you pay as much attention to it as you do when you're younger.

SPEAKER_04 1:29:16

That doesn't count. Okay. So there's like the vintage smell, and then there's just like vintage smell, the yard, the yard smell, right? But soap doesn't always fix it, and you can't really like exfoliate it off, moisturize it, light a candle, burn sage, whatever the heck you need to do. But you don't want your body to smell like an estate cell, also, right? And so uh I mean, I would tell you if you smelled like an old person.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:38

Well, I really would. But if I can't do anything about it, then don't tell me. Don't hurt my feet.

SPEAKER_04 1:29:42

Well, like I said, not every old person smells like this. I mean, just just some old people, like my grandmother smelled like uh white shoulders and like shampoo. Shampoo uh it was a uh cologne.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:54

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:29:55

White shoulders and lima beans. My grandmother made lima beans, but some people smell like coffee, leather. Um, some people smell like they just walked out of a spa. But um, I thought all we had to worry about as we got old was like wrinkles and gray hair and wisdom and blah, blah, blah.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:14

Sagging this and sagging that. I yeah, it's uh there's all kinds of things to worry about. I know my dad is actually uh very cognizant of that. He showers a couple times a day and he showers right before he always comes over. I think he's worried about it. Maybe he read that same article you did.

SPEAKER_04 1:30:29

Maybe he's like he doesn't want to smell like old people.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:32

It smells good though. He always smells good. He always smells like he just got out of the shower and I don't know, old spice or something. So yeah, I'd I'd there is something you can do about it.

SPEAKER_04 1:30:40

I'm you know me, because I can walk into a house. I'm very sensitive on smells, right? I'm I've always been able to they have a dog or they had a cat.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:48

We have been in people's houses where you go, oh, it smells like old people.

SPEAKER_04 1:30:52

Well, yeah, and I have my little my my favorite Orleans uh jazz flavored um air freshener that I really like. But but I so if I ever just walk in the office, Steve, because you asked me, you know what got me on this? Last week, you go, Do I smell? Do we smell Cedric? Because I had a candle going.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:10

Oh, you had a you had a candle and an air freshener you put up on my desk. And I was like, What are you trying to tell me something?

SPEAKER_04 1:31:17

No, I had just gone through the um quarterly cleansing of the office, and I I dusted everything and vacuumed everything, and I still smelt like you know what it was? It was the corner of dead crickets that I found. That it was in my nose. I had me to get out.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:33

So yeah, well, uh, I've got a story here. Can you spreadsheet your way to love?

SPEAKER_04 1:31:38

And this can Ask my husband, because he is the spreadsheet. Do you think he made a spreadsheet for you when you were not love? No, but if you want to know what our electric bill was in 2007 comparative to, I don't know, today, it he will be able to tell you.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:54

Yeah, well, yeah. Yeah, he'll be able to do that. I'm sure I'm sure he will. Well, so dating's become so exhausting that some singles are literally creating spreadsheets to evaluate dates.

SPEAKER_04 1:32:03

That is an interesting concept. I would think that if I was single, I would have a running tab in my head.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:10

But these these it's mostly younger people, less than 30. All the examples I read uh were late 20s. They're Chat GPT that this one lady, she started a uh she made this spreadsheet and she sold 10,000 of them for 10 bucks apiece. Uh and it's a spreadsheet, and this it it lists out the things that they that she recommends you should track when you're on a date. Oh, really? Yes, and then you rate them from one to ten, and then it gives you a total at the bottom whether you're gonna be compatible with that person or not. And here's these are some of the points that she has. Chemistry. Did you have chemistry? Which we talked about with Rita. Remember, we talked about it. You know, if you hit it off with somebody right away, if you feel comfortable with that.

SPEAKER_04 1:32:55

Okay, do they smell like an old person?

SPEAKER_02 1:32:56

Do they smell like an old person? Shared values, communication, emotional availability, who paid, red flags, friends' opinions, and number of dates before feeling developed. Before feelings developed. Sorry. Before you do before I felt developed. And then uh this one wasn't included on the Before Your Feeling? But she all the she also amended the mentioned the quality of the sexual encounter if sex if they had sex. So she Imagine that. The pressure of that, thinking, oh, I know this woman has a spreadsheet, and so am I one or am I ten on that spreadsheet? You're like, you're like, I gotta pull out all my tricks. I gotta I gotta be on my best behavior.

SPEAKER_04 1:33:42

But wait a minute. Imagine dating somebody, okay, for like you've been dating them for a couple months, and you find this spreadsheet.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:50

That's actually one of the things I was gonna talk about. And so you're sitting there at dinner and she says something about her spreadsheet, or he says says something about her. Do you want to see it? I I don't think I'd want to see it.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:04

Okay, what were the categories? Again.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:06

Uh chemistry, shared values, communication, emotional availability, who paid, red flags, friends' opinions, number of dates before feelings developed, and the quality of the sexual encounter.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:16

I'm just thinking of like back when I first started dating Todd, and he hit all of those.

SPEAKER_03 1:34:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:22

He kind of hit every little check mark or button. But um, I really I wasn't really a dater. So I didn't really date people.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:31

Yeah. Um I th this would ruin it a lot for me because I've I want to feel that emotional connection that and if I start rating each individual thing, I think that's gonna make it seem very clinical, and I'm not gonna appreciate the relationship.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:47

I'd add something.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:48

What would you add?

SPEAKER_04 1:34:49

Um how their breath smelled.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:51

Well, actually, I think I did read that uh their uh cleanliness or how they take care of themselves.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:59

Yeah, but in their car. If their car was clean, I would I'd you know what that would be a big one for me too.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:06

Yeah, if their car was all trashy and uh would feel like that's probably what their life is gonna be like is all trashy.

SPEAKER_04 1:35:12

Or you know what else? If they had animal hair on them. That that drives me crazy. If you have animal hair on that, like like like they've got those little sticky things, like sticky them.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:22

One dater actually even added a new column, friends feedback. So you went on a double date.

SPEAKER_04 1:35:28

Well, my friends are I don't know if I'd want my friends.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:30

Well, but that this person did. So, you know, I I think I would rather trust my gut. And it I think these kids are getting too an analytical about love.

SPEAKER_04 1:35:40

But but on the flip side, okay, in the culture, especially the millennial culture, where it was the sleep around culture, right? This is this is very adult of a Gen Zer to be able to do this and to know what they want.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:57

Can love be quantified like that though?

SPEAKER_04 1:35:59

But yeah, maybe, maybe there's just so much noise nowadays that they need something to write it down. Like because for us, like when we were when we were of the dating age, right? And we were dating our spouses, there wasn't all this other bullshit noise. You could just really pay attention to it.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:14

I think you did hit on something there because one of the things that popped out of this article was our dating apps creating decision fatigue because there's simply too many choices.

SPEAKER_04 1:36:22

Yeah, I I think so.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:23

So it cuts kind of cuts to the quick one that there was a story in there about this woman. She went on a couple dates with this guy and she felt real good about it, and then she started plugging him into her spreadsheet, and she said, This this relationship's going nowhere, so she broke up with him.

SPEAKER_04 1:36:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:38

Well, I don't know. I I I think uh, you know, it's it's uh a spreadsheet's great at telling somebody to check the boxes, but I don't I don't know if it's the way to to find true love.

SPEAKER_04 1:36:49

Well, maybe it's a lot of things.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:50

Some things are not about numbers and maybe it's a tool.

SPEAKER_04 1:36:53

A tool in your toolbox, just like I think that if my daughter, or you know, if your daughter came to you, right, and said, Okay, I really like both of these guys. And this guy kind of hits these boxes, and this guy comes out.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:05

Can I just say no, neither one of them's good enough for you?

SPEAKER_04 1:37:08

Well, your dad.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:10

That's a dad thing.

SPEAKER_04 1:37:11

And and one day you're gonna get the most precious grandbaby ever.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:16

I can't wait for that.

SPEAKER_04 1:37:17

Yeah, you're gonna have that baby child. You're just gonna smell that baby child and love that baby child. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:22

I'm looking forward to that. That's gonna be nice. And then I can get them all sugared up and send them home with the kids.

SPEAKER_04 1:37:27

You can introduce them to ranch dressing like I did, maybe.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:31

That's funny. Well, uh, if anybody's out there in the dating world, I'm I feel bad for you. And maybe you need a spreadsheet. I don't, I can't, I didn't get the lady's name that's selling the $10 one for uh on uh you know the on I think it was on TikTok.

SPEAKER_04 1:37:45

Well, and also if you would like ooh de old people smell, I will bottle it up and sell it to you. It's called Steve De Ooh.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:52

It does not come from me. Steve De Ooh. I actually I I think because I swim a couple times a week that the chlorine kills all that stuff on my skin.

SPEAKER_04 1:37:59

I'm surprised you even have skin left.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:02

Well, yeah, you I've come in here many times and you've g come over with a bottle of lotion, and you're like, hey, do you want to use some of my lotion? Yeah. And then by the way, I'm lighting candles and I got air fresheners because you stink. You got old person smell.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:15

Oh, well, you guys have a great afternoon, morning, or whenever you're listening to us. And remember, don't forget to go over to our YouTube channel also, and you can see us in person. Make fun of each other.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:26

Subscribe, like, comment, do all those cool things. So thanks for joining us, everybody.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:32

From rodeo clowns, teachers or doctors, and everyone in between, Texans have one thing in common: hard work, deserves smart banking. At South Star Bank, whether you're buying your first home, building a dream ranch, or just managing daily finances, our 16 branches across Central Texas are here for you. Southstar Bank, trusted by professionals, backed by tradition, and built for Texas. Southstarbank.com, member FDIC, an equal housing lender. NMLS 410624.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:02

The Deep Eddie Vodka tasting room may be closed, but don't get it twisted. Deep Eddie Vodka isn't going anywhere.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:10

It's still made right here in Texas, and you can still enjoy every flavor, including the new espresso vodka.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:16

Pour it over ice, mix up your favorite cocktail, or keep it simple with soda and a lime. The tasting room chapter may be over, but the good times are still being poured.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:26

Deep Eddie vodka. Find your favorite flavor near you.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:29

Enjoy responsibly available nationwide.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:35

This show is brought to you in part by the Mallet Integrity Team, serving Dripping Springs, Austin, and the surrounding areas of Central Texas since 2004. When you need the best real estate advice and service, give them a call at 512-829-2062. Or email them at malletintegrity team.com.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:59

Ever had a contractor disappear halfway through a job?

SPEAKER_02 1:40:02

Or leave you with work that just isn't right?

SPEAKER_04 1:40:04

That's where Black Slate Construction steps in.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:07

They fix bad work and actually finish the job. And here's the difference they're also master electrician licensed. So whether it's cleaning up a remodel or installing an EV charger or upgrading your panel, they do it right.

SPEAKER_04 1:40:20

Start to finish.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:21

No shortcuts, no second guesses. Call Black Slate Construction or visit Blackslate Construction.com. Even we're surprised by what we say sometimes.

SPEAKER_04 1:40:35

Big mouth, small town.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:37

Follow us on Apple, Spotify, and YouTube.

SPEAKER_04 1:40:40

Leave us a review or email us at Maladamichelle at gmail.com. I'm surprised we haven't been canceled yet.