Today’s guest blends culinary consulting with being a chef at the Four Seasons , a personal chef to some really dynamic entrepreneurs, she’s all about health and how we can make changes in our restaurants to keep up with all the constantly increasing food allergies and food sensitivities.

we talk about best practices how these healthier choices can actually be more profitable than your regular menu. So you’re not gonna wanna miss this. We cover all the bases. If you like what you’re hearing, we’d so appreciate if you leave us a review on your favorite podcast player, now on with the episode.

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Welcome back. This is the Restaurant Rock Stars Podcast. So glad you’re with us. Thank you so much for tuning in. And Leslie, welcome to the show. I’m happy to have you here.

Thank you. Thank you. I’m happy to be here.

You’re such a dynamic person. I had the opportunity to meet you last week at a business mastermind event, and you’ve got so much going on.

You’re traveling the globe, you’re personal chefing, you’re working for the Four Seasons, you’re consulting, you’ve got a lot going on. But with that said, let’s let’s dive on in. Let’s talk about, besides the biggest restaurant challenge right now, it seems to be labor. It’s negotiating the ever increasing number of food allergies that are happening and food sensitivities.

And it’s so important to not only take care of our guests that have these issues and to train our staffs, but also offer choices that appeal to everyone that isn’t gonna cause them a challenge. How do we navigate this and how do we keep on top of it? There’s so much there.

It’s a great question.

There is so much there. I work with fair, the Food Allergy Research Education Foundation, and it is so true. Food allergies affect one in four Americans. And so whether your guest has allergies themselves, chances are they’re with somebody that has some sort of allergy. So providing them menu items that are already food allergy friendly so that your chef doesn’t have to stop what they’re doing back there.

Try and figure out what to make, makes life so much easier and smoother. And so that’s where I come in. I like to come into restaurants, resorts, hotels, and help them make life easy, make them make money, and make the life easy so that everyone feels welcome at the table.

So generally the chef is the person that’s got a really strong handle on, what menu ingredients are going into these dishes and all and, and which ones potentially have exposure to nuts.

And obviously you’ve gotta put these things on the menus and all that, but the staff training really enters into it. This is something that every restaurant needs to be aware of and their team needs to be knowledgeable because guests are gonna ask questions. And I’ve always thought it was a negative.

If you had to say I don’t know. Let me go ask my manager, or I’m gonna go ask the chef. It’s if we could educate people, how does that happen at Four Seasons? How do you train the staff and how do you stay on top of the safety side of things?

Yeah, absolutely. Luckily we haven’t.

Phenomenal team at the Four Seasons is really a great brand. I also work with a couple other brands as well in the hotel space, but the Four Seasons mostly and. You just have to stay on top of it. Every time somebody new was coming, they get the new training. You color code everything. And one of the first most important things to ask is have your servers ask when someone sits down and they say that they have an allergy, it’s how big of an allergy, is it cross contamination or is it just if it’s in your food?

Because that may affect the back kitchen. Something might be. Gluten free. But it’s prepared in a kitchen where there is non-gluten free flour floating around. And so if they have an or airborne illness let’s say peanuts or to flour, then you know you’re gonna have to instruct that differently than if it’s just a contact thing.

But I think it is, you can prepare, there’s the top nine allergens and if you can prepare your staff to know what all those things are and know which one’s on the menu. Are already going to accommodate them. It just makes the guest experience so much smoother. So I’m plant-based, but I also have allergies, and so when I go somewhere and someone says I don’t know if that has shellfish in it, let me go.

Let me just go talk to the chef. It’s just whoa. Okay. Am I gonna get some? Am I gonna get sick? Tonight? Is tonight the night the EpiPen’s coming out? And you don’t ever want your guests to think that you want your guests to be completely comfortable to spend the whole evening enjoying and not have to worry about that.

So if you worry about that a little bit on the front end. It makes everything smoother on the backend.

Yeah. The food safety piece is so important. You me mentioned cross-contamination and obviously not everything can have a separate kitchen for, gluten-free, dairy free, nut free, all that kind of stuff.

And things are prepared in close contacts, and I wouldn’t have even thought about the flour in the air could potentially affect someone. My wife has that challenge. It’s like she’s dairy free and gluten-free, and whenever we dine out, it’s like, it’s a real challenge to get in advance, notification of what’s.

What can she have on the menu that she can enjoy before we actually just show up and take our chances? And this is a real balance for restaurateurs and it seems more important than ever now.

Absolutely. If I can give your listeners, one giant piece of advice is to put a vegan, gluten-free dessert, really thoughtful dessert item on their menu.

You’ll get it ordered. Nine times out of 10 by anybody with a dairy allergy, gluten allergy, or is plant-based, because those people are so used to only having sorbet for dessert and

good point.

Let’s be real. Nobody really likes sorbet. Nobody really orders it. So if you can have something thoughtful on your menu, it’s gonna sell like gangbusters and become one of the bestselling desserts.

If not the bestselling dessert.

Now you just hit a really amazing point because someone who doesn’t have any allergies isn’t concerned about what they eat. It’s really awesome if you can put things on the menu that are healthier options like vegan, dairy free, and all these things that still have the flavor profile and still would be really appealing to someone, whether they’re allergic or not, right?

Is that possible to do?

Of course it’s possible to do, I call my food accidentally vegan because it’s just food that tastes really good, that happens to be made out of plants. I don’t make that typical what people think of vegan food. I’m not gonna put like a slab of tofu with some rose petals on top of it and call it a dish, and that’s not what I’m encouraging these hotels to do.

There’s a reason why. I get to work in the places that I do because I make food that’s very orderable. And so when you are working on a plant-based dish to have at your restaurant that if you wanna make it gluten-free even better, because so many people that are gluten-free usually have a dairy allergy to like your wife.

They usually go hand in hand. And so to have something that’s dairy-free and gluten-free is such a winner on a menu. But when you make the approach. If you would not order that dish, don’t put it on the menu. It’s not good enough to just have something there to put on a, vegan burger on the menu and just that be the only option.

Make something thoughtful that you would actually order. I always say the, there’s so many accidentally vegan foods in the world. You eat ’em all the time, spaghetti and tomato sauce. Falafel and hummus. Peanut butter and jelly. People eat these foods all the time without thinking, oh, I’m gonna order the vegan chips and guacamole.

They’re just ordering chips and guacamole. So you have to make food that’s just that appealing, but plant-based.

So let me ask you a question. If I were starting a new restaurant today, I have the feeling that I would either have a separate healthy choice menu that addresses all these sensitivities, or I’d have a special section on my menu that really draws attention to it.

So there’s no guesswork involved. There don’t, it limits the number of questions to the staff. There may still be questions, but at least people can feel comfortable ordering off these dishes. But then there’s also a marketing aspect to it where someone may read a description or it might have a really interest.

Name that convinces someone who doesn’t have any sensitivities to order it. Do you do that at the Four Seasons or do you work in outlets that specifically cater to, plant-based?

I’m gonna tell you my secrets.

Okay. Please do.

And I don’t tell very many people this, but I’m gonna tell you how I work and what actually works.

So the Four Seasons, pun, tomita is my kind of flagship property where 40 to 80% of each of the menus there are plant-based. And this is what works for us. That’s also the most profitable food program out of any four seasons in the world. And a large part of that is because of our plant-based menus.

But when you may, I recommend that people make a separate. Vegan food allergy menu, that’s only given when someone says they’re plant-based or have an allergy. Those same dishes all have to be incorporated onto the regular menu as well, because. The way to make money is to get the meat eaters, to order those dishes.

Because the profits are so much larger on plant-based items, you can make so much more money on them. So if only vegans are ordering them you’re cutting out so much money. You want the meat eaters to be ordering those dishes, even if it’s as a side dish or the dessert at the end. Whatever it is, you wanna make sure that they’re ordering at least one or two of the plant-based items so that you’re taking a larger profit from those dishes.

So to have them integrated into the menu, maybe even just very small with the descriptors that they are plant-based, or not even labeling them as plant-based on the menu. And then if someone says, oh, what’s plant-based? Then you whip out that menu and say, these are all the things that are plant-based.

But it’s not to trick people, but it’s just to show them, because most people, if you eat a standard American diet and you’re reading a menu and you see a box of healthy options or a thing that says vegan chips in guacamole, no one’s gonna order vegan chips in guacamole. But everyone’s gonna order chips in guacamole if they go to a restaurant.

So the labeling of it isn’t always the best way to sell it, but it is a great marketing tool to bring people in and let you know, let them know that you haven’t.

I’m really glad that you clarified that because I wouldn’t have off the hand thought that this would be more popular and profitable as well.

And I think you got our audience’s attention because everyone right now is dealing with shrinking margins and trying to maintain a profit. And the value to the customer thing is harder than ever. Because as prices rise, we have to raise prices on the menu, yet we’re short staffed sometimes, and the service level may not keep up with, what we’re trying to deliver for hospitality.

And yet someone gets a, a big bill at the end of the night and suddenly they’re dissatisfied. And that’s not the key. It’s finding that balance. I really love what you said about profitability and I think that opens our eyes a little bit more to adding some more things into the menu that lower our food costs and increase our profit.

So thanks for sharing. Now, you mentioned this vegan and really cool dessert idea that was really important to put on a menu. Do you have, let’s talk about some entrees that you find to be really appealing. Maybe just a couple choices that you have on some of your menus that might be a good balance between nutrition and health and profitability.

Anything come to mind?

Tons of things. So working in the hotels, I don’t have one specific cuisine that I specialize in. I am Italian by birth, by family. I love Italian

food.

Okay, good.

And I love traveling to Italy too, so

Me too. I go every year, at least once a year. But the food is. So easy to veganize or to already be vegan.

Pasta is one of the simplest things on earth to make vegan, and it’s very cost effective to have plant-based pastas. If you look at a typical Italian dish, the money and the dish is in the meat and in the cheese. So if you take the meat and the cheese off the plate and you just left with pasta, vegetables, sauces.

You. It’s a much more profitable dish. And so there’s so many things like that and there’s so many accidentally vegan Italian dishes, Mexican. I work in Mexico a lot. I grew up in San Diego, and so Mexican was a big part of my culture. And same thing. It’s very easy to do plant-based Mexican dishes. Asian dishes.

So easy sushi. You can get really creative with fun sushi. If you follow me on social media, you can see a lot of the different kinds of fun sushi that I do. There it’s. Especially with sushi. The profit margins are huge on a vegetable sushi versus a a fish sushi. So again it’s a great way to make money.

It’s a great way to fill your menu with interesting things that people haven’t always seen. And, open their minds to what eating healthier can be. And there’s always like gateway dishes. One of the restaurants that I do at the Four Seasons in Punta actually is a appetizer. It’s a it’s a cauliflower, it’s a crispy cauliflower dish with a really yummy, sweet, smoky spicy sauce on it.

It is ordered. By almost every menu or by almost every table that comes into that restaurant. Not because it’s a vegan dish, but just because they really like it. So again, making things that are just orderable and sound really good. My, another one is an avocado Baja taco that I put on almost all my menus.

It’s just a quarter of an avocado in a taco done with really cool sauces in a slaw in a really neat way. And when you offer like a trio of tacos. The person ordering a shrimp taco, a fish taco. The third one, they’re gonna go, I wanna try the avocado taco and it. Then turns into one of the best selling dishes at a restaurant.

So just having that creativity of what do you like to eat? What’s your favorite vegetable? And how can we turn that into a dish?

I like asparagus. What do you got?

Oh Italian to that’s my favorite. Oh my gosh. A lemon as. Asparagus.

There you go.

Pasta with a cream sauce sounds amazing.

So the key to having something really healthy, but having the flavor that just goes wow is sauces and spices that accompany when you remove, say, the fish and the meat proteins and you replace it with some really zesty sauces, but that are also, allergen free. That’s the way to go.

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Think about it, even with most meat dishes, you need a really yummy, zesty sauce to go with it.

Most people aren’t just serving a piece of grilled fish with nothing else on the plate. You’ve got all the exciting things all the exciting things are the plants, and so then just make it all more exciting and it gets to be amazing. And when it comes to the protein, I, when you’re cooking a vegan dish, it’s not.

What you think of, it’s not a one-to-one swap. So it’s not okay, what am I gonna put in the center of this plate now if I’m taking a steak off the plate, what am I putting on the plate? It’s how can I layer these vegetables in such a way to make them interesting complex. And then. I call it protein layering.

So most plants have protein in them, but it’s a question of combining them to get the most amount of protein versus just having one piece of meat in the middle of the plate. So adding fun things on, adding pumpkin seeds, adding spices, adding crispies, quinoa, crispies, or like something to make the plate super interesting, to make it have multi textures, multi flavors, and exciting is gonna be the best way to make your dish.

Fantastic. Now, I’m not gluten-free and I rarely eat gluten-free items, but have things changed? I remember that gluten-free items never really had the taste of a regular dough or a bread. They tasted a little funky, or at least to me they did. And then they always came much smaller. Like a loaf of gluten-free bread is half the size of a regular loaf of bread, yet it’s much more expensive.

And we used to order gluten-free pizza dough for our restaurant, which we never needed before for the 18 years. I never had a. Gluten-free item on the menu, and then suddenly we needed gluten-free. And we never made that ourselves. We, that was the only product we didn’t make ourselves from.

Scratch, the dough is always made fresh every day, but suddenly the dough shell itself was like, so much less in size than our regular pizzas, but yet we were charging more for it. And some people are like, where’s the value here? What caused that shift in expense and size? Not knowing, not baking.

Yeah wheat is, not that expensive in this country. And the gluten-free flowers can be quite expensive, especially I always recommend, the best gluten-free flowers, the best flowers in general. Yeah, are Italian flowers and so if you can import them in even better, but there are so many brands out there now that are making really good gluten-free substitutions.

You were talking about pizza. There’s a brand called OG, OGGI that makes really good gluten-free pizza crus. For wholesale that you can order and they just, they should be paying me for this kind of shout out. Yeah.

You’re promoting the product. Same with cheeses, right?

The first dairy free cheeses that came out, my wife would say they tasted like plastic. They’re waffle if they still, or they come a long way.

They’ve come a long way. So if you are gonna bring in some of the plant-based substitutions into your restaurant that’s great, that’s wonderful.

But not all brands are created equal. And so that’s where you really have to do your research. I actually just sent out an email newsletter with all of my favorite ones in it. And anybody’s welcome to message me and I’ll gladly share that information with them. Those you really have to try on your own, and you can make all of them inhouse.

You can make nut milks inhouse. You can make oat milk inhouse. You can make vegan butter inhouse. You can make. All of these things in house, you can make vegan cheese in house, just depending on if, is the labor worth the extra spend? Always. And so is it easier to bring something in that’s pre-made or do you wanna make it yourself?

But all of those things are doable if you want to make them in-house. And they’re, they’re very cost effective. Almond milk is just almonds and water in a blender. That’s it. And it’s also cool. So if you have a smaller restaurant that you think that you can handle making your own, how cool is it to offer house-made almond milk or house made cashew milk or house made almond oat milk versus saying, oh yeah, we’ve got the silk one with the label.

That’s half the label is the ingredients because there’s so many stabilizers in it. So to be able to do it yourself is cool.

I’m a huge advocate of what I call hooks. You know what sets you apart from your competition? And anybody can, like you say, bring in the silk soy milk.

But if you make these things yourself and really promote them, it gives people a reason to say, Hey, they’re different, and give people reasons to come into your place and you can’t have too many hooks. So I’m glad you brought up that example, and

that non-dairy person will never forget that you make your own

milks

in house.

Especially in this internet world where online reviews are so important in how people share information and things go viral. It’s one person has a great experience because of something unique and different, especially as this movement grows, then it’s just gonna spread, and who knows? You could get a lot of new business that way.

So I’m glad you shared.

Absolutely. 60% of Americans prefer non-dairy milk. Now, the non-dairy milk section in most grocery stores is larger than the dairy section. So if you’re not offering some sort of non-dairy. I you’re missing revenue.

They’re not all the same though. What’s the difference between oat milk, coconut milk, soy milk, this milk, almond milk?

Then, like you said, there’s so many choices. Some are healthier than others. Some are they’re not equal, right? Coconut milk, they’re not

equal. They all taste a little bit different, and I think that they all have their place. If you have a coffee shop oat milk and coconut milk are much thicker and creamier, and so they’re gonna give you a better kind of, they’re gonna make a better coffee.

But some people really like the almonds. I really like doing a blend. So I like to offer a blend to people, but, that’s ’cause if you make it homemade, you can do whatever you want. You can throw in a couple almonds, you can throw in a couple cashews, and you can throw in a couple walnuts. You could do hazelnuts, macadamia nut milks.

You can make milk out of just about anything. And so maybe that’s your thing. And finding your signature blend, that’s just for you. And so only you can only get this at your place.

Now you mentioned soy sorbets earlier. Do you see any ice creams being made from non-dairy milk and is that actually a new dessert that you can add for those people as well?

Yeah. Non-dairy ice creams have been around a long time. If you’re making in-house ice cream, it’s very easy to make. I recommend doing it with coconut because ice cream needs a lot of fat. It needs high fat content, which a lot of the nuts don’t have enough. And so cashew milk and coconut milk are gonna be your friends when you’re making homemade ice cream.

And then there’s so many brands out there. There’s a brand called Craig’s Vegan. If anybody has been to Los Angeles, there’s a very famous restaurant there called Craig’s. It’s legendary. It’s been around a long time. And he wanted to, he has a dairy allergy and wanted to make a vegan ice cream. And I said the same thing to him ’cause he was making it with almonds in house.

And I said, try cashews, it’ll be better. And he did. It’s gangbusters and now he sells it to other restaurants around the world and he sells it food service so that people can get it. And it is delicious. Any meat eater is going to eat this ice cream and be mind blown at how good it’s, I gotta try that, because the ingredients are so high quality.

He only has, I think it’s, I think it’s six ingredients in his ice cream. It’s very clean and really delicious, so I highly recommend checking out Craig’s. And then there’s plenty of people that offer non-dairy ice creams if you don’t wanna make it in-house.

Let’s switch gears a little bit and let’s talk about oils because we had a conversation earlier last week, and I know you’re a huge advocate for the finest quality Italian olive oils, but those are perhaps cost prohibitive for the average restaurant to bring in.

Yet seed oils at temperature can be toxic and have some side effects and all that. Is there a balance? Is there an oil that we can use that doesn’t cost a, a tremendous amount of money, but it’s healthier than cotton seed and all those other terrible oils?

I wish I had an amazing answer for you, but seed oil is really the, it’s the gluten of five years ago.

It is the bad word today. Everybody wants to know if this is seed oil free. It’s seed oil free. And so it obviously, high quality extra virgin olive oil from wherever you get it in the world is gonna be my favorite thing, followed by coconut oil and avocado oil. They are, they’re just expensive.

And so to think about doing things with either less oil in them, because you don’t need all, you don’t need oil to cook really at all. There’s plenty of dishes that you can make without oil. So if you wanted to make a couple dishes on your menu that just don’t have any oil in them at all so that you can offer them to people, that would be great.

Or if you wanna go full blown and put. Coconut oil in your fryer and do seed oil free fries. That would be an amazing thing and you’d probably be the only person in your town doing it. There’s a couple chains. The proper hotel chain just announced that they are going completely seed oil free in all of their restaurants across the country, which is very exciting.

And then there’s a few restaurant chains that are also looking into it. And so I think that you’re gonna hear more and more about it. So if you can get ahead of the curve on that one. I think that you’re gonna find some benefits

now. Four Seasons, high profile, luxury leading hotel organization around the world.

First class experiences all the way. What can our audience learn about how they run their kitchens, how they onboard and train their teams, how they motivate and inspire others. Maybe recognize and reward them and maintain longevity versus high turnover. I’m sure they do it well.

How much time do we have?

I could talk about this for the next five hours. I, that brand is doing it better than anybody I know. There’s the executive chef at the Four Seasons in Pita Chef Jorge Gonzalez, who I’ve never seen a leader like that before in my life. The culture that he’s created down there is beautiful. They truly are a family first and coworker second.

Beautiful. And everybody folds into that. And when you have that many, there are 90 chefs on that property. And so when you’re running an operation that big and you can really have your hand on everybody, it’s amazing. And when everybody’s working simultaneously, but it’s really about creating that culture of positivity.

So many kitchens that I walk into are just. So negative, it’s just bad. And so to really create good culture is. Top of the list important. I’m Italian and it all comes back to food is love and food is communication, and food is joy. And so if you’ve got chefs back there that are miserable and that are just not enjoying their day, it’s gonna come through in the food.

It’s gonna come through and the servers are gonna feel it. The gusts are gonna feel it, everybody’s gonna feel it. So to have a culture of really like strong positivity where you help those people be super successful, they always say that the most successful restaurants are the ones where the busboy are the happy.

Because if you can make everybody happy and make everybody money, everybody will rise to the occasion and be joyful in doing what they do. And so it’s very important. And then as far as training staff, education is huge for them. It should be huge for any restaurant owner to constantly be on top of education and the latest things, being educated on all the food allergies, being educated on the latest food trends.

Absolutely being educated. On everything and being willing to change and take risks and chances. And,

mentoring and shadowing happens as well, I’m sure.

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Wow, that soy up level of culture. My restaurants had a very simple culture, hospitality, family, and fun.

Hospitality was the foundation of our business. We wanted the guests to feel like family. We wanted the team to feel like family, and we just wanted everyone to have more fun, and that was that simple. Yet. A big key to the success we had. So it is about culture and I’m really glad you mentioned that, but positivity and sharing that spirit and sharing the love of food and the reason why we’re in this business to begin with.

And if everyone understands that and if people have team spirit and respect for each other, then the guests are gonna get a better experience.

Yeah, and taking care of your staff, making sure that they’re eating well, that they’re sleeping well, that they’re taking care of themselves so that they can take care of other people.

I always say that when we feel better, we do better for ourselves and for everyone around us. And so making sure that your staff is taking care of them. Selves is really important. Let’s dive a little deeper into that. I was gonna ask you how, owners and GMs and chefs, people that are under a high level of stress who are spending lots of hours at their properties, what can they do in their personal life, food related, and otherwise to have more energy, perhaps get better sleep and just approach their jobs with more vigor than they normally would.

Because it’s drudgery versus, my habits are bad, my health is going by the wayside because I just don’t have time to exercise or eat what would you say to these people?

There’s the three pillars of health, sleep, exercise, and food. And so if you can get at least a couple of those, you’re gonna feel a lot better.

But again, it’s not just food. It’s foods that are gonna energize us and make a. Feel better. There are foods that are going to heal us. So if you are, if your restaurant and you’re chef and you’re eating, a burger and fries every night, or just shoving in some something, or bars or chips, or just something to put sustenance in your body, you’re gonna get done, run down really fast.

All of the important vital nutrients and vitamins that you need are implants. And so the more plants you can consume, the better. I always say that it’s not about taking things off your plate necessarily. If you wanna have that hamburger for dinner, great, surround it with salad and vegetables, and have fruits for breakfast.

Eat every single color of the rainbow every single day to make sure that you’re getting all those things. It’s not about taking away, it’s about adding. It’s about adding all of this color to your diet. And then as far as sleep goes, we had a long talk with Todd Anderson from Dream Recovery at the weekend that you were at, and I keep calling it a weekend.

It was a week, but it felt like a weekend. It did for sure. Yeah we lost track of time. We lost track of days. It was just like, wow. It was awesome.

Yeah, I know. It was so great. It was so great. But Todd has so many beautiful insights into sleep and how much sleep you need and just tools that can do it.

So I, I got really big into mouth taping when I met him, and this might be getting a little too woo for your audience, but mouth tape is basically. Piece of tape that goes across your mouth when you sleep, and that sounds really weird and freaky. And then I tried it and I was blown away that even if I only have, I travel every single week.

I’m on a airplane and I always take the first night or the first flight out in the morning. So it’s usually a 5:00 AM flight. So there are many nights that I’m only getting a couple hours of sleep. If I put mouth tape on and sleep for three hours, I feel like I’ve slept eight hours. Wow.

Higher quality of sleep in a shorter amount of time.

It’s such higher quality of sleep in a shorter amount of time.

You mentioned the mouth tape. I came home from the event with the nose strips.

Yes. And I’ve never had a breathing

problem, but my wife has been using them nightly and she’s always had a problem. She used to have inhalers when she was running her marathons and all that kind of stuff, and she literally says, wow.

It’s an amazing difference in how it opens up your nasal passages. And now she’s sleeping better because of that. So that’s just one other tip. Amazing. And it’s like I don’t generally discover these things unless someone brings it to my attention, but she’s always seeking these things out, but it’s made a difference.

So thanks for sharing them. Mouth tape also.

Yeah, the mouth tape, eye masks, like there’s so much that you can do to hack your sleep. It’s really important. And then exercise is a hard one because especially if you’re a chef or a server and you’re or manager and you’re standing all day long, like the last thing I wanna do after working a shift is go to the gym or start my day in the gym because I’m.

Physically exhausted, but it is really important on those off days. Even when I’m on, I try and always at least go for a walk and just not just for my body to get the steps in, but also for my brain to just, yeah, clear your head.

Why now? And you do your best thinking sometimes too, and you can think of new ideas for your restaurant perhaps, or

new plant-based dish ideas.

Yeah, there you go. That’s fantastic. You’re on an airplane every week. It’s like, how do you find the time and the bandwidth? What’s a typical week like for you? Because again, you’re consulting, you’re personal chef to some pretty dynamic, high profile people, and you’ve got the four Seasons gig.

Like what’s a typical week like for you?

I have no typical weeks.

All right. Nothing.

I truly don’t have any typical weeks. There’s always an airplane involved, I guess that’s typical. And then there’s a new project everywhere. Right now I’m in Austin working on opening a project here, and then at the end of the month, it’s Connecticut, then Utah, then Europe.

I’ll be in Europe for a month and a half, and then Atlanta, like really just all over the place. So location wise, there’s no, patterns.

Okay.

But yeah, it’s just, it’s always just me and my knives traveling somewhere.

Let’s talk about last question. Let’s talk about personal chefing and not that chefs have a lot of spare time, but some of them may be really intrigued by the possibility of doing private events in people’s homes.

And what advice would you have for them if they’re looking for a side gig that might be lucrative and fun and fulfilling at the same time that they can, wind around the regular day gig? Or night cake as it is. Yeah,

absolutely do it. If you have the time and it’s not gonna stress you out, it can be really beautiful because when you’re cooking in someone’s home, it’s a different experience in the kitchen.

You can take more time, you can do more detail. It’s neat to be able to connect with your guests that way, if your restaurant has a chef’s table in it. Amazing. But most restaurants don’t. And so the chefs very rarely get to connect with the guests like you can in someone’s home. And so I love it because it reminds me of why I am a chef.

When you get that, you see them eating in it, you see the joy that it’s bringing them and hopefully they’re complimentary for what you’ve just served them, and it just feels really good. And so yeah, if you can do some private chefing, I highly recommend it. If anyone’s looking for a job, let me know.

Leslie, you’ve been a wealth of information. You’ve given us lots of key nuggets of how we can improve our restaurants and the profitability piece really stood out, but just being healthier in general is awesome. You’re in a noble profession and you’re a credit to our industry, and I’m really glad you’re a guest on the show today.

Thank you. Aw,

thank you so much for having me on. I could have talked to you for another two hours. I really enjoyed this.

I’ll see you at the next event.

Yes,

that was the restaurant Rock Stars podcast. Thank you so much to our audience for tuning in. Thanks to the sponsors of this week’s show. We hope you all stay well, stay tuned, and I’ll see you next time.

Running my restaurants taught me that the right tools move your business forward. So I’m a fan of Touch Bistro. It’s more than just a POS. It’s an all-in-one restaurant management system Built by restaurateurs, touch Bistro helps speed up service, reduce errors and turntables faster, while loyalty programs, online ordering and contactless payments boost your bottom line.

Plus real-time analytics. Inventory tracking and staff scheduling are game changers. Wanna learn more? Reach out to my friend Becky at B-T-A-R-T-I-C k@touchbistro.com, or give her a call at (647) 360-3994. She’ll give you the full scoop and take great care of you.

Thanks for listening to the Restaurant Rock Stars Podcast. For lots of great resources, head over to restaurant rock stars.com. See you next time.

Restaurant Tools & Resources:

The Top 3 Restaurant Profit Killers & How To Fix Them Fast (Free Video Training): https://academy.restaurantrockstars.com/profits

Restaurant Profit Maximizer Mini-Masterclass: Learn how just a few tweaks in the way you run your business can hugely impact your profits. https://academy.restaurantrockstars.com/sp/restaurant-profits

Unlock all the Secrets to Running a Highly Profitable Restaurant. Follow the Restaurant Profit Fast Track: Master Finances, Boost Sales, Train Staff, and Multiply Your Revenue! Unlimited Staff Accounts. Join the Restaurant Academy:  https://academy.restaurantrockstars.com/joinacademy

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