Hurricane Helene Relief Effort: Pooch Rivera & Cooking For 1st Responders

What happens when nature’s fury meets human resilience? Our latest episode takes you to the heart of a catastrophe that has shaken Appalachia, especially western North Carolina, where Hurricane Helene's wrath left a trail of devastation. Chef Pooch Rivera joins us from the ground zero of disaster relief, sharing his pivotal role in nourishing the spirits of first responders with fresh meals. As we explore the emotional and physical demands of this crisis, we promise you'll walk away with a newfound appreciation for the unsung heroes battling against the odds.

Our discussion unfolds the immense logistical challenges faced in Asheville, with resources stretched thin and unexpected barriers testing the resolve of relief teams. We witnessed the extraordinary commitment of chefs who traveled from faraway cities to cater to the needs of those on the front lines, ensuring that morale remains high with hot meals over canned goods. This conversation draws powerful parallels to past disasters like Hurricane Katrina, emphasizing the crucial collaboration between community and state agencies, and the profound personal sacrifices made by individuals.

In the face of overwhelming destruction, stories of hope and solidarity shine brightly. We highlight the remarkable efforts of AJ, Brianna, and their team, who rapidly organized logistics across states to provide immediate aid. Their dedication underscores the vital role of the food industry, illustrating the urgency and significance of unity in disaster relief. As communities embark on the long road to recovery, even food trucks are being coordinated to bolster the ongoing support. This episode is not just a reflection on the power of collective acti

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Chapters

• 1:02 Disaster Relief Efforts in Appalachia
• 8:04 Logistical Challenges in Disaster Relief
• 19:44 Emergency Relief Coordination in Appalachia
• 23:20 Urgent Disaster Relief Mobilization
• 32:02 Rebuilding After Natural Disaster
• 46:31 Food Truck Coordination for Disaster Relief

Transcript

Speaker 1: 1:03

Thank you on-site at Ibis Images Studios, where food photography comes alive and I get to eat it. Here's a humble request to give us a follow on Instagram at walkandtalkshow, please and thank you.

Speaker 1: 1:15

All right. Hurricane Helene has hit Appalachia hard, especially in western North Carolina, where severe flooding has caused devastation and claimed at least 180 lives, including over 50 in Buncombe County alone. North Carolina State Climate Office has called it a worst-case scenario for the region, with some areas expecting over 31 inches of rain. We know that happened Heading into rivers, overflowing those rivers, landslides and people being trapped in their homes. We've been seeing the videos. Emergency officials have described the destruction as biblical, interesting Drawing comparisons to Hurricane Katrina. Jeff has some interesting data on that.

Speaker 1: 1:59

Rescue efforts continue, concerns are growing that the death toll could rise further and unfortunately, I believe that's what's going to happen, and the sheer scale of the damage suggests that's what's going to happen. And the sheer scale of the damage suggests that the recovery is going to take years, leaving many communities grappling with the aftermath for a long time to come. I mean, this is all a shocking thing to me. You know we're in florida and the reality is we deal with hurricanes always and this was a different one. This was just different. Florida coastline smashed, tennessee, north Carolina.

Speaker 3: 2:32

Georgia.

Speaker 1: 2:33

Yeah, in the midst of this crisis, walk and talk media personality and chef Pooch Rivera is in North Carolina aiding in the relief effort by cooking for those on the front lines first responders. He and the culinary team are working 18-hour days serving these first responders and military personnel who are tirelessly working to help the affected areas. You know I've been on the phone with Pooch every day for the past week and you know I hear his decline. Pooch is with us on the show today to share some insights as to what disaster relief cooking looks like. And you know, in spite of all the tragedy, you know the incredible work being done in these communities. There's a lot that goes into this and it's, yeah, take your. You know like I'm sitting here and I wrote a bunch of stuff down here that I'm reading, but the truth is, you know, is it doesn't worth to read. It's so difficult to even talk about these things because we all have friends, family, colleagues spread across the country. This is something. Big Pooch, how are you doing bud?

Speaker 2: 3:42

Yes, sir, I can't lie and say that I'm not tired and feel my immune system kind of about to give out on me, but I'm good man. There's a lot of passion, there's a lot of pride in what we're doing here. And you know and I happen to be a part of something that knowing that people are really trying to make sure that these people are OK and sadly we don't even know if that's a status anymore Okay, maybe out the window, because I'm here on day six, day seven, actually seven, and it's just been a crazy wild ride, man, it's a lot of. You know, we've already been given a medal, some sort of medal. I don't even know where it is, it's lost in some bag but they presented us a medal because of what we've, we've done here in what we do. But there's no, really no time to lax in any way. It's just constantly trying to make sure that everyone's fed and just to let everybody know that we're not feeding.

Speaker 2: 4:37

You know, refugees or I hate to use that term refugee, but we're not feeding any of the survivors or anyone who's needy of anything like it, such that we're in a FEMA camp, cannot disclose where we are, but we are the primary FEMA camp for this endeavor. We are the first. So this was actually a slow summer, thank goodness. It was a slow summer for hurricanes and, as you can see, a lot of major hurricanes, and even in the Gulf right now. That's one thing that goes in the back of everyone's head is like where is this hurricane coming? You know the new tropical stuff in the gulf right now and um.

Speaker 2: 5:16

But so when you get into disaster relief, people were kind of picking up their stuff. You know it's a seasonal business and you know you have some fires in California and we learned some fires in Virginia and certain things. So people, a lot of people that are handling those kind of things and feeding the people, the firefighters that are fighting the fires and all those different things out there. They're out there, they're far away. They can't make it to the southeast. Even if they did, you know, know a splinter crew off, it would take so long to get there. So, and I know I'm probably choppy guys, but I haven't slept in, I can't even tell you how long so what was your describe, your initial reaction when you actually got up to north carolina?

Speaker 1: 5:59

obviously the hurricane had just hit and you'd you know. You basically got there within what?

Speaker 2: 6:03

48 hours, right, 24 hours, something like that we well the first call, so I'll start from the beginning. So, in the how I can do that, I need to give a shout out to maddie mcshay, amin tinkler and maddie's wife, georgia mcshay. Like you know, I got a phone call from from maddie mcshay, who's an old chef friend of mine, who, ironically, we worked on disaster, disaster relief and snowmageddon for Atlanta and he said look man, there's no pay, there's no, nothing. But we're hearing rumors that things are really really bad and we can't even get in touch with half the people that we know up there Because a lot of the Asheville people work in the Atlanta food scene with TV shows and whatnot. So it's a very tight-knit. You know TV set, catering and things like that and you know the Vast Relief kind of falls into those same things, because if you have a food truck and you have trucks and this, that, the other tents, all that, you kind of fall into that.

Speaker 2: 6:59

But we knew that we had a lot of allies there and it was like look, dude, you want to come out here because we can't get anybody to come. And we really think that we're hearing that it's something really really bad and it touched all of us because of the fact that we're from New Orleans and New Orleans had Katrina, you know, not 20 years ago, almost to the date, you know. So we really wanted to make it happen. As far as like getting here, I don't even remember that as of now, but we we wrote, cause we wrote at night and we we came overnight. We just loaded up a convoy. I was in a big old reefer semi truck. That was. Once you got to North Carolina, the roads were really horrible, especially into where we were coming in, having to drive, you know, 35, 45 miles an hour because of debris things in the interstates, all of the above. Ironically, we took a long time to get where we were going because of roads being down and whatnot. I'm sorry, guys.

Speaker 1: 8:05

What sort of specific challenges have you faced while you're you know, while you're doing this, this, yeah, I mean while you're trying to execute? Well, listen, we we.

Speaker 3: 8:14

We can actually talk to all that too. We can help him out as soon as he doesn't remember. So I mean we, we, we, we, we we.

Speaker 2: 8:23

We were trying to figure out where I am Forever. I wasn't trying to even John, silent John, but thank you for speaking this one time. Johnny, you mentioned that it's because of wherever the tower is pinging. The only tower available is pinging 83 miles away from where I am, but we're not where they're. So it's Katrina-esque when they say biblical and all these different things. It's Katrina-esque To the reason.

Speaker 2: 8:48

Reason we get here and there was nothing. We get to the space camp and there's nothing. Here there's maybe a, you know, there's one trailer there is for, like, the people on the coordinate, this thing. There was no tents put up yet there was a bathroom-type scenario, kind of scenario going on. It's because all of the efforts have been already put. Number one, people were off and couldn't mobilize that quickly because off the season. And then, number two, and I'm going to put many factors, but number two of these factors is the fact that everyone was in Florida, the Tampa area, that area, Then they went up into the Alabama and the Georgia area where it got hit, and then they went into Tennessee and Tennessee and all these different things. And then, last but not least, is the worst one, in Asheville, the worst occurrence, and it's not even because of the hurricane wind forces or anything like that. There were a few tornadoes, but it's just because of the massive amount of rain that dumped on them within a four-hour period. You couldn't do anything.

Speaker 1: 9:45

This happened a few months ago over in dubai. You remember that yeah, oh yeah, and it was like out of nowhere just massive rainstorm yeah, and again they I think they used biblical in in their uh, you know definition of that as well, their description of that yeah, and I saw a stat and I don't know how they come up with this.

Speaker 3: 10:02

They said something like 40 trillion gallons of water went through north carolina and I was seeing statistics that by the time the hurricane actually hit, it was moving at 30 miles per hour and it dumped a 14 inch inches of rain in that matter of time period.

Speaker 1: 10:18

What did you say? That's crazy. What did you say? The the very size. Yeah, so, Katrina, it's it's.

Speaker 3: 10:24

it's eyeopening. I saw this on social media and I just kind of was like this is ridiculous. So everyone realizes how bad Katrina was for New Orleans. Katrina was a Cat 3. It was 125-mile-an-hour max sustained winds. Diameter of the storm was 400 miles. The wind field was about 230 miles. That's wind field is from the center of the storm out to where the bands are. So Helene is a cat 4. Maximum sustained winds are 20 more miles per hour, about 145. Diameter ready for this one 822 miles in diameter. Wow, wind field is double the size, almost of whatever it is.

Speaker 2: 11:08

When you think about that being over the water and if it's 800, you know 20 miles, whatever the term how much momentum is picking up from that heat of the water over that wide? You know it's just, it's bananas. How to do that? Just think of that even. But it happened. We got here. But all the reason what the story was trying to say is that all the resources were being utilized in all these other states that were hit first and no one expected it to be as catastrophic as it would be.

Speaker 2: 11:34

Here in the Asheville area, team of people, including FEMA, the state of North Carolina and other people who were Virginia shout out to Virginia who I saw them pull in last night with some big old military vehicles. I couldn't tell you what they are, but there's every kind of vehicle here from all over many different states I probably haven't seen yet and that we're pulling up and the momentum is starting here now on day six that things are kind of gelling so we still don't have a place to sleep. You know, a lot of times we're sleeping on a floor or we're sleeping in our car or the truck, things like that. We are piece of milling things together to try to be able to adapt to how many people we are actually feeding and we're going to have to feed, and it's just an ongoing's just a. It's an ongoing thing. It's exciting and it's it's amazing yet just to be a part of it, to see how it happens. But to be four chefs, you know. And shout out to Maddie Morgan, as well as another chef that's up here with us, and a shout out to Victor Duran, his son, brian Duran, and they came down from Chicago, some friends of us in the industry. They came down and they showed up last night. They got in town and they're here right now really relieving us. Them being here is allowing me to come get on the phone with you guys for a few minutes, but it's ongoing.

Speaker 2: 13:06

It's meals breakfast, lunch, dinner and then basically a midnight meal which is already plated. So we plate those, so we have time to like, get somewhat rust. But in the middle of those things it's never stopping because you're prepping for the next thing. One thing that we're trying to do is we're refusing to use canned goods, we're refusing to use anything. Those type of things we would prefer to go are donating. Donate those things to the people we take pride in providing for the first responders, the police, military, fresh food, as fresh as we can do it, and just making people realize that their morale is good. Well, you know.

Speaker 1: 13:46

I wanted to ask you that. So you know, and I'm glad that you got fresh legs on the ground I came in last night with you, with your pals. I mean I'm thrilled that you're getting some, just some help. But have you seen, you know? So all this, with all this tragedy and everything that's, it's still you know, we're still in the midst of it. How's everybody, in terms of dealing with each other? I mean, everyone must be on edge is it?

Speaker 2: 14:11

random acts of kindness, or is it? You know, are there people, people just having to work with each other, like this? Yeah, as far as our team, like I'm the team I'm on personally or within each where you are.

Speaker 3: 14:22

I mean you've got you've got different municipality workers and federal different, obviously egos that are involved in it. There's got to be something and attention has got to be high, because you're trying to save people, you're trying to feed people, so how is everyone?

Speaker 2: 14:36

getting along.

Speaker 2: 14:38

We're getting along. At the end of the day, we know that resources are going to get pulled from us. Everything is extremely fluid. No one has been rude to us in any way. Fluid, no one has been rude to us in any way, as we in the industry know that seeing someone's face every day and being hot and sweaty and having bathed in three days, and you know just all these variables will make, you know, us ticking time bombs with our own brethren in this industry. So yeah, of course sometimes it gets testy in between what we're trying to get done to accomplish things, because these are tall tasks, these are tall feeds. You know they'll come at us and say this is a certain number that we think we're going to need you to feed, and then, minutes before it happens, they're adding two to three hundred people or more. You know so, or more. Yeah, you know who's counting. You know I'm not sitting there counting how many people. It's just a lot of people.

Speaker 1: 16:05

This may seem like a silly question, but what are you feeding these people?

Speaker 2: 16:11

What is being served. We're trying to provide a protein. Lots of pasta has been donated, so we're doing pasta. The crazy thing is proteins such as meatballs and chicken your typical chickens, we do pork. We roasted some pork butts. A lot of people donated some briskets your typical chickens, we do. Let's see pork. We roasted some pork butts. We had some. A lot of people donated some briskets, things like that. You know, things that kind of.

Speaker 2: 16:31

We wanted things to boost morale as well when we were getting people to send us some stuff. And then now some good, some broadliners have decided that they might come drop some reefer truck off for us. Those things I'd like to. You know, call it a call to action. Anyone listening, anyone in the industry, I can't tell you that you can come out here and come donate your time. Please donate your time to anyone else, but please donate. If there's anything where there'd be an apron, anything like that, we could use those things, send an email to walk and talk and and we can coordinate how to get that to us.

Speaker 2: 17:03

But it's going back to your question, jeff.

Speaker 2: 17:05

It's a morale thing and it's a mental health thing, but I can tell you, when we come together, everyone's going to bicker, whether it be whoever it may be, especially in these stressful situations. But we all come back to the realization that we're here and, number one, we're alive and thank God we're alive, and I feel so bad for how many numbers we don't even I don't want to fathom they didn't stop think about or talk about how many numbers that are up there but also that we are here, able to still do our passion, and we talk about it every night before we like wrap up, we sit, we sit there and we hold hands and and we just meditate and pray and just concentrate our energy to have a good day the next day and um you know they're gonna get a little choked up guys so there's there's there's some resources that we can work on and I have already reached out to aaron boyle over at chow, which is culinary hospitality, outsource wellness there it's a free service that they talk to restaurant people.

Speaker 3: 18:02

I'm trying to coordinate to maybe getting some people there. I can be counselors to you know the workers and I'm not just talking about you guys, I'm talking about the chefs and the service industry, people that have been affected by Asheville or by the hurricane in Asheville.

Speaker 2: 18:16

Well, jeff, it's really crazy to think, brother, I don't know if there is an Asheville anymore. Well, that's why.

Speaker 3: 18:22

I kind of changed my whole comment. It's the people that were in the service industry that have been decimated because of what happened, of this natural disaster. There's got to be, you know, a lot of mental health issues moving forward and forget about just losing the income or their job or their restaurant if they were the owner of it. Think about the family members that have been unfortunately passed away because of this. So there's multiple. There's multiple trauma, that levels of trauma that we're talking about with PTSD. You know, you know this is a long term effect, mentally. That's going on. But the short term, which is amazing, is that hot food, when, when you don't have the ability to make anything, that hot food, that hot meal that you're giving those first responders, that changes morale instantly. You know just what they're going through and how they're dealing with it. Coming back and having that hot meal that you're doing, that's what's worth it.

Speaker 1: 19:20

You know, I just want to say something too. Yeah, dude, I've been, you know, in the conversations that I've had with folks in describing what you're doing right now. Pooch, you know and listen, and people like you it's not just you, but I mean, obviously you're our friend, so I have you to talk to. I don't know any of these other folks that are out there, so I just appreciate what it is that you're doing. It took a lot of balls to do it. Like that's a lot of, that's just a lot of guts, because yeah, I mean, yeah, it's cooking, it's. You know, you've been chopping vegetables your whole life, but the truth is you're doing it now for a huge cause. You're doing it with, you know, with passion, with purpose, it's, it's, it's an amazing thing, man. So I just, you know you, you respect tons of respect to, uh, to what you're doing. Thank you, man.

Speaker 3: 20:08

Thank you, you know, and I want to give a big shout out because I know a lot of people I found out today via social media. Two high school friends that live in Asheville made the announcement that the New York Fire Department is actually now in Asheville helping out. So that was one that just came through the Allstate over in South Carolina. The rental LEAP please give a call to Pooch. I of the rental leap, please give a call to Pooch. I told you, can I give you a shout out? They need some help and what we need is to get a dishwasher out there not a person, but an actual physical dish machine, so that you can get that done. We're looking for commodity foods.

Speaker 3: 20:41

I talked to Chef Greg over at Mercy Chef God, I love that group. He admitted to me that he's actually stretched thin. I know that one of our good friends, gaston, is leaving with his catering company from tampa, driving up to north carolina as well. So there's a lot more that's going to be coming through, because you got to realize, 820 miles, it affected a lot of different and you got to realize like it's, it's, you know there's, there's a budget for this.

Speaker 2: 21:08

Fema has a budget. We're not going to pay us and we wouldn't want the money anyway, but FEMA has a budget to buy stuff. Stuff is just spread thin, man. It's all over in all these sites of every places, and so it's just hard. You know we're like I'll go ahead and say it. You know, cisco, drop us off a whole reefer truck sitting there with all kinds of. Can you drop us off A whole reefer truck sitting there with all kinds of? We have to give you one by daily trucks, and it's minimal things on the trucks. We're barely scraping by rationing one onion for four different things, because it's just what we got to do. But I want to just elaborate a little bit more on that. This reminds me so much of Katrina, and what really drove me to come here was that I didn't want the industry to have to go through what it did before. Hold on, you're next.

Speaker 1: 22:06

Yeah, look. I wanted to say I wanted to. So take a second there, pooch. I wanted to say something about the turnaround time. You know, we know chef gaston real well and you know shout out to him, I love that guy and what he's doing. It takes a long time, you know. It takes time to put the response effort into place because everyone you know in in florida we got hit too.

Speaker 3: 22:31

So the fact, anna maria, anna maria decimated.

Speaker 1: 22:34

Yeah, the the gulf coast is a mess, you know we have, I have friends that their restaurants filled to the ceiling with water. It's bad, but I want to. I do want to mention about response times, metro shelving, you know pooch and I run.

Speaker 2: 22:49

Wow, yeah, but well, pooch and I were on the phone.

Speaker 1: 22:50

Yeah, but we'll put. You and I were on the phone the other day and it's like carl man, you know I'm like what do you need, what? I don't. There's nothing that I can physically help you with. But what do you need? Yeah, you only eat, or call, I only eat. But he's, you know he's. He says, well, I'm in a tent and there's nothing in the tent we're getting. You know, we have supplies, but everything's on the floor and, and you know we came up with, hey, let's give AJ a call over at Metro. Do you know, like there's already that they have, I don't know, 16 racks?

Speaker 2: 23:19

We have a caravan of people coming in to put up stuff for us.

Speaker 1: 23:21

They mobilized, aj and Brianna and their team mobilized and I'm staring at the thread there's 15 people in X amount of States that put this together to where they're actually getting that product. The product is on the road already, like the material is on the road and they're going to install it and do everything. And they and they did that fast. You know we had the conversation and you know AJ is like well, you know, look, this is this is going to take a minute. Like this is not something we can do today. We have to figure this out the next day. The plan was in place and everything was in motion and it's amazing.

Speaker 1: 24:01

I just wanted to say, because it's important, that you have to compare, you have to look at what things are. Thank God for Cisco, thank God for the broad, thank God for anybody who's helping right the broad. I thank God for all these, anybody who's who's helping right now. Whether you know we're friends, the company friends or not, I don't get people are helping and that's amazing. And if you can mobilize quickly, you're you're light years ahead of the of the game.

Speaker 3: 24:22

So I'll give you a situation a couple of years ago, when I did work for us foods, we were activated and we were coming, you know, even under the restraints. I was going during going to work during a curfew and I got stopped by the police. But I also had a letter that said I was a first responder. All I was doing, guys, was cooking for my warehouse people and every restaurant tour that was opening their restaurant who had never had food in the week or two days or whatever it was. I opened up the door to my will, call and fed people, and having the ability to have that and see the faces of what people are going through, and listening to the stories and just having the ability just to take a second and say, hey, breathe, come on in and have something to eat, that's huge. But for the broad liners and I know US Foods quite well, I know both the Charlotte warehouse and I also know the South Carolina warehouse very well.

Speaker 3: 25:18

So, todd Hanson, who happens to be the president of that single warehouse over there in South Carolina, you guys, I know you have shrink, I know you can donate stuff. So I'm asking you, I'm pleading with you, please get in touch with the Walk and Talk. I know somebody that lives 18.3 miles away. I know that he will be back up there in Friday from being down here in Tampa. I hope to God that he can mobilize and get more people out to help pooch and the team out there and get them food more people out to help pooch and the team out there and get them food. But the realistic, the real realization is that things happen and when, for humanity to come together as quickly as it does. That's what's the most important thing. It's not about politics, it's not about anything else. It's about getting people fed and getting people what they need and having the common courage to do things. That's going above and beyond and that's what we do. I mean, you know, and and go ahead, go ahead, go ahead.

Speaker 2: 26:16

I was going to say that I am the things. Like I was saying before, things are moving forward and they're moving forward in a great way Now with, like you know, things are very streamlined and logistics of how things are working. Here Now we are basically this thing of becoming a full-fledged, like actual, engine. It's just amazing to watch and see how the logistics works and all this from propane to gasoline, to ice, to water to you know, we've done this all over the world, you know. So it's happening now.

Speaker 2: 26:47

It's sad that it is late. It's very Katrina-esque. It's like where is everybody? It's starting to happen. Things are working positive now.

Speaker 2: 27:00

But my biggest thing is is this is what what drives me but also breaks me down sometimes, but it drives me as well is that we have to be here for the chefs of asheville, for the chefs of any town of of devastation. But for this industry, for us to be an industry podcast and everyone who listens to us, we have to be here for those chefs. We have to be here.

Speaker 2: 27:19

There was a brutal uphill battle in New Orleans and of course, you had your big, big, huge names that had the money to come back. But how many of? We all know that man, a lot of people, and especially with this economy, everybody was robbing Peter to pay Paul and just streamlining just to stay alive and survive. And now all those people have nothing and it's sad to say that a lot of them might not even be there, guys. So we're hearing that people went to sleep thinking it was going to be a. You know it's going to be a heavy rain, you know whatever it's not, and landslides happen. So you, basically, you know that you can't really survive that.

Speaker 2: 27:59

So I'll be honest, it took a long time for that industry to come back.

Speaker 3: 28:05

I'll be honest, my buddy came down on Sunday morning and didn't have self-service, obviously, until he got down here and his son finally got a hold of him. He hadn't heard from his son since Friday. So imagine being a parent going through this storm and he's in Vail, his son's in Canton, which was decimated, and his son's first reaction was Dad, I thought you were going to come for me, and he said I had. I thought you were going to come for me and he said I had no idea where you were. So these stories you're going to start hearing a lot more.

Speaker 2: 28:38

Oh yeah, I mean, you know it's. It's crazy to see when I've talked to some people and they're just like, well, I mean, we don't even know like, is this a lie, is it false? You know, because you're not really hearing a lot about it on the media. You are kind of now, but not not that we have a lot of time to look at the media, but you don't really, you know, you weren't here really hearing about it, and I think a lot of that had to do with the fact that this is something that's a, you know, a civil engineering conundrum that no one would ever expect to ever happen. And it's proving now that maybe we aren't up to par with our civil engineering. Because, you know, we've heard the term over the last 10 years 100 year storm, 100 years storm. Well, how many 100 year storms that we had in the last 10 years? It seems like it's every two year storm or three years. So actually it's five years putting this, five, putting this kind of rain on the United States. And I'm not trying to get into all the political global warming stuff like that, it's just a fact that it is happening and it's ruining people's lives. And as we get into the new age of. You know, there was no AI, there was none of these things back when we were in Katrina and all these different things.

Speaker 2: 29:53

And what I worry about the industry now is that these people have lost everything and when you're in a 21st century now, where we're not going to rebuild, they're going to rebuild bigger, bigger, better. You know, obviously it was a great, aesthetically pleasing and a great place for people to visit. It was a very much a tourist town. It was a funky kind of hip town, had New Orleans vibes to it in the mountains. You know it was really cool and it was a fun place to be. And now to think about it, it's just like well, when people are going to come in there, there's going to be a lot of federal dollars, but there's going to be a lot of big money. People trying to we're People are trying to. We're talking about starting a new canvas like from the ground up. So I mean, it's not just like, oh, we can take over that building and renovate it, and that are modern. Everything is going to be modern, from the fiber optics in the ground to the plumbing, to the first brick or first piece of concrete, every single thing that's going to be built from this point on is going to be state of the art, new and new beyond our wildest dreams. But where's the chef? In that? Everything is computerized, everything. Where is the chef where? Where, you know, it's great to think of all these major cities in the world that have all these train rails and all these different things like that, and this famous stuff, robots and all this. But you know, I know I'm talking to some delirious guys, but I mean, that's what we talk about at night, just like, where's the chef and all this thing, when they're going to build from the ground up, that nobody's ever going to think about the chef or the arts.

Speaker 2: 31:24

Like the, ashville was known for its art, it was known for that, and so that's what I want to mobilize people to, to be passionate about in before, before going to be a part of something that's going to be a money-making thing, because obviously this is going to be the. This is the new gold rush. Now everybody's going to come here and try to get contracts to rebuild, do all these different things, but keep in mind that there were people there who built that town to what it was and what it made it was. It's a town that my children loved. It's a town that I remember going to. I have fond memories of going to when I was a kid We'd go up into the Smokies. And now it's not going to be the same and it never will.

Speaker 2: 32:07

And just like New Orleans is not the same and it never will be the same, but New Orleans was still there, it wasn't built back from the ground up because it was just water staying there, stagnant, this is mud, landslides and houses on top of houses on top of houses on top of of buildings, on top of 18 wheelers. I mean, if you see some of the stuff that I've seen, these pictures from people's phones here, it's just like how did that happen? Like it was almost like a Marvel movie where one superpower where they can throw an 18 wheeler truck, throw 18-wheeler just with the flash of their hands. I mean it just looks like somebody did that, but it was active nature that did that and it's just. It's something to process.

Speaker 2: 33:29

But just the call to action that I have for everybody is keep the arts, keep what made that city alive, alive. And it's what I hate about new orleans now of my town. Love being from there. But it's not what it was, because nobody gives a crap about what it was. Everybody's trying to make. Well, here's the new way, the better way. Well, that new orleans was never about the new way, the better way. It was lazy, fair. It was about being passionate about jazz, arts, foods, foods, flavors all of the above. The Big Easy and Asheville was very much that, and I have fear that that's what's going to happen. So, all our listeners out there, everywhere you know, find a chef that's from Asheville, write them a card, write them a letter, do whatever it is and pray for the ones who probably aren't there, the ones who've lost family, the ones who've lost everything.

Speaker 3: 34:21

Because as a kid who wanted to be a chef, I feel for these people well, but just being from the restaurant industry and going through katrina yourself, I mean I, I went through hurricane andrew I know these guys sitting across from me definitely did too and I drove down to help my family who obviously lost everything because they moved from coral gables down to kenn Kennel when Andrew hit and, knowing what you know, it took 10 years for Homestead to come back and what. I don't know what that's going to look like for Asheville, because that was mostly, I mean, it was a small hurricane but he was damn well powerful hurricane, but nothing compared to this.

Speaker 1: 34:56

Well, let me, let me just say this the message is simple you know as we, you know as we kind of go forward together, we're stronger. In times of crisis, it's the little acts of kindness that create the ripple effect in the community, and the truth is, we shouldn't be waiting for the next disaster to hit. We need to build that spirit of support and connection every day, because the reality is we don't know when it's going to be needed and when?

Speaker 3: 35:24

You know the biggest thing, I had a member from Palm Beach Art Ritt. He's one of the oldest members, the longest member, 52 years, 53 years with the American Culinary Federation. He wanted to do something where he got reefer trucks that were retrofitted as a disaster relief truck and I know he's probably going. Why are we not doing this? This is the perfect opportunity and it you know logistically, think about it. Like chef pooch has been saying, it's seasonal, it's. You're waiting for that national unfortunately. You're waiting for that natural disaster to happen so that you can be mobilized to get there. What you need to do Mercy Chefs and all those other companies that are doing stuff like this. Think about the logistics they have to go through and the manpower that they have to gear up for when something like this happens.

Speaker 1: 36:09

Hey Pooch, I know-.

Speaker 2: 36:10

Think about the fact that I'm going to say this because it was what I was trying to say before, but I'm gonna tie right into that. But think about the fact that all these resources are where they think things are going to happen the gulf coast. Nobody expected this to happen here, because it was just some rain, right?

Speaker 3: 36:28

well. So their homes are not built like miami or florida homes, are not built like louisiana homes, because they don't go through that stuff like we do, you know. So there's a different, like most of those homes, like I know, john just posted or looked at the picture of chimney rock and how that one street was like. It had some houses on the left and the next thing you know they're gone. They weren't. You know cbs block houses. I can tell you that much. Most of that destruction was mostly wood, but that's what nobody thought. Well, we don't have to worry about that because there's not going to be a hurricane hitting in the wood. You know asheville, which is how many miles from the coast I mean, we're 83 miles from far from from where you are right now to asheville is something like 83 miles, I think I saw so it's got to be over 100 and something miles.

Speaker 1: 37:16

I, I don't know. Look, we've been through in Florida.

Speaker 3: 37:19

You know we're older, older gentlemen we've been through a lot of hurricanes since 1979 Hurricane David yeah.

Speaker 1: 37:26

So you know I'm, I'm maybe 20 miles or so from water and I look at that and go, you know what 20 mile, I'm good, you know what I mean. I'm not really worried about a direct hit. You know, per se, and this is, you know, 15, 20 hurricanes that you know we've been through, so we have a good bearing on what this is supposed to feel like or be. This was so different because people were getting. People were, as Jeff said earlier, how wide the span of this storm it's stretched. This thing was offshore, offshore, yeah, while it was still yeah, and the Florida coast got just murdered. Naples got flooded, everybody got flooded. The whole West Coastulf coast got got smashed and then, you know, obviously, go straight up the straight up the gut into, uh, passes tallahassee, go straight into, you know. But I'll tell you it didn't feel normal. This was the most abnormal thing I've ever seen in terms of a hurricane I unfortunately think this is going to become the new norm.

Speaker 2: 38:36

Well like I said earlier.

Speaker 1: 38:42

This reminds me of what happened in Dubai several months ago, and I feel like we all forgot about that already too. But it was just like really out of nowhere, doesn't really?

Speaker 3: 38:51

make any sense. Well, Las Vegas too. Remember, Las Vegas got flooded again.

Speaker 2: 38:55

And I was there for that, and these are all places that you know are modern civil engineering, you know, especially Dubai. You know, and they're factoring in all these things when they're building these huge buildings and all this other stuff, but they don't factor in, you know, global warming or flooding or any of these things that are called, whatever it is that's causing the water to get so hot to create these huge storms that are never in history recorded stuff. You know.

Speaker 3: 39:20

40 trillion gallons of water. That's what it was done with. Yeah, that's what they said in North Carolina, was it?

Speaker 2: 39:28

for or for. True, and that's just North Carolina, yeah, the western part of North Carolina, so it's not even the whole of North Carolina. Yeah, yep, for insurance, because it's what status quo is what we know. Living there, these people had nothing insurance, wise, they weren't living in a flood zone, they weren't living in any things that. Now, how do you pick up the pieces? And it's to be a conundrum, like it was in new orleans, with you know dollars in the federal government giving money there, but it also could be you know dollars in the federal government giving money there, but it also could be, you know, a positive thing, because we do have a presidential election in a couple of days and I'm sure these people are going to have to be addressed with this task and this could be their legacy, whoever it may be, whatever side you want it to be, this is probably going to be their legacy and, like you know, this could be the thing that brings back the economy. This could be in such a bad way and it's so, process it like this, but if we can make it positive, and we could make this not about building it to be a money maker some money, some.

Speaker 2: 40:52

You know a town in the mountains. That's all where rich people go flock now and it's a playground like if we can bring it back to early what it was with all those tax dollars it would. It could really spark something to the the the normal person, not the rich people and and uh, and and bring back what ashville was to. You know it was our, this was our swiss house of the south. You know you go to swiss house and you go be these high peaks and go do all these different. You know beautiful scenery and just watching the leaves change and all this other stuff. That's what Asheville was to us in New Orleans or to people in the South. It was the place that you could go not too far away and get that feel of being in there. And I don't have to go to the Rockies, you know, right there, nestled in the South, and what a beautiful place it was and and it's just. You know. You know, pray about it, be about it, make sure that it is what it was the arts.

Speaker 3: 41:46

You had the biltmore there. That's why it was like that, though and I you know it's funny I've not heard one thing about the biltmore I haven't as well.

Speaker 2: 41:53

I don't even think about that.

Speaker 3: 41:54

I think I mean like that's you have, oh silent john. No, I haven't as well, I didn't think about that. I mean, like that's you have, oh Silent John. No, I haven't. No, no, Silent John was shaking his head yet, so you know he's not going to talk, so I'll find out later.

Speaker 1: 42:05

Listen, bush. Yeah, I know that you told me before you only have a few minutes.

Speaker 2: 42:11

I'm hearing my text bing, bing, bings. I'm assuming that's hopefully it's people reaching out saying they can send us some morale boosters. But it's probably them saying let's go of people that came through with morale boosters even if they couldn't really help in some sort of a way physically. And we're not in for any financial, we're not in for any money from anybody. You know people send us. Metro is sending us stuff to be able to complete our task. But I want to thank Clark and Hopkins. They're sending hot sauces for all the troops. They're sending peanuts and snacks, all their new stuff, popcorns, just to boost morale, just to make sure that everybody's having those endorphins and dopamine that when we eat sweet stuff, salty stuff, all the reasons that we love food, that's what the morale boosters are right now for us. Flossy Foods, love y'all, Appreciate y'all so much Sending out some peanut, brittle and corn dogs. Appreciate y'all so much sending out some, you know, brittle and corn dogs.

Speaker 2: 43:17

I want to give a shout out to Jen Booker, Chef Jen, very close colleague, and she and Camellia Beans. Shout out to Camellia Beans because they're sending beans right now and then they're going to send a caravan of some things from New Orleans up here. Shout out to Jen Booker for coordinating all that. Everybody at Camellia Beans, Allison Frank, all of you over there who are really making this happen and showing that the solidarity and knowing what it takes to build the industry back. They had to do it. They gritted their teeth and made it happen.

Speaker 2: 43:49

I want to shout out to Chefworks they're sending us a care package of aprons, shirts, things that we need, things that we just you know, you think about what you need in the industry. You need a knife, you need all these other things. You really don't think about the fact that a chef's jacket in these type of situations is truly the jacket made for this type of cooking Aprons, things of that nature. So they, Chef Works is really coming through through, sending us a big, huge care package. Shout out to Chiwis, Shout out to everybody else. I can't remember who has got as things on the way. All I get is texts with tracking numbers and I really appreciate it, guys. I really, really, really appreciate it. So if everybody wants has any way to assist us, and we're not asking for anything financial, we're really just asking for anything where it may be a morale booster or you know, or something, a utensil or tool that we can utilize to feed more people efficiently? We would. We would love to hear from you, so please contact our walk and talk, guys.

Speaker 1: 44:52

I think jay jay gardner is going to be heading up there that way to, oh yes, and thank you for reminding me, sir. So think Jay Gardner is going to be heading up there that way to, oh yes, and thank you for reminding me, sir.

Speaker 2: 44:59

So Jay Gardner is going to come out here at Citrus America. He's going to be serving fresh squeezed orange juice to however many people are here. However many oranges we got, we're going to squeeze them and shout out to Citrus America for making that happen. It's really cool. What's kind of fun about this whole thing as well not and I don't mean fun and the fact that you know catastrophic things happen. What I'm fun about it but walk and talk podcast is kind of being the catalyst, to be kind of that uso for the troops, for the people that are aiding in this kind of thing, and that's really that. It's fun and it's it draws, it drives my passion and it gives me energy and it helps me keep going, you know.

Speaker 1: 45:39

So I appreciate you saying I appreciate y'all I appreciate you saying that and you know, when I think uso, I think singing, I think bob hope I think comedian, I think comedians and john is giving me the heads up. John said he's willing to go out there and perform stand-up.

Speaker 3: 45:56

Oh, for some comic relief. Cue cards, only Cue cards, only Cue cards only.

Speaker 1: 46:03

Cue cards only. All right, booch man, just stay the course. Godspeed to you, brother, and appreciate everybody who's helping out with this whole thing. And if there's anything that we could do to help, kind of middle or catalyst of any sort, just hit us on Instagram at walkandtalkshow and we'll see what we can do if there's anything possible at all. And you know love everybody Appreciate it.

Speaker 3: 46:30

Oh, real quick. Troy Schiller is the gentleman that I told you about Pooch. He's got the food truck. I'm going to follow back up with him. He's got Alter Sham bringing the food truck next week and he has a three-compartment sink, so I'm trying to get you as much as I can. So if you need more, just let me know and I'll hit my network up.

Speaker 2: 46:48

All right, not a problem, guys, I appreciate you all so very much.

Speaker 1: 46:52

All right, Pooch baby, Be good man, We'll catch up on Side B, brother okay.

Speaker 2: 46:57

Gotcha Everyone who hasn't gotten my emails returned or text returned. I apologize, but I love y'all and we will make it happen sooner than later.

Speaker 1: 47:05

Excellent, all right Everyone. John Jefferson, we are out.