Matthew Beaudin: The Indiana Jones of Culinary

Chef Matthew Beaudin explores the intersection of culinary innovation and sustainability while advocating for responsible seafood sourcing. His discussion sheds light on global sourcing practices, community engagement, and the vital role of consumer awareness in conservation efforts.

• Chef Matthew’s diverse culinary background and its effect on his approach 
• Importance of the Seafood Watch program in guiding sustainable choices 
• Building meaningful partnerships with farmers and fishermen 
• Creating innovative dining experiences in cultural attractions 
• Collaborations with chocolate producers to elevate sustainable sourcing 
• Emphasizing mentorship and ongoing learning in the culinary industry 
• Inspiring consumers to consider the environmental impact of their food choices

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Chapters

• 0:52 Sustainable Dining and Ocean Conservation
• 13:55 Culinary Partnerships and Inspirations
• 22:50 Creating Culinary Experiences
• 29:52 Culinary Innovation and Sustainability
• 39:32 Local Conservation Efforts Through Organizations

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:52

Hello Food Fam. This is the Walk Talk Podcast where you will find the perfect blend of food fun and cooking knowledge. I'm your host, carl Fiodini. Welcome to the number one food podcast in the country. We're recording on-site at Ibis Images Studios, where food photography comes alive and I get to eat it. Here's a humble request to give a follow on Instagram at walkandtalkshow. That's a big please and thank you.

Speaker 1: 1:17

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Speaker 1: 1:37

Here's an update we're going to be with our friends chefs Nick and Polly Barrington at the NAFM show up in Atlanta next week covering the US Culinary Open cooking competition. We'll be at booth 6614. That's 6614. Come by and say hello. Maybe we'll put you on camera. I don't know. We'll see how I'm feeling that day. So today we're joined by Matthew Bowden, the Corporate Director of Culinary Innovation for SSA Group and Culinary Director at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. With experience spanning kitchens from Hong Kong to Rwanda, matthew is a leader in crafting innovative dining experiences that prioritize environmental stewardship. His tenure at multiple five-star properties has solidified his reputation for excellence and creativity in the culinary world. Join us as we discuss how Matthew is redefining sustainable dining and inspiring ocean conservation through his culinary vision. Get ready for an insightful conversation that promises to enrich your perspective on food and the environment. Chef Matthew, welcome to the program.

Speaker 2: 2:41

What's going on, man? Thanks for having me Really appreciate it.

Speaker 1: 2:44

You know, I tell you what, I tell you what, I tell you what. It was really great how we met, which I just want to give a shout out to LinkedIn we were just talking about it off air man. People come together on that platform.

Speaker 2: 2:55

Heck yeah, you're a hard man to track down. I'm glad I finally got some time with you here.

Speaker 1: 3:00

Me or you, dude, you're jet setting across the globe looking for, like you know, I don't know shrimp. I don't know. Where are you going? Where are you going right now? Where are you? You're heading off somewhere. Where are you heading out to? I am?

Speaker 2: 3:11

actually headed to Vietnam and then over to Thailand, and so I'm going to go look for some cool, sustainable shrimp options that are seafood watch green best choice.

Speaker 1: 3:22

See, I told you it was shrimp, I knew it was.

Speaker 2: 3:24

It's a pretty awesome job to have.

Speaker 1: 3:25

How did you actually come into this gig?

Speaker 2: 3:27

So a buddy of mine was the corporate executive chef at the time and he said, hey, listen, I have this opportunity in California. Would you be willing to give it a go? He said we have a partnership out there and we're trying to find just the right person. Would you give me about a year? I said yeah, absolutely no problem. So I kind of packed it up, went to california and it's it's been 10 years and the company itself is called the ssa group, based out of denver, colorado, family-owned company, and we literally just focus on zoos, aquariums and museums. Right, it's the core of our business. And so cultural attractions and when you work with those people like their soul is conservation, sustainability, and so being able to wake up every single day and focus on those things from a food perspective is wild dude and it never gets old.

Speaker 1: 4:16

Well, you've been in some diverse kitchens around the globe. How have those experiences kind of put your culinary direction into play?

Speaker 2: 4:24

Diverse kitchens, I think is a broad statement. Right, being in the places I've been in across the globe has really challenged my perspective on what a kitchen is. And so when I was in Rwanda, for example, our kitchen was outside and it was a grill. And then we had an old seed mill and it was like this drum that we threw a grate across the top and that's where we baked our bread. The kitchen has really kind of taken on a new form for me in regards to like what it means to have a kitchen, and for me that's a place to bring people together and a place to tell stories and to meld tradition and sustainability really took heart in Africa. Right, I've built my the latter part of my career here.

Speaker 2: 5:07

I say that at the ripe old age of 41, the latter part of my career here. I say that at the ripe old age of 41. The latter part of my career on sustainability. But sustainability there was a whole different story. It was where does my water come from? Where does my next meal come from? Sustainability wasn't about the ingredient itself as much as the lifestyle, what I've taken and what's kind of shaped my story has been what sustainability truly means and what it really feels like, and it's not always just the ingredient, it's the impacts of that ingredient where they're coming from. You know what the impact there is in truly taking a holistic approach to it.

Speaker 1: 5:43

You're kind of like the culinary Indiana Jones, okay, because when I say diverse kitchens, what I really mean is you're traversing rivers and you're landing on mountaintops and you're doing things. That it's adventure, it's an odyssey. Everywhere you go, it isn't just like oh, I'm going to hang out at the Hilton Hotel, you're going to remote places and these kitchens are actually not kitchens. It's open fire pits and whatnot. I think that's fascinating. I, I think you're one of these, like I think you're one of these guys that if you, you have a bull whip and a fedora hat, I think you're. You know, I think you're good to go.

Speaker 2: 6:18

Dude, you know what I'm saying yeah, but like when you think about it, bro, like that's where our food comes from, right, and I think that's that's been my hope, right. So at SSA group, we've leaned in a lot on like, hey, we have some of the best food out there, there's nobody that doesn't like us, and we put effort into reshaping the dynamic of what a culinary experience is and cultural attraction. But the one piece we dive into also is where our food actually comes from. It's not like, oh, we get it from just US foods or we get it from this broad line. It's like where does that food come from?

Speaker 2: 6:48

Giving people the ability to connect has been my biggest joy, and so, whether it's on LinkedIn, sharing a story through there, or whether it's my ability to then take these stories and sit down and share them over a meal or whatever it is, it's the ability to share with people where their food actually comes from. I mean, it is those remote villages, man, it is those out there places. The adventure is on your plate and I'm just trying to connect you with it.

Speaker 1: 7:15

You talked about shrimp, Chef. You're talking about shrimp from Vietnam. What is it that is the draw? To take this trip to do the Odyssey to look for that product?

Speaker 2: 7:32

take this trip to do the odyssey to look for that product. Man, I'll tell you the the seafood watch program. You know they, they kind of rate, a kind of they. They rate shrimp or any seafood on this kind of stoplight scale. So it's green is best choice, yellow is a good alternative and red is a void. So green is like you can eat it, we can indulge in that yellow being a good alternative and red is a void. So green is like you can eat it, we can indulge in that. Yellow being a good alternative is like yeah, try it, but like let's not eat it every night. You know, this is something that still has the opportunity to become red if we're not careful. And red is like stay away from it. So when I'm looking at products, we always want to start and say, hey, where are our options for green and can we find something that's green? Best choice? First, what that is like. All the boxes have been checked, whether it's environmental impact, the feed, the feed ratio, whether it's farmed or wild. You know the catch method, whether you're trolling it, making sure that you're not affecting the bottom of the ocean and the bottom of the rivers, whatever you're fishing, it really goes into everything, but what these things are.

Speaker 2: 8:31

Seafood Watch at its core. It's a science-based program. Right, you have marine biologists and scientists that are looking at all these things and it's absolutely incredible to see and look at the work that goes into these things. I just sat on the International Tuna Coalition meeting, probably three weeks ago, as an observer, who say that I didn't understand what was going on would be a massive understatement, because the the things they were talking about and the data they were going over was just insane to me. But all of that data only works if the consumer is engaged and if the consumer asks questions and if the consumer wants to know.

Speaker 2: 9:07

What I'm looking for when I go over to Vietnam is to engage the consumer. I want to be able to tie them to the story and for them to go. Hey, we understand where this is coming from and we know that these farms are approved by Seafood Watch as doing things the right way. They're certified and so we know that when we make these purchases, we are doing so with not only the intent to have a great meal, but to leave the world a better place and to support people that are doing it the right way, because when it comes to farm seafood.

Speaker 2: 9:40

There's a lot of intensive shrimp farming that goes on. There's a lot of intensive salmon farming that goes on, and as an average consumer, we don't necessarily know what that means. But what it boils down to is those intensive farms. They're going to ruin the environment, right. They're crushing the mangrove and the mangrove systems, their escapes and inoculations in the salmon population that are getting into the local populations, and those are dangerous. We want to support the people who are doing it responsibly and making sure the ecosystem that surrounds what they're doing is positive as well.

Speaker 1: 10:13

It's a great job. What you're doing right now is admirable. Thank you, Appreciate it. There's another part to this and that is you're changing the lives of the farmers that you're encountering. These are, I presume, in many cases very rural areas, not a lot of money and SSA is a pretty. Ssa Group is a pretty large organization, even though it's a family-run operation. That's a lot of product to be buying or purchasing. Putting these deals together for these farms, You're changing the lives of those people. That's got to feel terrific.

Speaker 2: 10:53

Yeah, it feels incredible, but I think that's one of the things that's kind of the core of who we are right is our people are the power, and so our people doesn't stop at the people who are our team, you know, or the SSA family, it's these partners. And I go so far out of my way to not say vendor right, because a vendor is just a relationship. It's just hey, I'm going to buy this from you for this amount of money, and that's it. What we do is we form these bonds right and they become part of our family and they are part of the SSA group. And so when we look at these farmers, it's not, hey, give me a shrimp at X price, see you later. Like it's hey, how are you doing? How can we help you? How can we better get you to market?

Speaker 2: 11:38

And that's the desire here is to impact lives right. At the end of the day, it's a shrimp like the amount of shrimp cocktail you can see in a year, I'm sure is astronomical. And the, the people that are involved in this process, are what's so important. And whether their son or their daughter becomes the next shrimp farmer who then owns the next shrimp company but then becomes the biggest shrimp operator in the entire world, and they go hey, hey, my grandfather did it right, I followed the seafood watch guide. Now we're going to as well Like the impacts are so far reaching, and so, at the very best, you hope that you can impact the next person who's going to be the person that changes the world, and I think a lot of times we underestimate that as people like that.

Speaker 1: 13:01

The impact of one is massive, think a lot of times we underestimate that, as people like that, the impact of one is massive.

Speaker 2: 13:12

How many countries have you been to for SSA group and how many friends have you made I'd say a handful with SSA? I've been really fortunate man. This, this job, has been so incredible to me and you know, the core of what we do every single day is in the United States and it's within the borders of the United States, and our partners are here and we have nearly 100 incredible partnerships and zoos and aquariums and museums across the United States and chances are there's there's one next to every single person who's listening, and I would encourage you to go support them, because when you think about getting a meal there, that's supporting conservation. You know there are partners and and we are walking hand-in-hand with them You'll never see an SSA group logo because we assume the identity of our partners, because we truly believe in the mission, but the friends are endless, right?

Speaker 2: 13:56

I think it's such a small world when you get out there and I think as a kid, you look at it and you're like man, I don't even know how to get down the street, I have no idea how to get to the next city over, and if I did, I wouldn't know where to go. But when you start connecting the dots, it's like that there's a six degrees of separation, whatever it is, and you start to realize that these impacts the friendships you have, the relationships you make. They're so important and you know I'm beyond thankful for that?

Speaker 1: 14:23

Has your life ever been in danger when you're going to one of these remote locations?

Speaker 2: 14:26

I don't think so. You know, maybe that's just blind bliss to me, to me, to me. You know I don't think so. Yeah, I'd like to hope not. There's a lot of hype, right. You know, in one of the safest places I've ever been to in my life that I feel like I was the most afraid to go was Rwanda. There was a massive conflict there at one time and I got there and people were so nice and I say to this day one day I'll retire to the hills of Rwanda because it is so peaceful and so quiet and so nice and everyone is so hospitable. Same thing in Mexico. You hear a lot of things, but Mexico, when I go to mexico the mexico I know, I love it is so full of culture, in diversity, and just history and steep in, just people's, people's grandparents, handing things down and handed things down you just, you have this amazing community that is built on tradition and I just, just, I love it.

Speaker 1: 15:23

Let's talk chocolate, let's talk Ghana and let's talk to Florida Aquarium here in Tampa.

Speaker 2: 15:28

We are. We actually had a partnership SSA has with Cho Chocolate out in Berkeley, california, for, I want to say, the better part of two years now and this, this chocolate partnership, is just organic, right, I had seen show chocolate one day I reached out to the guys and I was like, hey man, what would it take to to work with you guys? Like I don't know what the relationship looks like, I just love what you're doing. I think it's really really cool and I love your story. Fast forward.

Speaker 2: 15:56

I started talking to the chief chocolatier his name is brad kinsinger and the folks at show and they came up with their first collaboration bar with us, and so it was called deep, dark and salty, and we started at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. We took our seaweed, which is grown locally, we dried it out, we took salt from big source salts over Monterey as well and we mixed that with dark chocolate and the bar made it in the New York Times. It was this epic collaboration and we realized there was something to that partnership. Since then have come up with a bar for the oakland zoo called the grizzly bar, we came up with one for the museum of pop culture and then we have one coming out for the florida aquarium. Uh, that'll be out end of this summer, so it's going to be epic.

Speaker 2: 16:40

That being said, in order to be able to tell this story, uh, we really wanted to kind of open up the book for the florida aquarium bar, and so I'm going to head to ghana with cho and kind of do the whole, the whole gamut. We're going to go pick the cocoa, harvest it, process it into raw cocoa in ghana, come back to Berkeley, process that into a chocolate bar, and then we'll bring that down to Tampa. And so, in true SSA form, following the ingredient from harvest to the plate, is really important to us and knowing the people in between, and I'm extremely pumped to be able to go do that with them.

Speaker 1: 17:18

When you're putting together a program like this, there's so much that has to be accounted for. What sort of challenges do you run into in putting these programs together?

Speaker 2: 17:27

I think the challenge is more on the logistics side. When you look at it for anyone out there who's an operator in a restaurant, you start looking at getting things from point A to point B or purchasing things in bulk or making sure they're going to sell. There's a large what if in these things, right. So you go all the way to Ghana, you procure this cocoa, you bring it back to California, you process it and then you hope that people are going to engage with it.

Speaker 2: 17:55

I think when you look at a partnership like we have with Cho, it's so incredible because they are a vegan chocolate and so they have a cool story. They source cocoa responsibly, right. Obviously, that's a huge piece for us making sure it's responsibly sourced, and so the story's there. And then when you couple that with a conservation based organization like the Florida Aquarium, it's a perfect recipe for success. No pun intended, our goal is to bring the story to life in these things, and not just the story this is a cool chocolate bar for conservation but the story that you said earlier of the people and the partners themselves. The challenge is first logistics and the second is conveying that story and getting people to understand when you're holding this chocolate bar in your hand. What does that mean? Where did that come? Come from? Who made that? I think and the story is is the hardest piece to tell sometimes you bring up a great point.

Speaker 1: 18:53

You have the entire world at your fingertips in terms of culinary direction. Let's say here on the state side that have to put together a menu. At the end of the day, you're feeding people at a museum or at an aquarium and the food has to be good. Where does the inspiration come from to see this thing through?

Speaker 2: 19:14

It comes from anywhere, and I think that's that's what I love most is like I'm the guy. Yeah, but is it a round table?

Speaker 1: 19:21

Is it a round table thing? Is it? Is how many people are involved in putting a menu together that you have to go and traverse the globe, and locally too, domestically too, but you're out there.

Speaker 2: 19:34

How many people are involved in that? I mean, for us it's our whole team, right? So we have over 100 executive chefs in our group and so we're constantly working together to come up with ideas. I literally after after talking to you today, I'm getting on a call with all of them. We're at a quarterly call where we do exactly that. We sit down, we talk about cool stuff, you know, we talk about who's doing what, what's new, what's fresh, like any crazy ideas you have, like that's where they come from.

Speaker 2: 20:02

I'm the dude who sleeps with a notebook next to my bed, bro, for real, and it's literally just like I wake up in the middle of the night and go what if? And I write it down and that's where these things come from. We have some of the most epic partnerships that just come via the connections you know from from one person to another. Uh, one of of my, my favorite connections right now is happy himalayan water, and we started talking to these guys, I'd say about six, eight months ago, and they said we have a canned water, aluminum canned water, and we, we wanna, we want to sell the aquarium. I said cool, tell me more about it. They said it's got himalayan sea salt in it for hydration, he said, because when I perform I want to be hydrated. What do you mean when you perform? He said, oh, I'm a country music singer, who? He said, oh, nico Moon. I said you got to be kidding me. And so I look it up and it's this country music megastar and he started a water company where he's selling canned water now. Yeah, so over the past six months we've really dialed this thing in.

Speaker 2: 21:08

So there's there's no plastic on it. The entire can is made of aluminum and we're even moving to, like the, the beer can style where you pop it. So underneath the cap of most aluminum bottles is a piece of plastic for freshness and safety. But if you have just the beer can pop top, they don't even need that. Additionally, this can it's taken so long to kind of fabricate because on the outside it has this color change, because a huge part of who not only Nika Moon, but Happy Himalayan is about mental health. He found that if you could make the cans change color, it would encourage kids to get outside in the sun so they can watch the can turn color. Everybody knows when you get sun you're a little bit happier. This can has a color-changing label. Additionally, the aluminum is popped up on the outside. It's like a fidget label.

Speaker 2: 22:04

And so really finding partners, man, that, like they're, they're totally invested, like we are, and they believe in the mission, I think, like I said earlier to me, it's not a vendor, we don't do the vendor piece because it's a partner. The partner is something so much bigger. It's somebody who believes in not only our mission, but it's somebody whose mission we can believe in and totally buy into. Like this is this is something we can get behind, right? It's not just hey, send me a box and I'll open the box and we'll cook some food. It's what's your story. You know, how are you doing stuff that's going to make the world a better place? And I think that's the question we ask every single time, like what are you doing that's going to make the world a better place?

Speaker 1: 22:51

Matt, you've been on the Food five-star hotels and establishments.

Speaker 2: 22:54

How much of that prepared you for this particular leg of your career. The piece for me that I used most from that part of my life is how to redefine this market segment right. And so when you look at cultural attractions in general, it's usually like you get your hamburger, you know, your cracker jacks, your popcorn, whatever it is. You get this like canned experience almost um, for lack of a better word. And so, coming from that world of higher end dining and you know luxury and the show, I think has given me the opportunity to translate that to this world and say how do we redefine this world? How do we do something different? For example, we started probably four years ago. I was talking to one of the team members at one of our units and I said what are we missing? I said you talk to people more than I do. You see people every single day. You are out here as the brief. I said chef, we need lemonade. I said lemonade. I said that's silly. I said what else? He said we're missing lemonade. I said I'll give it a shot. So we went back, made a couple of gallons of lemonade. 20 minutes later he comes in, he goes. We're out of lemonade. I said you gotta be kidding me. So I made some more lemonade. He comes back. He says chef, we're out. I said what? So we started this lemonade program.

Speaker 2: 24:21

Lemonade became our biggest seller last summer. I said this is wild to me. I said I don't understand it. But how can we make it better? I refuse to just give people the regular lemonade experience. And so we bought these big glass carafts and we lined the insides with fruit. You could come up and get this fresh glass jar of lemonade, because we're not doing single use. And so you get the glass jar to take with you and you take it. It's like a mason jar, really cool experience.

Speaker 2: 24:48

And this year I said that's, that's cool, and all but people are starting to catch on. How do we make it better? And so we bought the sugar cane. Uh, press, so what if we took fresh sugar cane and we ground a cane over some some crushed ice? And then we took fresh lemons, squeezed them in there, oh yeah.

Speaker 2: 25:09

And then a piece of mint, right, and. And then you, right, you can taste it, right. And then you get this like this fresh squeezed lemonade with cane sugar and mint, and like talk about the most refreshing thing, but it's a memory too. Like think about when you went to like fairs as a kid or you know you went to the zoo, like there's, there's things that stick with you, and I just feel like as a kid or you know you went to the zoo, like there's things that stick with you, and I just feel like as a kid, walking up and being like I watched them grind this sugar cane over crushed ice and then squeeze the fresh lemon and the whole lemon gets put in the ice and then there's this mint and like that's a memory. And so I think creating these core memories for people of doing things differently is so epic and that's what we're trying to do.

Speaker 1: 25:49

It's a core memory, but it's also the right way of making the product. You didn't cut corners on the quality of it. It's not processed, it's something, it's fresh and I think that's the story. That's beautiful and that leads me to say your colleagues, the other chefs, everyone that's part of the SSA group experience with your chefs across the company. Are there learning curves? Because these are cats that come from the food industry and obviously they need to put out good food, and food cost is a thing, but it seems to me what you guys are trying to actually execute is an experience, along with the sustainability part of this. What's the process there?

Speaker 2: 26:34

Yes, there's a learning curve, but we also hire outside of that network, right. So, like we, we know people from hotels are used to doing hotel things. We know people who do and find dining like that's what they're comfortable with. And so, like we, we want people to come in and redefine and be uncomfortable with us. And so I think that, while there's a learning curve and people might look at that as a negative sometimes in life, we want that. Like we want the people that are hungry to reshape the industry with us. We want the people that are going to break the mold, and I think that is what sets us apart, right.

Speaker 2: 27:05

So you come into some companies. It's like here's our box, fit in this box. And you come work with us and it's like, hey, we're not building a box, like we're building a circle and we want you to help. And so I think that's the piece where you get to come and be part of it. You're not necessarily plugged into this hole versus required to help build. And I think that when you start putting a bunch of culinary engineers together like that, you come culinary masters that are like rocking the grill every single day and putting out the hamburgers and the hot dogs and the most incredible pizzas you ever have, and so figuring out how to leverage that experience. But then you start talking thousands and thousands of people who've been in the industry for 10, 15, 20 years. You're talking like hundreds of thousands of years of experience, tens of thousands of years experience over this organization. How do you leverage that?

Speaker 2: 28:42

That, for me, is what gets me most excited. It's like who's the next great idea going to come from? Because they're not me. The ideas come from a conversation that I'm having with somebody else. The ideas come from, like you know, somebody else posted a picture online. I'm like, dude, that's crazy. Like we, we could take that and run with it. Like why don't we take this? And just like, take a left? Or like let's joke right real quick. Like, figure out how to take the cool ideas and then elevate them in a way that not only they they create an experience for people, they're Instagrammable, they're memorable, but that they're redefining an industry and get other people to want to follow it.

Speaker 1: 29:28

Other people in the industry either mimic or try and change. What we're doing is so cool, man, because it means we're being impactful and we're really making a difference On the chocolate bar, for example. You're putting that together. It sounds amazing.

Speaker 2: 29:40

Is each property going to carry that, or is it limited to just a handful or one? So the chocolate bar is kind of a handful, you know, and we're working with partnerships across our portfolio that are interested in I think for the chocolate bar. It's telling the story. You know, what we're really working on is trying to figure out a way to turn that into hot chocolate programming, right, like, how do we take that partnership and create a craft, high-end program where, like, hey, you're hot chocolate. Yes, we have this cool one that's that's unique. But we have this crack hot chocolate and this one tells an amazing story as well, and so, like it's like in my friend, there's levels to it, you know. And so, like, how do we develop these different tiers of of cool? We're like, you have the very basic level that that still exceeds everyone's expectations. But then you can, you can grab this other one that is just so unique and it's something you've never seen. You just got to have it.

Speaker 2: 30:33

That, for me, is what I look for when I'm out dining. When I'm out dining, when I'm out exploring, I look for the thing that I just got to have, that I know I've never seen that before. I'm never going to see it again, but I got to have it, and so I that's that's what I keep in mind when I'm trying to develop things and I'm trying to come up with new ideas is what's that thing that's going to catch your eye, what's that thing that's going to inspire you to do something different, or inspire you to think outside the box yourself?

Speaker 1: 31:05

It's safe to say and tell me if I'm wrong that the Monterey Bay Aquarium is probably the place to be, because it's probably your biggest test kitchen, right?

Speaker 2: 31:14

The Monterey Bay Aquarium is my biggest test kitchen the setting alone right. The monterey bay aquarium is my biggest test kitchen the the setting alone right. I'm in the salinas valley, which is full of the most incredible humans there is. So many times that I've been driving, whether it's the airport or back and forth to a partner's location, you know, to go look at their shop or go see what they have, or go, you know, check on the new fish that are coming in or the the new produce targets, that I drive by the fields and you had to stop, because there's something so incredibly humbling to drive through the salinas valley and see how hard people work, and like that, I think was was one of the precipice for me to like get people involved and let people know where their food comes from, because when you drive through these fields and you see people picking produce, planting produce, it is it's life-changing and it's right here in the united states and so when I'm, when I'm in monterey, I'm working like that. That is my place to think and dream, because I have the ocean, I have the Salinas Valley, I have all the ranches. Like our salt is hand harvested right down the road, our seaweed is grown in the largest seaweed Red Bulls production facility in the country, like five blocks down the road. Our abalone is grown a block down the road, like you can't get any closer to the product. And so I realize how fortunate I am to be immersed in that and I just want to make sure that when people come they feel the same way.

Speaker 2: 32:51

When I first moved to Monterey I had kind of gone down and checked out all the local businesses and there's chowder and all these things. I said when I go to Kansas City you get barbecue. I always wonder if I'm getting the real barbecue, if I'm getting the tourist barbecue, or if I go to Florida I'm getting seafood. Am I getting the local experience, like the guy that just caught the grouper, or am I getting the cod fromouper, or am I getting, like you know, the, the cod from new England, like what? What am I getting?

Speaker 2: 33:21

And so I I kind of committed that when you come in and dine in our location like you're getting the real experience and you are leaving knowing that the experience was authentic and the food was authentic. And that's one of the most important things to me is to know that when you dine you experience locality and you're not going to get butternut squash in the summer, you know you're not going to get tomatoes in the winter. It's a true experience. It's the most authentic one you're going to get, because we're true to the seasons, we're true to the partners, we're true to the people that are doing the work.

Speaker 1: 33:58

You're speaking my language. There's nothing worse than getting watermelons in the wintertime. I loathe it so much. My background is in produce distribution and you know obviously your clients have a need, a want and a menu and you need to source these things and you know that's where you start. You know shipping containers full of fruits and veg that take a long time to get here and by the time it arrives, and by the time it gets to the warehouse and then ultimately delivered into a kitchen, quality is not great, the flavor is not there because it's terrible, and it leaves a bad mark on the establishment who's selling it. So what you're telling me is a breath of fresh air. You're a leader in this particular trend. Do you see others that are going to look to participate in this with you guys as well?

Speaker 2: 34:46

You know, for us, when you talk about seasonality and things like that, like when we were at menus, it's not me saying, hey, here's the menu, right, like here's what we're going to serve, because this is what we want to serve. And here's the menu, right, like, here's what we're going to serve, because this is what we want to serve, and I'm the chef and this is my will be done. It's hey, let's sit down with our farmers and let's sit down with the fishermen and let's sit down with the ranchers. And we talked to them and go hey, what, what, what's growing this year? You know, what are you going to plant?

Speaker 2: 35:33

What didn't do well last year? What was a struggle for you? What did you, you know, have to water too much, that you lost money and it wasn't, it wasn't fruitful for you, right, and have chefs and you know, with the advent of the Food Network and all these things, kind of everybody learned a little bit more and got a little more into food and I think I became a chef at the right time. But I also became a chef at a challenging time, when everybody knows more than they used to know. You can fight that or you can embrace it, and I chose to embrace it and say I am going to double down and be an educator, you know, protect the ocean and get people to to really dive into sustainability and conservation and consider the choices. I never would have believed you, but I realize now that there's so much more to being a chef and there's so many other avenues and I think that that's one of the pieces I hope people take away. Most is like you.

Speaker 1: 36:36

you can do something other than just cook food as a chef and you can still make an amazing difference it must be a fertile environment when it comes to mentorship with your young chefs in the sustainability world that we're living in it is, and I think people are so excited to learn more.

Speaker 2: 36:57

You and it's not even the young chefs, right Like young chefs, older chefs, like we're all kind of inspiring and mentoring each other in different disciplines, if you will right, some are into sustainability, some are into, like molecular gastronomy, some are into, you know, whatever it is, and I think that's one of the cool pieces where people dive so deep into a, into a discipline or area of focus, and when you find those people, those diamonds in the rough, you can kind of latch onto them and learn from them. That gets me pumped, man, like I love finding somebody who knows something I don't and I'm constantly trying to teach myself. Reading has become one of the biggest things to me, you know, trying to find out different ways to speak to people and different ways to engage with people. And if you look at yourself as like this, this painting, you get a lifetime to change that painting and it just takes one brushstroke to change the entire dynamic. So for me, getting more engaged with reading and trying to figure out how do I, how do I change myself just enough that I can reinvent myself, but I can keep. I can keep the narrative of the story but make it a little more exciting. So the the ability to teach that to other people but continue to learn.

Speaker 2: 38:13

Man like this industry is constantly changing. You know you said he came from a, a produce sales background dude. Like whoever would have thought you're running the number one food podcast on Apple Like that's. That's wild, stupidly, stupidly. So the directions are insane. Man Like you can. You can literally take it wherever you want to take it and if you put it out there in the universe and you make it yours like it's there, it's there. People, people want to learn, everybody wants to learn.

Speaker 1: 38:46

I feel like this is all like blunt force trauma in my life. How it's gone down. It's just barreling through no finesse whatsoever. It's just like banging your head on every branch on the way to falling out of the tree. Matt man, I got to tell you you're awesome and I love what you do, and I mean it when I say that you are the Indiana Jones of you know chefs out there. How do we find you and how do we find more about SSA Group?

Speaker 2: 39:16

Man, I'll tell you it's been awesome talking to you too, and it's probably the first time in my life I've been called Indiana Jones. I think I was recently called Wolverine in Vietnam, but that's a whole nother story for another day. When you ask how to get engaged and how to get involved, the best way is to visit your local zoo or aquarium or museum, like that's the best way. When you spend your money in it, it goes towards conservation efforts of those organizations, like there's no better way and it's a little bit of fun. The SSA Group probably, again, the most incredible place I've ever worked in my life thessagroupcom. If you're looking to find me, I am on LinkedIn, and LinkedIn only. I'm the only guy rocking a pair of Grundons, throwing a fishing trap over the edge of a boat.

Speaker 1: 40:03

I'll see you there. That is awesome. Everybody out there, come check us out in Atlanta at NAFM. It's going to be a bad ass. Matt, you are terrific and I appreciate you being on the show today. Stand by, I'm going to catch you off air. Hold on.