Season 5

Special Sauce: René Redzepi on Apprenticeships, El Bulli, and Being a Better Leader [2/2]

In this week's Special Sauce interview with René Redzepi, he describes his journey from being a 15-year-old novice cook to culinary visionary, which started when he was an apprentice at Pierre André, a Michelin-starred, classic French restaurant in...

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Special Sauce: The White Moustache’s Homa Dashtaki Makes the Best Yogurt in the US [1/2]

I have a confession: Until Daniel Gritzer told me about  a couple of months ago, I 'd never heard of it, much less its founder, Homa Dashtaki. Now, after interviewing Homa and trying her yogurt, I can tell you that Daniel was right when he said...

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Special Sauce: The White Moustache’s Homa Dashtaki on Staying Small and Flourishing [2/2]

On this week’s Special Sauce I continue my delightful conversation with  founder Homa Dashtaki. I asked her how she makes her sinfully rich yogurt. Homa said, "There's nothing I'm doing different than the way I would teach you how to do it at...

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Special Sauce: Chef Anita Lo on Cooking for Michelle Obama [1/2]

This week on Special Sauce with the terrific chef and fine writer Anita Lo. Anita had Annisa, a great restaurant in Greenwich Village, for 16 years before closing it in 2017. She was part of the first wave of women chef-restaurateurs in New York....

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Special Sauce: Chef Anita Lo on Cooking for Yourself [2/2]

On this week's Special Sauce, Chef Anita Lo talks about her new cookbook, Solo: A Modern Cookbook for a Party of One. To Anita, cooking for yourself is a journey of self-discovery. "I think cooking can be self re-affirming," she says. "I mean if food...

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Special Sauce: Doug Crowell and Ryan Angulo on the Neighborhood Restaurant [1/2]

I am constantly on the lookout for good neighborhood restaurants. The kind of restaurants that treat me like a regular even if I'm not; where the host greets me warmly even when it's really crowded; where the food is consistently serious and...

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Special Sauce: Doug Crowell and Ryan Angulo on the Importance of Kindness (and Salt) [2/2]

On this week's Special Sauce, Doug Crowell and Ryan Angulo talk a lot about a lot of things, including their cookbook, the aptly titled I asked them to dissect the unusual title, starting with "kindness." Doug explained, "It's a big part of what we...

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Special Sauce: Uncovering Pizza’s US Origins [1/2]

We rarely deal with breaking news on Special Sauce, but when said news concerns pizza's US origins, exceptions must be made. As soon as I learned that Peter Regas, a Chicago-based statistician by day and  by night, had discovered that there were...

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