Working your way up from dishwasher to chef to restaurant owner is the ultimate success story, but no easy task. Something our guest can be proud to say he has achieved, not only as an owner of one restaurant, but two successful establishments that we can’t stop raving about.

In today’s episode, Philip Krajeck, owner of Rolf and Daughters and the newly opened Folk in Nashville, Tennessee, sits down with host and friend, Eli Kulp to discuss his lifelong passion for food and his journey in becoming an owner of two bustling restaurants. All while providing for a family at a young age.

From the kitchens of Brussels, Belgium, to arriving in Florida, Phil saw the major contrast in quality when it came to cuisine, which sparked a fire in him to create something he felt was missing in America. After years of grinding it out, pushing through challenges, Phil met and worked with talented chefs from all over the world where he was able to extract pieces of their techniques and systems to implement in his future restaurants.

Phil reveals his philosophies on what it takes to run a successful restaurant while serving, consistent, quality food. Listen in to hear Phil’s journey from childhood to now, and a ton of valuable tips learned along the way.

Topics discussed in this episode:

Phil’s experience opening a restaurant

Phil’s unique story growing up

How Phil went from dishwasher to chef and owner

Mental health in the restaurant industry

Pushing through discomfort to get the job done

Importance of open communication between the kitchen team

Importance of consistency and systems

Impact of the pandemic on the restaurant industry

How Phil implements his teams vision into his restaurant

Listen to more episodes at The Chef Radio Podcast.

A big week for the Philly restaurant community as the annual James Beard foundation award ceremony happening in Chicago on Monday, June 13 where chef Eli's business partner, Ellen Yin, is up for the Restaurateur Of The Year and then we have Christina Martinez of South Philly Barbacoa, Jesse Ito of Royal Izakaya and Nok Suntarnanon of Kalaya Thai Kitchen! All South Philly chefs battling it out for Best Chef Mid-Atlantic...crazy!

And then secondly, we are announcing the Listener Appreciation HOTLUCK that will be happening Saturday, June 18th at a secret location in Philadelphia. Listen for details how you can get the invite to the very limited, but very exciting event kicking it off summer solstice style! Let's Party!

What's the first thing people think about when the great city of Philadelphia is mentioned? What's the single most common reference to Philadelphia? Oh so often, it is the cheesesteak. The ubiquitous hot meat sandwich, covered with cheese whiz that so many Philadelphians love, but some even loathe.

It's often mentioned before such historical giants as the declaration of independence, the writing of the constitution, or even the Liberty Bell itself.

And of course, if you've ever spent time in Philadelphia, there's always the great debate about who makes the best cheesesteak, and at the epicenter of this great cheesesteak debate lies the two OG's, Pat's and Geno's. In this episode of The CHEF Radio Podcast, you're going to hear the story from Geno Vento himself, a man who struggled mightily with his identity as the heir apparent to the cheese steak kingdom that is Geno's Steaks.

Whether it was his struggles with his weight, friends, personal tragedies, or with his identity as a gay man, Geno has persevered and continues to ensure that his family's legacy is intact and that Geno's will continue to be the number one cheesesteak in world for years to come!

In the third and final interview of the CHEF Radio LIVE! event, Eli sits down with Chef Kurt Evans of Everybody Eats, which is a group dedicated to increasing food security and building community and their mission is to nourish hungry people and lead the community in the fight against hunger.

Chef Kurt is also fighting for reform in the US criminal justice system – using food as his medium.

Through the ground-breaking End Mass Incarceration dining series, which is a brave new restaurant business model and his community-focused activism, as well as his vision for Everybody Eats and Down North Pizza, Chef Kurt is driving change across the culinary landscape and beyond.

He recently received the “Champion of Change" award from the The World’s 50 Best Restaurant by San Pellegrino for his work in shining a spotlight on the disparities of the criminal justice system for people of color, as well as training formally incarcerated individuals to learn the important skills needed to thrive in the restaurant industry.

https://www.theworlds50best.com/stories/News/chef-kurt-evans-champion-of-change.html

A huge shout out to our sponsors Maxwell McKenney and Singer Equipment for their unwavering support so we are able to bring these amazing conversations to you. Check out their websites for all the amazing equipment they can supply your restaurant with to make it more efficient and successful.

www.maxmck.com

www.singerequipment.com

If you think back to the early days when you first started in this industry, you'll probably remember fondly some of those early memories of working on the line, battling it out with your fellow cooks and friends, just hoping to get to the end of service without running out of mise en place.

But those are the moments that you forged really close bonds with your colleagues as you would finish service, maybe get a shift drink, and then head out into the night in search of something fun to get into, just to come back the next day and do it again.

But then there are those times when you meet someone with whom you really connect and who is as passionate about the industry as you are, with lofty ambitions and goals that help stoke the fire within you and propel you forward throughout your career.

Rich Torrisi is that person for our host, Chef Eli Kulp. Rich is a fiercely dedicated chef whose unbridled ambition, blended with his self-described "stubbornness," has created an international restaurant juggernaut, along with his friend, Chef Mario Carbone, and business partner, Jeff Zalasnick, who have opened, on average, about 2.5 restaurants a year for the past 10 years.

This is a fascinating story of how two Italian American kids from working class families have been able to build Major Food Group into a world-class company from a tiny little restaurant on Mulberry Street in Manhattan, called Torrisi Italian Specialties.

Working with Rich and Mario, Eli was able to create a framework within his repertoire that would eventually lead to his success in Philadelphia, where he applied a similar approach to cooking, but through a lens that was more personal to him.

In the second of the three part podcast, CHEF Radio Live!, Chef Jenn Carroll joins Eli on stage to discuss her latest venture where she brings exciting and meaningful events to life with her company, Carroll Couture Cuisine, as well as all the amazing online work that she's doing to teach aspiring chefs and home cooks different recipes and techniques.

They dive into her history working with such great chefs as Eric Ripert of Le Bernadin, the three Michelin starred temple of seafood in NYC, where she began training at a young age and where she impressed Chef Ripert so much that he sent her down to open is Philadelphia restaurant, Ten Arts in the mid-2000s.

You ever wonder what kind of tree Jen would be if she was one? Well listen in and find out!

Coming to you LIVE! from the kitchen at MANNA, acclaimed Thai chef, Nok Suntarnanon, sits down with Eli in front of an audience of 130 people at CHEF Radio LIVE!, which raised over $19,000 for the life saving work that the team at MANNA does.

Listen in as we get some of the latest info on her new restaurant, her recent trip to Thailand and the one, very Philly food, that she has yet to try.

As a chef, when you are able to successfully apply your point of view to a cuisine that may be often overlooked or antiquated, it can easily translate into pure gold. That is exactly what the husband-and-wife duo, Angie Rito and Scott Tacinelli, have done with their genre-bending menu at their Michelin starred restaurant, Don Angie in New York City.

A Caesar salad made with chrysanthemum leaves, BBQ calamari with pepperoni fried rice, and prosciutto and papaya in tamarind are just a few examples of how these two Italian American chefs play with flavors and concepts and walk the fine edge between the familiar and the unknown.

As we all know, hospitality has to be step in step with the food to really achieve a high level of success, and the team that Angie and Scott have assembled to ensure that each guest feels as though they're family, and by the time you leave, you feel like you've made new friends. This is what happens when you have chefs who are so attuned to what the vision is and can easily and effectively communicate with their staff, which translates into high levels of morale, which then translates into a beautiful and unforgettable dining experience that is so New York, yet so familiar.

Imagine it's April 20, 2020, and finally your dream of owning your own place becomes a reality. You've worked really hard to someday have the opportunity to be your own boss, so you grab the entrepreneurial spirit by the balls and go for it, signing your name on the dotted line, not knowing what's lurking just around the corner.

Well, this is the story of Huda, Chef Yehuda Sichel's debut restaurant that opened in the middle of the pandemic in downtown Philadelphia in the summer of 2020. Listen in as he details those sobering moments and the work he's had to do to ensure his dream stays alive, as well as hear about his strictly kosher upbringing and the hilarious moments when he started working in restaurants where he was exposed to foods he'd never even touched before. "Shrimp have peels? Do I peel it like a banana?"

It’s not breaking news that opening a restaurant is hard, but opening one in the middle of a pandemic is borderline insanity. However, when you open a restaurant with such a hyper-focus on the primal aspect of food and root to snout cooking over open flames, it’s borderline brilliant.

Chefs David Feola and Scott Calhoun opened up their love letter to offcuts, Ember and Ash, in South Philadelphia, where they cook in their custom kitchen that's built to use live fuel and where they work with local farms and purveyors that are dedicated to minimizing their carbon footprint while showcasing the best ingredients their region has to offer.

So, get ready to talk about pig's heads, lamb tongue fries, and every other beautiful and delicious offal, on this episode of The CHEF Radio Podcast.

There's nothing better than a homegrown success story, and this next podcast is proof of that. Justin Rosenberg, founder of Honeygrow restaurants, has quite the story to tell. It's a story of resilience, courage in business, and great leadership, because it wasn't always sunny in Philadelphia for this local brand.

Established in 2012, Honeygrow was on an explosive trajectory, growing outside the Philadelphia market quickly and expanding as far west as Chicago, which proved to be too much too fast and Justin had to make some difficult decisions in order to save the company and his dream. Justin talks candidly and honestly about the successes as well as the failures, giving myself and the listener a true lesson in business that we may all face someday.

In this can't miss podcast, one of the greatest culinary minds America has ever produced, Chef Wiley Dufresne, sits down with Eli to discuss his journey as a chef and modernist cuisine champion. Curiosity has been a leading edge for everything Chef Wiley does, and as one of the first chefs to start asking questions about the chemistry and science behind cooking, he began to develop his own New York version of modern cuisine. Working with food scientists and modernist chefs around the globe, he began to blend his own creativity and curiosity to bend the rules of cooking as we knew it, creating dishes such as pickled beef tongue with fried mayonnaise, foie gras tied in knots, and a frozen "everything bagel" with smoked salmon threads and crispy cream cheese, just to name a few.

In this episode, Eli sits down and chats with the incredibly talented and passionate chocolatier, Christopher Curtin, to talk about his journey of learning, which has led him around the globe in search of finding the best skills and techniques, as well as finding the best and rarest cacao for his tremendous chocolate. His creative flavors and methods have put him and his chocolates amongst the world's best, which he credits to the foundations of hard work that he learned as a nationally ranked cross country skier in his hometown of Madison, Wisconsin.

As an absolute technician in the kitchen, Chef Ron McKinlay has ushered the Toronto stalwart, Canoe Restaurant, into a new era with his breath-taking craftsmanship that combines old-world technique with modern day sensibilities. After taking over Canoe four years ago, Chef Ron has continued to push the narrative and shine a spotlight on the amazing ingredients coming from the forests, oceans, and farms that make up his culinary ecosystem. Working for some of the best chefs around the globe, Chef Ron has now found the perfect place to showcase his talents.

As a chef who has kept an open mind throughout his career, which has had many different influences on him, Tyler Akin describes his journey, from falling in love with Southeast Asian cuisine to opening his beloved Pho spot, Stock, to his current love affair with modern, French brasserie cooking at the recently updated and re-launched Le Cav, in the storied Hotel Du Pont in Wilmington, Delaware. Chef Akin opens up about going from studying law in DC to working for a bakery in West Virginia and how that singular decision has led him to where he is today and takes us along the journey and arc of his career.

Chef, author, inventor and all around food enthusiast, Alex Talbot, sits down with Eli to discuss his journey with his dynamo doughnut brand, Curiosity Doughnuts, where their boundary pushing doughnuts are flipping the script on the industry. Eli also reminisces about the days as a young chef when he would spend hours pouring over Alex’s (and his wife, Aki’s), Ideas In Food, food blog where they would post about their journeys in exploring foods, flavors and cooking techniques. Alex and Aki were instrumental in pushing the modern food movement in America through the blog by supplying many cooks and chefs with new and inventive techniques and perspectives in food and cooking at no cost. Alex and Aki now put their energy into running Curiosity Doughnuts, consulting and writing books.

In this episode of CHEF Radio, we invite local coffee roaster and owner of Càphê, Thu Pham, into the studio to talk about her growth from being a one-woman show to running a full-blown coffee shop in the Kensington neighborhood of Philly. Her recently opened spot has been the talk of the town as it’s Philadelphia’s only purely Vietnamese and Southeast Asian coffee shop, where she focuses on showcasing the flavors of her family’s heritage and proudly plants the Vietnam flag in Philly.

Raised by two chefs, Michael Vincent Ferreri was destined to do great things. Michael left everything behind in upstate New York to start fresh here in Philadelphia, where he began working with Michael Solomonov at Zahav, Joey Baldino at Zeppoli and Tyler Akin at Stock and Res Ipsa. After blowing up the scene with Res, Michael took over the kitchen at Irwin‘s in South Philadelphia where, through his minimalist approach to Sicilian cuisine, he has made Irwin’s a must-go restaurant in Philadelphia.

As a true pandemic story, Kismet Bagels came on the scene in 2020 after Alexandra & Jacob began experimenting with bread and bagels out of sheer boredom in their home kitchen after the pandemic took away both of their incomes as well as access to foods they craved. Just as kismet, aka destiny, brought these two childhood crushes together after 20+ years apart, bagels became their livelihood and passion after both their careers where put on hold. Hear how these two have manifested their destiny and created a dynamic relationship with Philadelphia’s food community and how they have philanthropy and generosity, baked into their recipe for success.