[laughs]

And is sometimes called mostaccioli, or also ziti, is often used in, like, um, baked pasta dishes that aren't lasagna.

You take your, your penne that don't have ridges, you cook them, you put them in cold water, then you add your sauce, your cheese, your whatever else you want.

You pack it into your, your baking dish, cover it with Parmesan, you put it in the oven.

And then for some reason, the licci stays more...

It has more form, precisely because it hasn't absorbed as much sauce-

But wh- why is bucatini better than spaghetti for cacio e pepe, which is cheese and pepper?

So actually, I wanted to say something about this.

Okay, so what kind of foods travel especially well in this kind of presentation?

So traditionally, foods are and were selected with portability, temperature, and keeping quality in mind.

Rice is central to nearly all bentos, accompanied by relatively small amounts of fish or meat, egg, pickles, and cooked vegetables.

And seasonings often are more assertive because the food isn't eaten piping hot.

So there's kind of like a useful shorthand.

The classic structure is rice, plus main dish, plus several small accompaniments.

But of course, here in LA, you can't keep, a lot of those chefs, they're like chaos muppets.

Okay, so you've brought us a few recommendations, starting, obviously, in Little Tokyo.

Eat a burger.

And just eat a burger or, you know, have some chicken pot pie.

You know, there's a bunch of little cafes.

There's the Julian Cafe and Bakery Serves Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner.

Their Chicken Pot Pie Turnover has a ton of fans.

Soups and Such Cafe is a small town cafe.

for homemade soups, sandwiches, and salads.

think

You get some salsa.

A beautiful flour tortilla, some great beans would be applied down the center, finely chopped onions, and a very finely chopped chili, and then it was wrapped up and handed to me.

So there was no rice, no guacamole, no sour cream.

I never had a burrito like that until I went to San Francisco.

I don't know.

It was like, like four inches in diameter, and then I bit into it and there was all this stuff getting in the way between me and the beans.

I just thought it was the weirdest thing ever.

Is it possible that your disdain for sandwich wraps is, is ma- a- and your love for burritos is creating this sort of false association where you're like, "I don't want burritos in the same category"? I mean, isn't a wrap just a delivery system?

Mm.

Um, maybe the sixties somewhat, but i- it was bifurcated, so you had the very high-end, very clubby restaurants that were patronized by the wealthy and celebrities.

You know, old stalwart places.

And then you had neighborhood restaurants, little diners.

What started to happen is the middle started to fill in.

The idea of, like, a bistro, something a little more casual, but with more considered food than your average neighborhood restaurant.

And it happened within the context of a, a whole cultural shift.

Mm.

Yeah.

... who have helped produce this show.

And those relationships, for me, are just wonderful.

You know, I was a chef for many years, and working in a restaurant, and for a period of time, I did both things simultaneously.

And while I love cooking and I love the physicality of the act of cooking, for me, there was always an intellectual part of exploring food that that particular process didn't resolve.

You don't want to be soaking it in the water, right.

Yeah, but then you get a vessel big enough that the bird can comfortably bob around completely submerged in water.

And you change the water every 30 minutes, 'cause it's gonna get really, really cold, and so you dump out that super cold water and you fill it up again.

Hmm.

Um, maybe the '60s somewhat, but it, it was bifurcated, so you had the very high end, very clubby restaurants that were patronized by the wealthy and celebrities, you know, old stalwart places, and then you had neighborhood restaurants, little diners.

What started to happen is the middle started to fill in, the idea of, like, a bistro, something a little more casual, but with more considered food than your average neighborhood restaurant.

And it happened within the context of a, a whole cultural shift.

So-

Hmm.

And, um, in the late '70s, early '80s, you had, you know, the huge people, you know, Wolfgang comes on the scene, um, Michael's opens and, um, all of a sudden the template for the high end changes.

Art is really important.