Fine dining
36
MENTIONS
5
EPISODES
3
PODCASTS
Search complete. 36 mentions across 5 episodes found for "Fine dining".
Sep 24, 2026
Francis SchottHOST
One of his restaurants, his flagship restaurant in Chicago, is True.
Francis SchottHOST
We were talking just before the break about cell phones, but we were also talking about the experience we're trying to give the customer when they come to a really fine dining restaurant.
Francis SchottHOST
One of the things that you write about a lot, and it's in your press material a lot, is you talk about injecting a sense of fun into fine dining, sort of traditional French roots and then injecting a sense of fun.
Francis SchottHOST
What do you mean by that?
Rick TramontoGUEST
Well, you know, the old school guard, you know, back in the day when I was... line cooking and growing up in the industry and traveling France and you know through the 70s through the 80s through the 90s there's always this intimidation factor I mean I you know I grew up really blue-collar upstate New York Rochester New York and you know I worked at Wendy's old-fashioned hamburgers never graduated high school never went to culinary school we had very blue-collar Italian family you know my grandfather immigrated here from Naples my mom's side was from Abruzzi and You know, very humble people.
Rick TramontoGUEST
Now, there's obviously always a line of how to read the table is what we call it.
Francis SchottHOST
And when we come back after the news, I want to talk about how to put customers at ease because, you know what, I'm a fireman's kid from North Jersey.
Francis SchottHOST
First time I walked into a fine dining restaurant, I was looking for a job, and I got one.
Francis SchottHOST
Met him at the Water Club when he was bringing them three stars from the New York Times when that mattered more than it does today.
Francis SchottHOST
He then went on to open RM Seafood in New York and closed it down to move to Vegas at the dawn of the Vegas Fine Dining Restaurant, where he still remains in Vegas.
Francis SchottHOST
In fact, I just got off the phone with him.
Francis SchottHOST
Today's show was an excuse for me to call an old friend and catch up.
Francis SchottHOST
We make a lot of ice cream here in the restaurant.
Francis SchottHOST
You always made ice cream in your fine dining restaurant, but now you make a lot of ice cream.
Francis SchottHOST
Willie, you talk.
Mark PascalHOST
Yeah.
Nicholas HararyGUEST
And, you know, it's when we realized we probably have a business on our hands.
Mark PascalHOST
I remember in the early 2000s talking to you and you giving me the advice of, listen, you guys got to make your own ice cream.
Mark PascalHOST
You're a fine dining restaurant.
Mark PascalHOST
You have great ingredients.
Lala ZiemskiHOST
And she is, in fact, a butcher.
Lala ZiemskiHOST
She is a fine dining provocateur who is dangerously well-dressed.
Lala ZiemskiHOST
Y'all, Angie Marr, welcome to the podcast.
Lala ZiemskiHOST
Hi.
10 MINS LATER
Angie MarGUEST
It's a legacy brand.
Angie MarGUEST
So I didn't cook, you know, the food that I'm trained to cook and I'm classically French trained, right? I cooked the food that was indicative to that space because that was the respectful thing to do.
Angie MarGUEST
When I closed that restaurant and I opened up Le Toit Chavot, I found it to be, you know, this really great blank canvas for me where I got to cook the food that I'm trained to do, which is fine dining French cuisine.
Angie MarGUEST
And I think it's really interesting because, you know, the press is like so sexist, right? They're like, you think like, wow, you know, and so like when I when I bought the Beatrice, I got pigeonholed as like this.
Tiffany BaderHOST
Yes, thank you very much.
Tiffany BaderHOST
I wanted to start on one thing that I've I've read in your books that there seems to be this overlying thread through all of them about fine dining and Michelin starred restaurants.
Tiffany BaderHOST
And I was thinking about it the other day and I. I was out for a fancy meal and I was so hypercritical of every element of it.
Tiffany BaderHOST
And all I could think of was how many different unpaid workers in the kitchen have touched this food.
Trine HahnemannGUEST
But it has a space in our culture.
Trine HahnemannGUEST
Of course it does.
Trine HahnemannGUEST
Fine dining can be amazing.
Trine HahnemannGUEST
But in many ways, I think it is running its course.