Joe Bastianich
Joe Bastianich
Joseph "Joe" Bastianichis an American restaurateur, winemaker, author, and television personality. He, along with partners Lidia Bastianich and Mario Batali, owns thirty restaurants worldwide, including Babboand Del Posto in New York, Carnevino in Las Vegas, and in 2010, expanded the LA eateries Pizzeria and Osteria Mozza to Singapore. Earlier that same year, the trio teamed up with Italian retail businessman Oscar Farinetti to bring Eataly, an artisanal food and wine market to New York, with the Chicago outpost following in...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionChef
Date of Birth17 September 1968
CountryUnited States of America
Frankly, Milan kind of sucks as a restaurant city. It's so fashion-obsessed that people don't pay that much attention to the food.
'Restaurant Man' is kind of the story, an unabridged story of what happened in my life, the good bad and ugly. Some people might glean some life lessons. It is honest, not written as a press release.
The general manager is kind of like the step into darkness when you reach the top of the league. As GM, you're responsible for everything, including the maitre d's and the sommeliers - all these people who have their own agendas. But you probably make less than the maitre d' and have a lot more work and a lot more headaches.
I think a lot of people overlook the importance of the menu as a marketing tool and a way of communicating to the customer what the ambition of their restaurant is. Not only the typeface and the design, but what is it printed on? Is it cheap-looking? Is it the right kind of paper for that restaurant?
Maitre d's are at the financial spigot of the restaurant, meaning they control who gets in and who doesn't, but aside from that, they don't do anything. And yet they get paid as much as the highest-paid people in the place.
After World War II, a lot of people moved to the cities for work and abandoned the old vineyards. Then in the 1950s and 1960s, wineries were paid to produce volume at a cheap price. That's when the Lambruscos and bad Chianti were popular.
Frankly, Milan kind of sucks as a restaurant city. Its so fashion-obsessed that people dont pay that much attention to the food.
Restaurant Man is kind of the story, an unabridged story of what happened in my life, the good bad and ugly. Some people might glean some life lessons. It is honest, not written as a press release.
Most people who open restaurants will fail, because they lack the fundamental understanding of restaurant math. Either they think they're superstar cooks or they think they're superstar hosts.
Aside from hospitality and delicious food, our [restaurateurs'] job is to entertain people. Restaurants should make people feel special, excited and fulfilled.
There are certain things that make restaurants work and a certain kind of DNA that people who excel in restaurants need. But it's a lot like life, in the sense that you get out of it what you put into it.
You can enjoy a $15 bottle of wine as much as you can enjoy a $100 bottle of wine.
The pressure, the heat, the almost impossibly fast pace at which you need work - this is the reality of working in the culinary industry. This is what professional chefs do night after night.
I think that, by comparison with $2,000 bottles of grand cru Burgundies, first-rate barolos, which sell for under $100, are undervalued ten-fold.