This Is TASTE

Julia Moskin has been a food reporter at the New York Times since 2004, and her beat has taken her everywhere from the best Jamaican patties in New York to a 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, earned for reporting on sexual harassment in the restaurant industry. Today she joins Matt to talk about her latest investigation: a bombshell report revealing years of alleged physical and psychological abuse inside Noma's Copenhagen kitchen. It’s the story that set off protests at the restaurant’s Los Angeles pop-up and led to founder René Redzepi stepping down, all in the same week. How do you get 35 former employees to go on the record? And what does this moment mean for the future of fine dining as a form? Julia tells us all.

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Read more about Noma:


René Redzepi Steps Down at Noma Amid Allegations of Past Abuse [NYT]


The Fall of Noma’s Chef Reverberates in the Restaurant World [NYT]


Noma, Violence, and the Line Between a Hard Kitchen and an Abusive One [Mad Food World]

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Trinity Mouzon Wofford is the cofounder and CEO of the wellness brand Golde and the author of Eating at Home: The Nourishing Practice of Everyday Cooking. The book is a charming, practical guide to reimagining home cooking in a way that’s more grounded, joyful, and doable. Today on the show, we talk about how Trinity approaches cooking at home amid parenting and running a business, the vintage cookbooks that inspire her timeless point of view, and much more. 

Also on the show, Matt has a fascinating conversation with Teddy Kim. Teddy is the cofounder of Last Call, a hangover remedy with roots in Korea. We talk about founding a company in 2026 and all that bootstrapping as well as Teddy’s previous career working in Hollywood at Netflix, and the writer's room of Beef. You can buy Last Call on Amazon. Read⁠ Teddy on Substack.

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Jessica Koslow has been thinking about dinner for a long time. Since Sqirl opened in LA’s Virgil Village neighborhood in 2012, she has built one of the most influential restaurants in California—and watched as an entire generation of all-day cafés took note. Dinner has long been anticipated. In February, “Sqirl After Dark” finally launched. I sat down with Jessica to talk through the first weeks of service, the new menu, and what it feels like to cook the food you’ve been planning for decades.

And before that it’s the return on Three Things. Aliza and Matt discuss some of their recent restaurant visits in Mexico City and Los Angeles, including: El Cardenal, Orbita, El Tibur, and Contramar in CDMX and in LA: Max & Helen’s, LaSorted, and Sora Craft Kitchen.

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Ari Weinzweig came to Ann Arbor, Michigan, to study Russian history. He stayed to open a deli, and 43 years later, Zingerman’s is one of America’s greatest food institutions. In this very special episode, we talk about the company’s obsessive ingredient sourcing, anarchist philosophy as management theory, the mail-order Reuben kit beloved by New Yorkers, and why dignity might be the most radical business idea of the moment. Later on the show, we speak with Brad Hedeman, one of Zingerman’s longtime food buyers. We find out what he tastes in a day and how he’s always on the hunt for the next greatest thing.

You can purchase Matt’s curated Zingerman’s mail order box, featuring a loaf of sourdough bread, Cabot x Jasper Hill Clothbound Cheddar, Zingerman's Pimento Cheese spread, Great Lakes Smoked Whitefish spread, Finocchiona Salami, a Black Magic Brownie, and a Magic Brownie.

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Lucie Franc de Ferriere is the owner and head baker at From Lucie, a small bakery in the East Village known for its whimsical baked goods adorned with fresh flowers. Born and raised in Southern France, Lucie grew up baking cakes with her mother at the family’s farm and bed-and-breakfast in their 165-year-old chateau. After moving to New York, she began to bake at café pop-ups and eventually opened her own bakery—and now she’s sharing her recipes in a beautiful debut cookbook, Cake From Lucie. Today on the show, we talk about the French techniques and ingredients that shape her food, and  what it’s like running a bakery in NYC.

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