Chapter 1: What role does food play in connecting cultures?
Ladies and gentlemen, one of the coolest episodes I've ever done is this episode that you're about to listen to with Emmy-winning TV host, James Beard-nominated and winning chef, Andrew Zimmern. We're going to talk through a lot of things and maybe not all the things that you actually think of when we talk about a chef. We're going to talk about life. We're going to talk about food as a healer.
Absolutely. Make sure you listen to this entire episode because we're going to give you the goods. If you're into food, if you're into life, if you're into wanting to be healed, this episode is for you. Ladies and gentlemen, I present Mr. Andrew Zimmer.
Andrew, how are you doing today, brother? Good, Nick.
Chapter 2: How did Andrew Zimmern's career in food begin?
How are you?
I am awesome, man. I have been a huge fan of you for a long time. I called it bizarre foods in the intro, but just foods that the everyday person like me wouldn't think that, oh, yeah, I'm going to go eat that. I'm going to go prepare that. When did you know that was a thing for you?
The day magically that they told me that my travel food idea that I had finally gotten into the boardroom to pitch at Travel Channel in 2004 was a PBS show and not a commercial television show. And I had this idea called The Wandering Spoon. Worst
named for a food travel tv show of all time and what i did was i wanted to you know teach the world about diving into other cultures through food there was at the time unbeknownst to me uh because you have to remember i'm we're we're pushing our show 2002 three four five tony had yet to anthony bourdain had yet to make cook's tour
which was on Food Network that got bought by Travel Channel, and they basically re-aired what didn't work on Food Network and renamed the show No Reservations and moved forward with that show that became so legendary.
There was a huge part of my life where...
Looking in the rearview mirror, I was eating whatever it was that was in that place. When I was seven years old in Spain with my dad, I ate angulas, baby eels, and we ate whole roasted partridge, red-legged partridge in Asturias together in little restaurants. And they were shot by a hunter. You had to be careful of eating any shotgun pellets. And then there was a tiny little resting
cradle looked like a chopstick rest and there was a heavy knife there. And the idea was you would flip it around and use the handle and crack the skull and eat the brain. And yeah, you know, this was something that was just been traditionally done for ever and ever there. You know, I was a little kid.
I was eating big or no little French periwinkle snails in layout with my father when I was five baby. I mean, literally two days later, you know, past being fetal lamb and, and pig in Valley de los Cayedos, uh, in Spain with my dad.
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Chapter 3: What is the significance of Andrew's 'because' in his work?
It's at its most delicious, regardless of what animal it is. It's why when I'm in Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, I love being out in the jungle markets and villages where they're taking tiny little birds, often little ducks or chicks, and dipping them in boiling water, removing all the feathers and deep frying them whole.
And then you just eat them with a little bit of nuoc cham and you eat the whole thing except the beak. When birds hoofed animals, and so the first couple of weeks of life, they are at their most delicious. But the point is, is that I didn't think there was anything of it. My father was the kind of person who was like, you know, when in Rome, Yeah. What the Romans eat. Right.
So flash ahead to 2004 or five. I'm pushing this show and about travel and they they rejected it. But they let me come back the next day to repitch it because they they said, look, if you can reverse this, give us 75 percent entertainment instead of 75 percent education in this show. We think we can do something with that. And so I came back the next day. I didn't have a clue in the world.
And lucky for me, instead of them saying, have you thought about it? What's your idea? In which case I would have said, I have nothing. Pat Young, the head of Travel Channel, threw me a laser pointer, hit a button, a map of the world came up on the wall in the Discovery boardroom. There were 20 different executives there at the time and me alone at the other end.
And he said, take me through episode one and then season one. And I just saw all I saw because I was standing there. on the North American side of the map, and I could see the Philippines straight ahead of me, I just hit the laser pointer. I said, well, we would go to the Philippines and try Balut, which is a fertilized duck egg. And then I just made my way around the world. And I realized I was
About two, three examples in, I realized I had mentioned foods that for those people in the room were new. They hadn't heard of them. And they were exotic and different and unique. And I was getting quite a reaction from them. And the only thing, one of the few smart things I've ever done in my whole life was I read that room the right way. And I just kept going. And I put the pointer down.
And I think I named 30 foods in 30 countries. And they were like, OK, go find a production company and let's make this show. And the rest, as they say, is history.
The rest is history. And so that was 2004. And one of the reasons I adore you so much, Andrew, is just that passion, that energy, that creativity.
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Chapter 4: How does Andrew Zimmern advocate for sustainable seafood?
It's like it continues to evolve. Right. Like you're never stale. No, no pun intended from a food standpoint. Right. But like you're always fresh. You're always palatable. And so I wanted to ask you what I ask all my guests. What's your because? What's your purpose? What's that deeper thing that's deeper than your why for you to continue to do the things that you do?
Because I'm going to say what Andrew won't say. You've accomplished so much, brother. You've accomplished a lot that if you wanted to, you could say, all right, I'm good. But you continue to do. What's your because?
Because I... spent 10, 12, 14 years being a user of people and a taker of things because I owe the world a debt that I don't think I can ever repay because I have such a lack of self-appreciation, I guess, that I continue to want to do more. because I'm endlessly curious. And so there's always something that I want to put out there in the world, another story, another idea.
another way of looking at something to try to make the world a better place. And I don't say that in a Pollyanna sense. I mean that really seriously. I believe, as I did when I created Bizarre Foods, that if we diversify our diets, we can save this planet. We can save families. We can lower prices on food. We can, I mean, you just look what's going on in the supermarket today.
The reason, you know, meat prices and seafood prices are so high is that we eat like four things and that's it. And when you put all your eggs in one basket and that basket hits the ground, some eggs are going to break. And that's why ground beef is, which America literally lives on as a nation, is almost $10 a pound. And I would argue that, you know, fish raised in the aquaculture situation
if it received the investment it deserves, which is not that much more because it's almost been perfected, would be able to feed an ever increasingly and hungry planet cheaper and more effectively. And, you know, I got a lot of becauses, right? And, you know, maybe I like solving global problems because I don't want to turn the mirror around and solve my own. It has been, I'm not proud of it.
I just, I learned a long time ago to answer a question honestly. And I think it's way more interesting for people to hear because I think there's more people out there who can relate to a human being who screws a lot of stuff up, relationships, fatherhood. I mean, I make a ton of mistakes every single day and I'm constantly trying to evaluate it before I go to bed at night and try to get better.
And one of the places that I can both simultaneously hide and make a difference is at work.
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Chapter 5: What stories illustrate food as a healing force?
And so I keep doing what I'm doing. And I just, I don't know. There's, you know, I want to keep working. I want to die in the saddle. I mean, I don't. I have no interest in stopping and going off and playing golf and all the rest of that kind of stuff. I'd like to spend more time with my friends. I'd like to spend more time with my family. I'd like to do a couple other little things in there.
So do I want to keep going 90 miles an hour? No, I don't think that's sustainable. But I'm going to go down to 50 or 60, whatever the speed limit is, and just keep cruising along.
You know, I want to go there, man, because, again, I'm I'm getting therapy from you by having this conversation. I run hard. Right. I mean, I'm I'm and you get it. I don't have to explain that to you.
You've got a lot of velocity in your life, just like me.
How do you find that balance? Because. I try to make sure and I hate saying the word try. I usually don't have that in my vocabulary. I put. I put importance on making sure I give people time, even though I'm running hard. But what people don't see is there are moments where I just need to exist just by myself. Right.
But you have to be committed to be the best parent, the best husband, the best friend that you can be, all while still running at 150 miles an hour. How do you balance that? Because I need help. And this is me being honest. I need help.
I'm in the same. Well, well, they were really screwed because I was hoping you'd help me with that when you were starting that last sentence. The I don't know. because I struggle. I mean, I had a friend text me the other day who told me that I had gotten lousy responding to texts fast enough. And he wasn't talking about it immediately. He said like, you know,
you know, I'm one of your two or three best friends. What's the, you know, within a day you get back to me, I'm asking you about important stuff about your kid, your relationship, you know, whatever it is.
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Chapter 6: How can diversifying diets impact global hunger?
I mean, and I didn't. And I know that my son needs more time from his father. And I know that in my primary relationships, be they at work or at home, need more time from me. but I'm a mile long and a quarter inch deep. And I want to get, I was, I use a football metaphor here. I no longer want to have a spread offense and be a wide receiver all the way at the end.
I'd rather be an interior lineman at this point. I need to, I need to be an inch deep and a quarter mile long. And I, So that's my goal. How I get there is with legitimate action steps. I think, and it's never one thing. I had a behavioral scientist who I was talking to at a conference about 15 years ago say something that I've never forgotten.
He said, in any human dilemma where you have choice because a problem exists, The solution to the problem and the cause of the problem is never one thing. He said, as human beings, we tend to look at it one way, right? Oh, Mick's background on our recording is dark and mine is light. That's the reason I'm having a bad day. We want to pick one thing.
He said, in fact, it's usually eight, nine, or ten things. that when taken together, either pile up on each other, or in some cases, relationships, business, many of them can be intertwined. And so you really have to separate them and use what he called astronaut logic, which we've all heard of before, one task at a time in sequence. And so unraveling that
And attacking that is what I try to do more of every single day. It's just tough, especially when dad's job takes him away. Right. And I'm not around the people in my life. And I'm going, you know, because primarily what I do is television, even though I'm shooting fewer days a year than I used to. I have a lot of days where from seven in the morning to seven at night, that phone is off. Right.
And so I'm not around to answer tests. Then I get home and I'm exhausted or back to the hotel room. I just want to watch the football game or two episodes of whatever show I'm binging or whatever it is to relax because I need my me time. And we all hear about take care of yourself, put your own oxygen mask on first.
So I rationalize not responding to solving the problems at hand in my life, even the little small ones. I've learned I'm better off handling those smaller problems, I'm less weary. I'm less world weary when I do that. The other thing that I've learned recently that I think is really fascinating, and I talk a lot about this when I'm giving the talks in the wellness space, schools, universities,
So conclaves, gatherings of any type will call my lectern agent and they're just as likely to have me talk about wellness as they are to have me talk about travel and food.
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Chapter 7: What insights does Andrew share about co-regulating with others?
Just because I spent a lot of time in this space and long-term sober and fascinated about creating better human beings, starting with myself. And I have found that the greatest tool for helping my, which is why I answered your question, honestly, at the very outset, is co-regulating with human beings before operationalizing with them is the most crucial thing that you can do.
And I just had a friend in my office who I haven't seen in a decade and I rang him up and he's in the coffee business and I'm trying to work on a coffee project for a client. And so he came here and as he's leaving, he said, I'll ask you this question. He said, my daughter's a teenager. She's having her first party at our house. How many people is a good number?
You know, you're a dad, your kids are older. How many is a good number to have over? And I said, well, you're turned it around. What you should do is you should ask her what's a good number. And then you should ask her why that's a good number. And then you should ask her what she wants the evening to look like. And you should just keep asking questions until you don't have any more.
Let her tell you everything before you respond. Then you can tell her how that makes you feel. Right. That you will then be co-regulated. She's told you, you've told her. And then you can say, so what do you think now? You know, like because maybe one of your concerns is too many people would for a first party might be not dangerous, but, you know, put too many people at risk. She's only 15.
You don't need 40 people there. Maybe 20 is a good number. Maybe that's better for economic reasons, whatever it is. But co-regulating before operationalizing allows you to connect with people on a very meaningful, direct way, almost literally in real time, very, very, very immediately. And I have found that to be of infinite value as I navigate my way through life. Good stuff.
Good stuff. Ladies and gentlemen, you didn't know you were getting life lessons from Andrew, but that's what we're here for. And part of this, Andrew, you know, I said it in the opener again, you're one of the greatest storytellers that I've ever seen. And to me, that's an art. Like, I know the culinary art that you have and the passion that you have, but you're also an amazing storyteller.
And I've heard you say many times that food is like a universal language. Right. In Andrew's way, can you give us an example of how you've seen food heal or comfort or bring people together? Does the story come to mind?
Well, sure.
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Chapter 8: What can readers expect from The Blue Food Cookbook?
I mean, I've got millions of them. I do think the concept deserves a moment or two of of illumination.
We we only. We only do several things. all the time.
And one of them is eat. Now, not everyone in America in 2025 has a food life. We have to be very careful about that. It's one of the other things that drives me. It's another because, right? I've made a lot of money off of food. I have a lot of success because of food. I have made an impact because of food.
And yet I'm also part of the problem because I fetishize food while 20% of Americans don't know where their next meal is coming from. So I work really hard to try to solve hunger and waste issues here in Minnesota, nationally in America and internationally with my work with the UN World Food Program. But because we do this every day, food is a universal, right?
So I'll give you a couple of very general examples, perhaps from shows people have seen. In every episode of Bizarre Foods, we always had a family meal, every single one. We didn't put a circle around it. We didn't put a lower third graphic underneath it. We didn't flash lights to let everybody know, here's the family meal. But we always sat down with the family in every single episode and ate.
And the reason why I insisted on that along with several other storytelling silos. I wanted a how it was made story. I wanted to, because I wanted there to be something for everyone to take from this experience in this culture. And we always had a family dinner episode because I wanted people in Finland to see how people in China ate. And I wanted people in Uruguay to see how people in China ate.
And I wanted people in Arizona to see how people in Uruguay ate. And I did that very consciously because I wanted people to see how much they had in common with each other in a world that was increasingly defining itself by the things that divided us.
So even though I may speak a different language, have different color skin, worship a different deity, listen to different music, have different sexuality, and on and on and on than whoever I was with, if we were sharing a meal, amazing things could happen, right? And we would find out that we wound up having way more in common, even though on the face of it, it may appear that we were
very very different people from very very different walks of life yeah i believe our humanity in the general sense of the capital h is what defines us not all of those those other things and i remember being in finland we went up to lapland and we were having a dinner with some reindeer herders
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