Katie Button Transcript
Kerry Diamond:
Hi, everyone. You are listening to Radio Cherry Bombe, and I'm your host, Kerry Diamond, coming to you from Newsstand Studios at Rockefeller Center in the heart of New York City.
I know everyone's hearts and minds are with Los Angeles right now, but last September, Hurricane Helene devastated the town of Asheville, North Carolina and the surrounding area. Restaurants had to shut down, the tourism that supports the region ground to a halt, and residents and businesses didn't have running water for almost two months. One of our favorite chefs, Katie Button, has become synonymous with Asheville. She and her family opened their flagship Cúrate restaurant there and have developed multiple businesses around it, including a wine club and a travel series. I asked Katie to join us to share how she and the town are doing and what we can do to help. "If you've been thinking of visiting Asheville, now's the time to do it," says Katie. Asheville is such a charming place and we are rooting for everyone down there. Stay tuned for my interview with Chef Katie Button of Cúrate.
We've got lots going on at Cherry Bombe this week. For all you print girlies out there, we just revealed the cover of the latest issue of our print magazine. It's our first ever Love Issue and you are going to, yes, love it. The strong, smart, and sexy Maher sisters are on the cover. You probably know Olympic Rugby star, Ilona Maher. You can snag a copy or subscribe via cherrybombe.com or check out our stockist list and buy a copy at your favorite shop and support a local business.
We're also deep in the planning for Jubilee, our annual conference. It's happening Saturday, April 12th at the Glass House in New York City and it is going to be an amazing day of connection and community. We hosted the very first Jubilee in 2014 after I read an article on eater.com about women being shut out of food conferences around the world. Boo to that. Since then, Jubilee has grown to become the largest gathering of women in the food and drink space in the U.S. There are lots of ways to participate in Jubilee. You can purchase a ticket, volunteer, or be a Jubilee scholar. If you're a Bombesquad member, be sure to use your member discount when buying your ticket or consider applying to showcase your brand as part of the Bombesquad booth. You can find all the details at cherrybombe.com.
Now, let's check in with today's guest. Katie Button, welcome back to Radio Cherry Bombe, right? You've been on the show before, yes?
Katie Button:
Yes. It's been a while. I'm excited to be back.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, we're so happy to have you back. I mean, you are just such a bright light and have done so many wonderful things. You have been through a lot in the past year and I'm grateful that you're taking the time to come on the show today and give us an update. Why don't we start with how are things today down in Asheville?
Katie Button:
It's interesting, there's a mix of, as a new year begins, like hope and looking towards the future and kind of being ready to look beyond 2024, but also at the same time we're seeing the economic fallout.
I mean, in the beginning, you immediately see the physical devastation of a hurricane and the loss of businesses due to physical destruction, but now we're starting to have the ramifications of businesses and restaurants loss of the best quarter of the year, which for us is October through December, and just the revenue losses and not receiving the aid that they need, whether through insurance or other funding, to be able to withstand the kind of losses that they face. Now we're seeing the permanent closures start to roll in and it's scary. Yeah, it's challenging because, you know, Cúrate is still open and operating and so we're trying to be optimistic and hopeful and at the same time, and we're feeling good getting back into business and all of that, but at the same time, you're kind of watching what's happening and understanding the story of every single creative entrepreneur in our community and yeah, it's definitely challenging right now.
Kerry Diamond:
So for anybody who's listening who wants to come visit and help with their tourism dollars, do you recommend that we come visit?
Katie Button:
Yes. Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
What is opening and functioning?
Katie Button:
Well, I mean there are lots of areas. Downtown, what is open for sure and ready, downtown Asheville is open and ready, so is West Asheville, East Asheville. There's so many parts. I mean the brunt of the physical damage, impact, was taken on the River Arts District, which is the area right along our river and also Biltmore Village and in some of the surrounding communities in Swannanoa and other areas, river adjacent areas.
But downtown in the rest of Asheville is, we are back up, open, and desperately needing people to know that and instead of postponing their 2025 Asheville plans for 2026 or 2027, we actually need them to follow through with their plans to come visit. It's the thing that most of us, most businesses, need to be able to make it.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. Give us some practical advice. Where do we fly in? Do we rent a car?
Katie Button:
Yes. Three airport options. You can fly into Asheville, that's easy and you can definitely rent a car. You're just going to want a car in the Asheville area. And since it's a smaller city, the other kind of car services are more challenging, so I would say rent a car. Or fly into Charlotte, it's a two-hour drive from Charlotte, which is a major airport that flies direct almost everywhere. Or Greenville, South Carolina we're about an hour, a little over an hour, from that airport as well. Wherever you can get a direct flight, but there are a lot of direct flights in and out of the Asheville Airport itself. You'd be surprised.
Kerry Diamond:
All right, so everybody start looking at flights, start making plans, and there are a lot of great hotels. I've been lucky to stay in some of the hotels in the area and so many great restaurants. I had read that you all didn't even have running water for 53 days. Has all of that been resolved?
Katie Button:
Yes. That was the hardest, or the most difficult thing that we faced was the lack of potable water. I mean lack of any water and then no potable water for an extended period of time. Restaurants can't operate without water. So if you think about that economic devastation of just, even if you had no damage to your business, which happened for a lot of downtown Asheville, physically, because of the storm, you were unable to operate because the city's water system was so devastated by the storm. It took them a while to rebuild and then a while to make the water potable again. It was a bigger problem than I think anybody ever anticipated.
I do have to say the city worked as fast as they possibly could. 53 days was better than some estimates in the beginning, like it would've been till January, 90 days, but it was one of the biggest problems that we faced.
Kerry Diamond:
But some of the restaurants had to operate with water trucks outside.
Katie Button:
We did that, yes. Basically, if you had the space behind your building, the best way to mitigate the economic devastation from the storm was to pay for a water tank to be installed, filled daily with potable water that you pay for, that then is connected, plumbed, into your building so it bypasses the city water, and now the building is operating off of this purchased water. But that expense for businesses to be able to do that costs them about $1000 a day-
Kerry Diamond:
Oh my God. I can't imagine.
Katie Button:
... to be able to bring water in.
Kerry Diamond:
I mean for those of you out there who have worked in restaurants, who run restaurants, own restaurants, I know there are a lot of you out there, I mean that is, it's unimaginable.
Katie Button:
I would say that the biggest learning for me after all of this, or disappointment has been the learning that there is no real aid for businesses at the federal level or any level in the event of some kind of natural disaster. The pandemic was different because it hit the entire nation and the world, and so the government acted fast and came up with programs like PPP, ERC, the Employee Retention Credit Program, the Restaurant Revitalization Fund because of how global it was. But if you think about these events, I mean we basically went through something very similar to what happened in the pandemic, the fact that our businesses were forced to be closed and we were closed for a long period of time due to this water outage. And even if we could operate, it was on a limited scale and we were incurring extra costs, $1000 a day, to get water to be able to operate. And then there just weren't enough people visiting to be able to support our teams and the normal just costs of running a business.
I think it's a real miss. I think the government expects insurance companies to be the stopgap for businesses in these situations where we pay for business interruption insurance that, in theory, you buy this policy thinking that if your business is interrupted due to windstorm, variety of things, that then you will be covered for your losses during the entire period that you're facing that interruption.
But the truth is that what we are seeing is that while at face value, that may be what businesses think that their policy is covering, in the 300 pages that follow it, it's almost like they rip out every single use case for using it. So I see this huge gap where the government is expecting private insurance to be this safety net. Businesses are forced to have this insurance policy, but also they're under the assumption they've bought it to pay out in these kinds of situations, but then the disaster happens and there is no one there to help them through it.
One of the things I love about Asheville is that it is this vibrant community full of creative small business operators. We don't have a ton of professional industry, so it's filled with people who make pottery and art and music and cheese and honey and restaurants, and they're all tiny operations that are creating this incredible product because they're passionate about it and they love what they do and there's no one to keep them in business during a situation like this.
Kerry Diamond:
How has it been for you on the insurance side? Have you just been fighting with folks? Have you been able to recoup anything?
Katie Button:
Yes. I have had a little success and I think I'm one of the only people through an indirect blanket loss limit in our policy. I have had some success and now the work that I'm trying to do is connect with other business operators to say, "Hey, this is the avenue and the path to success. If I've had success, even if it's not our full business income interruption, it's a limited, much smaller amount than the actual loss that we occurred, but something is better than nothing. This is how you get to your something," because if one person is receiving it, then everybody should. We're working to kind of band together and do that.
I got asked to be on our new governor, Josh Stein's, task force that he put together to rebuild Western North Carolina, and they are working on some kind of funding or aid for businesses in our area. There is work, it's just that unfortunately because there isn't already a government-created program for this, it's taking too long.
Kerry Diamond:
So there's been no state or city aid?
Katie Button:
There's been very minor small grants. It's like a few thousand dollars here, a few thousand dollars there that were independent grant funds, but the losses that are incurred are so much more than the little bits of money are helping.
Kerry Diamond:
How reliant are you all on tourism dollars? Does it make up 50% or more?
Katie Button:
I don't know the exact percentage, but it is enormous. I mean, it's got to be more than 50% I would say. Recent statistics I saw is we get about 13 million visitors a year, which is a lot for ... Our city has like 100,000 population, like 90,000 to 100,000. So it's vast. And that impact, a lot of it's concentrated and it's like October, November, December timeframe and the entire city lost the entire month of October, which is our best month out of the year, and no one got any income for their best month.
Kerry Diamond:
That is heartbreaking. It is so beautiful there in October.
Katie Button:
I know, I know.
Kerry Diamond:
Katie, let's talk about you and your businesses for a little bit because Cherry Bombe folks know you because of Cúrate, your amazing restaurant down in Asheville, which you are a chef and co-owner, but you have really expanded over the years. Tell us all your businesses, you've got mail order businesses, you've got cookbooks, you've got so many things now, a wine club.
Katie Button:
We have two restaurants. So Cúrate is a Spanish tapas restaurant in downtown Asheville, and then around the corner from it is La Bodega by Cúrate is kind of a more casual all-day cafe, still Spanish, but more Basque Country inspired and casual local spot with a bakery and market. We have not reopened La Bodega yet since the hurricane, so that one is still just pending the return of tourism investors and people to the area.
Kerry Diamond:
Didn't I go to a bagel shop you had?
Katie Button:
Oh yeah. It was that space. That was pre-pandemic. The pandemic changed some things, which for now I'm like, "I didn't really need this lesson a second time within four years."
Kerry Diamond:
Well, I remember the bagels as being very good and bagel snob from New York, I was like, "Oh, these Asheville bagels are pretty good."
Katie Button:
They were, yeah, we don't make bagels anymore, though. We focus on Spain, which makes sense. But we did, after the pandemic, kind of move into ... We started to understand the need for diversifying our businesses out of just having everything dependent on dining inside of our restaurant spaces. We added an e-commerce site, Cúrate at Home. We started developing our own charcuterie, which we are now producing at a greater scale and looking to expand into retail shops, which is exciting. And then we also do trips and travel to Europe and Morocco. And then under Cúrate Trips we have a wine club, which is mostly local North Carolina-driven groups because kind of just a small little wine club, but it's fun to educate people on Spanish wines.
And then for myself, I published a cookbook in 2016. I am working now on my second one, which is exciting, so that will be coming in the next couple years. I have a TV show, “From the Source,” and I'm continuing to expand in that area. That's just all the ways that we've kind of expanded and it's been fun.
Kerry Diamond:
Wait, you have to stop for a second. You just threw out all that stuff. You're so modest and you just went on to the next thing. You have built something really substantial.
Katie Button:
Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, it's kind of been a natural progression of just adding on one more way to connect with our customers and people who love us.
Kerry Diamond:
How big is your team now?
Katie Button:
Right before the hurricane, around 155 employees, we are now down to about 95. I mean to show you the impact, I mean we lost about 33% of our people, and that's just another statistic out there for the Asheville area that we're all kind of ... It's hard, you know, because restaurants are such important economic cornerstones of our community, it's these small profit margins that restaurants have make us. But the number of vendors that we have, not only the interested parties who receive, I mean, we're just like of money. We're basically, every dollar that comes in goes right back out the door to our employees or our farmers or local suppliers. So we're this economic engine for communities and super important in that respect.
I think getting this lesson a second time after the pandemic of just that fallout when restaurants are injured in a disaster and cannot make it, and how that ripples through the other industries in our farming community and our employees and all of that is something we're currently grappling with.
Kerry Diamond:
People want to support some of these things that you're doing. They can go to the Cúrate website and we'll put all the links in the show notes.
Katie Button:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
What are the products that you're making that people can order?
Katie Button:
We have three Spanish-style charcuterie products. One is chorizo, which is kind of that classic canonically smoky, cured chorizo sausage. Salchichon, which is more mild. It's a kind of like a salami, but I like it, it has a hint of nutmeg and black pepper. Delicious. And then the last one is sobrassada and sobrassada, not to be confused with sopprassata, sobrassada with a B is the Spanish style. It's kind of like nduja, it's spreadable, but usually not very spicy, it's more smoky, pimento-based charcuterie.
I love spreadable charcuteries. I think that that is this world, I want people to discover them more. It's like chorizo butter. If you took a baguette and you spread on and it's fatty, delicious, buttery, smoky.
Kerry Diamond:
I want chorizo butter right now. I laughed when you said sopprassata because I grew up somewhere very Italian American, but where they pronounce everything a little differently, like ricotta is ragut and mozzarella is mozzarell, and sopprassata was soprasat.
Katie Button:
They just cut off the end?
Kerry Diamond:
It's like if you ever watched “Sopranos-”
Katie Button:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
... It's where I grew up. Well, you grew up in New Jersey, you know that.
Katie Button:
Yes, I remember. I'm
Kerry Diamond:
I'm sure they pronounce it all the same for you, too. But yeah, they just dropped that last vowel for whatever reason. My favorite though is gabagol. Capicola, they would say gabagol.
Katie Button:
Oh, my gosh. How do those even relate?
Kerry Diamond:
Anyway, off on a tangent. Are you importing them? Are you making them down in Asheville?
Katie Button:
We're working with a co-producer who's ... We were originally making them in Asheville ourselves, but we couldn't then sell them to other retailers, so we're now working with a USDA-approved facility that is making our recipe, which is exciting.
Kerry Diamond:
Can they buy the charcuterie here in the U.S.?
Katie Button:
Yeah, absolutely. You can buy it on our website at Cúrate at Home, which there's a link at the Cúrate website-
Kerry Diamond:
Okay.
Katie Button:
... to our landing page. You'll find everything.
Kerry Diamond:
Who can join the wine club?
Katie Button:
If you live in a state that we can legally ship alcohol to, which is the challenge. If you live in North Carolina and 13 states that are listed on our website, I can't list them off, but check that first. But yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Fantastic. And your TV show is on the Magnolia Network?
Katie Button:
Yes. Yeah, it's called “From the Source,” and it's been so fun. I get to go out and explore different ingredients and producers, passionate people who are making incredible things here in the U.S. and why they do what they do. Because behind every passionate, I feel like, restaurant, the food industry is just full of passionate people. I think you don't get into farming or food production or restaurants unless you love what you do. It's all too hard work, you know?
Kerry Diamond:
Exactly, exactly. Okay, so folks should check all of those out. We'll put all the links in the show notes for those. You have really become associated, not just with Cúrate over the years, but Asheville. When people think of Asheville, they do think of you and you are not from there. You were born in South Carolina and you were a Jersey girl. You really grew up in New Jersey. How did you come to fall in love with this part of the country?
Katie Button:
Honestly, it was my mother who was part of the driving force and decision because when we were living in, I lived in Greenville, South Carolina, which was about an hour and a half from Asheville when I was a little girl. And we moved up to New Jersey when I was about seven. My mom remembered driving up to the Asheville area even then, 40 years ago, to check out just different interesting restaurants and things like that. So even then, it had this kind of vibrancy to it a long time ago and she remembered it. When we were looking to open a restaurant, we opened it as a family restaurant in the beginning, she has now retired, which is great for her, she deserves to.
Kerry Diamond:
Your mom was a caterer.
Katie Button:
She was, yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
No stranger to hard work.
Katie Button:
Exactly. And it was her dream to have her own restaurant. So when I switched from engineering into food, she saw this as a light bulb opportunity and asked me to go in on this restaurant with her. When we were thinking where to do that. We started looking in the Northeast, but then it felt expensive and competitive and just intense. So we were like, "Well, I guess we're opening our own business. You can kind of do that anywhere and where would we want to be?" And the Southeast was really the only other region that we felt any sort of family connection. My grandmother was in South Carolina at the time and my mom remembered the Asheville area. So when we went driving around, she made a point of us to make sure that we stopped through here.
I would say, like so many people do when they drive through Asheville, it's like this moment of like, "Wow, this is the place." There's something about the historic buildings, the downtown that's got so much charm, and then the different neighborhoods, but it really is the creative spirit and the small independent creative businesses that exist here and the fact that the local community supports them. They're major champions for everything Asheville. We saw that after the storm, too. It's like this community comes together for each other in a way that is truly magical.
Kerry Diamond:
We should shout out one of my other favorite Asheville businesses, East Fork, the pottery company. They recently opened in Brooklyn, which I was so happy to see. For those of you who don't know East Fork, it's a fantastic pottery company based down in Asheville, and they make my favorite mugs in the world. There is nothing like an East Fork mug and the feel of it in your hands.
Katie Button:
Absolutely, I know. That handle is perfect. It's like, yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Were your kids born in Asheville?
Katie Button:
Yes. Yeah, both of them. They are now six and 10. It's a wonderful place for kids, the outdoors, the rivers, the mountains. I mean it's just really a special special spot.
Kerry Diamond:
And you had mentioned it was not your dream to be a chef or to own a restaurant. You were on a completely different path.
Katie Button:
Yes, exactly. Studied engineering at Cornell and then have a bachelor's of science in chemical and biomolecular engineering, and then I got a master's degree in biomedical engineering, but I did it in Paris, which was smart. This was my first inklings of my love of food. I cooked a lot when I was there and just, it was kind of dreaming that entire time. I'm on this path of engineering, I'm dreaming about going to culinary school, which is really weird, but just not doing it thinking, "Oh, maybe it's just a hobby." And then eventually there was no other decision other than to get out from the science world and head into restaurants.
Kerry Diamond:
Katie, when I was doing some homework for this episode, I listened to another show that you had done and you told this absolutely bonkers story about your time in Paris when you taught yourself how to make puff pastry on your floor.
Katie Button:
Yes, on the floor.
Kerry Diamond:
And you bleached a spot on your floor. You have to tell us a story. Only you would do this.
Katie Button:
Yes. I was in Paris doing this master's degree in biomedical engineering, and I was struggling. I mean it was hard, one, living in another country doing this master's degree in French, feeling so lonely and my refuge was cooking. So I bought these incredibly complicated professional French culinary books. And then I started teaching myself these classic dishes and one of them was like the Poisson Croute, which is the fish wrapped in the puff pastry stuffed with the vegetables, and so I had to make puff pastry.
I was in this tiny studio apartment in Paris and I did not have, I mean there's no counter space, none to make puff pastry, so I bleached a section of my floor and taped it off and then vowed never to walk on it because it was the extension of my kitchen counter was now on my floor and that's where I made the puff pastry. It turned out great. I don't know if the wood grain or something like that helped, but it turned out great. Those are the moments when I was looking back on when I was like, "Gosh, you're using food and cooking to save you from the depression of feeling lonely and not enjoying your studies. Maybe there's something there."
Kerry Diamond:
So you wind up on this other path. People probably figured that out by now. You sort of switch from French to Spanish, you fall in love with Spanish cuisine.
Katie Button:
That was, I feel like, fate. I was in Washington D.C., I was actually supposed to start a PhD program in neuroscience. It took me a while before the light bulb went off. It was really facing the beginning of this PhD program and I was in D.C. and about to start this program and I just was like, "I can't." So I dropped out. It was the first time I'd ever dropped out or quit anything. And I needed a job because I had this apartment that I'd signed a lease for and didn't know what I wanted to do. I was unclear, honestly. It wasn't like I dropped out and was like, "I'm going to be a chef." I was feeling lost and unclear.
Kerry Diamond:
It was a big existential crisis for you.
Katie Button:
Exactly. But I knew I loved food and I thought, well, restaurants, maybe I can get in.
Kerry Diamond:
Didn't you go somewhere in between and build houses?
Katie Button:
I did. I went to Zambia one summer.
Kerry Diamond:
I remember that from last time we spoke.
Katie Button:
Yeah, that was right when I quit my PhD program.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay.
Katie Button:
It was right before. It was part of that decision-making again. Yes, quarter-century life crisis basically is what that was, moment, in the best of ways, or awakening, whatever you want to call it. I think crisis is the wrong word. I think we have these moments in our life where we face these awakenings. I've had another one turning 40. There are these times and they're right on and it's okay.
Kerry Diamond:
You do big bold things.
Katie Button:
The fearlessness of diving into something new helps for sure. I was applying for different restaurants in D.C. and honestly the only one that would give this PhD dropout with zero restaurant experience a job was one of José Andrés' restaurants, and that is the beginning of why Spain. I worked in a few restaurants of his and then also in Spain and met my business partner, who's now my ex-husband, who's from Spain, but we're still business partners, co-parents, best friends. He's from Spain. He's why we opened Cúrate and a Spanish tapas and it was just meant to be. Now my kids are now 50% Spanish, so.
Kerry Diamond:
I love the stuff you gloss over, Katie. You cooked at El Bulli in Spain.
Katie Button:
I did.
Kerry Diamond:
You didn't just cook there, you worked there one year, front of house, and made such an impression you were invited to come back and cook.
Katie Button:
Yes, yes, that is true.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah, you're so modest.
Katie Button:
It was an incredible experience. That was my culinary school, truly.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah. You mentioned José Andrés. I actually met José because of you. You were my connection to him and I'm sure for other people as well. You brought him down to Asheville to work on the inaugural Chow Chow Festival, which was something you had started, which was so much fun. You probably never thought in a million years that José would return with World Central Kitchen to help feed your neighbors.
Katie Button:
I know. It was surreal. I mean, for years we've run fundraisers through our restaurants for World Central Kitchen for people in communities that have been devastated in other areas. I never imagined that there would be a day when that would be us, that we were the ones needing help. And even the day the hurricane hit, it was like you're just so shocked that you can't even understand the devastation and what the community is going to need. But he does and his team does, and they were activating as soon as the storm hit. By the day after, within 24 hours, we were getting a phone call from his team asking us if Cúrate had power. They knew the water situation was out for the city, but if we had power, and if they could get us water, if we could prepare meals for the community.
They also partnered with Bear's Smokehouse who does a lot of work for World Central Kitchen around the country, and they partnered with them to be the central location hub of the distribution and production. It's amazing. I mean, their organization is amazing because it's not just about feeding communities in the... And it is about that. I mean, they were helicoptering meals to communities and neighborhoods where bridges and road access were completely destroyed. They were isolated with no way to get resources or food, and they were like some of the first ones bringing firewood and water and food to these people. They are that. But even more so, they also help communities come back faster by jumping into Asheville.
They first reach out and find a bunch of partner restaurants, and when they're asking a restaurant to produce meals, they're not asking us or our employees to show up and do it for free. They pay through their fundraising efforts for you to hire back your team so you can then get people their jobs back. You get your business operation, while it can't run as a restaurant, converting it into this business that is now producing meals for the community.
It's an incredible model. It's really the only reason we were able to reopen as quickly as we were, but the support that it gave for our employees, for them, not only their sanity of now having something to do that feels good physically, that then they get to hear the positive feedback from the communities that eat their meals, but just being busy in a disaster is important. But also the fact that they now get their income back. And the truth is, I mean, unemployment limits in this country and rates are also just outrageously low and people cannot live or survive on their unemployment limits and businesses can't maintain people on payroll if they're not in operation, it's this other big problem and World Central Kitchen really does help that economic and hospitality workers in that way. It's amazing.
Kerry Diamond:
Katie, how are you taking care of yourself?
Katie Button:
I have been, over the past year, I think, really good at finding personal time for myself. One, exercise has been really important. I sometimes row in my dad's apartment. He has this rowing machine and it's nice because I get to go in the morning and see him and then we get to chat and then I also row and work out. It's both not only about exercising, but about seeing my dad, so that's nice.
I will say every time a disaster happens, I get thrown off of these self-care routines. You lose yourself. As Christmas and the holidays have waned, it's been nice, and I think this new year feels like the time for that and setting aside the time for that is coming back, or I'm just more able to be there for myself and it's equally as important.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah, I mean, Katie, as we're talking, things are happening real time in Los Angeles. It's devastating and heartbreaking in ways that you can barely fathom right now. Given what you've been through, which was certainly different, but we know a lot of people in the restaurant world are going to face the same thing that you faced when the hurricane hit. Do you have any advice for folks in Los Angeles?
Katie Button:
I know it is so hard. I mean, they're facing not only the fear or reality of the physical destruction of these spaces, but displacement of their workers, loss of their business income. I mean all of that. As far as advice, don't take no as an answer from your insurance company. That is one piece of advice. Really no is not an answer. There are pathways. And I think a lot of people don't know that they actually ... That sometimes they get a no, they think that that's the end-all and final decision, but really sometimes you have to take them to court or take it another level, and that is really hard.
I think the biggest important thing is to gather similar industries, banding together with other restaurants, to talk about the problems that they're facing as quickly as possible and then activating collectively.
I think that is where we are at right now in Asheville. It's taken a few months, but we are now finally gathering the information from everybody and activating collectively to be able to advocate for the things that we need.
Kerry Diamond:
That's really smart. Are there any outside organizations like James Beard or Independent Restaurant Coalition or even the National Restaurant Association?
Katie Button:
Yes. The Independent Restaurant Coalition, I know, is working on some things, and I'm not sure about the James Beard Foundation, but there are organizations like Southern Smoke and the Giving Kitchen, which have funds that directly are there to support hospitality workers. One of the first things to do is to get your employees to apply for aid through one or the other, or both of those organizations. They are enormously helpful.
Kerry Diamond:
Both amazing organizations, yeah.
Katie Button:
Yes. Yeah, they're incredible. That is the first thing that I would do is finding that kind of aid.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. Well Katie, do you want to do a fun speed round.
Katie Button:
Sure.
Kerry Diamond:
Get your mind off disasters and things like that?
Katie Button:
Sure.
Kerry Diamond:
All right, Katie Button.
Katie Button:
Let's do it.
Kerry Diamond:
What beverage do you start the morning with?
Katie Button:
Oh, coffee.
Kerry Diamond:
How do you take it?
Katie Button:
With milk, like a latte. I have an espresso machine, like a little. I love it. The grind espresso. Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Of course you do. The mind of an engineer, mind of a chef, no doubt, you have an impressive coffee setup. What is always in your fridge?
Katie Button:
Kefir. That's like my second beverage in the morning. That's number two. That's always my fridge. Eggs, butter, cheese, lots and lots of cheese. I'm heavy on the dairy products.
Kerry Diamond:
What was your favorite food as a kid?
Katie Button:
Oh, good question. Baked ziti. That was it. My mom would ask, "What do you want for your birthday?" Baked ziti every time.
Kerry Diamond:
Classic. New Jersey classic. Totally.
Katie Button:
Exactly.
Kerry Diamond:
What's your favorite snack food?
Katie Button:
Oh gosh. I'm like, do I want to tell you the thing that I try to eat, which is roasted nuts of some kind is what I try to snack on. But my favorite is really Cheetos, the crunchy kind with the orange and they turn your hands like a different color. It's not good.
Kerry Diamond:
A little ultra-processed food.
Katie Button:
Just to drizzle occasionally.
Kerry Diamond:
Nice little healthy, nice little healthy snack. Okay. What are you, I don't even know if you have time to watch anything, what are you streaming right now?
Katie Button:
I just started watching “Lioness” and it has me hooked.
Kerry Diamond:
Nicole Kidman. It's good?
Katie Button:
Yes, it is good. It is good.
Kerry Diamond:
What's your favorite food film?
Katie Button:
“Big Night.” I have a few. Yeah, I think it's that one. Yeah, that's definitely it.
Kerry Diamond:
All right, dream travel destination.
Katie Button:
I'm really curious. I would love to go to Iceland or something sometime or way up north in Norway. I just want to discover some place cold and beautiful and I don't know. There's something about that like crisp air and cold plunge culture that I'm starting to love.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay, very cool. What is your most used kitchen tool or implement?
Katie Button:
I mean, my most used is my chef's knife for sure. My favorite is probably the microplane. It's that zest, the citrus zest that I just need in everything.
Kerry Diamond:
And that smell when you start to zest something. Oh, that's heaven. Do you have a motto or a mantra?
Katie Button:
I would say... Not really, but recently, I've really been trying not to rush. If I have options in my day, sometimes you can't avoid it, but if I can get up earlier and take some time in the morning to myself before my kids get up, I feel less frantic and my day starts out better. Then I'm trying to just fit in, how do I fit in all the things without rushing. More of it is about protecting my time. It's like boundaries on how I schedule things on my calendar that then create whether or not I'm rushing or not and saying no in order to avoid the rushing.
Kerry Diamond:
Are you good at trusting your gut?
Katie Button:
No. I'll say I'm working on it. I'm working on it. I'm still working on the doing what I think others may want me to do or think that I should versus what my gut is telling me that I should do. But I'm at the point, I think, of recognizing that when that's happening, which is the first step in change, and then it's telling myself it as I'm doing the wrong thing so that then the next time I could pause, of course. That's also part of not rushing. It's like taking a minute to think about how you feel about something really is important. So I'm working on that.
Kerry Diamond:
All right. Last question. If you had to be trapped on a desert island with one food celebrity, who would it be and why?
Katie Button:
I mean, it might be José. I'm serious. He is fun and not only is he fun, but he came down to Asheville numerous times. And because of all of the different places that he has been to and different disasters that he has faced, I mean, he knows how to survive on any circumstance. I mean, he was telling me, I'll give a little funny anecdote, but he's like giving us, because we can't flush toilets and he's familiar with being places with no running water ... I mean, we were literally lugging water buckets from creeks and things to then pour in the back of the toilets so you could flush the toilet, but you can only flush once a day or else you're wasting water, so there's one flush a day and he's giving us hints. He's like, "If you put a splash of bleach in there at the beginning of the day, it really helps how the bathroom aroma is before you get to that last flush of the day." These are the tips that he would have if we were on a desert island together.
Kerry Diamond:
And you really bond with people when you are flushing a toilet once a day, I guess, right?
Katie Button:
That's right. Yes, exactly.
Kerry Diamond:
You lose a little bit of your mystery.
Katie Button:
That's right.
Kerry Diamond:
Well, José is probably a great choice because either you're going to get rescued immediately or you're going to be fine. He's a global treasure. He's not going to be lost for very long unless he wants to be.
Katie Button:
That's right.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah. And he better get that Nobel Peace Prize one of these years.
Katie Button:
I know. Oh my gosh. I mean, really.
Kerry Diamond:
Come on world, what does it take?
Katie Button:
Yes. I know. Let's do it.
Kerry Diamond:
Anyway, Katie, you are the Bombe. Always a pleasure to see you.
Katie Button:
Thank you, Kerry. This was so wonderful. I appreciate you.
Kerry Diamond:
That's it for today's show. I would love for you to subscribe to Radio Cherry Bombe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify and leave a rating and a review. Anyone you want to hear on an upcoming episode? Let me know. Our theme song is by the band Tralala. Joseph Hazan is a studio engineer for Newsstand Studios. Our producers are Catherine Baker and Jenna Sadhu, and our editorial coordinator is Sophie Kies. Thanks for listening, everybody. You are the Bombe.