Sarah Thomas 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 here in New York City. I'm the founder and editor of Cherry Bombe Magazine, and each week I talk to the most interesting women in and around the world of food. Today's guest is Sarah Thomas, co-founder of Kalamata's Kitchen, a platform that inspires children to experience the world through adventures with food. Some of you might have seen the Kalamata's Kitchen children's books. I needed those books when I was a picky little kid.
Before her Kalamata's Kitchen Adventures, Sarah was a sommelier for Le Bernardin, the highly regarded New York City restaurant. If you, like me, are wondering how wine and children go together, then you'll definitely want to stay tuned. Sarah has had a fascinating journey and she's here to tell us more.
Today's show is presented by Whole Foods Market and Chia Smash. If you attended our Jubilee conference in April, I hope you had the chance to stop by and meet everyone at the Whole Foods Market installation, including the folks from Chia Smash, the makers of deliciously nutritious superfood jams. Founder Anna Peck was there, along with baker Danielle Sepsy of The Hungry Gnome and HBO Max's The Big Brunch. Folks tried Chia Smash flavors like strawberry, blueberry, and cherry pomegranate on Danielle's famous scones, and it was a match made in heaven.
Personally, I love Chia Smash because it is naturally sweetened. I really love jam, but usually there is so much added sugar in this stuff. Just look at the labels and you'll be shocked. I know what some of you are thinking, "You need the sugar. Otherwise, how does it become all jam like?" Well, Anna, the founder of Chia Smash, realized that the natural gel that forms around chia seeds was the magic she was looking for. Also, Chia Smash uses upcycled ingredients like imperfect fruits that otherwise might go to waste. And most important thing of all, Chia Smash tastes great. Make your own ricotta and jam top toast with Chia Smash or layer it into a yogurt parfait. You will love it. Whole Foods Market is partnering with Amazon to cut food waste in half by 2030. So they're working with brands like Chia Smash that have similar goals. Look for Chia Smash at your local Whole Foods Market or on wholefoodsmarket.com.
Now let's check in with today's guest, Sarah Thomas. Welcome to Radio Cherry Bombe.
Sarah Thomas:
Thank you so much for having me. I'm so happy to be here.
Kerry Diamond:
Let's jump right into it. Lots of people in the food world have two jobs, but your two jobs couldn't be more different. Let's start with the one that came first. Sommelier at Le Bernardin.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes, I will say I don't see them as that different. My two jobs were sommelier at La Bernardin, and Chief Imaginator Kalamata's Kitchen, and I think both of them, they're both hospitality jobs in their own ways.
Kerry Diamond:
I was just going to say, drinking wine in children's books, there's a connection?
Sarah Thomas:
Well, okay, the books are not about wine. The connection is I think about taking care of people through food and drink, and creating new experiences for people through food and drink. So there is definitely overlap. Obviously, alcohol is not involved for the children.
Kerry Diamond:
Tell us how you went from studying English Renaissance literature at Cambridge to becoming a sommelier. I know there's a lot of ground in between.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes. I mean, there is and there isn't. I'm about to reveal my full naivete about the industry, working in the industry. When I was doing my master's, I was really burned out on academia. I had this very, very romanticized notion of what it might be like to work in a restaurant. I happened to write my dissertation on a metaphysical poet named Henry Vaughan, who was also a physician. Back then, all medicine was just booze mixed together in various amounts with various other ingredients thrown in.
Kerry Diamond:
Really?
Sarah Thomas:
It was all a distillate of whatever, and then you add it to wine and that's medicine. Crush them pearls up or whatever. I don't know. There's all kinds of funny things that went into that. It was funny. I saw metaphor everywhere, and I was like, "Oh, this is just making cocktails." So I did... My end of year party at Cambridge was, I was like, "Oh, I'll do cocktails that are all themed off of Henry Vaughan's medicines from his medical journal." So lame. Probably terrible cocktails too, but I was like, "Oh, I love this. I want to do something while I'm doing my post bach. I like restaurants, I'll be a bartender." That's how much that went into it.
Kerry Diamond:
Had you ever worked in restaurants?
Sarah Thomas:
No, never.
Kerry Diamond:
That's okay. I'm not judging because I owned restaurants and had never worked in restaurants.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah, I definitely only saw it from... I loved restaurants. I had a very wide-eyed starry vision of what... I'd see a bartender doing something cool and I'd be like, "That is the coolest job you could possibly have." Then of course it was for a while and-
Kerry Diamond:
You're really taken with the cocktail shakers and all that?
Sarah Thomas:
I liked the idea of making cocktails. I thought that was really cool. Then I discovered in the process of learning how to do that and learning service, that I was really good at service, and it was because I liked teaching, and talking, and doing a couple things at once. I got such an adrenaline rush from it. And then it just so happened that the restaurant where I was working was one of the only places in Pittsburgh that also had a wine list and a sommelier. I actually didn't know that was a job. I thought that was an Old World holdover or something. But that's where I learned about it. I didn't drink wine. I didn't know anything about wine.
Kerry Diamond:
You left Cambridge, went back home. I went and were working in Pittsburgh?
Sarah Thomas:
Yes. Correct. That's where it started. I was just like, "Oh, this seems like the thing in the restaurant industry that I could learn the most about." I wasn't completely devoid my academic tendencies, so I just dove in and I really loved it and I started studying it in earnest. That's really where it all started.
Kerry Diamond:
Now did I read at some point you wanted to be a doctor?
Sarah Thomas:
Yes, I was doing a post bach for medicine. Okay. So I come back from Cambridge. I was doing this post bach, but I was like, "I can't only be in school. I've been in school for so long." I was 21 and I was like, I just need to do something else. So I was just working in the restaurant on the weekends and then slowly I was like, I'm going to work here more.
Kerry Diamond:
So something else was just a little something to take off steam as you were preparing for-
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah, but it became what I loved. Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
How did you break it to your parents?
Sarah Thomas:
Ooh, it was not fun. It wasn't a fun conversation. But at this point, actually, I think doing a master's in English had sort of primed them for me being their exasperating child. Because I had started with medicine, then I switched, then I was going to switch back. When I finally told them, they were just like, "I literally don't know how you can make that a job." They weren't happy. They just weren't happy. It wasn't until I got to Le Bernardin and they could Google Eric Ripert that they were like, "This seems fine."
Kerry Diamond:
That sets up our next question. How did you wind up at Le Bernardin? You're working in Pittsburgh?
Sarah Thomas:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Le Bernardin is one of the most respected, fine dining establishments in the country.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Set the picture for us a little bit.
Sarah Thomas:
At that point, I had very quickly transitioned into actually running a small wine program in Pittsburgh. Then I did that for a couple years and it was like 2014 I think. I was visiting friends in New York and I was allergic to not working. So even though I was coming to hang out with people, I had cold emailed a bunch of Master somms that I'd seen in the Somm film. And I was like, "Can I come stage?" One of the people... Again revealing my complete naivete. You can't just come show up and stage at 11 Madison Park. You know what I mean? I didn't know that. So I asked Dustin Wilson, "Can I come stage at 11 Madison Park?" He was kind enough to let me down gently. He's like, "We don't do that."
Kerry Diamond:
Was he the somm there?
Sarah Thomas:
Yes. He's a master sommelier and he was at the time of the beverage director at 11 Madison Park.
Kerry Diamond:
Stages have been so romanticized. They do make it sound like you can just show up at someone's back door and you will be welcomed to stage.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah, I thought that was the case.
Kerry Diamond:
But also in all the interviews we've ever done on Radio Cherry Bombe, I don't think we've ever talked about someone doing a wine stage. What does that entail?
Sarah Thomas:
I don't know. Because-
Kerry Diamond:
Is it not a thing?
Sarah Thomas:
I don't think they're a thing. There was never a for wine when I worked at Le Bernardin. All the years I worked at Le Bernardin, we never did it. I just didn't know that. I thought for all restaurant jobs, because I'd really only read about stage in the kitchen. I didn't know at that time, and I've come to see this as an asset in hindsight. I didn't know what I couldn't do yet. I wasn't afraid to ask if I could just do it. Now I would feel like would such an idiot telling people sometimes, "Oh yeah, I asked asked to stage at 11 Madison Park." They look at you like you're an idiot. And I just didn't know.
Kerry Diamond:
Or a genius.
Sarah Thomas:
Here's the thing, what happened was Dustin was like, "I can't do that, but I'll have coffee with you and we can talk about your career." So I had to come into New York a day early to meet with... I didn't want to tell him I couldn't meet at the time that he could meet. So I came in a day early. Because I came in early, I had to find a place to stay. Ended up staying with some cousins who took me out to dinner. They took me to Le Bernardin. Very nice cousins.
Kerry Diamond:
I was just... You took the words out of my mouth.
Sarah Thomas:
Very nice cousins. We sat at the bar. I had no idea that they knew who Aldo [Sohm] was ,and they did. Aldo came over to say hi, and they were like, "Oh, our cousin is a sommelier in Pittsburgh." He was like, "Okay, sure." No, he wasn't like that. He was very nice. But he then blind tasted me on my entire dinner and-
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. I need to stop you because you need to explain a few things to folks. First, Aldo?
Sarah Thomas:
Yes, Aldo, the beverage director of Le Bernardin. Legendary, like world's best sommelier. I didn't email him. He's not one of the guys I emailed cold because I was terrified of him.
Kerry Diamond:
I was so in love with his wine bar. Is it still open?
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah. It is.
Kerry Diamond:
I lost track during the pandemic. But that is such a fabulous little jewel in New York City.
Sarah Thomas:
It is. I totally agree.
Kerry Diamond:
All right, so you've got him blind taste testing you, right?
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Tell folks what that means.
Sarah Thomas:
So basically, he was just terrifying me publicly. No, I would have whatever dish in front of me, say the pounded tuna with the fois gras, or whatever, and he would come over and he'd have the bottle hidden in a serviette. He'd pour me a little bit and he'd say, "What do you think? Tell me about it." He didn't really care. Blind tasting is not necessarily always about getting the answer. It's about being able to speak intelligently about the wine in your glass. He didn't care about the answer. I don't know why. I just knew that that's not what he cared about.
He didn't want me to pick it up and go, "Oh, it's burgundy 2012 from da da da." He wanted me to tell him about the wine. So I just talked. I was like just drunk enough to talk enough that I guess that impressed him. I probably talked more than I should have, but at the end of five or six of these, I don't remember anything I ate, because I was so scared. He wanted to talk to me about my career, and he was like, "What are you going to do?" And I was like, "I don't know, maybe move to Philadelphia." He was like, "Okay, if I offered you a job, would you move here?" I just thought he was humoring me. So I kind of laughed, and he wasn't laughing.
I was like, "Oh, you're serious. Yeah. Yes, I would." And he goes, "Okay, great. Email me tomorrow and let's see what we can do." I was like, okay. So then the next day I meet Dustin. We have a great conversation. He's so kind. He's now one of my best friends. At the end of the conversation, he gave be such great advice. I was like, almost not even going to tell him, but I was like, "Dustin, I don't know if this is a thing or not, but I met Aldo Sohm. Do you know Aldo Sohm?" He was like, "Yes."
I think he offered me a job yesterday and Dustin was like, "I don't care if Aldo offers you a busboy job at Le Bernardin. You take it, because that's how you're going to learn. That's how you're going to rise up here." So I emailed Aldo as soon as I left Dustin. Within five minutes, he'd emailed me back and he was like, "Come in. Come to Le Bernardin right now. We'll figure it out."
Kerry Diamond:
Wow. So you were leaving everything behind in Pittsburgh?
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Your family, this job you've had for several years.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah, my now husband, yes. All of that. That's an opportunity you don't really turn down. In fact he was... I didn't know this at the time, but I found this out when I went in for the interview. He was opening the wine bar. He actually hired me as one of the opening sommeliers for the Aldo Sohm wine bar in 2014, and then in 2015 he moved me over to Le Bernardin, which is where I stayed till 2020.
Kerry Diamond:
Wow. Tell us a little bit more about Le Bernardin, because really, like I said, it's one of the most respected restaurants, not just in America but around the world in terms of fine dining. Just got a great review from the New York Times.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes. I was so proud to read that. Yes, it's everything you just said.
Kerry Diamond:
Female founded, which we love.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes, man, Maguy Le Coze is a real icon. I was so grateful for the opportunity to get to be part of that, because now in all the years that I've been able to experience a lot of other fine dining as well, it's a world that I had no context for, to be completely honest with you, before getting into it. And I really loved it. And working at Le Bernardin, of course you have the pressure. It's a very high stakes environment of perfection. But what I realized fairly quickly and why I think I ultimately was good there, was great there in some ways, was because they didn't want us to all be formalized automatons.
I mean we were very much encouraged, of course being very professional, of course keeping a really high standard, but to have fun with our guests too. When I got there I was really like, "Okay, everything has to be perfect and formal and buttoned up and rigid and da da da."
Then I would watch Aldo at a table, and he's so charming. He's a genuinely funny, charming person selling some of the most expensive wine in the world to some people with really great taste who are paying a lot of money to be here. They were having a great time and he was having a great time. So I saw that as license to be a little bit more of myself. I used a lot of my life experience to I think make... I could identify certain guests that I was like, "I think that person might feel a little out of context here or out of place here. I know how to make them feel better, because I've been there, and I'm always out of place."
So being able to insert a little bit of my personality into that structure, a very formal, very fine dining was I think an incredible way to figure out a lot more of who... Of how to be myself too in a very highly stylized environment. I think of everything in forms of education. It was a very special form of education.
Kerry Diamond:
Do you still always feel out of place?
Sarah Thomas:
Oh yeah. I feel like I'm a very awkward person, but it's okay. I've actually learned to embrace that a little bit more now, and largely because of my experiences there. I saw being out of place when I was younger as a bad thing. I was always trying to... assimilation was the name of the game for when you grow up being Indian in rural southwestern Pennsylvania. But now I'm like, "I see these things as superpowers in a lot of ways," and I'm proud of that. That's taken a lot of work.
Kerry Diamond:
You also have navigated two very complicated worlds. I feel like we need a whole separate episode just to talk about them, or else we'll never get to the second part of your life. But we know all the problems with the sommelier world and so many of the problems with fine dining. I'm just happy to see that you seem to have navigated that.
Sarah Thomas:
It was not easy. I don't want to put too rosy a picture on an industry that has a lot of problems. On the other side of it, I feel comfortable saying that I could use a lot of those experiences to fortify myself and also now to educate people on how to behave and what you can stand up for. It's just a very different environment when I started to now, and I think that's great. I think it shows a lot of growth for a lot of people and I think there's a lot more opportunities. Anytime that I've had to struggle through something, I've never seen it as "I had to struggle through it. You should too." I'm very happy to be able to share the things that I've learned and the ways that I overcame things, and what you just shouldn't put up with just to start with that I had to learn. I'm very happy to share all of that, and I only see that as good.
Kerry Diamond:
That's such a beautiful sentiment. I think more people should embrace that. Why should everyone have to suffer?
Sarah Thomas:
Oh, it's just nonsense.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah. For folks who are like, "Oh, why are you glossing over the whole sommelier thing and all of that it?" There's just not enough time in this episode, but I promise you we're not glossing over it intentionally. We do talk about hard things on Radio Cherry Bombe if you are a regular listener, but there is so much to Sarah's life that I want to get to, so we're not going to dwell on that. I would love to know what your first few weeks were like. I was reading an article about you on the Cup of Joe website, and you said your learning curve was steep.
Sarah Thomas:
Oh yeah. Yes. It was very steep. I had no idea. I didn't know what I didn't know, first of all. Then you show up and it's just the pace of New York City, is completely different from anywhere else. It just is. And I was coming from Pittsburgh. I worked really hard in Pittsburgh, and I'm really proud of all the work that I did there with my chef. We started a little wine room, we did fine dining and tastings and coursed out pairings and all this stuff like that wasn't being done in Pittsburgh at the time. I had some handle on that, and I knew how to work hard. New York's just different. It's just different. I was really sad and really tired for a long time. Then I don't know, I don't remember exactly if there was a thing that happened that clicked, but suddenly I just was... I kind of realized, I was like, "Oh, I think I'm in the groove of this." It didn't happen quickly, I struggled. It was very hard.
Kerry Diamond:
Did you have much interaction with Eric Ripert, the famous chef behind Le Bernardin?
Sarah Thomas:
He's there a lot. He's there at the restaurant a lot, and he is incredibly nice. At first I was also really intimidated and scared. He's a very nice person.
Kerry Diamond:
Seems to be his reputation. Being nice.
Sarah Thomas:
Very nice person. Genuinely nice person. He asked to be in one of the books. They were just the nicest. They came to be... I was there for nearly six years and they came to be... Just, I came to know them as very supportive, very good people.
Kerry Diamond:
So you're working at a place that some folks can only dream of working at. Did you think you would stay there for some time? Where does one even go after Le Bernardin?
Sarah Thomas:
Even being there for as long as I was, I was still a baby in terms of how long people stay at Le Bernardin, so I knew I could. People stay there for over 20 years. The captains have been there for a long time. I could, but I didn't know. I didn't know if I wanted to stay in... I didn't know if I wanted to be a sommelier forever. So I was actually looking for what my next step would be. I didn't know.
I think I knew I didn't want to be a beverage director, for example, and I think that would've been a logical next step. I was asked to do that a couple times, but it didn't really speak to me. So I was looking into writing, I was trying to go back to those roots a little bit. Wine writing and stuff like that, but that wasn't... It also wasn't really speaking to me at that time. I didn't really feel like my perspective would be all that valued to be honest. I got some feedback that suggested that that was true, which changed a couple years later. But at the time that's what I heard.
Then my good friend Derek Wallace actually knew that I was in this kind of flux state of like, "I don't know what to do. I'm not leaving Le Bernardin, but I don't know what else that I want to think about in the future." Derek is the co-founder of Kalamata's Kitchen and a very, very dear friend of mine who I met actually through my now husband. We were just friends that really bonded. In his friend group, he was the friend that I got along with the best because he just loves food and travel bars, and we just had a lot to talk about.
He knew about my passion for working with kids. He knew about my background in writing, and he understood that I was a hospitality professional, and this was what I loved doing, and I was good at it. He had this idea of creating this children's brand that centered around food and exposing children to the world through food. Ye was like, I think that if we did this through a character, it could be really impactful. Do you think you could bring this character to life?
Kerry Diamond:
You said something, that he knew you enjoyed working with children. Where does that part come?
Sarah Thomas:
Oh, it's funny that I gloss over it sometimes in the history of me. I genuinely always loved working with kids. I would go to India every summer to visit my grandparents. There was a school for neuro divergent children very near our house, and I went and spent weeks there. I would go and stay for the weekdays. I'd go to the school. I'd just stay with the kids and hang out. I did that for years. I loved working with kids. I worked with kids in Pittsburgh too, after school programs and stuff like that, and I really missed doing that in New York. I didn't have time for it with the schedule that I had at Le Bernardin at the time.
It's just something that he knew I loved. I'm surprised at myself, but I hadn't figured out exactly how to tie that into whatever my career would be. I wasn't thinking about it that way. Then Derek was like, "What if we tied everything that you love together and a perfect package? Do you think you'd want to do that?" And I was like, "Yes, this is the best idea I've ever heard in my life."
Kerry Diamond:
You said yes right away.
Sarah Thomas:
Immediately. Immediately. I thought it was the best idea I'd ever heard.
Kerry Diamond:
I forget where you said this. I was reading a lot about you last night, obviously, but you mentioned how important books were to you.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
As a child. Can you talk about that a little?
Sarah Thomas:
Books were escapism for me, but just plain and simple. I loved reading. I read a ton. The two things I loved the most were books and food. I grew up in rural western Pennsylvania. I say Pittsburgh. It wasn't Pittsburgh. I was an hour and a half outside of Pittsburgh, the middle of nowhere. It was tough. My parents were Indian immigrants. I was like, not super... I wasn't like quite Indian enough. I wasn't quite American enough.
I think that's the tale for a lot of first gen kids is like you're in this kind of in between space where you don't really know. You don't fit in anywhere, it feels like sometimes. You try really hard sometimes to fit into one or the other, and it's not always successful. That was my experience. For me, imagining myself literally anywhere else was how I got through the day most of the time. It sounds kind of bleak, but I loved it. I actually just genuinely loved the escapism of reading, and especially fantasy books when I was a kid.
Kerry Diamond:
Let's take a quick break and we'll be right back. Okay, pizza lovers. Today's show is presented by La Rossi Pizza. La Rossi is a frozen pizza company founded by mother daughter duo Martina and Bianca Kenworthy. How cool is that? La Rossi uses sustainable farm sourced American ingredients, like stone ground grains from upstate New York, and they pair those ingredients with their Italian expertise. La Rossi has four flavors, the traditional Margherita, Maialina sausage pie, veggie with cheddar cheese, spinach, and mushrooms, and just crust. You can customize that last one however you like.
La Rossi frozen pizzas are available in New York City at places like Key Food, Brooklyn Fair, Park Slope Food Co-op, Poppy's, Big Night West Village. Yes, Big Night now has a location in the West Village. And Butterfield Market, and online at farmtopeople.com. If you live in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Connecticut or Rhode Island, you can order up some deliciousness direct from larossipizza.com. Good luck to Martina and Bianca as they build their company. So awesome to see more women launching their own brands.
Now, back to our guest. Where did Kalamata come from?
Sarah Thomas:
The idea for a character that would inspire kids through food was the seed of Derek's idea. Right? He was like, kids learn about everything through characters and stories. Why isn't there one for food? And not necessarily even for cooking, but for a very specific idea of trying and open-mindedness. That was the seed. That seed of the idea for the character was what Derek started with, and what he had proposed to me.
I immediately connected with that because I think in a lot of ways, there were a lot of things from my childhood that could inform that character. In a very profound way for me, I would've then been creating the kid I wish I had been instead of the kid I was. There is a lot that's autobiographical about Kalamata. She looks suspiciously like me as a child, it's true. But I always say, "She's not me. She's the kid I wish I had been."
Kerry Diamond:
I also was going through your entire Instagram account last night, and you had the most adorable pictures of yourself when you were little.
Sarah Thomas:
Oh yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm familiar with Kalamata, the character. I wasn't familiar with you, the baby, the child. You had the biggest eyes in the world. So Kalamata's eyes are not that much of an exaggeration as to what you looked like as a child.
Sarah Thomas:
No, they're not. Neither is her hair, and her sideburns, and her big eyebrows. All of that is stuff I really wanted to celebrate as a character, because I didn't feel like I could celebrate those things as a kid. Someone was always trying to straighten my hair. Someone was always trying to tame my eyebrows. Shave off your sideburns. That's embarrassing. And I was like, "No, this character is... Those things are beautiful. They're beautiful about people who look like me. They're beautiful about a lot of other people whose cultures celebrate these things too, and we're keeping that on this character." Really, I-
Kerry Diamond:
You were also given a hard time about food. I read about that too.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes. Yeah, and I mean, again, I think that's a pretty unfortunately familiar story for a lot of first gen kids. Not all, but it was for me. There just wasn't a lot of open-mindedness towards things that were different. So it's amazing now. How do Lunchables look better than chicken curry ever? I just don't get it. But they did.
Kerry Diamond:
Or even worse, I read something you said that people would make fun of you for your lunch and you were like, "I just need to go get a Slim Jim."
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah, a hundred percent.
Kerry Diamond:
A Slim Jim. That's heartbreaking.
Sarah Thomas:
Way worse. They were a quarter in the thing, and I had my emergency phone money for the payphone. I would go and get a Slim Jim and throw my good food away. It's one of the main reasons, again, when Derek brought the idea to me, the first thing I was like, "Wow, I needed this character when I was a kid. More importantly, the kids around me needed this character when they were kids."
Kerry Diamond:
How did the title Kalamata's Kitchen come about?
Sarah Thomas:
Just super fast. I mean honestly-
Kerry Diamond:
The name Kalamata. How did-
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah, Kalamata... when Derek and I talked about it, I think Derek was like, "What about Kalamata?" And I was like, "That's great." It's because we were trying to come up with a name that was a food name, but wasn't already a name for kids. We didn't want it to be Olive or Clementine because those are already named for kids. But in that world, there's so many cute words that could be a name, and it is a place, and it was really simple. It was like, "That's the name." I don't even think we debated it.
Kerry Diamond:
I love how all these things, it was just like, yes, yes, yes.
Sarah Thomas:
Oh yeah. I was so jazzed about all of it.
Kerry Diamond:
And Al Dente.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah, Al Dente was a genius invention. I knew she needed a sidekick. We were toss around a couple different ideas. I was like, I have a stegosaurus named Steg, and I was like, oh, I want it to be like Steg the character. Steg has his own whole narrative, which of course he does. Then my husband was like, "What if it's an alligator? What if its name is Al Dente?" I was like, "That's genius. That's it."
Kerry Diamond:
This is a real family affair, this project.
Sarah Thomas:
Oh yeah. I love collaboration.
Kerry Diamond:
Illustrations are so important to children's books.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
How did you find your illustrator?
Sarah Thomas:
Facebook. I just think that the universe wanted us to find Jo too because she's the Jo Kosmides Edwards is the most talented, brilliant person I've ever met. I mean, I always start with a very clear image of what I want on the page. Jo, no matter how much detail I give her, whatever Jo puts on the page is always more beautiful than anything I could have imagined. She's so brilliant, and so talented and working with her was one of the great joys of creating these books and these characters.
Kerry Diamond:
The character is so personal to you.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
How many iterations did you have to go through until you were like, "This is her.
Sarah Thomas:
You're going to love this. We saw 17 different Kalamata's, but the first one that Jo sent us was the one we went with. That's her.
Kerry Diamond:
This is a magical project.
Sarah Thomas:
It was meant to be.
Kerry Diamond:
I hope you're all picking up on this. Okay. Tell us about Kalamata and her adventures, and some of the things that are very specific to her.
Sarah Thomas:
So Kalamata and Al Dente, I like to describe them as fearless food adventurers. This is a little girl who's on a mission to taste everything, and that is kind of like the little kid I was. I was like, there's no food I wouldn't have tried. I've learned that's unique. That's part of what I wanted to embody, is that I don't think it has to be. So Kalamata is on this mission to taste everything. She can be inspired by anything. So any smell, a photo or a snippet of a story, whatever she hears, her imagination. Once she latches onto something, she's like, "I have to try that. I have to try that."
Her imagination, she can't go to these places. She can't just jump. She can't go to India, she can't go wherever. But her imagination can take her there through the power, the scents, the sounds of food, and the flavors obviously of food. So she's very inspired to take these imaginative romps... in her imagination, she can go anywhere in the world, and she tries everything. Al Dente is always doing something just exceptionally silly in the background. That's Al Dente's role. He's also down to eat everything, but sometimes to his detriment.
Kerry Diamond:
I am sure half of our listeners are like, "I need to get my hands on these books really quickly." What ages do you recommend the books for?
Sarah Thomas:
I'm going to say a really wide range, and then I'll explain it. I've seen kids who love being read to, so like little ones, two years old, all the way up to eight years old. I've seen really connect with these books. I would say the reading age is solidly in the six-year-old range if you're reading on your own. But kids love being read to, and I think these are great books to read to children, because my greatest focus is on the sensory experience.
So for example, in book one, Kalamata's kitchen, she's learning about through experiencing the senses of spices cooking, spices tempering, and so you have the popping of mustard seeds like fireworks. You have the blooming of curry leaves into a lush forest. You have a roasty, toasty cumin wafting her on this wind, a spice wind.
Kerry Diamond:
You decided to do a Kickstarter and self-publish. Why not go the traditional publishing route?
Sarah Thomas:
We looked into it. It's complicated. Anyone who's ever pursued that knows it's not an easy thing to just break into. You don't just walk in somewhere and say, "Have a great idea for a book," and they go, "Great, let's publish it." We did look into it. Derek, and I knew from day one that this was never going to be just one book. It was never going to be just two books. This character we knew was going to be at the center of a whole kind of ecosystem of products, experiences, et cetera. Our kind of motto at that point was like, "All right, we're not going to fake it till we make it. We're going to make it till we make it." So we decided...
A lot of our team now comes from kind of marketing backgrounds on really big brands. So we had this incredible wealth of experience there that said, "Okay, if we self-publish a couple books," we did three. Then we funded through Kickstarter. "A, we're raising awareness for this property. B, we're already creating a product that people have in their hands. We want to own all of our IP when we take this out to the traditional route again. So if we create a world around this and we already have the IP, we have much more leverage in this conversation when we go back to the traditional publishing route," which you do need for distribution, for mass distribution.
We self-published three books. The third was with Eric Ripert. We knew at that point if we took that package, we had a much more compelling case and a lot more leverage in the conversation. We did, and we ended up publishing two more books with Penguin Random House.
Kerry Diamond:
That's fantastic. And still kept the intellectual property.
Sarah Thomas:
Correct.
Kerry Diamond:
Great. Good thing you did because in 2020, Imagine Entertainment's kids division bought the rights to Kalamata's Kitchen. I know a lot of Imagine out there. It's the company founded by Brian Grazer and Ron Howard, the famous Ron Howard. What does that mean exactly? That they bought the rights?
Sarah Thomas:
That means basically the last few years, Imagine has been our development partner in terms of bringing the animated series to life. When you talk about, first of all, talk about steep learning curves. Getting into the production side in LA, a whole different world for me. But I like diving into things, so it's been fun. We've learned a ton. That process of development has only made the base, the core of the content that much deeper and richer, because you have to go through all these processes of character bibles and all this stuff, and it's-
Kerry Diamond:
Wait, a character bible? What is a character bible.
Sarah Thomas:
All kind of stuff. Yeah, you have to... okay, great. I'm not the only person who didn't know. Great, thank you for making me feel better. You build the bios out, but to a really deep level. I wrote all these stories about how her parents named her Kalamata, and all this stuff. It was very fun. That creative process and that development process has only made our roots of the IP and the content so much richer and deeper. What I can say is that there will be an animated series. There's a lot actually in development. We're also working on an unscripted series, the live action shot.
We have a property called the Taste Bud Travel Guide, where we're basically trying to create these real world... Highlight, not create, but highlight the real world food experiences that kids and families can have in their communities or when they travel, by featuring amazing chefs and restaurants that feature cuisines from all over right in their home. So we're-
Kerry Diamond:
Folks can find those guides on Kalamata's Kitchen website.
Sarah Thomas:
That's correct. So there's an unscripted show there, and Kalamatas really just the beginning. There's a whole lot of other IP that we're working on developing. I'm really lucky. I work with a lot of really creative people who can't stop coming up with stuff.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm just so endlessly impressed by what you've created.
Sarah Thomas:
Oh, thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
Now that we know a little bit more about your story, it's just, it's a remarkable story, Sarah.
Sarah Thomas:
Oh, thank you. Thank you so much.
Kerry Diamond:
It really is. We have to talk about your dog for a second.
Sarah Thomas:
Oh yeah. I love talking about my dog.
Kerry Diamond:
This is an audio medium, not a visual medium, but you all have to look up Sarah's dog, because if I had to guess, I'm guessing some of this IP is going to be around the dog one day. Tell us about your adorable little dog.
Sarah Thomas:
You read my mind. Yeah, I would love to have an entire content series around Perry, to be honest with you. Her name is Pernelle. We call her Perry. She's a super mutt. Rescue we got as a pandemic puppy, and-
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, she was a pandemic puppy. I didn't realize that.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah. Yes, yes. She's a pandemic puppy. I'm completely obsessed with her. She has the biggest personality. She's so cute. She's just got a very distinctive face. She's got two black and white spots on her face and nowhere else. Pure white otherwise. Yeah, she's just a funny character, and she's famous. I call her the mayor of Caroll Gardens because if you walk around with her... she's very distinctive looking. She's very friendly. Everyone talks to her. To her, not me. She had a cocktail at Frank's named after her. She's the real Deal.
Kerry Diamond:
I knew Sarah's dog before I knew Sarah, and we lived in the same neighborhood.
Sarah Thomas:
It's totally fair. I get it. That happens to me a lot.
Kerry Diamond:
But it is funny. You can live in a neighborhood and not see someone for ages, and then boom, you see them every day, all of a sudden.
Sarah Thomas:
All the time. Yeah, New York is so big and so small.
Kerry Diamond:
It is so big and so small. I want to see animated series for all these things. I want Perry books. I want Kalamata's Kitchen cartoon-
Sarah Thomas:
On it. We heard it here first. It's going to happen.
Kerry Diamond:
I can't wait. Let's go back to wine for a little bit.
Sarah Thomas:
Sure.
Kerry Diamond:
What is your wine life like today?
Sarah Thomas:
I am just a solid enthusiast. I still do occasional events, which is very fun for me to step back into because there's aspects of service I've really missed. So I just did a amazing wine dinner at the Ojai Valley Inn with the wonderful and talented chef Mei Lin. So I get to do the fun-
Kerry Diamond:
Love Mei Lin. Love Ojai.
Sarah Thomas:
She's amazing.
Kerry Diamond:
You must not have wanted to leave Ojai. I mean, it's just-
Sarah Thomas:
It was one of the most beautiful places.
Kerry Diamond:
Citruses in Ojai.
Sarah Thomas:
I eat like 40 Pixies a day. They're so good. So I get to... I'm doing air quotes, "come out of retirement" for fun stuff like that, which is, it's always such a joy to do. But in my day-to-day life, I'm just an enthusiast. I love going to places where I trust the somms and the wine list, and I almost never even look anymore in those places. I love someone else showing me something really cool.
Kerry Diamond:
That's fun.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Are you a fan of natural wines or more of a traditionalist?
Sarah Thomas:
When you said earlier we needed another podcast-
Kerry Diamond:
Right. I'm not trying to cause any problems here, people.
Sarah Thomas:
No, no. No problems to be caused, I don't think, because... Okay, so-
Kerry Diamond:
You can say pass.
Sarah Thomas:
No, no. I'll just say this. The wine, for me to drink it... Everyone has their own personal taste. For me to drink it, the wine has to taste good. The words natural and traditional I think are misleading to people a lot of times. What I think some people believe are natural versus traditional. When you're talking about some of the classic wine regions of the world, a lot of those wines, some very expensive and some not, have been made naturally for years. Just not their marketing tool. Then I think on the other hand, there's a lot of wines that are just marketed to a certain aspect of what some natural wines sometimes taste like.
That's become kind of a prevailing idea of what natural, again, I'm using a lot of air quotes, guys, sorry. Natural is. I find that kind of problematic. But for me, has to taste good. It has to be made responsibly. I like low intervention wines, but they have to taste good. Also just, I don't know, drink what you like, guys. It's fine.
Kerry Diamond:
What is your take on canned wine?
Sarah Thomas:
Theoretically, I'm definitely not opposed to it. I think there's a lot of good that can come from, first of all, from a sustainability standpoint. Aluminum cans make a lot more sense than bottles for a lot of reasons. I don't know enough about how those things taste, because I don't drink a lot of canned wine. I don't think I've ever had a still wine and a can. I would say I'm a fan of RAMONA, which is a wine spritz.
Kerry Diamond:
We all love RAMONA.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah, RAMONA's great. RAMONA's delicious. I had both RAMONA and Vinny both made by two extraordinary sommeliers, friends of mine, at my wedding. So yeah, I like those things. I don't know a whole lot about the other stuff, but I will say theoretically, I think the sustainability end of it is something that is very important to explore, if we can make sure that the quality, and taste, and flavor and everything is somehow maintained.
Kerry Diamond:
Can you share a wine bar or two that you love?
Sarah Thomas:
Oh, happily. I basically live at Franks Wine Bar. It's like my living room. I don't know if they know that. No, they know. I'm there all the time. Then also in our neighborhood, Franks Wine Bar and June are just two favorites of mine.
Kerry Diamond:
June is fantastic.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah. Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
I love that.
Sarah Thomas:
Love both.
Kerry Diamond:
I love how it's designed. I love everything about it.
Sarah Thomas:
Beautiful place, really kind people. If you're going for that, if you're trying to... You can't pin me down, because you could look at June and Franks and say, "These are two very different styles of wine bars," and honestly, I love them both.
Kerry Diamond:
That's true. Not that far from June is Boisson.
Sarah Thomas:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
I don't know if everybody knows what Boisson is, but it's a kind of a liquor shop, but everything is non-alcoholic in it. The one in our neighborhood was the very first one.
Sarah Thomas:
Oh, I didn't know that.
Kerry Diamond:
Now there are locations all over the country, and they've really been behind the no alcohol movement that's taking place right now. So I was just curious, your take. First, have you been there?
Sarah Thomas:
I have.
Kerry Diamond:
Have you visited?
Sarah Thomas:
I have.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah. Curious, your take on the low alcohol, no alcohol movement.
Sarah Thomas:
All for it. All for it because-
Kerry Diamond:
Even the... What's the term? The de-
Sarah Thomas:
De-alcoholized?
Kerry Diamond:
De-alcoholized.
Sarah Thomas:
I think? I don't know.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah, wines.
Sarah Thomas:
I don't know enough about the technical side of it to be completely honest with you. But in theory, to me, anything that makes the act of food and drink more inclusive and not less is important to me. When so much of our socializing and social life revolves around food and drink, alcohol's not good for you. You know? I love wine, but no one is out here being like, "This is a health food." It's good for people to have alternatives that are delicious and good for you, and also allow you to participate in a meaningful way in the regular fabric of social life. So I'm all for it.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm having so much fun talking to you. I'm sad we have to go to the speed round, but we do.
Sarah Thomas:
We have eight follow up episodes, so it'll be fine.
Kerry Diamond:
That's true. We have all these follow up episodes, and our neighborhood. One of your favorite books on food or wine?
Sarah Thomas:
Okay, so I'm actually going to give you a category, because when I was young, food descriptions were like my favorite things in books. These writers are all problematic for one reason or another now, but I'll tell you, I still salivate thinking about food descriptions from Roald Dahl and Enid Blyton.
Kerry Diamond:
I've read a lot about him, because I'm fascinated by the making of Willy Wonka. That's a whole different conversation, but wow, I had no idea how problematic he was until I read his biography.
Sarah Thomas:
I didn't either. It's very bad, and Enid Blyton too had all kinds of issues. But when I was a child, I'm telling you, those descriptions of food were some of the most transporting to me and deeply influential on the way I learned to talk about food to people and to kids.
Kerry Diamond:
Favorite kitchen tool?
Sarah Thomas:
My mom gave me a little stone mortar and pestle that I still use all the time.
Kerry Diamond:
One thing that's always in your fridge.
Sarah Thomas:
I'm the condiment queen. I have just so many pickles and hot sauces. It's honestly absurd. I always have some array of Indian pickles. I always have chili crisp, and I always have hot sauce.
Kerry Diamond:
What else do you need, really? Favorite childhood food?
Sarah Thomas:
Oh, so tough. Anything my mom made, but I have a particular fondness for her appam and goat curry that we'd usually have on holidays.
Kerry Diamond:
Snack food of choice?
Sarah Thomas:
I'm such a wide grazer, snacker, but I will say it's almost always savory. I have a real deep fondness for Kerala hot mix.
Kerry Diamond:
What are you streaming right now?
Sarah Thomas:
I just finished the Last Of Us. Three. I ugly cried the entire way through Three. I loved it.
Kerry Diamond:
I know, it was enough to give me crazy nightmares for a week.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah. Also that. I hated the first two episodes because I don't really do horror that often. But Three converted me to being a really... Just invested in the show. Then the rest of the... I won't say anything. The rest of the series was wonderful. I really enjoyed it.
Kerry Diamond:
I don't do horror. I don't do zombies.
Sarah Thomas:
No, I don't really.
Kerry Diamond:
But somehow I got talked into this one.
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah, me too. But I'm glad I did. I'm very glad I did.
Kerry Diamond:
Any motto or mantra?
Sarah Thomas:
What I'll say is, and as I look back over the things I've done, I definitely... I can see a really strong rise in my confidence levels, I'll say. I think that's exemplified by something that Derek and I started saying to each other when we started Kalamata's Kitchen, which was, we'd look at each other, pitch it to someone. We'd look at each other afterwards, and we'd be like, "I think this is a really good idea." Now, we look at each other and we say, "This is a really good idea."
I try and take that attitude with me way more than the other one. I try just to have more confidence in my ideas and what I'm doing in a way I just didn't have. I'm 35 now. I didn't have it when I was 20. I'm proud of that. Yeah, I think this is a really good idea, or "This is a really good idea," is how I tried to live now.
Kerry Diamond:
It's like, “I think, but I know.”
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
If you had to be stuck on a desert island with one food celebrity, who would it be and why?
Sarah Thomas:
Yeah. My gut instinct would be Ina Garten. Her voice is just pouring cold cream into a tall glass. I think if I were stuck on a desert island, my anxiety would be pretty high. I feel like Ina Garten would make me feel better somehow. Also I think she's the kind of person, maybe, I don't know her, I'm just saying this. But she seems like the kind of person that would make me laugh. We were foraging for coconuts or whatever. She'd be like, "Store bought's fine!" I would be like, "I love you, Ina."
Kerry Diamond:
I want to visit her wine cellar.
Sarah Thomas:
Oh my gosh. Me too.
Kerry Diamond:
Maybe instead of the desert island, you could be trapped in her wine cellar.
Sarah Thomas:
That would be-
Kerry Diamond:
With her.
Sarah Thomas:
Honestly. That would be better for, I think, for a lot of reasons. But I'd take either.
Kerry Diamond:
Sarah, this has been so much fun. Thank you so much.
Sarah Thomas:
It has been fun. Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
I hope the next time we get to hang out is at a wine bar in our neighborhood over a glass of something wonderful.
Sarah Thomas:
I would love that. I would love that. Thank you for having me.
Kerry Diamond:
That's it for today's show. Be sure to sign up for the Cherry Bombe newsletter over at cherrybombe.com so you can stay on top of all cherry bomb happenings, podcasts, and events. Radio Cherry Bombe is a production of The Cherry Bombe Podcast Network. Our theme song is by the band Tralala. Thank you to Joseph Hazan, studio engineer for Newsstands Studios. Special thanks to our friends at CityVox. Our producer is Catherine Baker, and our associate producer is Jenna Sadhu. Thanks to you for listening. You are the Bombe.