# An Evening at Verse with Chef Oscar Torres and Manny Marroquin - Pensado's Place #591

## Метаданные

- **Канал:** Pensado's Place
- **YouTube:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj_Q6xR7oRw
- **Дата:** 27.09.2024
- **Длительность:** 30:03
- **Просмотры:** 6,664

## Описание

Coming to you live from one of the most incredible gems in the Los Angeles area. Verse is a place unlike any other, where fine dining meets exceptional music and entertainment. Join us as we sit down with Executive Chef, Oscar Torres, and the master mind behind it all, Grammy Award Winning Mixer and Owner of Verse, Manny Marroquin. You're at The Place!

## Содержание

### [0:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj_Q6xR7oRw) Segment 1 (00:00 - 05:00)

hi everybody welcome to this week's episode of pensado's place we're at a very special place a place that just passed its three-year anniversary a place where there's no other place like it in the country it's an extraordinary experience we're sitting in this beautiful facility called burst it is the only restaurant meet recording studio uh it is put together by the man the icon one of the icons of our business Manny m keing who you'll see in a second um but I've been here a number of times and one of the things that makes this place so incredible is the food and I think there's a correlation between food and music and we have the food Master with us Chef Oscar Torres thank you guys so much what up thank you so much so man you are cooking it's such an interesting thing you are cooking for the rich and famous but also the restaurant if you're a regular guy it feels just as comfortable yeah correct it's definitely one of those uh those feeling of nourishment right and to us that's the most important thing is where we you know to have somebody feel nourished whether you're you know selling 50 million records a year or you're just your average person for us you know it's uh it's the same as making music you want people to live and die by it and you want them to listen to your music and love it you know and and with food it's very similar you know you want to feel like you're being transported somewhere you know you you're you reminded of something and you know at the end of the day you feel nourished you know the the thing that I find fascinating about food and in particular the way you deal with food is that the correlation to me to music making is very similar like so tell me from a chef's perspective if I'm close you have to pick amongst certain ingredients and not clutter it up y um The Taste come from subtle things that you have to know how to put together that's like writing a song um presentation is important y right a amount is important um I think often times in music what people sometimes don't understand our audience um sees it all the time is that you're trying to get to simplic and simplicity is complex like it's almost easier to be complex so when your food comes out as simple it ain't simple to necessarily make yeah you know it's funny cuz we always talk about the Arts and Commerce right and for us it's like there's only so much art that we could have right there's only so much that we could you know develop that then like you said it to your point it's then it just becomes too much right so a lot of it's obviously driven by inspiration it's driven by things that you see and just like with music you know it could be driven by things that you could hear and and music that you grew up listening to as you were a kid that might inspire you to like make this new track right uh with food it's the same thing you know there's this emotional attachment to it that um you create based off of the way you feel you know and that's one of the biggest things that I learned from Manny and like his world is that you know he mixes with emotion right and I never really understood what that mean until I started to hear it and I was just like man this is a big difference right I know at some point we're going to get into it but you know once we were going doing everything during the pandemic you know it was very much one of those like hey man like you know I felt like I was cooking for him you know and he was just like dude just cook for yourself you know just cook for like something that makes you feel like emotionally great about what you're doing um and as a chef I mean you don't get that very often you know as a chef you get the like hey man you know we got to think about you know getting the stars and the James Beard and the accolades and and this demo um and so that sometimes could kind of put you in a box you know and it could kind of not let you know Veer off into something that you never knew that you could really tap into you know audience you just heard something that if you take anything away from it and Manny's going to join us take that way because at the end of the day what you're facing is AI and all these complicated things and stuff that is coming at you don't know where to go and what to do with it but at the end of the day if you don't feel if you don't put some emotion to it if it doesn't touch you it's not the best it can be it may be good but you want to try to be great and great always has emotion in it correct definitely you know it's it's like um you know I always tell the guys in the back you know they out of everybody we have an incredible team and everybody we have in the team has the

### [5:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj_Q6xR7oRw&t=300s) Segment 2 (05:00 - 10:00)

ability to create a incredible menu right um but you know there's a certain there's a certain uh standard that you obviously have to abide by um but you don't always find yourself being able to create something having the emotion that you could have to it um allow you to sustain that standard right so sometimes you know like yeah can they put the menu together a th% you but is there going to be that same everyday you know uh word for word on on the things that they're doing it might not be you know there could be a way where they can achieve it uh but for us we're so focused on like we said you know doing things with the emotion and being able to just create as creatives without any you know any barriers because if you think about it we have no barriers at all with the food there's no barrier as to what we can and can't cook wow with the music is the same there's no barrier as to what we will have perform from one night to the other right so for us that gives us the opportunity to just really you know blend something that as creative especially being an Angelino um to take a little bit of everything from everywhere and again that's what I personally love the most about music is that you know you listen to the herb Alps of the world you know you listen to Rise and then you all of a sudden hear you know big smallest track and you're like wait a minute how did that happen right and then you start you know realizing that you know I remember one of my old chefs used to say that you know we were all Pirates right because we would all take you know a little bit from everything everywhere without even knowing sometimes you know you just kind of get in this creative mode and then you're like something that might come up to your head might be little pieces that you Garner from everywhere whether it be something that you hear something that you see or that you taste um all those things at some point correlate into this like this magic right which is exactly what music is exactly what it is it if you get the opportunity to come to verse um what you'll find and what Chef is talking about somehow all comes together with it's intentional but it's easy like it's been thought through if you are somebody who loves music there's a reason that Manny m is on the Mount Rushmore of what goes on and it's because if you listen to a Manny mix Manny's intentions are in the song and you don't know how you got caught up in it yeah and all of a sudden you're rolling down the P I've called Manny like in the middle of the night going did you mix this same or I've done the opposite I'm like wait you didn't mix this track on he's like nope I'm like you know you could you could feel it and you could hear it too right yeah and I have for years call him the nuclear option cuz if you want your [ __ ] to blow up um but it but it's Manny's ability to say I'm going to be intentional about these things I'm not going to get in the way of the artist's intent I'm going to enhance it but in a way that feels completely comfortable to you which is what like this restaurant to me is a Manny mix yeah it is literally specific easy com and all you know when you come here the actually my most fascinating thing sort of ramble is watching somebody who's not in the music or not entertainment bus they just had a good time they had curated music they didn't know that they liked it that much they didn't know and then you come along with your magical food ass and absolutely kill it a quick thing on you I see Manny's here did you go to culinary school where did where did the chef come from yeah I spent you know um so I knew that I wanted to cook when I was pretty young and that was mainly just because cuz you know my dad was the one that always would cook at home and being his only boy you know he would gravitate towards me love it uh my mom unfortunately can't boil water to save her life but uh so you know I knew from a young age and when I was in high school I started a summer bridge program at lecordon Blue from I think 11th grade to my senior year um and so I did that right during high school and then eventually once I finished with school I was like you know I'm going to continue on this path and I went to loron Blue and um and far before that I mean when I was a kid my parents would ship me off to talisco with my grandpa nice and I would go to the farmers market and sell vegetables with him every Saturday Sunday wow what a great training um or you know other Summers I would be in somoma County you know on my uncle's uh Farm you know he had a cow farm and we would go and just you know spend the Summers there and without really knowing I was already really close to that world right had already kind of

### [10:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj_Q6xR7oRw&t=600s) Segment 3 (10:00 - 15:00)

been a part of this you know this something that now I obviously enjoyed thoroughly like the farmers market and you know and places like Sonoma and Napa Valley and all that stuff um but it's definitely one of those things where you just don't realize it until you're older that was kind of you know something that you were already in tune with when did you know that you had a pallet uh I would say probably like when I was 14 or 15 yeah there was times where look again my dad he would cook we weren't restaurant people like it was like that was once a year like for a birthday right so everything was all done at home and and he never really had you know the upbringing of where he would cook where his parents would cook because he was always working so he never really got that like home style cook right so he would always kind of just do everything very like you know he would just like wing it right um sometimes it was really good and sometimes I was like damn Dad please don't ever make that again like please stop um and it was like that like ability to see you know the good and the bad and being able to kind of like dignify which was which yeah and then there was certain dishes that I would have and I was just like man like this has really good spice and acidity and textures and and then I started to really kind of think that way and then I would ask him like Hey can you show me how to make this and he would show me and then it would just blow my mind CU I was like man I can't believe it takes that much work for that end result right and to me that was something that was kind of beautiful you know like to that was something that was like it's yeah there's an art form to something that you know it wasn't like that was his career either cuz he he's far from that World um but it was really interesting to see that somebody could just kind of create something and again back to the nourishment thing right cuz it was that feeling of being nourished whether he was your family member or not um that feeling is very special you know so let's uh let's get Manny in what do we think yeah this the man the myth The Legend um we are passing the three-year anniversary of this incredible facility that we're sitting in called verse um the Creator and originator and dreamer and entrepreneur and legendary icon Manny mad Keen is right here to my left um you guys know him as a mixer what you don't know him as is a guy who constantly uses his vision to not only Advance the cause of the Arts but also do it in a way that most people don't really do it um who would say hey I'm a mixer let me build a restaurant and then let me invest in it make it technologically way ahead of it time and then let me have a chef like Chef Oscar Torres who [ __ ] kills and on and on hey bro you're too kind man well you know the fun part about my job is I get to tell the truth um and um man who would have thought given the journey to get here You' be at three years yeah I mean it's um three years that's 2. 0 but the idea is you know it started way before that and uh you know I always say that you're only as good as your team so I feel like what we put together you know under this I think him amazing Restaurant Studio venue just have a great team and I'm glad you have Chef here because without him without I mean the whole team we wouldn't be where we're at so you know I can't take all the credit well the the thing that um I would say is emblematic of what you do and in finding somebody like Chef I don't know if there's anything I haven't done gone to larby watched you work seen St at larabie seen staff here where the idea of team and pride is not built into it and you know I think we're similar in terms of the kind of way we run teams um because I don't believe you get there by yourself no definitely not you know it's funny because I've been reading a lot of uh like Phil Jackson and John Wooden me too all me too same thing the moment I get up man I it's almost like going to the gym and if you want bigger biceps go do curls that's right to me for me to be mentally you know cuz my goal is always to be a better leader you know just to uh so that is my goal right now on this side so listening to Coach K and wooden and they say exactly what you're saying it's you know it's about the team effort and how you lead the team and it's not about the championship necessarily but how the journey to get to win the championship and I hope that you feel that adverse larby where I

### [15:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj_Q6xR7oRw&t=900s) Segment 4 (15:00 - 20:00)

think we're all we all feel like we're part of something special yeah and it doesn't mean anything except we feel like it sounds that's right and we're just going to go the extra mile to make it the best we can and what we have control over the take this point audience um when you're doing it for yourself that it's your own brand standard everybody else is going to get it like there are people who do it for others which is fine but when it's your own personal bar yeah everybody's going to get it because your bar is higher for you than other people will set for you so you know and lovingly even though I I'm always glowing about Manny it's because Manny delivers yeah it's just it's the same thing I get same thing you get there's not a time that I come in this restaurant or from the time I've met you that there isn't intention a Grace uh the level of food and the biggest one was one time we were here and we closed the restaurant down and you came out and hung out with us and I got in my car and went oh hell yeah like it goes beyond um as you envisioned verse um is it meeting your expectations yeah you know it's uh I you know buddy of mine and I would always say let's get tattoos and it's G say adap or die yeah yeah and uh I feel like the vision was always there to have exactly what we have so that's actually exceeded my expectations you know um I feel what we've been adapting is you know hey it's a new business that I know nothing about you know and it's one of the hardest business you know all things you're going to pick music restaurant like top five things you should not get into exactly can you the Middle East [ __ ] next right go for it right uh so safe to say that I like certain challenges just say the least uh but you know I going back to you know success is really it's all what is success we do in the studios like what's who's what's success to every artist some artists think success is having a billion streams others think it's selling out the crypto Arena 59 there's different levels of success so the worst success we all got to identify what that really means to each one of us success for chef may be man I'm going to have a perfect Friday night and that's success that's right so I think that it's really important to always remind ourselves that success is you know is what you want it to be right goals are the ones that we set right and then success comes along with it it's like as a mixer you know in my mind I wanted to be the best yeah and I not that I'm the best but I try to always strive for that and I knew that I wasn't get going to get there overnight I knew that it was going to take and we what we talk about here on this side is like I always say hey man let's just get 1% better just one every day we don't have to reinvent the wheel it's going to be a gradual change anyway so let's if we can get better and I always ask myself how what was the 1% today oh I tied my shoelaces in a record time of2 seconds move the ball forward there you go I got 2 seconds right that's right back uh so it's small attainable goals that we would want to now look back and say well 100 days later we improve by 100% but I think that's a very uh healthy way of looking at a very challenging because it's you know some people are like man do you like the restaurant I'm like honestly I'm being more inspired by the restaurant as much as I do next door exactly and most people would say oh man I hate this and that and I'm like that's funny you say that because I love this and that well you hate so it's really a matter of perspective things that people would hate about a restaurant I find I mean the challenges I mean you guys see how excited I get when we come with systems you know amazing and I think that's you know I think it spreads with the team because now the team everyone's like hey what if we do this I'm like yes that's what we got to do you know the um all of us are leaders yeah whether we CH chose it or not it's just been part of in order for us to be happy with ourselves we've had to lead you know and I have found that when my team is inspired I'm more inspired so if as a leader I can go hey bringing this to you and they go oh hell let's go kill and I go back like oh let me go do some more you know and inous yeah and it's um it's not Workman it it's kind of like oh

### [20:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj_Q6xR7oRw&t=1200s) Segment 5 (20:00 - 25:00)

I've been given this opportunity I give a lot of speeches to college kids and I always tell them that being a steward of pop culture is an incredible privilege and don't screw that up for somebody to say I'm going to make a decision to buy something or go to a school or do something based on your taste then you better damn sure bring it to the table and not waste that opportunity because there's such a small percentage of us to get to be there and what's interesting about your leadership style and I don't know and I want to hear how you found him there seems like there's nobody better to be Chef for this restaurant than him yeah yeah how' you guys connect I mean you know like I feel like I going to say I'm not going to say it but I feel like we kind of found each other I think it was a perfect time storm um I feel like you know from what I know in my short you know restaurant to life is that uh chefs are artists you know I mean well that's the obvious they're true artists and chefs have they have you know artists have to be dealt a certain way and I've had 30 years of experience dealing with different personalities so uh I feel like once the personalities click right I I always said after my previous Chef is like you know I want a personality more than the talent and I've always said this next door with some of my Engineers it's like you know I can teach tal not that I can teach how to cook but right that's going to that you're going to evolve that's your art you know but the personality is the key so my thing is I rather find the personality that can adapt that's willing to always be the best they can be and most important is the criticism that's going to come from some people I always say see it as criticism but constructive criticism is a way to learn and grow and I feel like magic wouldn't be bird and bird would without each other so you need that sort of like okay I lost this game I need to practice more or shoot free whatever it is so I feel like the personality and when Chef came over you know I won't go into the long boring story on my previous chef but it was kind of like you know I think we found each other out it was just the perfect time you know and uh you know again I rather have the personality than the actual talent now Chef I'm not under you know taking that away because he is one of if not the most talented chefs in town um I like the way he's grown not as a chef but as a leader to you know what I'm saying and like you said some people are born leaders others need to find themselves to be better leaders and that comes maybe with a combination of age experience and other things and what I'm proud of is not only his technical skills but his leadership as it it's evolving and to see that is honestly I get a maybe even bigger satisfaction to seeing the team grow in into what they didn't even well maybe they imagin it in their heads but they're seeing it now the results are in front of B difference and then the Red Sea Parts because now now you have a Clear Vision on where you want to go and what it could take to the like they say you win one Championship you got the code now to win more right but the first is always the hardest and I feel like that's what we're doing we're trying to win you know we're not trying to win games we're trying to win championships and look in a very humble way whatever that means to us you know and that's the beauty behind it is like you know we spent so much time trying to figure out exactly what that next level was going to be right until we realized that you know our industry is always so tunneled Vision with what you're supposed to do right and I think that's that could be very cloudy for a lot of chefs because you know you kind of want to you know you deter to the accolades and you deter to wanting to be this certain person in the industry um and that's one of the things that I appreciated the most about Manny was that you know you said it earlier obviously the 1% and we talk about that so often and that's very rare to find in our industry that's really rare to not have somebody come and say hey man we want this by this time and at this month we're going to be here and this is what we're looking for right that's a very uh uncommon thing and growing up in the industry you know you would always feel obviously the pressure of those things but um but I think being able to work with somebody that understod the the personal side of it was massive you know and I think now that you know you think of um you think of Manny in the music world right I think of him obviously as like my friend and and the restaurant tour side and

### [25:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj_Q6xR7oRw&t=1500s) Segment 6 (25:00 - 30:00)

I've always thought since the beginning I'm like man this guy's going to be the greatest restaurant tour of Our Generation and and you know it's funny because it's there's a lot of things that people would give you a laundry list of what that means right um but to me it's very simple you know and you said it earlier it's the Simplicity but with the structure um and him being able to do that in the way he does it is it's really interesting and then it's brought me to like levels like we've talked about before that I never thought I would really ever reach well let me add this as a consumer fan not as herb whatever herb is um in knowing Manny as long as I've known Manny yeah in watching the various permutations of just Manny setting his own bar right and then loving this keep going well the funny thing about verse was um our former Studio pensado's Place Studio was across the street and so when Manny was trying things we would have a moose boo tasting he would say come over and look at this material and I was like God the fact that he's even asking me is cool cuz I don't know [ __ ] about restaurants I was sit in the back and it was just not constructed and so on so forth and go that plate looks cool versus this thing so you saw his process he was mixing he was the elements then and mixing but now let me fast forward in coming to the restaurant as a consumer right from the time it started when he talks about your Evolution I have seen it just in the way when you roll through the room I've seen the way people respond to you I see the way you handle them y because what people don't understand is Hollywood presents an extra complication in the math everything's high-profile you have reputations you have people who are looking to you know there's some people are supportive there's some people that aren't they're testing you all the time it's a whole extra level of stuff so Manny comes with a reputation then the restaurant is a try and then you come with a reputation now the reputation's big and every single night the quality of this place the intention of the way you think about is consistent and the team continues to grow it's amazing thank you thank it is it talk about it as being uh every night is a performance it's a ballet you know and uh and when you go see a play or a ballet or you know and you don't you get lost in it the experience oh perfect we very much aware of the moment you even get out of your car what that experience is going to be like and what we have control over how we curate it yeah and then it's up to you we don't you know thankfully we don't worry about the 10% of hate anyways we yeah yeah we want to worry about the 90% that actually won an experience that's right um so we you know we very mindful of every moment every it's the play it's like the this this Broadway show that we've been rehearsing over and over put on it every night and keep it fresh um you know in wrapping up as I'm a chef ho now I can't I literally liter I literally can't boil water I can do a little bit of breakfast but I can tell you every Bobby fle every Kevin Lee every Stephanie AAR we can go Alex going every show triple threat I it's some for some reason it's musical to me when they're putting food we were talking earlier you know when you put food together much like when you're mixing something or writing a song it's what elements make sense what spice will throw it off how do you present it what proportions should it come in and when you're mixing you're making those decisions when a songwriter is songwriting they're making those decisions and um so I think when I watch those shows it allows me to get away from my business but still correlate to it right you know I can sit and go oh man look at that artist doing what they're doing and look at finally their art and if you get a chance to taste it so um you guys are where I actually experience it as opposed to watch it on TV thank you very much um audience it's uh this is Chef Oscar Torres we're in a place that is just the only place of its kind in the world called verse and all put together by the man to my left Manny you continue being Manny thank you man always pleas see you and spend time with you absolutely appreciate it um join us next week see you later

---
*Источник: https://ekstraktznaniy.ru/video/52517*