The word that kept popping in my head when you were giving your preamble to being back in the kitchen and The Flower Shop’s new menu is discipline, your way of discipline.
There’s a culture in the kitchen where the guy at night, or your lead line guy at night, they’ll just write what they need for the next day on receipt paper and then leave it up on the pass, and then the kitchen manager comes in and sees it. I’m just not that guy. I schedule the prep by the hour, like this is the amount of time this should take. I’m quite disciplined. You don’t write books and open restaurants and make movies without some sort of discipline.
Would you say you’re softer now? But still you, though?
Yeah, I’m a Pisces. Like, I’m very sensitive. I can lean into the fact that I care, but it actually makes me more intense. That’s the interesting conundrum. I’m much softer and more open about how I feel, what scares me, and what I’m sensitive to, but it’s also brought my drive back.
The Flower Shop is open Tuesday to Saturday.
Nicole A. Taylor is a James Beard Award-nominated food writer, home chef, and producer. She is also the author of “Watermelon & Red Birds,” the very first cookbook to celebrate Juneteenth. In addition to her other cookbooks, “The Up South Cookbook ” and “The Last O.G. Cookbook.” Nicole has written for The New York Times, Bon Appétit, and Food & Wine, and has been featured in the Los Angeles Times, BET, Today, Wall Street Journal, Today, Washington Post, NPR, Apple, and Oxford American. Brooklyn Magazine named Taylor to its list of 100 influential people in Brooklyn culture, and her cookbooks have graced more than two dozen “best” lists. Follow her on Instagram and X.
Adam Gray is the founder of BOH, a full-service creative agency focused exclusively on the hospitality industry. Walker Perry also assisted in the filming of this video.
Noëmie Carrant and Nicole A. Taylor assisted in the production of this video.
Michael Harlan Turkell is a food photographer, writer, and cookbook author. He most recently hosted the Modernist Pizza Podcast, and continues to explore the art, history, and science of many foodways. Follow him on Instagram and X. Follow Resy, too.