-KIimbal, welcome to the show.
-Thanks for having me. -Thanks so much for being here.
I was lucky enough to meet some of your family backstage.
I met your son, August, and your --
-My mom. -Your mom, who is here tonight,
I believe. Is she in the audience?
[ Cheers and applause ] There she is.
-Getting a jump on St. Paddy's Day.
-Yeah, no, yeah. Hi, Mom!
[ Cheers and applause ]
And that's your son August there?
-Yeah. -Uh, was mom the one
who inspired you to get into cooking?
-Yeah, my mom is a great inspiration.
And she also doesn't cook very well, so, uh...
-Oh. [ Laughter ]
So she wasn't. -Yeah, so --
No, no, no, that was the inspiration.
If I wanted to eat well, I had to cook.
-You had to make it yourself. Okay, yeah.
-She was like, "You're talking to me?"
-Yeah. -"You got to go cook yourself."
-Yeah, you got to cook -- Yeah.
You have a very popular restaurant called
The Kitchen, which is celebrating
its 20th anniversary this year.
-Boulder, Colorado. Whoo! [ Cheers and applause ]
-That's very -- That's an amazing run.
-Thank you.
-You're gonna open up your fourth location?
-We're gonna open up in Austin in -- in October.
-Wow. -Yeah.
[ Cheers and applause ]
-You're always innovative,
and you're always trying to take things to the next level.
Your restaurant is farm to table,
but you work with farmers to kind of introduce them
to technology, as well. -Well, that was thing.
So, 2004, when we were opening,
I had already built an Internet company,
sold it a few years before that.
I figured everyone was online.
But, actually, most people weren't.
I mean, this concept of e-mail
was a new invention to most people.
There were no iPhones. You know, it was really
actually quite -- quite astounding.
And so I would go out to these farmers,
and what they would do is, they'd drop a paper chit
at our restaurant,
scribbled on, like, a prescription,
you know, like, "This is a broccoli,
this is our name, and..."
And we're trying to, like, decipher who these people are.
They're, like, leaving us voicemails,
and we're trying to answer back, and I'm just like,
"Guys, there's this thing called e-mail!"
-Yeah. "It's gonna change your life."
-"It'll change your life."
So, anyway -- so, I got a bunch of them online,
but there's one grandfatherly figure,
he was like, "Look, if you want me on e-mail,
you got to -- you got to -- you got to help me."
So we took him to Best Buy, helped him buy a computer.
I didn't pay for it. He paid for it.
But I was his little -- like the grandkid he wanted.
You know, I came over.
I kind of had done a lot of Internet stuff.
I was a pretty well-known guy. -You're like Geek Squad
helping the guy out. -Underneath the table,
getting the modem to go. -You did hook it up for him?
-I did all of it. -Isn't that great?
-And, for years, we worked with that guy,
and it -- uh, it was a fun time.
You know, to just kind of get farm --
Creating farm to table was kind of a blend
of restaurants like ours
that wanted to work with farmers and then getting them online
so that you could communicate back and forth.
And as a result, we have a whole movement now.
It's really great. -And helped them survive.
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. We love -- we need our farmers.
-Our farmers are the best. It's a hard job.
-We need our farmers. [ Cheers and applause ]
Is that where the signature cowboy hat came from?
-Yeah. So... -Did it make you feel
like a farmer or a cowboy?
-Yeah. So I'd go out to these farmers.
I spend a lot of time on the farms, and, uh --
and they they --
I borrowed -- I borrowed their hats
because it's so damned hot out there.
-Sure. -And after a little while,
one of them came to me and said, "Look, I'm sorry.
Uh, we need to explain something to you.
When you have a hat, it's kind of like a pet.
Like, yeah, you can ask. We'll lend you a hat.
But it's -- But it's really not right."
-It's yours. You have to have it.
-It gets a little sweaty, as well.
It's a very personal thing. -"Let's go get you a hat."
So went out to the cowboy hat store,
got the same hat that I've been wearing now for over 10 years.
And I'd only wear it when I was on the farms,
but then, I'd hang it on this hook at the door,
and it would -- it would -- it would look at me
every time I walked out the door.
It would say to me,
"You don't have the guts to wear me today."
[ Laughter ]
-"You don't have the guts to wear me out
in front of your friends." -Yeah, yeah!
And I was like, "But I don't need to.
I live in a regular town." -It's not hot.
-Yeah. "You don't have the guts."
-Wow. The hat called you out.
-After a little while, I was like,
"All right, I got to wear it. I got to wear it."
And it's like, now it's the thing.
-Now you can't take it off. -Now it's my pet.
-Now it is your pet, yeah. It looks very good on you.
[ Cheers and applause ]
Tell me about your new book. This is exciting.
It's out. It's called "The Kitchen Cookbook:
Cooking for Your Community." This is your first cookbook.
What made you decide to do this?
-Well, 20 years in, we also had the pandemic,
which, if you're in the restaurant business,
it was -- it crushed our soul.
You know, you have just complete loneliness,
you know, obviously at home,
but, also, when you're in your restaurant,
even when you're open, no one was there.
And so we --
Our team is amazing at The Kitchen.
And we just said, "You know, this is a time.
Let's -- Let's put our recipes together."
You know, there's, I think, even after the pandemic,
there's a loneliness epidemic that -- that, uh,
I think if we just cook more together,
we just, uh --
These are fantastic dishes from 20 years,
100 recipes that we chose that were fantastic,
easy dishes, but also delicious.
But the message is, really, cook for your friends,
cook for your family, and get back together.
Let's, uh -- let's celebrate. [ Applause ]
-Let's get everyone back together,
yeah, over food or anything. I love it.
I'm a big fan of of cookbooks.
I actually collect cookbooks, and I love it.
I love it when there's great photos in the book, by the way.
-That's the thing. I'm a cookbook fanatic,
and I hate it when there isn't a photo for every single dish.
-Yes. -So I was like,
"I want a photo for every dish."
And the publisher was like, "We don't really do that."
I was like, "I don't care. We are doing it."
-Yeah! You're like -- like, this is the hat talking.
-This is the hat talking! -The hat is talking right now.
Got something to say.
You did something very cool to us.
And I want to tell everyone what you did
because I hope it becomes a trend.
You came on the show,
and you want to support local bookstores.
So, this afternoon, you went to a local bookstore,
and you bought 250 copies of your book
to give to everyone in our audience tonight.
[ Cheers and applause ] -Enjoy, guys.
♪♪
-That is so rad. That is so cool to do that.
You're the first to do that. -Well, great.
-That is awesome. I hope it becomes a trend.
-Thank you. -Please come back.
Kimbal Musk, everybody! "The Kitchen Cookbook"
is available right now!