River Cafe Society

Fashion People

In this episode of Fashion People, host Lauren Sherman sits down with Ruthie Rogers, co-founder and chef of London's iconic River Cafe, to celebrate the restaurant's upcoming

Key takeaways

• Ruthie Rogers opened the River Cafe in 1987 with husband Richard Rogers and Rose Gray under strict planning restrictions that limited them to lunch service for local workers, which she credits as a catalyst for their creativity.
• The restaurant's minimalist aesthetic and focus on high-quality, market-driven ingredients helped pioneer the modern casual-dining movement that influenced chefs like Alice Waters and Wolfgang Puck.

Main topics

• River Cafe founding story and early restrictions
• Evolution of London food culture and dining aesthetics

Notable quotes

"Every table is a world and every person is a story."

Conclusion

The episode offers a reflective look at how a single restaurant can shape culinary

Transcript preview

Speaker 3 (0:00) This podcast is presented by Wildwood, the newest animated feature from Laika. See Wildwood in theaters October 23rd. Speaker 3 (0:14) Hello and welcome to Fashion People. I'm Lauren Sherman, writer of Huck's Fashion and Beauty Memo Line Sheet. And today with me on the show is Ruthie Rogers, owner and chef of The River Cafe. We're talking about eating, fashion, podcasting, and so much more. Speaker 3 (0:32) Before we get going, I wanted to remind you that if you like this podcast, you'll definitely love Puck, where I send an email called Line Cheat. If you're a fashion person, you get that reference. It's an original look at what's really going on inside the fashion and beauty industries. Line Cheat is scoopy, analytical, and above all, fun. Along with me, a subscription to Puck gains you access to an unmatched roster of experts reporting on powerful people and companies in entertainment, media, sports, politics, finance, the art world, and much more. If you're interested, listeners of Fashion People get a discount. Just go to puck.news slash fashion people to join Puck or start a free trial. Speaker 3 (1:16) Happy Friday, everyone. Hope you're having a great week. I am recording this very early because on Thursday night, I hosted a party with Shop My at Montezuma here in Paris. Thanks to everyone who came out between Schiaparelli and Isabel Marant. I was sad to miss them, but you know, duty calls and it was so fun. Big thanks to Tiffany and the rest of the Shop My team. They make it so easy. kinds of things the only reason we do them is to make connections and that's all shot my once is to like get to know people better and I also am a big fan of the product and and the team and think they're really upstanding Speaker 2 (1:55) people who are Speaker 3 (1:57) letting other people make a lot of money so The most fun part of it is, yes, introducing them to brands or deepening their relationships with brands, but also it's when a cool person comes and signs up for a Shopify account. I just love it. I love when people make money. Also, thanks to the guys at Montezuma. They're very nice to me. The wine is great and the food is even better. This week in line sheet, it's chock full. We've got show reports. We've got LVMH scoops. We've got... Do we have a caring scoop this week? I can't remember. Lots of coverage of Condé Nast, CEO Roger Lynch's exit. He's going to be the CEO of Mattel. Congrats to Roger. He never came on the podcast. I think, Roger, I think you need to do your exit interview on our podcast. We'll see. He's still on the Condé board. He probably won't do it. Anyway, as for the shows themselves, what I thought, Jacob Gallagher, everybody's second favorite fashion people guest. The first one's obviously Derek Blasberg. It's really Becky Malinsky and Marissa Meltzer. We know that. Marissa, come back. Anyway, Jacob's going to be on next week to discuss Paris. So far, I have liked a lot of Paris, but loved... just a little. I love Dries Van Donen. I thought it was definitely Julian's best show that he's done and one of the best shows of the season so far, if not the best. I'm going to write about it soon. By the time you listen to this, I'll probably have written about it. Obviously, love De Saint Laurent, the spectacle, but also the clothes and just like the intent behind it. On Dior, I was very pleased. I really enjoyed it. And I thought it was... clarity of vision, but also like, it just felt like. Jonathan Anderson was in control of the situation. Like he did what he wanted to do and the bags are really good and the shoes are really good and the clothes are cute. I've cute is it's probably that feels like it's, um, reductive and, and Jacob and I will talk more, but I, I really enjoyed it. Uh, Tom Ford obviously loved. Hyder Ackerman is incredible. And also the definitely wins for most handsome designer. Not that that matters, but he. He looks great on the runway next to all those models. Anyway, the clothes were really, really good. And again, the show was small. It was interesting. Only 200 people. Apparently only seven retailers were invited. So it just kind of tells you how tight the room is. So it was cool to be there. On the like young designer track, I haven't really been. blown away by anything. You know, the music though, this season has been so good. Lots of Nina Simone. Three shows had Nina Simone. I don't know what's going on. But you know, I get served a lot of Nina Simone on Spotify. So maybe there's like a Nina Simone lobbyist. Who knows? Jonathan Anderson had Al Stewart. The Dior soundtrack was amazing. I loved it. Crimson and Clover. It was so good. I mean, that kind of stuff, it does affect your opinion about a show. Speaker 3 (5:03) shopping. If you're in Paris, you should go shopping at Institut in the Marais for expert vintage. And if you want a pair of high heels, I highly recommend Kristen, Nina Kristen's brand. She has a shop across from Charvet. These shoes are really good. She is also the designer for Dior. She used to design shoes at the Row. And before that, she worked at Bottega. I believe she also worked for Phoebe Philo. But Dior shoes she's doing are amazing as well. She's really, really good. And her brand, I mean, it looks so different from Dior. And I think it's really smart of these shoe designers always have like seven jobs. It's kind of like Trevor does Herbert Levine, but also did Versace shoes. There's a few of these shoe designers. And I just think she's really, really good. I bought a pair of her shoes during the summer. And they are incredibly comfortable. And so, yeah, if you want shoes, I would go there. Or Phoebe, of course. And just know, if you do go into Charvet, they currently only have women's shirts in white. Because I stopped in because I really want a purple shirt or like lavender. And I was like, yeah, maybe I'll just get one off the rack. And I tend to wear their women's shirts when I don't do custom, not their men's. I have a couple men's, but I like the women's a bit. more for just for me and she was like I'm very sorry we only have white shirts they had some caftan gown things in colors but like that's not for me and then I looked at the men's and the men's was it was pretty bare bone as well and then I was like well can I just go look at the custom and they were like yes you can have an appointment on October 29th or something so it just There's a lot going on. Essentially what I gleaned is that since the Chanel announcement, the number of women looking for shirts has grown exponentially. Because the reality is like, that's a place for guys to buy shirts to wear it with suits to work, where they wear like a Navy suit. So yeah, it's just not like typical, but I'm sure they'll start to manage it. And you Speaker 1 (7:12) know, it is what it is. Speaker 3 (7:14) We love Charbet. Also, I went in there and was still chilling there at like 10 a.m. on a fashion weekday. So they are managing it. I'm, you know, I'm a fan. Anyway, I hope you have a great week. Maybe I'll see you this weekend somewhere. And I'll be back on Monday. And I hope you enjoy this conversation with Ruthie. I am a big fan of hers, not only because... I really like food and I like going out to eat. I go out to eat way too much and have always had amazing experiences at the River Cafe. I'm very interested in people and creators who are really influential on other, and her and Alice Waters are just so, have done so much. And, you know, as many people know, I'm a big fan of Jess Koslow's in LA. She has a restaurant called Squirrel. And I feel like Jess is sort of like the next generation of those people or the ladies who run King and Dean's and all that stuff in New York. Similar thing. Like they all sort of come from either. Alice or Ruthie and the lineage. And I like those restaurants and also the aesthetics of the Rue Cafe are truly amazing. But anyway, we had a nice conversation. We did talk about clothes and fashion a bit, but I more did it because I'm a fan of hers. I also got to sit with her at the Burberry show, which was a dream come true. I've had amazing seats this season. Not always, but I'd say nine times out of 10, I'm like, oh my God, I get to sit next to this person, which has been really fun. Anyway, this went really long. Enjoy Ruthie. And if you have any requests for Monday or Tuesday, sorry, when Jacob comes on, let me know. Speaker 1 (8:56) Ruthie Rogers, welcome to Fashion People. Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you. I really am excited because we met the other day and we had a great time talking one-to-one and I'm just happy to be invited. Thank you. It's such a Speaker 3 (9:12) pleasure. It was the dream seating at Burberry. I thank you to everybody, Alistair and Paul and all the people on that team who... who did that. It was very sweet. The first question we ask on Fashion People is actually a food question. So what did you have for breakfast this morning? Speaker 1 (9:30) This morning I had, I have three people staying with me. And so we had, we all had scrambled eggs and coffee. So it was nice. I had three men, I had Griffin Dunn and John Lesher and Josh Berger. So that was They'd all found a place, a room to sleep in, and we all had breakfast. Speaker 3 (9:51) Do you prepare the eggs, or does someone else do it? Speaker 1 (9:56) No, I do. I do it, yeah. How do you cook your eggs? I cook them slowly. So I scramble the egg. I get the eggs. I crack them into a bowl. And then I put one extra egg yolk in, which I learned when I was living in Paris, that you put always add an extra egg yolk. And they're the organic, you know, they're organic eggs. They've got beautiful yolks. And then I don't cook them. I have a friend who really cooks them slowly. And you may cook them very slowly and keep adding butter. That's, again, kind of, I think, a French way of doing them. But, you know, I do them. Very simply, I do put quite a lot of butter in the pan, obviously salt and pepper in the eggs, a tiny bit of water. And then I don't scramble them too fiercely. And then over very, very low heat, I just, with a wooden spoon, I just cook them quite slowly. And some people like them. I think we all kind of like them medium cooked. Speaker 3 (10:55) They sound perfect. And the extra egg yolk, I think I have heard that, but I've never tried it. Speaker 1 (11:01) Yeah. I think that... slightly embodies the way I like to cook, which is just a few ingredients and dough to add one more thing. I'm always saying to the cooks in the River Cafe, you know, do whatever you're doing and then take something away. You know, maybe that's the way you dress as well. Just take one thing away. Speaker 3 (11:19) It is a rule to live by. I think it is attributed to Coco Chanel, which in some ways, Ruthie, you are sort of the Coco Chanel of restaurants. Speaker 3 (11:30) You're so influential and so much of, in the same way Chanel, so many pieces and things that she did and ideas are used, are just kind of the backbone of fashion now. Like what? What would you say? Like jersey, gray jersey. Yeah. She was the first one to use that or the way pearls are worn casually. Speaker 3 (12:00) The quilting, obviously, the flat bag. Fragrance being, if you, like from the industry perspective, fragrance being the engine of the fashion business. That was sort of Chanel's the model for