Olivia Tiedemann, Live From Cherry Bombe House

Radio Cherry Bombe

Host Kerry Diamond interviews private chef and social media personality Olivia Tiedemann about her debut cookbook, 'Eat Like the Rich.' The

Key takeaways

• Olivia's cookbook 'Eat Like the Rich' uses a cheeky title intended to bridge the gap between high-end dining and accessible home cooking.
• Her culinary foundation was built through hands-on restaurant experience rather than traditional recipe reading or formal classroom study.

Main topics

• Cookbook launch and themes
• Private chef lifestyle

Notable quotes

Salads are a scam.

Conclusion

A celebratory look at how non-traditional culinary paths and digital s

Transcript preview

Speaker 5 (0:00) That was Olivia's Spotify playlist, by the way. I thought I came out here and I was like, that music sounds a little new agey for Olivia. I think we need to put on her playlist. Thank you all for being here today. It got so quiet. Okay, I'm going to do a little introduction and some housekeeping for all of you. Welcome to Cherry Bomb House. I'm Carrie Diamond, the founder of Cherry Bomb and host of our podcast, Radio Cherry Bomb. For those of you new to Cherry Bomb, and I know half this room is new to Cherry Bomb because we have never had this many guys at one of our events ever. So guys, thank you for being here. For those of you new to Cherry Bomb, we are a media company that's all about women and food, and we have the most amazing community known as the Bomb. Squad. We are recording this talk for Radio Cherry Bomb, so I would love for you to silence your phones if you have your phone on ring or vibrate. If you cough, drop something, want to applaud, scream out loud, that's totally cool. If you have any questions, hold them to the end. We are going to do audience Q &A. All Speaker 6 (0:57) right, let's go. Hi, everyone. Speaker 5 (1:00) Welcome to Radio Cherry Bomb Live from resident in the Meatpacking District. I am thrilled to welcome today's guest, Olivia Tiedemann. Speaker 5 (1:11) I met Olivia for the first time last year, right? Time flies in Ireland. We had a great time hanging out with the cows and eating a lot of cheese and butter, as you can imagine one does on a Kerrygold trip. I did read in the book that you call yourself a cheese hound. I Speaker 6 (1:27) am definitely a cheese hound. Yes. Speaker 5 (1:29) Best cheese and worst cheese. Best Speaker 6 (1:31) cheese and worst cheese. You know, I'm really not a fan of soft cheeses. or blue cheese. So like, I don't know how much of a cheese hound I can really call myself, but I love like a hard, really stinky kind of cheese. Speaker 5 (1:43) Love Speaker 6 (1:43) a provolone, love a parm. You Speaker 5 (1:46) did have a few derogatory things to say about cream cheese in the book now that I remember it. I stayed up late reading the book last night and I have to tell you all, you are in for such a treat. I mean, we're super lucky at Cherry Bomb. We get to see every cookbook known to man and woman. I never laughed as much. reading a cookbook. And it was so funny and so you. And congratulations. Thank Speaker 6 (2:09) you so much. I really do want to say my publishers have been really, really chill about me writing this book. I was very sure that I wanted to do it exactly how I wanted to do it. And they did not stop me at all to the point that I almost felt like they should at certain times. So Speaker 5 (2:24) I will say you got away with a lot. You may have raised the bar definitely in terms of F-bombs dropped in a cookbook. I think Julia Child only said fuck once in her cookbooks. The book is out tomorrow. So all of you get the book today, which is so exciting that you get a preview of this book before the rest of the world does. So congrats. I'm so proud of you. Thank you so much. Really amazing. And I also heard that the pre-sales are off the charts. We're really good friends with the folks up at Kitchen Arts and Letters, the culinary bookstore here in New York City. And they were just like, it's amazing. Speaker 6 (2:59) Really? Wow. Well, I've been under the gun, so. Talk to me about the title. Speaker 5 (3:05) It's not so obvious from the cover design, but inside the book and in all the promo, you have parentheses around the word like. Speaker 3 (3:13) So Speaker 5 (3:13) the title is either Eat the Rich or Eat Like the Rich. Were you sneaking in a message there? Speaker 6 (3:19) Definitely. I mean, it's definitely meant to be kind of a cheeky title. I actually wanted the like to be even smaller than it appears. I kind of wanted it to be almost handwritten and then just, you know, inserted really, really small. We played around with a couple. Janice is shaking her head over there. We played around with a couple different ways to do it. This ended up being the best way. But it's definitely meant to have kind of a double meaning. I was very excited when I came up with the title of this. I mean, Speaker 5 (3:45) show of hands, who thought it was the most brilliant title when you heard the title? I was just like, well done, Olivia. That's great. Is it fair to say you are the people's private chef? I Speaker 6 (3:56) think so. I mean, if all the people would like to have me in their house, I don't know if I can be there. Yeah, I would kind of say that. I think bridging the gap between those two worlds. And that is kind of a perfect call out of the title. That's sort of what's supposed to be happening here. Like anybody can eat like the rich and also maybe eat the rich occasionally, too. If it gets to Speaker 5 (4:17) that. If it gets to that. Could be headed in that direction. You are not a political person, though. It is a political title. Speaker 6 (4:24) Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't say I'm a super political person. I don't know that me being incredibly political would make sense in the world of food. I mean, I sell food. I sell cookbooks. I sell food media. I don't know that me having like a strong political opinion would make sense. I have some, but I don't think that's what anybody's listening to me for. I Speaker 5 (4:44) have no doubt you have strong opinions on everything, Olivia. I do think, though, you should send a personalized copy to AOC. Okay. Speaker 6 (4:49) I think she Speaker 5 (4:50) would appreciate that. Do Speaker 2 (4:51) you Speaker 5 (4:51) have her address? We can find it. We can certainly find it. When I was taking some notes, I typed the word private chef into my document. And instead, I accidentally typed pirate chef. And I thought, that's so funny. It's just one letter different. You know, are you a pirate chef? Speaker 6 (5:09) Yes. And you know what's really funny about that is I saw that in the notes that I received. And I was like, she doesn't even know that my father calls me that all the time. And that's like a term he uses to describe somebody that's a little bit, I don't know. fucked up sometimes and he'll say things like you know don't be a pirate right now or you're acting like a pirate so it's kind of a perfect way to describe my behavior at times yes i Speaker 5 (5:32) could see if you had one of those houses you know when you go to the shore and you see people like american flags out i imagine you would have like a pirate flag yeah Speaker 6 (5:39) hanging Speaker 5 (5:40) i should get one of Speaker 6 (5:41) those i should put one of those in front of my house as Speaker 5 (5:44) a warning Speaker 5 (5:47) So tell us how the cookbook came about. I never got the sense that you cooked from recipes. No, Speaker 6 (5:53) I've actually never really, and I don't know if I should or should not say this, but I was never like a huge reader of cookbooks or recipes in general. I learned a lot of cooking, working in restaurants and, you know, from other chefs and things like that. And something that was always kind of important to me was creating my own ideas. And I always felt like reading them or like following a recipe to a T was kind of. like inhibit me from forcing myself to learn more, like push a little bit harder. So writing the book, obviously, as a result was very difficult because I wasn't often writing recipes or reading them. So learning how to format them, learning how to make myself measure everything. It was a process. It's a lot. No Speaker 5 (6:36) doubt. Did you have to use recipe testers? Yeah. Speaker 6 (6:39) How was Speaker 5 (6:40) that process for you? Speaker 6 (6:41) It was really interesting. And I had a really great co-writer who helped me a ton with like understanding how recipes really need to be written. And because any little thing can go a different way. You wouldn't expect the kind of mistakes that people could make. So, yeah, a lot of testing. And I'm a little bit meticulous about things. So it was quite a long time of testing. Speaker 5 (7:02) Was it always your dream to have a cookbook? Speaker 6 (7:04) I didn't know that I could have half the dreams that I have now. I wouldn't say that it necessarily was, but when it came about, it was obviously really exciting. But a lot of things happened really fast. So I didn't really have a lot of time to think like, oh, my God, one day I could have a cookbook. It was just like, holy shit. Now I can do a lot of things that I never thought I could do. And yeah, then I met Janice actually very organically, which was funny. She was friends with my clients in the Hamptons and she would come to dinner. And then towards the end of the summer. I started making videos and doing things online. Like I already knew her. And she was like, are you interested in doing a book? And I was like, fuck, I guess I'm interested in doing everything. So we have Janice to thank. Thank you, Janice. Yes. Speaker 5 (7:45) What was the hardest part about doing it? Speaker 6 (7:48) Oh, man. Okay, well, this is a loaded question because the very first summer that I started writing the book and like started having actual deadlines for it, I did not realize how many jobs I had. So I was still working full time as a private chef that summer. I had this other job that required me to drive from the Hamptons down to the city like every four days to like film for this sort of little mini show. And I was writing this book. So I was working all day and night. Every single day. And I thought I could do the things together. Like while I was working, I thought I could be like writing down recipes and testing things, which somehow I did. But it did, you know, kind of ended in psychosis. That was really tough. But a lot of good work came out of that insane time. The bulk of the book really happened then. So it's just balancing. What was the most fun? The most fun? Hmm. Probably sitting in that pool in the robe. With the tomatoes. Like, once the book was written and we got to kind of do some of the more fun design photo things, I mean, yes. Yeah, that was really fun. That was a personal request of mine, that we do that. I actually wanted that to be the cover, but they said it didn't seem enough like a cookbook, and I was like, fair enough, and we put it on the back. Speaker 5 (9:06) I feel like this book is a little bit like a movie. There's so much fun stuff in there from like the titles of your chapters, the recipes, everything. And I don't want to spoil it, but there are a few things I do want to point out. You hate mayo, but you like truffle oil. Speaker 6 (9:23) Most Speaker 5 (9:23) chefs hate truffle oil. Speaker 6 (9:26) Yeah. I mean, hating mayo is pretty obvious. I don't know that I need to defend that. Mayo is pretty rancid. Truffle oil, though, like I don't use it a ton, but I don't hate it. I think it could add something to something. I think in the book it's in a salad dressing. It's not, you know, overly truffle oil. It's just adding something in the background. And if you're eating salad, you really need something in the background. Speaker 5 (9:47) That's a good lead up to the next thing. You say in the book that salads are a scam. Why is that? Speaker 6 (9:54) Salads are a scam. I mean, you know, what am I, a rabbit? Speaker 6 (10:00) I've never really just understood like eating a bowl of leaves. But if you like that, I really, I support you in your journey to be scammed, but I just won't do that for you. Speaker 5 (10:11) Today's episode of Radio Cherry Bomb is brought to you by California Prunes. For all you bakers, home cooks, and chefs out there, let's talk about an ingredient we love here at Cherry Bomb, California Prunes. They're a staple in my purse and in my pantry. California Prunes are naturally sweet with rich caramel-like notes. Their chewy texture adds flavor, moisture, and depth to all kinds of recipes, both sweet and savory. California prunes are the star ingredient in one of my favorite desserts, red wine prunes with mascarpone. The prunes are stewed in the wine with aromatic spices and served over the soft Italian cheese. They're also the star of another dish I love, the iconic chicken marbella, rich with prunes, olives, and capers. California prunes are also the perfect snack because they are super portable and a great source of fiber and nutrients that support gut, heart, and bone health. Give this versatile ingredient a spot in your kitchen and your life. For dozens of recipe ideas from baked goods to salads to smoothies, visit CaliforniaPrunes.org. Today's show is also presented by Whole Foods Market. At Cherry Bomb, we're always inspired by great ingredients, thoughtful sourcing, and the people behind the food we love. That's why we're excited to partner with Whole Foods Market. You Whole Foods fans out there know this, but Whole Foods Market is more than a grocery store. It's a destination for health and wellness. Their purpose is to nourish people and the planet, and that commitment comes through in everything they do, from supporting local makers, including so many founders and entrepreneurs in the Bomb Squad, to championing quality ingredients and responsible sourcing. I always discover something new when I shop at Whole Foods, whether it's a seasonal ingredient, an emerging food brand,