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234 | Nio DiPietrantonio: From Burnout to Bliss - A Chefs Journey to Purpose and Balance
Episode 234 • 29th April 2025 • Chef Life Radio: Empowering Culinary Leaders • Adam M Lamb
00:00:00 00:41:08

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In the high-pressure world of culinary arts, finding balance and purpose can be a challenge. As chefs, we often sacrifice our well-being for the sake of our craft. But what if there was a way to maintain our passion while prioritizing our mental and physical health?

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In this episode, I sit down with Chef Nio DiPietrantonio, a culinary professional who's experienced the ups and downs of the industry firsthand. We explore his journey from the intense restaurant scene to a more balanced role in senior living communities, and how this transition sparked a mission to support fellow hospitality workers.

A Shift in Perspective

Chef Nio shares his personal story of burnout and health struggles, including a wake-up call that forced him to reevaluate his career path. We discuss:

• The cultural shock of moving from traditional restaurants to senior living facilities

• Finding purpose and connection in cooking for a different demographic

• Balancing creativity with nutritional needs in healthcare settings

Building a Support Network

Inspired by his experiences, Chef Nio co-founded Serving Up Support Maine, a grassroots organization dedicated to helping hospitality workers. We delve into:

• The genesis of the organization during the pandemic

• Addressing issues like substance abuse, financial struggles, and mental health

• The importance of community and peer support in the industry

Changing the Narrative

Our conversation tackles the broader issues facing the culinary world and how we can work towards positive change:

• Challenging the "badge of honor" mentality around overwork and stress

• The need for leadership and adaptability training in culinary education

• Creating a more sustainable and supportive industry for future generations

This episode offers a candid look at the challenges facing culinary professionals and provides hope for a brighter future. Whether you're a seasoned chef or just starting your culinary journey, you'll find valuable insights on creating a more balanced and fulfilling career in the kitchen.

Key Takeaways:

• The importance of prioritizing mental and physical health in the culinary industry

• How changing work environments can lead to new perspectives and opportunities

• The power of community support in addressing industry-wide challenges

• Strategies for creating a more sustainable and supportive culinary culture

Join us as we explore the path to a healthier, more balanced culinary industry – one chef at a time.

Chapters

00:00 - Introduction to Chef Life Radio

00:17 - Meet Chef Neo DiPietrantonio

00:46 - The Origin of Serving Up Support Maine

01:11 - The Reality of Hospitality Work

04:54 - The Importance of Humility and Learning

07:15 - Struggles and Resilience in the Culinary World

12:34 - Transition to Senior Living Communities

15:04 - Challenges and Rewards of Senior Living Kitchens

21:27 - Balancing Flavor and Nutrition in Cooking

21:50 - Challenges of Working with Nutritionists

24:21 - Creating a Support Network During the Pandemic

26:43 - Founding Serving Up Support

28:48 - Mental Health in the Hospitality Industry

35:15 - The Importance of Leadership and Adaptability

40:12 - Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Stay Tall & Frosty and Lead from the Heart,

Adam

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Transcripts

Adam Lamb:

Welcome back to the Show Chef.

Adam Lamb:

What if I told you that burnout doesn't have to be the end of your story, that

Adam Lamb:

you could walk away from the chaos, not in defeat, but with clarity, purpose,

Adam Lamb:

and a deeper connection to your craft?

Adam Lamb:

In this episode of Chef Life Radio, I sit down with Chef Neo DiPietrantonio

Adam Lamb:

but not before completely butchering her name, who went from chasing perfection.

Adam Lamb:

High pressure restaurants to rediscovering balance, health and

Adam Lamb:

meaning in the most unexpected at places senior living communities.

Adam Lamb:

We talk about what it takes to slow down without giving up how creativity

Adam Lamb:

and care can coexist and why changing kitchens might just change your life.

Adam Lamb:

We also dive deep into the origin of serving up Support Maine, a

Adam Lamb:

grassroots initiative, chef Neo Co-founded to help hospitality workers.

Adam Lamb:

Battling burnout, substance abuse and mental health challenges,

Adam Lamb:

and why it's always true.

Adam Lamb:

That need is the mother of all invention.

Adam Lamb:

Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.

Adam Lamb:

This is a story about reinvention, resilience, and the radical idea that you

Adam Lamb:

don't have to suffer to prove you care.

Adam Lamb:

Whether you're just getting started in the industry or you're wondering how much

Adam Lamb:

longer you can hold on this one's for you.

Adam Lamb:

Stick around.

Adam Lamb:

We'll be back with all that and a whole lot more.

Adam Lamb:

Welcome to Chef Life Radio, the podcast dedicated to helping chefs and culinary

Adam Lamb:

leaders take control of their kitchens, build resilient teams, and create

Adam Lamb:

a thriving career in hospitality.

Adam Lamb:

I'm Chef Adam Lamb, your host, leadership coach, and industry veteran.

Adam Lamb:

If you're tired of high turnover.

Adam Lamb:

Burnout and the daily grind, you're not alone.

Adam Lamb:

This podcast is here to give you the real strategies, insights, and tools you

Adam Lamb:

need to lead with confidence, build a culture of excellence and craft a kitchen

Adam Lamb:

that works for you, not against you.

Adam Lamb:

Because the best kitchens don't just survive, they thrive.

Adam Lamb:

Hit that subscribe button and let's get started.

Adam Lamb:

Hey, chef, real quick.

Adam Lamb:

If you're digging the conversation and you want more tools, insight and

Adam Lamb:

mindset shifts to help you thrive, both in and out of the kitchen.

Adam Lamb:

Make sure you're signed up for the recipe for your success Newsletter

Adam Lamb:

Drops twice a month, totally free.

Adam Lamb:

It's packed with leadership tips, culture building strategies, and

Adam Lamb:

reminders to breathe before the burnout.

Adam Lamb:

Whether you're a head chef, a team leader, or just trying to figure out

Adam Lamb:

what's next, it's written for you.

Adam Lamb:

Hit the link in the show notes to get on the list and let's succeed together.

Adam Lamb:

And now back to the show

Adam Lamb:

because I'll have to do it again, so

Nio DiPietrantonio:

no worries.

Adam Lamb:

Say it one more time again.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

DiPietrantonio

Adam Lamb:

dri Dupri.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It's ridiculous.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I,

Adam Lamb:

I know.

Adam Lamb:

I'll say just Chef Nio.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's what everybody else does.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So

Adam Lamb:

really

Nio DiPietrantonio:

DiPietrantonio

Adam Lamb:

DiPietrantonio okay.

Adam Lamb:

Forget it.

Adam Lamb:

I'm, I'm a little tired.

Adam Lamb:

It's not you, it's me.

Adam Lamb:

It's always me.

Adam Lamb:

No, that's

Nio DiPietrantonio:

fine.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I hear you, brother.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I hear you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It's been a long day.

Adam Lamb:

And so, but you didn't even go to work today?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I didn't, but unfortunately my mom, she had

Nio DiPietrantonio:

a really bad accident at work.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

She fell and broke her leg last month.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

She's not able to get herself around, so I've been taking her to

Nio DiPietrantonio:

do like grocery shopping and to her physical therapy appointments and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

doctor's appointments and stuff.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So trying to help her get her life back on track.

Adam Lamb:

And do you find that, uh, for most of your

Adam Lamb:

life you have been a caretaker?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes, definitely.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes, for sure.

Adam Lamb:

Oh, it's fantastic.

Adam Lamb:

It's fantastic.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah, it's, I think one of the weird things is to actually understand

Adam Lamb:

that we're in a life of service.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I would say that's for probably the same for most people in

Nio DiPietrantonio:

the hospitality industry and for chefs.

Adam Lamb:

We

Nio DiPietrantonio:

give ourselves to people all day long.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

But we hold everybody else in judgment because they don't get it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's true.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's true.

Adam Lamb:

And the thing that I had to come to terms with is

Adam Lamb:

like no one will ever understand.

Adam Lamb:

So why am I expecting them to,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

at least to encourage the conversation, to have a little

Nio DiPietrantonio:

bit of empathy with each other to

Adam Lamb:

see

Adam Lamb:

Nio DiPietrantonio: where we're coming from.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

That very often gets into, I don't know, I spent lots of nights.

Adam Lamb:

Service bars way, way late.

Adam Lamb:

And inevitably the conversations get to this point where, you know,

Adam Lamb:

the, everybody just wants to bitch and be a victim of the circumstance.

Adam Lamb:

And that would've really hit me is no, I made this choice, so therefore

Adam Lamb:

I have no right complaint about it.

Adam Lamb:

And the cool thing is, is like understanding that I

Adam Lamb:

have the power to change it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We do.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And we did.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'd say for sure we did choose the life, but that doesn't mean

Nio DiPietrantonio:

that we can't make it better for ourselves and for other generations.

Adam Lamb:

Couldn't agree more.

Adam Lamb:

Couldn't agree more.

Adam Lamb:

So tell me one thing that you want me to know and tell me one thing

Adam Lamb:

that you don't want me to know.

Adam Lamb:

How about

Nio DiPietrantonio:

you?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

All right.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Let's see.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

One thing I want you to know is that I take a lot of pride in what I do,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

but I don't want my pride to ever get in the way of learning something.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And that, I think that's easy to do, especially in our industry where we have

Nio DiPietrantonio:

a certain body of knowledge and we get to a point where we're like, I know how to do

Nio DiPietrantonio:

that, but you also have to learn to hold yourself in a certain level of humility.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Mm-hmm.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And that's something I am very aware of in myself to.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Take a step back and be like, okay, check your ego and pay attention

Nio DiPietrantonio:

to what's going on in front of you.

Adam Lamb:

It's very admirable for sure because that takes,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

it's hard,

Adam Lamb:

a bit of maturity.

Adam Lamb:

That doesn't necessarily happen right outta the gate.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

You have to fall on your face a couple times.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

First, first to get there.

Adam Lamb:

Oh yeah.

Adam Lamb:

That's so much fun.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It sure.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Let's call it that.

Adam Lamb:

And one thing that you don't want us to know about you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I don't want you to know how sensitive I am.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I do take criticism very personally, even as I got older.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So I try to be very stone faced when someone's saying they don't like something

Nio DiPietrantonio:

or something didn't hit well or land well.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I'll just be like, okay, thank you for the feedback.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

But then inside I'm like crying.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm sad and I'm like, I'm trying to put that wall up of like shame

Nio DiPietrantonio:

that I had because it didn't come out the way I wanted it to.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And it's learning to separate my emotions from my, my aptitude.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And to just to learn from that experience and not take it personally.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

I think it's, I think it's a given that if you're in this life, if you're in

Adam Lamb:

this career, you're already sensitive.

Adam Lamb:

That's true.

Adam Lamb:

It takes a certain bit of sensitivity to be able to work with, really find products

Adam Lamb:

and the nuances of flavor and be able to.

Adam Lamb:

Have some sort of reverence for where they came from and where they're gonna be, and

Adam Lamb:

yet we put ourselves out there every day.

Adam Lamb:

It becomes almost like a self-fulfilling fantasy that we want criticism,

Adam Lamb:

even though we don't want it.

Adam Lamb:

Does that make sense?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Absolutely.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I went to art school.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

My degree is actually in fine arts, so that's where like my passion started when

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I was a a kid, fresh outta high school.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I've always loved cooking, but when you put out a piece of work, whether

Nio DiPietrantonio:

it's a painting or a plate or a pastry or something like that, and you put it

Nio DiPietrantonio:

in front of somebody and they don't like it, you're like, Ugh, I just put all

Nio DiPietrantonio:

this work and effort and love into it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Why don't you like it?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And then you gotta take a step back and be like, okay, why don't they like it?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

What can I do better next time?

Adam Lamb:

One of the things that I'll say that I don't want anybody to know

Adam Lamb:

is that typically what would happen is I would work really hard on like a

Adam Lamb:

particular beer dinner or wine dinner or huge event and be charging all the

Adam Lamb:

way up to the minute the plates hit the table, and then I always had this

Adam Lamb:

huge sense of depression afterwards.

Adam Lamb:

I don't know what I was expecting.

Adam Lamb:

Did I have an expectation that people were just gonna jump up or

Adam Lamb:

whatever, and then that didn't happen.

Adam Lamb:

I'm not quite sure that's it, but I just understood innately that

Adam Lamb:

that's a shit load of energy to put into something that for most folks,

Adam Lamb:

will be forgotten in about 48 hours.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I can understand that there's a certain level of

Nio DiPietrantonio:

expectation versus reality where you build something up in your head.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

How much work went into that event and when it feels like it's not appreciated,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

that can be very demoralizing.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah, and that's why I, a lot of my coaching is around, I hear

Adam Lamb:

time and time again how chefs feel like not appreciated or not valued,

Adam Lamb:

and I had to come through the fire myself only to understand that if

Adam Lamb:

I'm expecting someone else to value me, then I'll be waiting a long time.

Adam Lamb:

Like no one will ever be able to know what we do.

Adam Lamb:

The nuance and the effort and the passion, the calculation and the

Adam Lamb:

time travel and all that stuff.

Adam Lamb:

And so when we come back to the space of, we expect everyone

Adam Lamb:

else to know that's, that I don't think that's fair of us to them.

Adam Lamb:

And again, becomes like a, forgive the word, but a circle jerk.

Adam Lamb:

It's almost, geez, what are we gonna do now?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

No, I, I can understand that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I think too, maybe a certain aspect of that social media has helped and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

hurt in a way because it shows, we see a lot of, especially with younger

Nio DiPietrantonio:

chefs taking these elaborate videos and photos of the work that they

Nio DiPietrantonio:

do and the work that goes into it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And that's great, but it, they also don't show necessarily what goes on

Nio DiPietrantonio:

in the background, the long hours.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

The cleanup, the having to stay late to take care of the dishes and the, the

Nio DiPietrantonio:

weekly cleanups of scrubbing out the ovens and the ranges and the salamander,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

and taking everything apart and taking apart a greaser and all that stuff.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And that's the real kitchen life that people don't see.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And sometimes when they come from culinary school or what have you, and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

step into that world, they're like, whoa.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

Like even just mopping a floor.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

There is joy to be found even in mopping the floor.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It's a very zen experience, especially after a crazy

Nio DiPietrantonio:

shift when you just have that, like there's silence in the restaurant and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

there's silence in the dining room and everything else is clean and you're

Nio DiPietrantonio:

mopping the last thing of the day.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It's a very.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Centering time, which is you need after a busy day

Adam Lamb:

for sure.

Adam Lamb:

Now you got a lot of, I was very intrigued by watching your, or reading

Adam Lamb:

your content on LinkedIn because it resonated so deeply with me because I

Adam Lamb:

wish our paths had crossed because it seems like you and I have a very similar

Adam Lamb:

aesthetic, and so that's why I wanted to bring you on the show, and there's

Adam Lamb:

several things that we want to get into.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I appreciate

Adam Lamb:

that.

Adam Lamb:

But before that, why don't you let the listeners know how you got here?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah, of course.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So I've been in the hospitality industry since I was 16 years old.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I started as actually a hostess for a chain restaurant up here in New

Nio DiPietrantonio:

England, like a mom and pop kind of aesthetic where it's like a burger joint,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

milkshakes, ice cream, that kind of thing.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And at that point we had some chefs who just decided not

Nio DiPietrantonio:

to show up for work one day.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So my manager's like, Hey, can you hop back there and help?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I was 17 at this point and I'm like.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Sure.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Okay.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So that's how I got started cooking, and I found I really liked it back there.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I liked being creative.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I liked learning about different styles of cooking because that's where I

Nio DiPietrantonio:

have a very strong Italian background, as you can tell by my last name.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm a third generation immigrant, which is really cool.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I learned how to cook WIC and with like my Nona in the kitchen

Nio DiPietrantonio:

when I was little, so that really.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Spoke to me on a deeper level.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So learning how to cook is where I stayed.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I picked up some other part-time jobs as I stayed in that role, learning

Nio DiPietrantonio:

how to cook from other, other really great chefs who were willing to teach me.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I eventually got to be like a manager, a general manager.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I served as a director for a very short period of time.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It's just 'cause I didn't really, I didn't like leaving home that much

Nio DiPietrantonio:

and leaving the state that much.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Um, and then I just went back into cooking and all that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

But during the pandemic, obviously is when a lot of

Nio DiPietrantonio:

hospitality folks were struggling.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Myself included, it was a little bit before the pandemic that I actually

Nio DiPietrantonio:

had a small stroke while I was at work.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Boy, oh boy.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah, it was not a good time.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I was working, I would say, anywhere between 14 to 18 hour days at this point,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

just because we were very short staffed.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I was working as both a cook and a manager, and.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Dual roles, which is never fun when you're a restaurant manager.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I was also abusing like caffeine pills at the time just to

Nio DiPietrantonio:

be able to get through my shifts.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I. And on top of that I was having like three energy drinks a day.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Very healthy lifestyle.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Don't recognize.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Right, exactly.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I was also, unfortunately going through a rough divorce, my husband

Nio DiPietrantonio:

was struggling with a substance abuse problem, so I was not in a

Nio DiPietrantonio:

good space mentally or physically.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And that's what eventually led me to that, that unfortunate health event.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And it forced me to make some lifestyle changes and that's how I got into

Nio DiPietrantonio:

cooking for a senior living community.

Adam Lamb:

So when you say lifestyle choices, like what were some of

Adam Lamb:

the lifestyle choices that you decided to make at that time?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I had my, I had to go to the hospital obviously because of

Nio DiPietrantonio:

what happened, and I saw a neurologist and I still see her a couple times a year.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And she told me that I needed to consider a career change at that point.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And that made me so depressed because I didn't wanna stop

Nio DiPietrantonio:

doing what I loved doing.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And the narrative I kept being here, being told from my doctors was

Nio DiPietrantonio:

that this lifestyle is killing you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That this job is bad for you, that like you, you need to get out.

Adam Lamb:

Boy.

Adam Lamb:

Oh boy.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And when you keep hearing that from people who are educated, and I

Nio DiPietrantonio:

assume that they were smarter than me, telling me that you need to stop

Nio DiPietrantonio:

doing this thing that you love, it's.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It hurts.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It made me sad and I was very conflicted and I was fortunate enough that one

Nio DiPietrantonio:

of my cook buddies was like, Hey, I know this place that's looking for

Nio DiPietrantonio:

a chef that I think would probably be better 'cause it's less stressful

Nio DiPietrantonio:

than what you're doing right now.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I'm like, all right, hey, I'll check it out and look into it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I'm really glad that I did because I think the lifestyle fits me a lot better.

Adam Lamb:

So let's talk about the lifestyle change.

Adam Lamb:

So you went from standalone restaurant, small chain.

Adam Lamb:

To a senior living facility.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And

Adam Lamb:

so just culture

Nio DiPietrantonio:

shock.

Adam Lamb:

I'm just kind curious about that mindset of, okay, I still wanna do

Adam Lamb:

this, but I need something that's I, I don't know, less intense or whatever.

Adam Lamb:

Let's say that that's the phrase.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's what I was thinking.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I was in the mindset that it wouldn't be as like I didn't have to deal with

Nio DiPietrantonio:

online orders and delivery orders and in-house orders and bouncing back and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

forth between manager duties or going to other restaurants to bail them out when

Nio DiPietrantonio:

they didn't have enough staff members.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Sure.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And just the absolute chaos of being in a restaurant versus being in like

Nio DiPietrantonio:

a kitchen with a couple of other chefs, taking care of like older

Nio DiPietrantonio:

folks is what I just imagined it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I just make 'em like a grilled cheese or something.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's was the first thing that came into my mind, and it's not like

Nio DiPietrantonio:

that in case anyone's wondering.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Right.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

But it was a culture shock when I got there.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

But I will say that I think that it's a much better fit for me

Nio DiPietrantonio:

because it's cooking with a purpose.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It's serving what I think is a, a community that really needs

Nio DiPietrantonio:

more support and engagement.

Adam Lamb:

Talk a little bit more about that.

Adam Lamb:

The need, I guess, is the thing that comes up as the way you said it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

There's not a whole lot, or What I will say is that I see a

Nio DiPietrantonio:

lot of turnover, of course in restaurants.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Everybody knows that hospitality has an incredibly high turnover rate, but

Nio DiPietrantonio:

even in senior living communities, the turnover rate is just as bad.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I worked at one facility where tenured service was considered

Nio DiPietrantonio:

two years, and I'm like, okay.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

But when we.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

When I work in the kitchen, I'm working in right now, we have five chefs and that's

Nio DiPietrantonio:

unheard of for the ones that I've been in.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Usually it's like one, two, or three people, three working

Nio DiPietrantonio:

at one time, if you're lucky.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And they don't tend to stay long just because it is a little

Nio DiPietrantonio:

different in the terms of you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

You see the same people every day, and if they don't like something, they're going

Nio DiPietrantonio:

to tell you in no uncertain terms what was wrong with it, why it was wrong, and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

why you should be ashamed of yourself.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

You have to get very comfortable hearing extremely direct feedback from people.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

But that can also be very refreshing.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And when you're working with a senior population, you get to

Nio DiPietrantonio:

know them on a deeper level.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

These are people you see every day and you're encouraged to go out and spend

Nio DiPietrantonio:

time with them and do activities with them and engage with their families

Nio DiPietrantonio:

and spend time in the dining room.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

They even ask us to go out and share a meal with them at least once a week.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

I, I also worked at a senior living facility.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Um,

Adam Lamb:

and I think the thing that shocked me the most was

Adam Lamb:

I hadn't counted on acknowledging the amount of stress that I put myself under

Adam Lamb:

on a daily basis, and I reflected that.

Adam Lamb:

When you're on the street, it's just not that one plate you put out.

Adam Lamb:

It's the 10 people that they're gonna tell and the 10 people that they're gonna tell.

Adam Lamb:

And before you know it, I'm living underneath a bridge in a

Adam Lamb:

cardboard box with my Natty ice.

Adam Lamb:

And so there's that kind of mania that's expected, even if it's just a slow burn.

Adam Lamb:

Some people internalize it, don't really put it out that much, but

Adam Lamb:

it's still that kind of manic desire to keep everything up.

Adam Lamb:

Which I'm, I'm sure you experienced when, you know you had your little stroke.

Adam Lamb:

I mean, shit.

Adam Lamb:

Gotta keep going.

Adam Lamb:

Gotta keep going.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Absolutely.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's the hustle culture.

Adam Lamb:

And then you get back into the, you get back into the

Adam Lamb:

senior living facility and all of a sudden everybody's like, just chill.

Adam Lamb:

Just chill bad.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's, it was such a culture shock because I was used to just

Nio DiPietrantonio:

running back and forth, get to this meal, get to this station, get to this order,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

get to this prep, put this away, and then when I get there it's just, oh, we've got

Nio DiPietrantonio:

a couple hours to put together this meal.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We have some stuff we gotta put away.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

They're starting an activity in an hour and a half if you wanna

Nio DiPietrantonio:

go participate in an activity.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I'm like, what are you even talking about?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

What is an activity?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

What do we do?

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

And I thought it was, it was such an interesting thing.

Adam Lamb:

I was there probably about three weeks before I recognized, I started

Adam Lamb:

falling in love with the residents and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

absolutely

Adam Lamb:

hadn't expected that.

Adam Lamb:

Because to your point, you see them every day.

Adam Lamb:

And I thought that would be a bad thing.

Adam Lamb:

But what I recognize is it's a perfect feedback loop.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Absolutely.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And it, it can be really intimidating because you are gonna meet those people

Nio DiPietrantonio:

who are a little extra spicy, I like to say, and they'll, they'll tell you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

What the hell did you guys do to dinner last night?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That was the worst thing I ever had.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Oh my God.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And how they'll be like, oh yeah, breakfast was amazing.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Thank you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Great job.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm like, oh, thanks.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah, thanks.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Feedback.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah, and it's, it's weird to like, um, again, there's

Adam Lamb:

that thing about the energy.

Adam Lamb:

Like I felt my body just settling into itself and someone pulled me on the side

Adam Lamb:

and like, I was in my, I was in my thing, I was in my jam and someone pulled me

Adam Lamb:

off the side like, what are you doing?

Adam Lamb:

I'm doing my thing, man.

Adam Lamb:

And.

Adam Lamb:

You don't understand.

Adam Lamb:

You got 650 fans here.

Adam Lamb:

They want you to try stuff, they want you to fail.

Adam Lamb:

They want you to like, at least something's changing, right?

Adam Lamb:

They can see it in front of their eyes.

Adam Lamb:

Like they want you to experiment.

Adam Lamb:

So don't think that you're gonna that, that this is a place where they're gonna

Adam Lamb:

criticize you until you walk out the door, because it depends on your skillset.

Adam Lamb:

But um, and the other thing that's probably a lot of people don't understand.

Adam Lamb:

Who've never worked in that market segment.

Adam Lamb:

Is that weird thing about seeing folks transition?

Adam Lamb:

I.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So if you work, it depends on obviously what community you work in.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Sure.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Because I, I went from originally independent care to assisted living care.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And when you move to those communities, you do have people who live in an

Nio DiPietrantonio:

independent lifestyle, meaning that they, they don't need necessarily medical

Nio DiPietrantonio:

assistance or mobility assistance, but when you move into assisted

Nio DiPietrantonio:

living, that usually means that you need help doing something somewhere.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And then we also have what they call a memory care unit, which is for people

Nio DiPietrantonio:

who are obviously struggling with, um.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Mental ability or memory loss, things of that nature.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And when you work in a senior living community, you do see that transition from

Nio DiPietrantonio:

when somebody, it might be independent to moving to assisted living and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

eventually up to the memory care unit, and they might start forgetting certain

Nio DiPietrantonio:

things or remembering that they don't.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I. That they don't like certain things or they don't like to eat certain things or

Nio DiPietrantonio:

it, and then it's just, it's disheartening and saddening at the same time.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

As much as you love this person because you see them every day,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

they're part of your family now.

Adam Lamb:

Yep.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And that can be very hard to watch.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

Some folks could be on property for 20 years because they spend most of that time

Adam Lamb:

in independent living and whether it's a little cottage or whatever, and then

Adam Lamb:

they start moving to the interior of the property where the more intense care is.

Adam Lamb:

And it's almost.

Adam Lamb:

I got really emotionally invested in the residents.

Adam Lamb:

I had a group of, I don't know, 15.

Adam Lamb:

After I got there, they pulled me into a room, had a meeting with me,

Adam Lamb:

and the one guy is saying, listen, you know I have prostate cancer.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I said,

Adam Lamb:

when I eat the food, my PSA is like 15, and when I stop eating it

Adam Lamb:

and eat at home, it comes down to six.

Adam Lamb:

Adam, you gotta help

Nio DiPietrantonio:

me.

Adam Lamb:

Like you gotta help me.

Adam Lamb:

Like I know that food is medicine and if I don't get the right nutrition,

Adam Lamb:

you know it's gonna be short.

Adam Lamb:

But once they moved, it seemed, once they moved into the building,

Adam Lamb:

it was like, yeah, weeks or months.

Adam Lamb:

I. Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And that's a big thing too, is that they care about

Nio DiPietrantonio:

flavor as much as anything else.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

But we also have to take into account nutrition needs.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We have to learn how to cook without salt in a lot of issues, which can be

Nio DiPietrantonio:

very challenging for, for some chefs.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Is that you have to learn to create flavor without salt or without sometimes fat or

Nio DiPietrantonio:

without dairy because you have to cater to a lot of different diverse needs.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

And you're also in partnership with a nutritionist.

Adam Lamb:

You submit your menus and the nutritionist comes back, green

Adam Lamb:

beans are a starch, right?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And uh,

Adam Lamb:

you've got two starch.

Adam Lamb:

You do have to

Nio DiPietrantonio:

work with the nutritionist, which is it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It can be difficult.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I've worked with some good ones and some bad ones.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

But a lot of times what I've noticed is that they just, you'll work with

Nio DiPietrantonio:

a nutritionist who also doesn't really know how to cook either.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's correct.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

They'll come up with some of these crazy recipes that make absolutely

Nio DiPietrantonio:

no sense, and I'm like, how did you even come up with this?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm like, oh, somebody submitted it to us.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm like, this is garbage.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

They're not gonna eat this.

Adam Lamb:

It's a very interesting way to work.

Adam Lamb:

You know, wield your craft, like in partnership with these people.

Adam Lamb:

Like to your point, someone's always coming in with a recipe

Adam Lamb:

like, they wanna try this and I had this with my nana, or whatever.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

And you're almost kind of,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

yeah, sure, why not?

Adam Lamb:

I could sit there and kick my feet or whatever, but it

Adam Lamb:

just seems so much easier just to, yeah, let's be together.

Adam Lamb:

I started a little newsletter every week and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I love that I

Adam Lamb:

kept saying, we're all in this together.

Adam Lamb:

I did it.

Adam Lamb:

It wasn't completely altruistic.

Adam Lamb:

They were used to raspberries in December and I'm like, I only

Adam Lamb:

get so many dollars per month.

Adam Lamb:

Per year.

Adam Lamb:

Yes.

Adam Lamb:

I'd rather spend that on high quality meats

Nio DiPietrantonio:

during

Adam Lamb:

budget.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

I started doing a commodity report and they were like, oh yeah, strawberries

Adam Lamb:

are getting really expensive.

Adam Lamb:

We're gonna stop having, yeah, man, because I wanna keep giving

Adam Lamb:

you this really great, these great proteins and vegetables, and so

Adam Lamb:

not only are you working in.

Adam Lamb:

In assisted living, senior care, but then you decide that you're gonna

Adam Lamb:

dedicate a portion of your life to.

Adam Lamb:

Hospitality mental health.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So when I was going through my own mental health struggles is when I actually

Nio DiPietrantonio:

discovered the Burnt Chef Project.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I know you're a big advocate and I'm, I appreciate that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It was very cool and that I was listening to Chris Hall doing a podcast when

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I was actually doing like Job Post Searchings one time, and he was talking

Nio DiPietrantonio:

about how that we shouldn't have to give up doing something that we love

Nio DiPietrantonio:

just because everyone's telling us that it's broken or it's wrong, or.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

For whatever reason that it's fundamentally flawed and that it needs to,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

it does need to change, but we shouldn't have to walk away from it to make it work.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I was sitting there like aggressively nodding.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

As I'm scrolling through indeed looking at job postings, I'm

Nio DiPietrantonio:

like, okay, why am I doing this?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I don't want to leave, but I need to figure out a way to make this better.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And what happened during the pandemic is that it was a small group of us

Nio DiPietrantonio:

who were actually like in a text-based chat from different restaurants,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

and we were all talking about the different struggles we were having.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So one of our coworkers has two special needs kids, and she was

Nio DiPietrantonio:

having trouble finding care for them because in the middle of the

Nio DiPietrantonio:

pandemic everything was shut down.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And another one of our.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

One of our support group members at the time wasn't able to afford enough

Nio DiPietrantonio:

food, so they were looking for a food pantry that was still operating in our

Nio DiPietrantonio:

area so that they could get groceries for the week, and other members

Nio DiPietrantonio:

started suggesting resources for that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

They'd be like, oh, check out this.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

This pantry on this street, in this in your area, or check out

Nio DiPietrantonio:

like the Autism Society of Maine because they might be able to help

Nio DiPietrantonio:

you find resources for helping with your kids and stuff like that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And it was that little support group that we decided, why

Nio DiPietrantonio:

doesn't everybody have this?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Why doesn't every restaurant have a group of people just willing

Nio DiPietrantonio:

to look out for each other?

Adam Lamb:

Isn't that interesting?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes, yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Especially with how cliquey it can be.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm sure you've worked with plenty of chefs and plenty of groups where it was

Nio DiPietrantonio:

very like tight knit and everybody knew what was going on in each other's lives,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

and that's just, that's what we do.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We see these people sometimes 80, 90 hours a week.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We are typically a family.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Whether or not we wanna admit it,

Adam Lamb:

we are spending more time with them than our families.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes, I certainly was.

Adam Lamb:

And so this starts as.

Adam Lamb:

For lack of a better word, no one else is doing it, so we might as well do it.

Adam Lamb:

Right.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Essentially.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We wanted to create, we wanted to take our support network and make it bigger.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We wanted to be able to include more people in it and get more people

Nio DiPietrantonio:

involved and try to find more resources.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We wanted to try to find more like food pantries to help

Nio DiPietrantonio:

battle in food insecurity.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We wanted to try to help people with, if they were struggling with

Nio DiPietrantonio:

financial problems to help with like debt counseling and things like that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

The, unfortunately, the pandemic hurt a lot of people in a lot of restaurants and

Nio DiPietrantonio:

people were struggling to pay their bills.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So trying to find people to help with paying bills was good.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And any kind of resource like that, that would help.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And, uh, substance use is very high in the hospitality industry, so trying to

Nio DiPietrantonio:

help people find clinics that they could get into to, to help them battle their.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Their substance use disorders.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's another big one.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

And

Nio DiPietrantonio:

trying to collect resources to help all of these

Nio DiPietrantonio:

people with these things is what we decided we wanted to do as a group.

Adam Lamb:

And so that turned into

Nio DiPietrantonio:

serving up Support me.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It's a nonprofit organization.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We decided to turn it officially into an organization.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It's me and two other former restaurant managers.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Unfortunately, they're no longer in the hospitality industry, but they're

Nio DiPietrantonio:

invested in helping to make it better.

Adam Lamb:

Chris Hall from the Burnt Chef Project.

Adam Lamb:

Not a chef, not in the industry.

Adam Lamb:

He was servicing the industry.

Adam Lamb:

He was a salesperson and he kept going into these kitchens and just hearing

Adam Lamb:

all the horror stories and said, shit, someone's gotta do something.

Adam Lamb:

But it seems to me, catkins, there's so many people from the outside

Adam Lamb:

who will listen to our stories, then go, oh, we need to help them.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

No, like a Sarah McLaughlin commercial.

Adam Lamb:

No, but I'm just saying, very few of us, very few of us were like going,

Adam Lamb:

oh, let's get together and do something until the pandemic, which I think.

Adam Lamb:

From my perspective was a good thing.

Adam Lamb:

It hurt a lot of people, and I don't want to demean that, but I also

Adam Lamb:

understand that this is a great opportunity for us to reset the

Adam Lamb:

industry, our culture, if not now when.

Adam Lamb:

And some of that's panned out and some of that hasn't panned out.

Adam Lamb:

So I celebrate the fact that you started as a grassroots

Adam Lamb:

organization just because you could.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's exactly what it was, is I wanted

Nio DiPietrantonio:

to make a difference here.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I wanted to help more people here because I've unfortunately

Nio DiPietrantonio:

lost people to, to overdoses.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I've lost people to alcoholism and I've lost friends just

Nio DiPietrantonio:

from just leaving the industry.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

People I still talk to, but were just so burnt out from the way

Nio DiPietrantonio:

that they were treated by people or by their managers, or just by.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

The very nature of the business that they're like,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I just can't do this anymore.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It's crushing my soul.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I don't want that to keep happening.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I want people to be excited to be in the industry.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm excited to be in the industry.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I just needed to find my niche.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

Like the meme, like I just want chefs to be happy again.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Essentially.

Adam Lamb:

I really want them to enjoy their work.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Happy chefs create innovative dishes and you can

Nio DiPietrantonio:

taste it in the food when they're happy and when they're not happy.

Adam Lamb:

Well, it's no secret that anger cooks make shitty food.

Adam Lamb:

So

Nio DiPietrantonio:

yes, agreed.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

You can taste the impatience.

Adam Lamb:

And so what does it look like now moving forward for this organization?

Adam Lamb:

I think in 2024 you guys won an award.

Adam Lamb:

You're.

Adam Lamb:

For your efforts?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Yes.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We got a best innovative mental health approach for 2024 from best

Nio DiPietrantonio:

of best review, which is really cool.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Very unexpected, but very cool.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And it's just, it's nice that it's being seen as a movement.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It also feels like maybe in a way it's, oh, helping people that's so novel.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And it's just, it feels like if it was any other industry, it maybe it would've

Nio DiPietrantonio:

been taken more seriously earlier, but because it's hospitality, and hospitality

Nio DiPietrantonio:

is generally seen as being like low income or lower skills are needed to do the job,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

that it's just seemed like a throwaway job or a throwaway industry, and it's not.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Hospitality is everything and everywhere in our society,

Adam Lamb:

it couldn't be more.

Adam Lamb:

I gotta ask, how you feeling?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm feeling good.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm definitely, one of the challenges of working in senior living is that you

Nio DiPietrantonio:

do run the risk of losing residents.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Mm-hmm.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And we actually, within the last two weeks, we've lost four just from different

Nio DiPietrantonio:

things, unfortunately, like memory care, dementia and illness, general illness.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And there were four people I really cared about, and it's hard

Nio DiPietrantonio:

to have time to process that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Especially because the care staff also doesn't really get a chance to process it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And these are people that you work closely with and they don't get the opportunity

Nio DiPietrantonio:

to cry and grieve because they have hundreds of other people to take care of.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So you carry that with you and you miss it when you don't see those people in the

Nio DiPietrantonio:

dining room anymore at their usual tables.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So not having that space to grieve there is challenging, but you have to

Nio DiPietrantonio:

make time to grieve and to appreciate the people for who they were.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And, uh, yeah.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

For your emotional healths

Adam Lamb:

and physically.

Adam Lamb:

Nio DiPietrantonio: Physically, I'm doing better.

Adam Lamb:

I'm doing well.

Adam Lamb:

I do have to take medications for life, it certain meds that I have to take, but they

Adam Lamb:

keep me happy, they keep me well focused.

Adam Lamb:

All the big free things that I need to do my job well, and to

Adam Lamb:

be able to be a better person.

Adam Lamb:

I need to be present for my family and I need to be present for my

Adam Lamb:

husband and to be who I wanna be.

Adam Lamb:

And so how long you think you're gonna be able to do this?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm gonna keep doing it as long as I can.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I, I don't see it ending.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I wanna see us grow.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I wanna see our organization grow.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I wanna see the Burnt Chef Project grow because I'm an ambassador.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I wanna bring that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I would love to have the Burnt Chef Project in the Burnt Chef

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Academy in every restaurant.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I think everyone should take the courses if they can.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Same thing with like healthy hospital courses.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Same thing with the chow organization.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I think everyone should go to a chow meeting at least once just to

Nio DiPietrantonio:

see what it's about, because having that catharsis is so important.

Adam Lamb:

I love the Wednesday night meetings.

Adam Lamb:

I dial in whenever I can.

Adam Lamb:

It's the men's only group, and I've done a lot of men's work, so that's a

Adam Lamb:

great environment for me to drop into.

Adam Lamb:

And I love the fact that sobriety is not a prerequisite to being there, right?

Adam Lamb:

So you still have to handle yourself, but the point you can't go and smash.

Adam Lamb:

But, but the point is like, they welcome all and it's, I, I.

Adam Lamb:

I've been beating the drum since about 2008 about these issues and

Adam Lamb:

thought to myself like, no one else is gonna clean this shit up, man.

Adam Lamb:

This is our mess.

Adam Lamb:

It's our responsibility.

Adam Lamb:

And I know a lot of these organizations were starting before the pandemic, but

Adam Lamb:

of course, during and after is really where it came up because they think.

Adam Lamb:

To a certain extent, we, the industry lost the narrative because now all of

Adam Lamb:

a sudden the Washington Post and the New York Times are writing, oh, it's

Adam Lamb:

shit to fucking work in restaurants.

Adam Lamb:

Okay dude, we do that all along, thanks very much.

Adam Lamb:

But now the outside world knows that, but there's, I don't know if there's

Adam Lamb:

some, like a certain amount of honor or props that we give to one another

Adam Lamb:

for slogging it out or for being in the grind and patting each other on the

Adam Lamb:

back and trying to outdo one another.

Adam Lamb:

I think that.

Adam Lamb:

That badge of of courage is, is really misplaced because I think we

Adam Lamb:

continue to egg each other on even now.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Oh yeah.

Adam Lamb:

And until a chef from a hotel or a chef from a restaurant

Adam Lamb:

can meet a chef from a senior living facility and go, yeah, dude, you got it.

Adam Lamb:

Restaurants close at seven o'clock at night, you're going home to kids.

Adam Lamb:

I'm still at the job like, oh yeah, each particular job has its own thing.

Adam Lamb:

But I think that there's a certain amount of, I don't wanna say respect,

Adam Lamb:

but I. Grace that we should be giving one another no matter what market

Adam Lamb:

segment we work in, because we're all dealing with the same stuff and it's

Adam Lamb:

just a little different on each end.

Adam Lamb:

And I, there were, I had been shamed a couple times.

Adam Lamb:

I had a, a sous chef who said to me on the line, he's getting ready for a Saturday

Adam Lamb:

night and a little Italian bistro, and he's like, dude, I'm quitting, dude,

Adam Lamb:

you've been here like seven years.

Adam Lamb:

What do you mean you're quitting?

Adam Lamb:

Yep.

Adam Lamb:

Going to healthcare.

Adam Lamb:

Healthcare.

Adam Lamb:

What do you what?

Adam Lamb:

That's such a great transition.

Adam Lamb:

And he said it very simply to me, he's, I wanna be home for my kids.

Adam Lamb:

And I'm like, oh, now that's somebody who really knows what his core values are.

Adam Lamb:

And I didn't know what they were mine like owing mine.

Adam Lamb:

Like I spent so much time chasing the pinnacle of my career that my children

Adam Lamb:

spent a lot of time like without me.

Adam Lamb:

And even though as they're grown now, I. They have a lot of compassion

Adam Lamb:

and for me, and they're like, no, dude, you were the, you were great.

Adam Lamb:

You were a great father.

Adam Lamb:

I know, I know.

Adam Lamb:

Like I could have done things differently, but at the time I only did

Adam Lamb:

what I did because that's all I knew.

Adam Lamb:

And having said that,

Adam Lamb:

I'm just, I feel very grateful to be here, to be talking to you, be talking

Adam Lamb:

about things like the Burn Chef project, about you serving up support Maine.

Adam Lamb:

I think these are things that are very positive and anything I can do

Adam Lamb:

to support you, I want to do that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm so grateful and I appreciate that.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And same with you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I love listening to you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I love listening to Chef Life Radio.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I learned a lot.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I did the, I was listening to your last episode about like adaptivity

Nio DiPietrantonio:

and adaptability and how that's a skill that can be nurtured.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And I had to take a step back and think about it and I'm like, you know what?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

That's true.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And no one ever really put it that way to me before.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Mm-hmm.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So I learned a lot from that too.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Thanks.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

You have to teach how to be adaptable, and that's not something I think anybody

Nio DiPietrantonio:

talks about in the restaurant industry.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

I've come down to this one simple statement, which is like, nobody

Adam Lamb:

teaches leadership in culinary school.

Adam Lamb:

Yeah.

Adam Lamb:

And at some point we all need to lead E, even if we just lead ourselves.

Adam Lamb:

'cause of course you can't lead anybody else if you're not leading yourself.

Adam Lamb:

But the point is like getting thrown a set of keys and now I'm the chef.

Adam Lamb:

That's the recipe for disaster.

Adam Lamb:

So that

Nio DiPietrantonio:

field promotion,

Adam Lamb:

like you, I wanna leave this industry better.

Adam Lamb:

Then when I found it, because as many crazy times, as many hard times, as

Adam Lamb:

many frustrating and, and, and sad times, I also had some amazing times

Adam Lamb:

and it has really been a gift to me.

Adam Lamb:

So I wanna make sure that I do everything possible to, uh, be a resource to others

Adam Lamb:

because I don't want to have another hospitality professional take their own

Adam Lamb:

lives because they didn't feel seen, heard, or had access to resources because.

Adam Lamb:

That's bullshit.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

It is.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And maybe some of it is a little bit generational too.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

My own mentor who I adore this, the chef who literally taught me everything I know.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I still talk to him regularly.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

He thinks I'm crazy.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

He says, I don't.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I appreciate what you're trying to do.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I just don't think it's gonna work.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I don't think it's gonna go anywhere.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

This is like a 65-year-old chef.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Sure.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I love death.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

He's amazing.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

But that's, he's A-A-C-I-A graduate and he was an instructor.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

He, if he doesn't think that we can change it, that can be a little demoralizing,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

but I wanna make it better for him too.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I want you to see that we can make this better.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We can do better for you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We can do better for everybody else.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

He even used to tell me how he missed his entire child.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

His kids growing up because he was busy working or busy teaching,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

and he regrets that he regrets not being there for his kids.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Like how you were saying he is.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

He is a great father.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

He's a great man, but he has so many regrets for not being there, for

Nio DiPietrantonio:

his family, and we can find balance.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We can find a way to make this work for people regardless of what stage you are.

Adam Lamb:

I couldn't agree more because.

Adam Lamb:

To be frank, everybody wants to blame the industry.

Adam Lamb:

We're the industry,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

right?

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I, we're only as good as our industry and right.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We have to make it better.

Adam Lamb:

Like how, like I say, very often that I've been trained, shamed,

Adam Lamb:

and conditioned to be the way I am.

Adam Lamb:

Because there was always somebody looking at me like outta the corner.

Adam Lamb:

And when you think about it.

Adam Lamb:

Comparison is the death of joy, right?

Adam Lamb:

Yes.

Adam Lamb:

If you're comparing yourself to someone else constantly, but

Adam Lamb:

that's what our industry does.

Adam Lamb:

Every single competitions or whatever down the street and you cook,

Adam Lamb:

comparing yourself to someone else and never quite, that was the original

Adam Lamb:

Instagram to be in this industry, yo.

Adam Lamb:

But that is also a recipe for disaster because it.

Adam Lamb:

It skews the journey of you discovering what you're possible.

Adam Lamb:

So to your mentor, I would say, dude, just because you made that choice doesn't mean

Adam Lamb:

you have to continue to make that choice.

Adam Lamb:

It's that simple, and when enough of us decide that we're gonna create

Adam Lamb:

something different, it'll happen.

Adam Lamb:

It's just a point of leverage.

Adam Lamb:

There's a certain amount of energy that needs to build up before things

Adam Lamb:

start changing, and it's not gonna be, listen, we could just sit there

Adam Lamb:

and go, okay, it'll never change.

Adam Lamb:

And then it won't exactly.

Adam Lamb:

But we certainly have no idea what's possible unless we try.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I remember when I started my management training, granted

Nio DiPietrantonio:

this was when I was 18, I had no business being a manager, but again, somebody

Nio DiPietrantonio:

didn't show up for their job, so I got a battlefield promotion and when I

Nio DiPietrantonio:

started my training, they actually had us watch a video called The Lone Dancer.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I don't know if you've ever seen or if you know what that is, but it's this

Nio DiPietrantonio:

little video of a guy I think he's at.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

A Woodstock concert or something, something crazy like a hippie, everybody,

Nio DiPietrantonio:

right, go to music and et cetera.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Dance.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Dance.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And this one guy gets up and he starts dancing and he looks a little silly

Nio DiPietrantonio:

doing it, but eventually one person will join him and another person will

Nio DiPietrantonio:

join him and eventually he's got a whole crowd of people dancing with him.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

And the, obviously the message of that is that you do eventually.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Have to be that one crazy lone dancer.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

If you want other people to join you, and you do have to put yourself out

Nio DiPietrantonio:

there, you have to look a little crazy to, to get people to, to join you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I love it.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

If they don't feel heard, they're not gonna be with you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

So I guess I have to be the lone, crazy dancer and I'm glad that

Nio DiPietrantonio:

you're up there dancing with you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'll

Adam Lamb:

dance with you anytime, Christopher, you.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

They can find me on on Instagram.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We are at serving up.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Support me as our Instagram handle.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm on LinkedIn, Neo duped.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Antonio, we have a Facebook page for both that and LinkedIn

Nio DiPietrantonio:

page for serving up support me.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We have also a, a place on our website where if you are struggling with

Nio DiPietrantonio:

anything, you can contact us and we will help you find resources in your area.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We are not just exclusive to Maine or New England.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We will help you no matter where you are.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We will help you find resources for what you're struggling with.

Adam Lamb:

Thank you very much for what you're doing, chef.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Of course, we owe it to us.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

We owe it to ourselves and we owe it to our industry.

Adam Lamb:

I look forward to having you back very soon.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

Thank you so much, chef Adam.

Nio DiPietrantonio:

I'm so grateful for your time.

Adam Lamb:

That's a wrap for today's episode of Chef Life Radio.

Adam Lamb:

If this resonated with you, do me a favor, subscribe, share, and leave a review.

Adam Lamb:

Your feedback helps us reach more culinary leaders like you who are ready

Adam Lamb:

to take their kitchens to the next level.

Adam Lamb:

Want more connect with me on LinkedIn, Instagram, or join our Chef

Adam Lamb:

Life Radio community for exclusive insights and leadership tools.

Adam Lamb:

Remember, leadership isn't about perfection.

Adam Lamb:

It's about progress.

Adam Lamb:

So take what you've learned today and apply it in your kitchen,

Adam Lamb:

your team, and your life.

Adam Lamb:

Chef Life Radio is more than just a podcast, it's a movement.

Adam Lamb:

The focus is no longer just on career survival, but on transforming leadership,

Adam Lamb:

creating sustainability, and ensuring chefs can build kitchens that thrive.

Adam Lamb:

Remember, the secret ingredient to culinary success isn't just in

Adam Lamb:

the food, it's in the leadership.

Adam Lamb:

Keep learning, keep growing, and as always.

Adam Lamb:

Lead with the heart.

Adam Lamb:

See you next time.

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