Ashok Bajaj and Chef Vikram Sunderam built the modern Indian dining scene in Washington DC, and in this chef interview they tell Nycci Nellis exactly how, starting with the night Ashok found out his landlord thought a building worth 40 million dollars still deserved a rent increase.Ashok Bajaj is the founder and CEO of Knightsbridge Restaurant Group, the man Forbes calls DC’s gastronomic power broker. Since opening the Bombay Club in 1988, he has built a ten restaurant empire that includes Rasika, Bindaas, Sababa, Rosselli, and his newest concept, Malabar, a coastal Indian seafood restaurant in Van Ness. On this episode of Industry Night, Nycci Nellis sits down with Ashok on location at Malabar, along with his partner of two decades, James Beard Award winning Chef Vikram Sunderam. They talk about Ashok’s path from hotel management in India and London to building an empire in Washington DC, why he tore down a struggling concept called Rosedale to build Malabar in its place, and his honest read on downtown DC’s post pandemic restaurant economics. Vikram walks through his own path from Mumbai to Rasika, the technique behind the restaurant’s famous palak chaat, and what excites him about coastal Indian cooking at Malabar. This is a DC food podcast conversation with two of the people who actually built the DC dining scene, thirty five years and ten restaurants in the making.Listen to the episode here, or watch it all unfold, here.

Chef Steven Fretz has spent two decades cooking in some of the best kitchens in the country, and now Michelin has finally noticed Utah. In this chef interview, he tells Nycci Nellis what actually happened when he got the email announcing it, and why his first reaction was pure disbelief. Chef Steven Fretz built his career across San Francisco’s Fifth Floor, the Michael Mina Group, and his own restaurant Church Key in LA before co-founding Coast Range, a Michelin recognized steakhouse in Solvang, California. Now he is home in Utah as culinary director and partner at South Hill, a luxury community on the Wasatch Back, where he is opening two restaurants, Montbleu and Charlay. On this episode of Industry Night, Nycci Nellis sits down with Steven right as the Michelin Guide announces its first ever Southwest edition, putting Utah on the map for the first time. They get into what Michelin recognition actually felt like the first time it happened, why he calls himself a resting chef who sears and rests a single steak up to ten times before it is served, and why he believes hospitality, not cooking, is the hardest part of running a restaurant. It is an honest conversation about accolades, ego, and building a serious hospitality business from the ground up, in California wine country and now the Utah mountains. This is a DC food podcast that goes wherever the best chefs and restaurateurs are, and this week that is Midway, Utah. Listen to the full episode, or watch it all here.

Gus Constantellis, the comedian behind the viral Greek Mom videos, joins this DC food podcast to talk about the cookbook his mother's death made him write. Four days after she passed, he posted a meatball video that changed everything, and comedy turned out to be the only way he knew how to survive what came next.Gus Constantellis is the Greek American stand up comedian and writer behind the Greek Mom videos, the ones where he becomes his late mother, Julia, on camera with more love than most tributes manage. The character went viral during the pandemic and never really stopped. The real story is what happened after Julia died. Four days later, Gus posted a video making her meatball recipe, the first thing she ever taught him to cook, and that grief turned into My Greek Mom's Recipes, a cookbook with the tagline she died, I wrote this cookbook. On this episode of Industry Night, the DC food podcast hosted by Washington DC restaurant insider Nycci Nellis, Gus talks about the forty years his mother spent in America without learning English, the difference between the edited version of her the internet fell in love with and the real woman who complained about restaurants and got sick from fish, and how he decided which family recipes and stories belonged in the book. It is a conversation about comedy as a coping mechanism, food as a language that outlives the person who spoke it, and what it means to keep someone's voice alive on the page after it is gone from the room.Watch the interview here, or listen to it here.

Victor Albisu, the chef behind Taco Bamba, just did something no chef wants to do on this DC food podcast episode: he read his own restaurants' worst reviews out loud, live.Victor Albisu is the chef and owner behind Taco Bamba, the fast casual taco chain he grew from one Falls Church location into seventeen restaurants across the Mid-Atlantic and into Nashville. Nycci Nellis sat down with him back at Taco Bamba in City Ridge for this DC food podcast conversation that covers twenty years of DC restaurants, from his fine dining runs at Del Campo and Poca Madre to his new anti-steakhouse, Electric Bull, opening in his hometown of Vienna, Virginia. Victor also debuts Roasted, a brand new segment where he reads his own restaurants' harshest online reviews and responds live, no notes, no filter. Later in the show, Karen Harris, a working vocalist, vocal coach, and rock band frontwoman, joins from the patio at City Ridge to talk about curating the Friday night music series that brings local musicians to the development's happy hour crowd. This is a Washington DC restaurant insider conversation about fine dining, fast casual, failure, and why talent is the smallest part of the formula for success. If you care about the DC food scene, the hospitality industry, or just want to hear a chef read his own bad reviews, this one is for you.Listen to the full episode, or watch it all here.

Jade Floyd walked into this DC food podcast conversation with a hard truth: most leadership advice is written by people who never had to survive the room. She spent two decades inside DC's most powerful rooms, and she is done keeping the lessons to herself.Jade Floyd is Senior Vice President at Bryson Gillette and the author of The Leadership Labyrinth, Women Navigating Power and Purpose in a Changing World. Nycci Nellis sat down with her live at Tony and Joe's on the Potomac for this DC food podcast conversation that somehow covers oysters, burnout, and boardrooms in the same hour. Jade spent twenty years building her career in Washington, from the Champagne Bureau to a decade as VP of Communications for Jean and Steve Case, before she started interviewing the women who shaped her own path. Seventy women considered, thirty interviewed, twenty made the final book, and twelve of them are Washingtonians. Jade and Nycci get into what the hospitality industry can teach corporate leaders about reading a room, why burnout stopped being something to brag about, and how to figure out the difference between what you want and what you actually deserve. This is a Washington DC restaurant insider's favorite kind of conversation, big ideas, no pretension, and a live oyster shucking lesson at the end. If you care about DC dining, DC leadership, or just want to hear two women who have been in the room tell the truth about what it took to get there, this one is for you.What You Will LearnJade Floyd explains how seventy considered women became the twenty leaders featured in TheLeadership Labyrinth.Restaurateur Stephen Starr taught Jade a lesson about reading a room that has stuck with her for years.Jade breaks down why burnout is no longer something leaders should treat as a badge of honor.Nycci and Jade talk about the difference between mentors and friendtors, and why every leader needs both.The book's workbook walks readers through separating what they want from what they actually deserve.Listen to the full episode, or watch it all here.

Drew Baker, Lisa Hinton, and Ashli Johnson turned a rocky hillside in Clarksburg into Burnt Hill, the most talked about winery in Maryland wine, and this DC food podcast conversation tells the whole story. An old farmer warned Drew the land only grew rocks. He bought it anyway. Then came a leukemia diagnosis, a 5 percent survival chance, and two sisters who became his bone marrow donors.Nycci Nellis sits down with the sibling founders of Old Westminster Winery and Burnt Hill for a chef interview podcast conversation about family, farming, and what it takes to build a world class wine destination an hour from Washington DC. Drew Baker farms the land, Lisa Hinton makes the wine, and Ashli Johnson runs the brand, and together they have gone from a kitchen table decision during the recession to a regenerative farm with Leicester Longwool sheep, Mangalitsa pigs, eleven beehives, and wines fermented in barrels made from their own ash trees. They talk about the frost that created what Drew calls the lost vintage, the Chefs Counter partnership with Chef Tae Strain, the Temperance non alcoholic program, and the moment Drew learned he had acute myeloid leukemia while building it all. Then, live from RPM Italian in Washington DC, Nycci pulls up to a caviar station with Executive Chef Massimo Vicidomini and RPM Events and Catering managers Luis Zelaya and Arrica Ashe to talk Amalfi Coast dinners, private dining, and how one of the busiest hospitality industry rooms in the DC dining scene executes events for 8 to 300 guests.What You Will LearnWhy rocky, depleted soil was exactly what Drew Baker wanted for the Burnt Hill vineyard.How the family produces 18 different wines from only 1,000 cases using single barrel selections.What regenerative polyculture farming looks like with sheep, pigs, bees, and log grown shiitake mushrooms.How Drew survived a 5 percent prognosis with his sisters Ashli and Lisa as his bone marrow donors.How RPM Italian DC builds custom private events, from Kaluga caviar stations to full off premise kitchens.Listen to the full episode here, or watch it here.

Chef Adrianne Calvo built a Miami restaurant empire on a philosophy she calls maximum flavor, and this chef interview podcast conversation gets into exactly how she did it. A high school scheduling accident, a Food Network run that spans two decades, and a foundation feeding families at St. Jude's, this one covers all of it.Chef Calvo joins Nycci Nellis on Industry Night for a wide ranging conversation about building a career on flavor, instinct, and never chasing a trend. Adrianne grew up in Miami, discovered cooking almost by accident after a scheduling mix up landed her in a high school cooking class, and went on to train at Johnson and Wales before opening Chef Adrianne's Vineyard Restaurant and Wine Bar at just twenty two years old. She talks candidly about self financing that first restaurant after cookbook sales spiked when Montel Williams held up her book on national television, what her signature maximum flavor philosophy actually means on a plate, and why two decades of Food Network competition, including Chopped, Beat Bobby Flay, and Titans, taught her that showing up on camera opens doors a quiet kitchen never will. She also shares the story behind her Make It Count Foundation, built in memory of her late sister Jennifer, and previews her upcoming Washington DC restaurant insider event aboard City Cruises Live this fall. If you care about DC dining, chef interview podcast conversations, or what it actually takes to build a lasting hospitality industry brand, this episode delivers.What You Will LearnHow a high school scheduling mistake led Adrianne Calvo to discover cooking and call it the lightning strike of her life.How Montel Williams holding up her cookbook on national television funded her first restaurant at twenty two.What the maximum flavor philosophy actually means across every dish she creates.Why two decades of Food Network competition on Chopped, Beat Bobby Flay, and Titans changed her career.How the Make It Count Foundation brings holiday feasts to families at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. Listen to the full episode here. or watch it on YouTube, here.

Chef Erik Ramirez did not set out to become one of New York's most important culinary voices. He was a first-generation Peruvian kid from New Jersey who spent a summer in Louisiana watching his uncle cook gumbo for the pure joy of it. That was the spark. Now he is behind Papasan at Hudson Yards, one of the most talked-about restaurants in the country, and the DC food podcast world cannot stop talking about what he is doing with Nikkei cuisine.If you follow the DC food scene, you already know that Peruvian cuisine is having a moment. Lima has back-to-back wins at the World's 50 Best Restaurant Awards. And Chef Erik Ramirez is one of the chefs helping American diners understand why. On this episode of Industry Night with Nycci Nellis, the DC food and hospitality podcast that goes behind the scenes with the people shaping how we eat and drink, Nycci sits down with Ramirez to trace the full arc. From a fishing rodeo in Grand Isle to three years as sous chef at Eleven Madison Park. From a life-changing month eating through Lima to opening Llama Inn and then Papasan, a Peruvian izakaya rooted in Nikkei cuisine. Ramirez is a James Beard-nominated chef with a Met Gala menu credit and a story that sounds like it was written for the screen. He talks about what Nikkei cuisine actually is, why Peruvian food is built for this moment, and how a pizza topped with eel and Peruvian chili oil became the dish that explains everything. This is the chef interview podcast episode you send to everyone who thinks they already know Peruvian food.What You Will LearnA summer in Grand Isle, Louisiana with an uncle who cooked gumbo and jambalaya for the joy of it was the moment Erik Ramirez decided cooking was worth chasing.Three years at Eleven Madison Park, finishing as sous chef, reshaped how Ramirez thinks about technique, hospitality, and the respect owed to every element of a restaurant experience.Ramirez grew up eating his grandmother's Peruvian home cooking but never saw it as a cuisine he wanted to cook professionally until one month eating through Lima's top restaurants redirected his entire career.Nikkei cuisine was born out of migration and necessity, Japanese precision married to Peruvian ingredients and culture, and Ramirez sees it as the same story every immigrant group has told through food.Every dish at Papasan must connect to New York, Peru, and Japan, and the eel pizza is the clearest example of how that three-way tension produces something completely original.Listen to the full episode here, and watch it all here.

Alam Mendez, Jose Contreras, and Luis Martinez are on the DC food podcast Industry Night talking about nixtamalization, the 3,500-year-old process that sustained entire civilizations and that most people eating corn tortillas today have never heard of. That gap between the food on your plate and the knowledge behind it is exactly what this conversation is about.Nycci Nellis sits down with three chefs who are each fighting the same battle from different corners. Alam Mendez grinds corn in house daily at Apapacho Taqueria in Washington DC, keeping Oaxacan tradition alive in the middle of the DC dining scene. Jose Contreras is a 2025 James Beard semifinalist and owner of Amelia's in Tucson, and he is about to open Carizal, a fine dining restaurant built entirely around nixtamalized corn. Luis Martinez grew up in a Zapotec pueblo in Oaxaca, now runs Takio Foods out of Asheville, sources heirloom corn directly from indigenous farmers, and drives a corn grinder to trailer parks in North Carolina so Oaxacan farm workers can access fresh masa. This is the hospitality industry podcast conversation that connects ancient agricultural science to the DC restaurant scene to the people picking our food in the American South. If you eat tortillas and you want to understand what you are actually eating, this one is for you.What You Will LearnNixtamalization adds calcium and niacin to corn that otherwise lacks them. Europeans who brought corn back from the Americas and skipped the indigenous technique developed pellagra, a nutritional deficiency disease, because they refused to learn from the people who invented the process.Mexico has 64 varieties of corn and 61 are endemic. Each variety requires different limestone ratios and cook times. The corn you use shapes the masa, the flavor, and the tortilla. It is not interchangeable.A real tortilla takes 24 hours to make. You cook the corn, add limestone by weight, check it by hand, and let it rest overnight before grinding. That is what you are paying for when you pay for a real tortilla at a Washington DC restaurant or anywhere else.People in the US have a problem paying for a taco the same way they pay for French or Italian food, even when the sourcing, the process, and the labor behind that taco is just as rigorous. All three chefs navigate that double standard every day.Luis Martinez drives a corn grinder to trailer parks in North Carolina where Oaxacan farm workers live, giving them access to fresh masa and nixtamalized corn. North Carolina has the third largest Oaxacan population in the country. These are the people picking our food.Watch the full episode here, and listen to it here.

Chef Vikas Khanna built Bungalow, the hottest table in New York City, after arriving in America homeless. This is the DC food podcast conversation that explains everything.Ten thousand people are on the wait list for Bungalow. Chef Vikas Khanna is not surprised. He did not open it to chase a reservation. He opened it at 54 as a promise to his late sister and his mother, to carry the full weight of Indian culture and cuisine into a dining room and set it free. If you follow the DC food and wine show, the Washington DC restaurant insider scene, or the hospitality industry podcast world, you already know guests like this do not come around every week. Chef Khanna was born with club feet in Amritsar, told he would never walk properly. He arrived in the United States with nothing. He earned a Michelin star at Junoon in 2011 and held it for eight consecutive years. He has authored more than 40 books, hosted MasterChef India for nearly two decades, directed films, spoken at the United Nations, and through Feed India, delivered more than 84 million meals to people in need. At Bungalow, he runs only 16 dishes, rotates specials nightly without repeating, and is currently running 36 weeks celebrating India, one state, one dish, one story per week. Nycci Nellis sat down with him and within five minutes understood why the New York Times used the word freedom to describe what he is doing. That word mattered more to him than any star.What You Will LearnChef Vikas Khanna opened Bungalow not to earn another Michelin star but as a personal promise to his mother and late sister, and every element of the restaurant from the Ganga Jal ceremony to the floral ceiling carries that intention.Khanna has documented more than 250,000 recipes from across India and distills that archive into a rotating menu of 16 dishes, proving that restraint and depth are not opposites in the DC dining guide conversation.The women in his life, his grandmother, his mother, his sister, a Muslim woman who sheltered him during the Mumbai riots, and designer Sheila Rizvi, shaped every instinct he brings into the kitchen and the dining room.Feed India grew from a single phone call from his mother during the pandemic and became an operation that converted 80 gas stations into food and healing stations for migrant workers and served hundreds of thousands of meals at Haji Ali Dargah during Eid.Khanna argued in Time magazine that civilizational cuisines cannot be judged through the narrow lens of Western restaurant standards, and the chef interview podcast world is still catching up to what that means for Indian food globally.Listen to the full episode here, and watch it here.