Industry Night: From 45,000 Miles On The Road To A Michelin Star - Catbird Seat's Tiffani Oritz & Andy Doubrava

Chefs Tiffani Ortiz and Andy Doubrava met at the French Culinary Institute in New York before reconnecting years later on a Malibu farm — living in a teepee, surrounded by wild parrots, discovering a shared obsession with agriculture, sustainability, and zero-waste cooking.
But in this episode of Industry Night, the conversation goes far beyond the restaurant.
We talk about how their nomadic culinary project Slow Burn — a traveling zero-waste pop-up that carried them through 42 states — shaped every dish now on the menu at The Catbird Seat. How two chefs with no tasting-menu experience took over one of Nashville's most iconic restaurants and earned a Michelin star doing it their way.
We also dive into: life on the road vs. rooted restaurant life, fermentation and preservation as philosophy not just technique, building a kitchen culture around empathy and high standards, how to run a restaurant with your life partner without losing your mind, and why great fine dining should never feel stuffy.
This is a conversation about restaurants, yes — but also about curiosity, resilience, and what happens when you build a career entirely on your own terms.
Listen to the episode here, and watch it all, here.