My estimated guess was 90% of all independent restaurants would close.

And I think a lot of people were like, oh, Dave, you're just being fucking doom and gloom all over again.

And what a surprise. And I think that number is going to be right.

Hey guys, John Howman here with the new episode of Hell in High Water, my new podcast from the recount.

Dave Chang is one of the most influential restaurateurs of the 21st century, the presiding genius behind the Mubo Fuku Empire,

the star of Ugly Delicious and Breakfast Lunch Dinner on Netflix, the host of the Dave Chang show podcast,

and the author of a new memoir called Eat a Peach.

I have known Dave for about 15 years or so and I've eaten a ton of meals with him and shared even more conversations with him.

And what makes him so compelling, beyond what he does in the kitchen, is his unflinching honesty and self scrutiny and vulnerability,

all of which are radically on display in Eat a Peach.

The reason that we're talking to Dave today is because of the new role he's sort of taken in the course of the pandemic when he's become a leading voice in the food world,

talking about the restaurant apocalypse brought on by COVID-19, about how so much of the industry is threatened with extinction,

not just because of the virus and its implications, but because of the structural flaws in the industry that existed even before the pandemic,

and the government's abject failure to help.

Dave's arguments for why the independent restaurant industry needs to be saved, why it's too small to fail as he puts it,

and how it can save itself, have made him a central figure of this moment, as the pandemic has brought havoc on a set of institutions that not only feed us,

but mean the world to us, bring us incalculable joy in our cities, states, towns, and neighborhoods.

And that is why I am so thrilled to have my friend Dave Chang here with us today.

Hey man, it's good to see you.

We actually have not laid eyes on each other in a while, partly because of the fucked upness of the world,

and partly because you had a kid, and the combination of those two things have meant that our physical meetings has been,

have been severely curtailed. I think it's been like maybe more than a year since I last, like actually physically saw you,

...