Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: I was interviewing another vegan chef out in New York in December who runs a restaurant group, so a lot of different restaurants. And I was looking at their reviews, as I tend to do when I'm getting ready to interview someone who's part of restaurant staff and restaurant leadership. I always want to see how they handle it. And one of the things that I noticed was every single time someone said something harsh, they responded. And they responded in this. Really? Tell us about it. Here's our email. And let's go. We want to hear from this person. And I was like, how much of that is actually you? He was like, it's not always me. I always have someone who does it, who brings me these things, but sometimes it is me based on the severity of what they're saying, and I might want to personally get involved. I found that fascinating because I was like, how can you handle that level of feedback? And he was like, every single person that says that stuff, even if they're saying it in the nastiest of tones, they want this thing to be better. And in some cases, he's like, I look into every single one, and in some cases, they're right. And when they're right, I do something. And as an example, it's like there was a part of a recipe that someone said is like, this thing I don't like. And what I had thought, the thing they were pointing out, it was kind of like this weird, minor thing. He was like, no, but actually I can improve that. And I did improve that. I made that change. It's like some of them, they're right. Some of them, it's kind of like just a matter of taste. He's like, but I'll see what I can do. And some of them are wrong. But that means the next time someone brings up that kind of complaint, which they certainly will, I'll have confidence that that person's got the wrong take. So all of it is coming from a place of helping you get better. I can't imagine spending that much amount of time focusing on negative feedback. So. Any thoughts on. On that?
[00:01:51] Speaker B: Yeah, no. I. I feel like it's. It's. Whether it be towards your person or towards, like, your job.
I. I feel like any kind of. Anytime somebody says something, I'm not like, you're wrong, I'm right. I do everything right. You do. You don't know what you're talking about.
I'm going to look at it. I'm going to take it. I'm going to think about it. Right. So just a Quick example, we're in food, right? So we do quality tests and this and that. And how long will it last? Well, I was making caramel apples and every Wednesday we, every Tuesday we clear out the bakery case, put everything in the fridge, clean it out so it can, you know, defrost for a day and then load it back up. On Thursday, something happened and somebody wrote in a review and they're like, I was just in there and I got a caramel apple and it was flavorless.
And I was like, what? Like, we just made these, right? So this was, we'll say this was Thursday. We just made a Monday. They have a week shelf life, which is, I'll take something and give it a shelf life. But then I'll, I'll, you know, I don't ever let it go to the point where it's not good. So I was, you know, take off a couple days. So anyways, so I was like, well, we just made those. What. So. But they're saying it because something may have been wrong, right? So I went and got a caramel apple cut into it. Turns out it, they had been frozen. We put them on the top shelf in the fridge and they froze over the day that we were, you know, gone. And so I refunded everybody that had bought apples, you know, throughout the day and, and, and fixed it. But it's, it's an opportunity to fix something. If it is wrong, sometimes it is just somebody's, you know, oh, it's vegan, it's not good. You can't change that. You can't change their mind. Hopefully you can with a candy bar.
But a lot of times it is an opportunity to grow and change. And I don't, when somebody says something I'm not like, you're wrong.
This is not correct. Like you're, what you're saying is not right. No, I go and I go and I look at it, whether it's something about me or something about the food.
Sometimes it's accurate, sometimes it's not. But it's, it's okay to just go look into it, you know, so it's an opportunity, if there is something wrong, to fix it, you know, or to work on it.
[00:04:32] Speaker A: Yeah. I'll just say this. If you're serious about doing anything, you got to be, you got to be in the fray, you know, like, so if you went to our, our 7 year old does Jiu Jitsu and if you went to Jiu Jitsu and you didn't like get like turned into a pretzel Then, like, why are you even bothering doing it? You're not going to win every match. You're not going to have experience, be good. And that willingness to be in the fray of, like, real feedback and learn and grow, that's the. That's the game. That's what you do. Especially if you're an entrepreneur, because you're always trying to get better.
As just a total sidebar. When Monica and I were in last, one of your staff who was like, your staff. The times that we've been in have been so wonderful and just so stoked. They're into it. They're there. They love it.
I was like, yo, what is this?
Pumpkin cinnamon roll. And their team member was like, hey. The chef actually wasn't, like, thought maybe that these weren't good. And we actually convinced her, like, no, you need to put these out. These are actually good. And I was like, I'll be the judge of that.
Monica and I cannot stop talking about this, like, pumpkin cinnamon roll. It was the most. It was the best cinnamon roll I've ever had. And, like, we were losing our absolute. Our actual minds about it. And plus, it was gigantic.
[00:05:49] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:05:49] Speaker A: So just some feedback from you. Like, listen, it's not always people complaining. Like, we were so stoked on it.
[00:05:57] Speaker B: Love it.
[00:05:58] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:05:59] Speaker B: I wasn't even gonna make those. Somebody was like, can you make this? I was like, I think I can.
[00:06:06] Speaker A: Bless you. You changed our day. All right, let's go to. Let's go to, like, talk about making things. Let's talk about the candy bars. Like, what a wild thing. Like, making all these, like, vegan takes on stuff. And I like the kind of. I like the.
The branding because it's kind of taunting. Like, ours is actually better than theirs. So how. First of all, what are the bars that you have? And then what are their. Their, like, non vegan.
[00:06:33] Speaker B: Their counterparts.
[00:06:35] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:06:36] Speaker B: So, right. I have 10 that I have wrappers for, so we'll go through them all. So we have better than theirs. And that's like a Snickers.
And I actually, when I first made those candy bars, I named them Snicks.
And I. Probably not very creative, but when I rebranded the candy bars, I. I was like, I can't call them Snicks. Snickers is definitely going to come after me. I want Snickers to notice me, but I don't want them to sue me.
It took me months to figure out a name for them because nothing was sitting.
Sitting right. And then one day I was just like, well, I was going to name it better than and let people kind of fill in the blanks.
But it was actually already trademarked, so. So I was like, well, I'm just going to call it what it is. Better than theirs. And so.
And I, I laugh every time I say it because I'm just like, we definitely are better than theirs. You know, it's just so fitting. I love that name. I love it. And even if other people don't love it, I love it.
[00:07:57] Speaker A: I, I love that name because it's got kind of like a good nature, taunting about it that I like. It's like got a, like a bit of a competitive. And it, it is actually frankly better than theirs. And Snickers are my favorite chocolate bars.
[00:08:10] Speaker B: So, like, dang, I hit the mark.
[00:08:14] Speaker A: Hell yeah.
[00:08:16] Speaker B: Okay, so we have better than theirs. We have Space Bar that's like a Milky Way.
We have a Crunchy. That's like a Twix.
We have a Peanut Overload. That's like a Nutrageous. We have Take a Break. That's like Take Five.
Trace Amigos, which is the Three Musketeers.
Pecan Bliss, that's like a turtle. Like so pecan, caramel and Chocolate.
We have a nut bar that's like a nut Roll.
We have an easy break. That's like a fast break.
And then we have a crunchy break. That was an. Actually was a mistake that we loved, so we kept it. I think that was all of them.
[00:09:01] Speaker A: I know the reason for doing this is like good alternatives for like loved chocolate bars and all that. And like, Monica and I, like, we're very thankful that you're doing this. A couple questions, though. You already hit on one. You haven't had any legal static for any of this, right?
[00:09:15] Speaker B: Not yet.
[00:09:17] Speaker A: So what do you do with something like this? Like I said earlier, you don't ship to Canada. So how do you scale up when you have a candy bar? And I know these were initially extremely high touch, like handmade, like really, really did everything. And now like you said, you took out loans so you could make your job easier, get machinery. But how do you like, practically scale up a business like that?
[00:09:38] Speaker B: A lot of long hours I've scaled. We're probably in. We are shipping to Canada now and. Yeah.
[00:09:50] Speaker A: What? What?
[00:09:51] Speaker B: Yeah, And I actually am talking to the Vegan Supply. They're the biggest distributors in Canada. Do you know who?
[00:09:59] Speaker A: Right down the street from our house.
[00:10:01] Speaker B: Oh.
So they, they reached out to me because we got nominated for Veg News. The Veggie.
[00:10:10] Speaker A: We also, we also mentioned you to them. Not that, not that they know who we are or care what we say, but we were like, hey, there's this chocolate bar company that you need to check out. They're the best.
[00:10:21] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:21] Speaker A: So they, well, I'm not saying they did it because of us, but like we were real freaks about it. So I'm glad to hear this is happening.
[00:10:29] Speaker B: Yes. So that, that did happen and so we're putting a hold on it to see kind of where the tariffs are falling and things like that. But I feel like she said they're the biggest vegan distributor in all of Canada.
The owner has a couple restaurants plus all the grocery store. Like, it's a big deal. I'm very excited about it.
But I, I started growing. I would just reach out to people on Instagram and I was like, hey, we make vegan copycat candy bars. Do you want some samples to possibly sell in your stores? And I would send these messages at like 10 at night. Sometimes people responded, sometimes they didn't, you know, and that's just like, just a little at a time.
[00:11:18] Speaker A: Yeah. So it's just like, well, it's kind of like how a band does it. It's just like you're reaching out to promoters, you're trading shows city to city. You kind of like build up your base.
But what's the goal? Is the goal just like get it everywhere as far as you can or what are you trying to do with this?
[00:11:35] Speaker B: The goal? Yes, obviously to get it to as many places as I can and for people to choose our candy bars over the traditional candy bars. And so I'm vegan for the animals. I told you that a little earlier. But if, even if people aren't vegan, if they, if they can choose our candy bar over their traditional snickers, because we just have such a good, good, such a good mission statement and such as such a better candy bar. Right.
So we're. I want to change minds one candy bar at a time to open people's minds up about vegan or plant based. You know, if somebody's first experience of anything vegan or plant based is what is my candy bar? That gives us a better shot of them being like, oh, I tried something and it was good. Like, you know, having them being like more open minded, like, yeah, do I want to make money doing this? Of course I want to make money doing this. But I, I mean, I'm, my heart is so big that I want it to be ready, available and people to just pick our candy bars over the other ones and create as many jobs as possible and save as many animals as possible.
[00:13:04] Speaker A: Yeah, well, so I'm interested in your thoughts on this.
It's definitely less now, but a lot of corporate money and investor groups have kind of entered into this plant based vegan thing and I find it interesting. So I was speaking to this guy Chris, who did magic vegan bacon grease. Do you know what that is?
This Canadian company, he just made a plant based bacon grease and he did this a long time ago, just made it in his kitchen. It was years ago. And it became this thing and started becoming a bigger thing and it became his job for a minute there, his full time job, and then he scaled back and now he still does it, but he does it more just like as one of his various hustles. He was on the podcast and I was like, well, you kind of seem like you had a crossroads moment there. He was like, yeah, like I was getting pulled into like, you know, like kind of big distribution deals and all that. And he's like, I just don't want to. I just don't want to be part of an oligarchy. And I was like, well, what do you mean? He was like, listen, man, when it comes to money, they just want, like, to big corporations, they just want all of the business. They want the meat eaters, they want the non meat eaters. He's like, on one side, I totally love the dream of people being able to have vegan food everywhere and having it being totally accessible. But part of what I don't love is my efforts being bought up by these soulless companies that don't really care about animal stuff. They're only doing it because they want everybody's money. They don't just want the animal money. So I don't want to feed an oligarchy. So I decided to go back to being small. I was like, damn, that's like, he's a, he's a smart guy. So. But I was like, whoa, that's like, that's huge. But then there's also Chef Tanya out in the Palm Springs area who did native foods and did go into that kind of like investor, investor capital and got terribly burned, like really, really burnt about it. She was on the podcast as well and went back to going just independent. And her take on it was real interesting too, which is again, like, they don't care about the mission. They just care about getting another vertical, another financial vertical. And if you're willing to play that game and you can play it smart, great. But a lot of People who are owners of vegan stuff. We're not business people. We don't come from that background, so we don't understand what we're really buying into. Her story is like super interesting. So you're kind of at the, you know, the early stages where you've built this super cool brand. You're kind of getting it out there. You're doing like the door knocking through Instagram, like, hey, do you want to do this? Looking at like a bigger distribution deal through vegan supply and doing that. But what are your overall thoughts on like investor money, corporate money to help people scale and grow?
[00:15:54] Speaker B: That's a good question. I actually just took on a couple investors. They're vegan, so that's helpful. But I hear horror stories.
We're relocating and we're going to be to go. But I just bought a soft serve ice cream machine. I feel like if you give people something that they can't get though, they'll go. So I'm going to give our community a soft serve twist ice cream cone. We don't have that here. Chocolate dip. I'm so excited.
So I bought this used ice cream machine and I was, I'm a talker. I feel like that's how we get information. You know, I was talking back and forth with these people that I bought the ice cream machine from and, and he's like, I have a hookup for a good vegan soft serve ice cream. He's like, actually we were going to have all of our spots have vegan ice cream because it's so good you can't tell the difference.
And I'm really excited about that. I'm meeting him next Wednesday to try it. But anyways, I, I asked like they had five, five locations and then I think they were franchising more and then they shut them all down and I was like, what happened?
And, and he said something about equity. They, you know, took on investors for equity or something like that.
So I hear all these horror stories and I just like, I'm open to investor money if they have the same goals and values as I do. Like, I don't want somebody coming in just like, I'm not. Do I want to make money? Sure, that'd be great.
Do I need to be a rich and whatever? No. I just have so much love, you know, it's all out of love.
So they would have to be going in for the right reasons. You know, it can't just be for money, which is hard. I don't know. It's a, it's a hard, it's hard, it's hard.
[00:18:08] Speaker A: I, I kind of flirted with the idea of having an investor and once so far as to I was in a conversation with someone.
So like with my company, it's like we've got, we've got 13 full time people and then like 13 more contractors. So there's like 26 of us. We work at like a global level. Yeah, it's, it's totally, it's been, it's been really great. Really, really great. And I'm like, do I work until I, I'm done working? Do I sell the company someday? Like, what am I trying to do?
And I had a client who had retired and like retired. He's still quite young, but has gone on to do. He invests in businesses. And I said, hey, should I be looking for an investor? And he was like, I'll invest in your company. And I was like, oh great, wow, tell me more. And he was like, before I do that, I would love to invest in your company, but you don't want me to invest in your company. And I was like, why? He was like, once you get an investor in, everything's different. And it's like your methodology of doing things, the why behind things is different. And he was like, if you don't need it, don't do it. And he's like, I would be the coolest investor to you, all of that kind of stuff. But at the end of the day, do you want the reasons for everything to take on a whole new dimension? And I was like, no, I don't want that. And it was such an interesting thing for me because like, at the end of the day I just do what I believe in and I, I don't serve anything else outside of just being sure that we do really good work. Our services are, do really good, we take care of our team, we're like good to our employees. I like enjoy it. I have fun. So the idea of growing and scaling I think is such a natural thing when you start having some level of success. But then there's the also of like, well, what am I trying to do and why? And that is where I'm at in a business of like, what's next for me. But from an investor's perspective, I'm always interested in what vegan owners are thinking. And very much what you said is like, well, if they're not vegan and they don't share that same passion, what's going to happen?
[00:20:12] Speaker B: Yeah, because then it all just comes to be about Money, Totally. You know, like, I. When I first opened, I had. People came out of the woodwork and they wanted to invest. And I. I met with a couple of them that we're talking 2020. I'd barely gotten the commissary kitchen. I didn't even have a storefront. And people were like, we want to invest.
And I sat down and I talked with this guy, and he's like, you need to make candy all day, every day. You. You shouldn't do anything else. And I was like, who are you to come tell me what to do? I'm not gonna. That's not what's gonna happen. Right.
You know, five years down the road, I'm like, the guy might have been a little smart about something, but.
Yeah, it's just.
It's just hard because it's not. It's not all about money, you know, I just. I have so much love in my heart that it was ne. In the beginning, it was never about growing and being this huge place. It was just about giving people things that make them happy and saving animals, you know, and so. But it looks a lot different if you have a lot of other people's money and then choices aren't yours anymore, you know?
[00:21:37] Speaker A: Mind if we switch tracks here?
[00:21:39] Speaker B: No, not at all.
[00:21:41] Speaker A: Let's talk about you personally. So there's two things I'm interested in. One, your website and all your branding. Make sure it's like, highly inclusive.
And you've mentioned your wife here. So how important is you about making sure that's a part of your business, or at least that you use that as a business? Like your business has some kind of platform to be expressing that about.
[00:22:05] Speaker B: All inclusive.
[00:22:06] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:22:07] Speaker B: Oh, it's so all important.
You know, it's like mandatory because we are all inclusive and we are. You know, I'm. I'm women, queer owned, vegan.
I hit. I kind of hit all. All of the marks. Right.
Break Free Candy was born on the.
So I have a justice involved background. So I. I got in trouble. I'm. I'm. And I'm in recovery. I've been sober for 14 years and just being inclusive and accepting people. And I actually have a. One of my employees is. He's not. He's unsheltered.
And I was thinking about him the other day, so. Break Free Candy. I want to create as many jobs as possible for the most marginalized community, queer community, people with justice involved backgrounds. You know, we all need. We all need to get a chance, somebody to take a chance on us. Right?
And this kid, he's, he's young, he's 24 or something. And I remember the first week he started working with us and he was so nervous and, and he has the stigma of his. In his head. Like, I live in a shelter, they're going to judge me. You know, you could just kind of tell his demeanor and use and you meet him, you see him now and he, it is, it is so just to watch the growth in him and his self esteem and being able to see like he, he's such, such a good person, you know, and just being able to see that transformation is literally priceless. Even if I don't make a ton of money, but I'm able to create jobs for these people and, and watching them and, and seeing what it does for them as a human is there's no amount of money that can get, can give you that, you know.
[00:24:42] Speaker A: Yeah. The reason I wanted to ask you about that specifically is like, you know, you are like really bold about your, your branding around that, which I think is, is awesome. And we're also in a time now where a lot of organizations, both big and small and like medium size are like pulling back a lot of that kind of branding where they're just being like, like we're just all about business. And again, I understand, like social pressures change. Like, you know, business pressures change. Businesses do a lot of things for reasons that I think are just really tied to making sure they are doing the thing that is the most.
Like this is the thing that's expected of us at this time to make sure that we're not like, you know, turning anyone off and that our doors are open and those things shift a lot when like, you know, who's in the office kind of changes and a lot of those things. So I'm interested in your thoughts on that because I don't imagine that's going to change for you. But what I think you've already answered the question. The drive is really about making sure that you give people a chance to really be supported and build their lives up. Because it is such a clear part of your business is like, that is like making that a part of your brand.
[00:25:57] Speaker B: Yeah, I, it's funny that you say a lot of these things because I've thought about a lot of these things, you know, and it's like it's vulnerable. It's vulnerable to put out there on a website. I have a justice involved background, you know. What does that mean? What did you do? Whatever, you know. And honestly, like, there's always A why? Everybody has a story, right?
If you can't let somebody grow and get better and be better and do better, they're never going to get better and be better and do better. If you're going to let somebody make somebody stay in their past and live in their past, they're never going to be able to grow.
So it is a huge part of my branding, right? We're breaking free. We're breaking free of the judgment, this, the stigmatisms, you know, animal agriculture. Break free means, that name means so much to me, right? And I have to break free sometimes of those things because I'm like, you know, I have it out there for everybody to see. And I have to, like, whenever I, I start, I'm like, oh, should we not say that? Should we not, should that not be the forefront, you know, of the business? Anytime I start thinking those things, I'm like, no, this is what it's for. Like, we're, we're breaking free of it. And, and it's hard, you know, because it's just how we're all raised. Oh, you know, you're, you're an addict. You're, you know, you're a drug addict. You know, we, these stigmatisms and these judgments that we've all, you know, learned to have and create, like, I, I, I personally have to break free from that. And I have to know, like, even if my company just stays little and we just pay the bills, you know, I'm okay with that because what I'm doing is more important than becoming a millionaire and like, being able to help, not only am I helping animals, I get to help humans too. Like, that's more rewarding than anything else, you know.
[00:28:15] Speaker A: So this was the second thing I wanted to ask about is your justice involved background and like, the intention of branding it out there. So I'll give you an example. Before doing what I do now, I was a therapist and I worked mainly in addiction and mental health.
And being a therapist in that industry, it's really common to hear people like professionals who are like, oh, I became a therapist or I became a frontline worker because I lived in addiction. Or, you know, I was, I was just involved. I was, you know, I spent this amount of time behind bars, blah, blah, blah. You hear all, all these stories. So it's like super normal for me coming up professionally to be surrounded with people who had had these kinds of experiences. I didn't think twice about it. And when I started working in the corporate world, it's like, like nobody's Talking about anything, if anything like that's happened. And you'll definitely hear about people in recovery for sure. But people.
I don't want to blanket speak for everybody in the corporate world, but if someone's in recovery, it's like certainly rarely a centerpiece of like what they're going to talk about or what they're going to be sharing. Part of what's been very, really helped my business in the corporate world is that I do have this background in addiction recovery. Like, I'm a person with my own, my own background with, with alcohol and I'm pretty like liberal. I could talk about it. And I also grew up playing in punk bands. So like when I work in the corporate space, people are like, oh, this, that actually like really knows this stuff and it's what's enabled me to work at the highest levels of companies is like, just like, I've got a real deal background in psychology, but I'm a real person and I've had like real stuff happen and it's been like a huge, huge win for me. But in that corporate world, that is relatively rare for people to very freely talk about it. What I find compelling about your story is like, and go into whatever you want to go into. There's not a go. Where you want to go is like, you use it as part of your branding. And what I feel is an extremely tasteful way. And like when I've looked at interviews with you, it has been a part of the background in it. So it's not something that you, you hide from. And in fact, the branding of it is extremely tasteful. And I find it to be more on the inspirational kind of like, hey, you can write your own, you can rewrite your own story going forward, but I do want your thoughts on that.
[00:30:31] Speaker B: No, you definitely get to rewrite your own story.
I did hide from it, you know, because it is, you know, it's a part of my past that I don't, I don't want to keep reliving. Right.
But once I decided to open up about it, things really started to, you know, open up more for me. Right.
So it really is, it's, it's breaking free. It's just breaking free of my judgments of my own self, you know, so when I was able to break free and not hide anymore, I think that's when, you know, my brand just, you know, really started to flourish on its own.
And then I have to know, like back to the beginning when we were talking about people are going to judge you, people are going to say things. People are going to have their opinions, you know, and I just have to say, like, what happened was in my past. I can't change it. But what I can do is be better and be a better person and grow every day as I am now.
And, and so I just, I just have to be like, if, if people can't see me, who, who I am now and what I do now, then that's their decision. And I can't worry about it because if I do, then I just get stuck. And I just, you know, being, being in recovery, like there's always that fine line, you got to be careful, right? So you can sit and dwell on it and live in the past, or you can just move forward and grow and just be the best person you can be now, you know?
So, yeah, people are always going to have judgments and say things, but you just gotta, you gotta be able to shield yourself and just be, be like that's their decision and they can do whatever they want and you. And you just have to stay on your side of the road and just keep going.
[00:32:43] Speaker A: Heck yeah. All right, as we're heading towards the interview, we're going to do what we call the crucial three, which is I'm going to give you three questions that scale up in difficulty. So question number one. I want you to think of Sweet Hazel and Company and Break Free.
All of your different branding and everything together.
Where do you want it to be two years from now, four years from now, and six years from now?
[00:33:11] Speaker B: So Sweet Hazel and Company. I actually want to.
I, I just want Sweet Hazel and Company to be for the community.
I want it to be there. I want us to be able to have good food. I want to be able to keep. I, I like to do fundraisers, fundraisers for the animal sanctuaries out here.
We. I've done a couple for the queer community recovery programs. So Sweet Hazel and Company. I just want it to stay for the community.
You know, it's just love Community Salt Lake.
How, you know, just kind of how it is always. I don't want, I don't need Sweet Hazel to scale and grow. I just want it to be there for the community.
Break free candy. I'm hoping to.
In two years, I would like to have my own chocolate factory.
And what I'm going to do, the, the location I have right now, it's for both companies. But when Break Free moves out, I want to have a vegan commissary for all the other little entrepreneurs that were in my position, except for I Didn't get to go to a vegan commissary. I had to go to one that had, like, me and everything. Things that we don't want to be around. So that's my plan for the location when. So Break free candy is 2 year, 4 year, 6 year, 2 year. I want to have Break Free, have its own candy company, own chocolate factory.
And then four years.
What do I want to do for Break Free in four years?
I want to have. Create as many jobs as possible. We know that, but that's a hard one.
Four years.
I don't know.
I have no idea.
I meant two years. I have two years for you.
[00:35:33] Speaker A: All right.
[00:35:33] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:35:35] Speaker A: Question number two.
You can bring three chocolate bars with you into the future that you've made, but you have to leave the rest behind. What are the three?
[00:35:46] Speaker B: Oh, man.
I can bring three with me.
Hmm. That's a really hard one. They're all my love.
They're all my loves.
What three would I take with me?
Take a break. Better than theirs. And crunchy.
[00:36:15] Speaker A: Heck, yeah. All right, last question.
Anywhere in the world, what are the top three purely vegan restaurants or bakeries that you recommend? That you're like, this is it. This is my thing. Like, I am into this place.
[00:36:34] Speaker B: Oh, man. I haven't traveled like you, but anywhere.
[00:36:39] Speaker A: It could be also Salt Lake. Anything. Anything.
[00:36:43] Speaker B: Well, I don't know the names.
Gosh, that's a really hard one, too.
[00:36:49] Speaker A: Or products. That's easier for you.
[00:36:51] Speaker B: Or products.
The problem is that I love everything so much.
[00:36:57] Speaker A: Pick three.
[00:37:00] Speaker B: We went to this sushi place in California. I don't know the name, but it was really good. I actually, when they delivered our sushi, it had the seaweed caviar on the top.
[00:37:11] Speaker A: Oh, wow.
[00:37:12] Speaker B: And I was like, have you had it?
I was, like, trying to flag down the waitress. I was like, this is not vegan. And she's like, oh, it is. It's seaweed caviar.
I was like, this is definitely not. She's like, it is.
I wish I knew the name of that place. It was really good.
Where else have I just loved.
I love dining in the dark. Have you guys done that in Vegas? Do it.
So it's a completely blackout restaurant. And it's your. One of your major senses is gone. And so you. You don't get to see anything. So it's just all smell and taste and texture. Dining in the dark. It was incredible. It was an incredible experience. Do it.
[00:38:09] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:38:09] Speaker B: Vegas. Vegas. Write it on your. Your list.
And then can I pick myself Hell, yeah.
[00:38:20] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:38:22] Speaker B: I pick my. I pick myself.
I pick Sweet Hazeln. Break Free Sweet Hazel has the best cakes out of anywhere and the best candy bars for Break Free candy. There you go. My top three.
[00:38:37] Speaker A: Well, we actually. I agree. We. You do have out of our. So we travel, like, far, like, all over the world. Break Free hands down, has the best cakes and the best. The best candy bars. Like, without a doubt. Like, we'll stamp that right now.
[00:38:51] Speaker B: Thank you. I agree.
[00:38:52] Speaker A: Heck, yeah. All right, so we've come to the end. How was it for you?
[00:38:57] Speaker B: So great. My first podcast.
[00:39:00] Speaker A: You did great. You did fantastic. So as we're closing off, any advice, anything that you would share, anything you want, a message to anyone who's thinking about taking that leap of faith, betting on themselves, someone who needs to hear the words that could encourage them to do that.
[00:39:21] Speaker B: Just do it. It's never going to be perfect, but if you don't try, you'll never know.
You know?
[00:39:29] Speaker A: Hell yeah. Awesome. All right. You rock. Thank you so much. We're going to give you a heads up next time that we're coming to Salt Lake because I hope you will make that pumpkin cinnamon roll for us again because it was, like, so unbelievable.
[00:39:40] Speaker B: You got it. We'll be out of season. Pumpkin cinnamon roll.
[00:39:45] Speaker A: I'll tell you, nothing would make us happier. Okay. You're awesome. Thank you so much, everybody. I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did. This is someone that I was, like, super stoked to talk to, so this was a good one. I'll catch you next time on One step beyond.
One step.
One step, One step beyond.
