Starting a business means wearing many hats, designer, marketer, manager, while chasing your vision. Shopify powers millions of businesses with tools to build beautiful stores, create content and market with ease. From inventory to shipping, everything runs smoothly. If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Sign up for your 1€ trial today at shopify.nl. That's shopify.nl. Welcome, welcome to the best 5-minute wine podcast with Forrest Kelly. This episode, we're taking a different path with Emmy Award-winning journalist David Page. He's hosting a new podcast called Culinary Characters Unlocked. And I don't know if you've noticed, but I love talking to experts in their field. They always seem to depart wisdom and humor into memorable stories. And this isn't your typical wine-focused episode, with the stories David tells about chasing down assignments in foreign countries, building a career through curiosity and instincts, and the people who shape our food culture share the same DNA as every great wine we discuss here on the podcast. So stay with me as we unlock the character that is David Page. The best five-minute wine podcast. Yeah, David Page, and I better damn well be amusing. Let's start with who is David Page? Sure. I'm a storyteller. I've been in broadcasting one way or another since I was 14 and a half. Came up in radio. The biggest chunk of my journalistic career was in network news at NBC News and then ABC News. For NBC, I spent much of my time posted overseas back when actual news events took place. I walked through the Berlin Wall the night it opened. I interviewed Moabar Gaddafi in the rubble of his house after U.S. forces blew it up. I came back to the States. I became a show producer. I co-created the weekend editions of The Today Show. I went over to ABC, where, among other things, I was the senior investigative producer of 2020. I was the senior producer of Good Morning America. Every third week, I would hands-on produce the show, including in the control room. When I got out of network news, I ended up in the world of food. I created a little show for the Food Network called Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives. And so because in this business, you are what you last did, I'm known to many folks today as a food guy. I did diners and I wrote a book called Food Americana, all about how we created a cuisine and the foods of other countries and cultures. And these days, my passion project is a podcast called Culinary Characters Unlocked, on which I talk with important people in food. That doesn't mean eggheads. It means people who are either significant chefs or restaurateurs who are also, as chefs tend to be, passionate and entertaining and a lot of fun to shoot the bull with. I grew up in radio as well. I started my first full-time radio job as a senior in high school. So when you say you've got a great figure-it-out story, I know it's going to be a good one. Let's hear it. I had moved to Europe for NBC News. Hadn't been there very long. When I got my first assignment to the Middle East, I was sent to Cairo. And there was some big story. Some story was going on that was big enough that there was an important person from New York running things. And he had flown into Cairo. And I don't know what we were covering. But he comes walking through the Cairo Bureau newsroom, looks at me, goes, Paige, go to Cartoon. I go, yes, sir. He leaves the room. I turn to one of the local drivers or fixers and say, where's Cartoon? He says, it's in the Sudan. I say, where's the Sudan? He says, next country south. OK, I got on a plane. I went to Cartoon, you know. With that limited knowledge, you just said, the boss said it. I'm doing it. Well, but see, it's funny. I really am a cranky old man. In my day, when someone said do something, you said absolutely. And if you didn't know how, you figured it out. So you took all of that. You won an Emmy for. I won. My first Emmy was for breaking news. I was the guy on the ground who ran NBC's coverage of the Romanian revolution. And I won my first Emmy for that. And then my next one was at ABC News many years later for best. I don't know if it was best investigative segment or best news magazine segment, but was an investigation that I supervised as the senior investigative producer of 2020 into the VA mistreating veterans. And then I got nominated for a daytime Emmy for a syndicated series I did years later called Beer Geeks, which in some respects is the best thing I've ever done. but we didn't win. We had a great, in fact, you know, we went to the daytime Emmys. We weren't going to win. We were up against some very big names. It was one of those nominations that just shocked. So, but my host was basically a brewer and he was a great guy and his wife was terrific. And so when we walked in and we were seated at our table, which, you know, we were sort of in Siberia. and um i said to the waiter i i handed him i don't know 20 50 100 some reasonable start the night tip i said we're gonna lose keep it coming and boy did we have fun and apparently he uh he did his job well oh he did his job so well that we had we just had the best time and you know if you go into one of those things if you're realistic it's fun to be there it's fun to wear a tuxedo Oh, it is fun to wear a tuxedo from time to time, especially when you're getting a big award. Next episode, we're diving into drive-ins and dining on the story of how David Page became the architect of diners, drive-ins and dives. So you took all of that experience into and you kind of, you know, did a jog in your career with diners, drive-ins and dives. What do you think was, because in your head, in the embryonic phase of putting that show together and where it turned out, where was the magic sauce? Well, first of all, let me be clear. I didn't plan the show. I was on the phone pitching an executive at the Food Network and she kept turning everything down And she was kind enough to take my calls But this had been going on for quite a while I had opened a production company was trying to make a few bucks And finally, out of desperation, she said to me, you know anything about diners? And I said, absolutely. I'm developing a show called Diners, Drivings and Dines. And I told her all about it. And she said, it sounds good. Now, I had just pulled this out of thin air. So, you know, the whole idea basically germinated in one billionth of a second. Now, why did it work? A number of reasons. And one of them is if you tell the story properly, if you have good content, then what makes or breaks you is the host. And Guy, while he was green as hell and we had to teach him a whole lot, has that natural television ability to come to pop through the lens. So that's step one. Now, a great talent with bad content ain't going to make, you know, that ain't going to work. The content was honest. It was real. And it was clearly the truth. I held the show to the same standard I held investigative stuff to. If it wasn't a fact, we wouldn't say it. And people have gotten so used to being lied to on reality TV that I think the obvious honesty of the show came as somewhat of a surprise. Additionally, I could go into all sorts of technical stuff. I'm very proud of the look we gave the show and how quickly we cut it and how we intentionally used jump cuts. Nobody cares about that. That's supposed to be invisible. The one thing we did do was I made sure to include every step of every recipe without making it a Dunkin' Store show. So if you were a deep foodie, you really learned how to make each dish. But if you want, this was a show and we used the music to advance the story segments, you know, from concept to concept. We subconsciously got you there with how we started our music. But it was something that you didn't have to pay attention to. I still think that I haven't watched the show in years since I left it. But at least in my day, much of our audience didn't really pay attention. It's great white noise. It's something you can put on and have in the background while you're doing something else. I think that was a lot of the appeal. It's like watching Law & Order SVU rerun. You don't have to pay attention. Someone's going to get assaulted. Someone's going to get arrested. The key evidence is going to be thrown out on the technicality, and then they'll still win. I get it. I can look up. I can look down. It doesn't matter. One of the things about television or audio forms of mass communication is you're making a promise to the audience. Here's what I'm going to give you. If you give them what you promised, they'll come back. If you don't, they won't. Yeah. It depends on what your promise is. You finished with diners, drive-ins, and dives, and fast forward to now. Culinary Characters Unlocked by David Page. How big is your ego? How big is my ego? Yeah. It's pretty substantial. Look, I've been in the business of attracting people to what I produce for 50 years now. So and I've had some success. So, yeah, I have an ego. OK. But I don't think it's out of control. Look, I have a very healthy. I like what I do. I think I do it very well. That doesn't mean I don't sometimes screw up. It doesn't mean I haven't had massive failures. But in a very limited spectrum, and feel free to use this, in a very limited spectrum, I can step back and look at what I do and say, I'm damn good at that. Look, I've been interviewing people for 55 years now. Someone told me the other day that I'd do a good interview. Well, if I haven't figured it out by now, it ain't going to happen. So you're bringing all of that ego and all that pride and everything to culinary characters on Locke. What is the basis of the show? I mean, you've kind of touched on it a little bit, but you're doing chefs, restaurateurs, personalities. It's mostly chefs and restaurateurs. For some reason this week, I did a couple of bartenders. But to a great extent, they're like chefs. I just find people in the world of food to be fascinating. They're deeply passionate about what they do. They have skills that I don't have. I mean, I'm a real good home cook. I could never be a chef because I don't have that magic yet. Starting a business means wearing many hats. designer, marketer, manager, while chasing your vision. Shopify powers millions of businesses with tools to build beautiful stores, create content, and market with ease. From inventory to shipping, everything runs smoothly. If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Sign up for your one-euro trial today at shopify.nl. That's shopify.nl. I respect them a lot, and I think they're fascinating people and they have fascinating stories and I'm storytelling. You know, the typical interview, I'd like to think no interview is typical, but we cover where did you come from? What was the importance of food in your life? How did you decide that you wanted to do it for a living? And what's your path? Where'd you go? What'd you do? What'd you learn at East Stop? What are you cooking today? What do you think you'll be cooking tomorrow? What do Americans like to eat? What's your view on the current status of culinary in America? Was there any of the chefs or any of them wine focused in your library? Yeah, I'll give you one good example. Bobby Stuckey, who is a master sommelier and co-owner of Frosca in Boulder, Colorado, which was just named the 2025 James Beard Outstanding Restaurant in America, is a huge wine person. It's very, well, he's a master sommelier. That says everything you need to know. His restaurant is the food of a smaller region in Italy that is basically in the shadow of the Alps. And he was explaining to me just how wonderful the wines are from that area. And I've never – it's not an area that I was familiar with. So that's on my to-do list. Secondarily, he wanted a great detail about what – first of all, we addressed the issue of wine fear. You know, the average American is terrified to go to a restaurant and try to order wine. And I would say that the restaurant industry has to some extent encouraged that so that they can sell you a bottle for But Bobby point of view is ask Don be afraid to exhibit a lack of knowledge Rely on the psalm and give him an honest question. Say, look, you got a whole lot of stuff here for $100. What do you got for $40 that might do for me what I'm looking for? And then the psalm's question is, well, what are you looking for? I think taking the fear away from wine is, you know, some restaurants do it, some don't. But I think that's that's essential. And I don't know why, but wine has, you know, as opposed to a foodstuff, an enjoyable product to to improve a meal, it's perceived by the public totally as a snob item. and as I say, few people know a whole lot about it. And I'm certainly no expert, but I'm not afraid to ask when I'm dying out. Yeah. And there's so much fascinating history. I mean, the fact that all the wines we think are better from France came from cuttings sent from the States back when there was a huge blight that destroyed the vineyards of France. When you sit down with your wife to a nice meal, what are you serving? It depends what I'm serving. I mean, our tastes in wine run pretty classically American. We're looking for big flavor. And I hate to get so stereotypical because the subtleties are the subtleties, and red and white don't necessarily have to go with what you think they have to go with. But traditionally, if I'm doing red meat, I'm looking for a cab or a Syrah or a Chianti. And if we're in the world of seafood, I tend to look for a shard, although we diverge a bit there because I like buttery and oaky and my wife likes a thinner flavor. I don't like, and I guess if I were an onophile, I'd sneer at myself for this, but I don't like thin wine. I don't, you know, I hate to be Paul Giamatti from Sideways, but in my world, nobody drinks Merlot. Yeah. And by the way, I'm a huge fan of two other categories. I love champagne. I'm certainly not a snob in terms of it has to be actual champagne from France. I mean, my New Year's go to is Jay, which no one will tell you is a great champagne. But in my mind, it is great value for the dollar. Look, I lived in Europe for years. I have enjoyed many a good bottle of champagne. Although there too, you know, branding in America seems to beat taste. You're not going to convince me that Cristal is particularly the top of anyone's heap. But since famous people want to overpay for it when they're seen at a table somewhere, it's, you know, it's Cristal. I've had many other, look, Perriez-Joy has always, or the Grand Dame, both of those have always made me very happy. But I also like a sweet dessert wine. I mean, we were at a chef's tasting counter at a high-end restaurant. Bizarrely enough, associated with Disneyland in California, where I was shooting the special. They offered Chateau de Kim as a dessert wine. And, you know, I don't know the vintage, but it was, yeah, a couple hundred bucks a bottle, I'm sure, retail. And our daughter at the time was, I don't know, 14. I've always been pretty open-minded about stuff like this. She was going to get a taste. And when the server came up, I said, could I have a third glass, please? He said, yeah, but when it's time to pour, I'll leave you the bottle and I'll walk away. So we poured my daughter, I guess she was like 15, a glass of Chateau de Kemp. And from that point on, it became her favorite wine. You know, it's like, it's birthday dinner. What do you want? I want Chateau de Kemp. Jeez, honey, it's 200 bucks, you know? We continue our collaboration with Emmy award-winning journalist David Page. That's what we do in the podcast world. We help each other out. And David's got a brand new podcast called Culinary Characters Unlocked. The best five-minute wine podcast. Has there been an episode where you unlocked something that was shocking to you or odd? There have been many revelations. I mean, I just aired an episode with Diane Mua is the chef owner of a place called Diane's Place in Minneapolis. Her restaurant was named the 2025 Restaurant of the Year by Food and Wine Magazine. She is Hmong, H-M-O-N-G. To many people, the only reference for that would be Green Torino by Clint Eastwood. And she's doing Hmong cooking, which is the mostly Asian cooking of stateless people with such a story to tell. I thought that was just tremendously interesting. You know, you meet incredible people doing this. someone like Dan Barber, who Time Magazine put on their list of the 100 most influential people, who is trying to reinvent, redefine how we as Americans eat with his restaurant, Blue Hill at Stone Farms and the whole farm that surrounds it. He's at the forefront of trying to get Americans to A, eat honest to God, local sourced good food and B, to do it in a way that minimizes animal protein without eliminating it and gets us to understand you can like vegetables if they taste good, if they haven't been genetically bred to be perfectly round so that they can be transported properly and in fact have been bred to have flavor. Every one of the folks I talk to has something interesting, unusual, provoking to say. So shocking? I don't know. When you can get Muammar Gaddafi to talk about cross-dressing, you can really get a screwdriver in somebody's back when you're interviewing them and get them to say things that they normally wouldn't say, right? Well, but hold on. If you're going to reference that story, let me tell it. I mean, after America blew up Gaddafi's house, I got the first interview with him. And this was shortly after, presumably based on a CIA leak, and who knows if it was true or not. They leaked to the I guess it was them to the New York Post the allegation that Gaddafi was using a lot of psychotropic drugs and that he liked to dress up as a woman So the Post mocked up a picture of him in a dress and heels and made the front page after. So anyway, I'm going to interview Gaddafi, who had I technically interviewed him or just been in a press conference? I've been around him before. Anyway, he spoke perfect English and he understood perfect English. But for political reasons, he would often insist that the interview be done through a translator. So I'm doing the standard interview with him and it's all the standard answers to all the standard questions and I'm done. So I figure I'll throw one more at him. So I say, listen, I didn't say listen. The New York Post, based presumably on CIA information, recently reported that you like to dress up in women's clothing. Is that true? And then his translator would not ask the question. And I looked over and I realized the guy was afraid that if he asked the question, he'd be executed. At which point Gaddafi, who spoke perfect English, broke out laughing because he understood the question. And then he blamed us Jews. But, you know, it was it was quite the moment. Did on the set there, were there go? Did he have security and guards standing with guns? And you mean, was I picked up at my hotel by armed machine gun carrying soldiers who blindfolded me to take me to his house, even though we all knew where it was yeah um that that's how things go over there did you did you sign up for that or did they prep you with that or did i mean did you wear a diaper i've been working i've been working overseas for a long time that's just what that that's reality that that's what you deal with although i will say it was also in tripoli where we were running late to feed a story to new york and so and there was traffic along the the little road that we needed to take to get to the TV station. So I got out of the car and I started running with the tape. And I was immediately stopped by a bunch of guys with guns because it turns out I was running in front of a bunch of military vessels. But we still got the tape to the TV station that time. Starting a business means wearing many hats, designer, marketer, manager, while chasing your vision. Shopify powers millions of businesses with tools to build beautiful stores, create content, and market with ease. From inventory to shipping, everything runs smoothly. If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Sign up for your one-euro trial today at shopify.nl. That's shopify.nl. I'm a coward. I don't have an ounce of bravery in me. And yet, if you look at my resume, you'd say, oh, you've been in some dicey places. They never seemed dicey. The fact of the matter is, that stuff was fun. I hate to say it and I hate to minimize a tragedy in any way. And I don't mean to do that. I'm not. But the fact of the matter was, in my day, covering stuff like that was fun. Bringing all of that to culinary characters unlock the episodes. I will say I am using the same editorial standards that I've always used when I was reporting overseas, when I was doing investigative work. It better be true and it better be provable. There's something sadly missing in America today, which is a commitment to the truth. I'm going to tell the truth. Yeah. That's all. So tell us the truth. Are the episodes pretty good? I'm very proud of them. They're damn fine. These are entertaining, informative, provoking interviews that I think improve your day. I mean, the bottom line is it's a bunch of personality. And each episode, you know, look at the thumbnails. They'll tell you. Chef Amy Mertens grew up all over the world as a military brat, went to the CIA, calling her Eastern America, not the spy agency, ended up as a sous chef at the legendary Commander's Palace in New Orleans and is now running her own kitchen in that town where she's redefining traditional New Orleans cuisine. That's all you need to know. She's entertaining. She's terrific. You know, give her a listen. Right now, the latest episode is Vinny Cimino. He's a chef in Cleveland who Food & Wine just named one of their 2025 hot new chefs or best new chefs. He's reinventing Midwestern classic food in his own way. He's doing he's turned the traditional from he's in Cleveland. From his part of Ohio, there's a driving chain called Swenson's that they do a particular kind of burger with cheese and sauce and pickles. He's doing his version of it as steak tartare. He's doing deep fried saltines. He's doing pickles marinated in Kool-Aid. This is a guy worth listening to. Pickles marinated in Kool-Aid. Yeah. His grandmother used to do it. He said, you know, you can't really taste the individual flavors, but it adds a sweetness and a color. Yeah. Deep fried saltines? Yeah. His grandmother, who is from Alabama, it's actually an Alabama dish, but she used to make it for him when he was growing up. She would deep fry saltines and he loves it and he's selling his restaurant now, which if you go to Cleveland, the restaurant is Cordelia. My Thanksgiving episode is one of the few complete throwbacks to diners. I booked Matt Redman, who is the owner of a place in Florida called I think it's Sarasota called the Alpine Steakhouse. I had him on diners in 2007 because he makes a turducken by hand. Now, that's a boneless turkey stuffed with a boneless chicken stuffed with a boneless duck. And by the way, if you've never had it, your duck and your life is empty. Yeah, if you do it right, it's kind of like cutting a tree and looking at the rings. You get a little of everything. And in between the various proteins is Cajun stuffing with andouille. It's just I get one. I order one shipped frozen every year. It's the best Thanksgiving on Earth. Wow. You know, we've got a hell of an interview. anytime you can mention Muammar Gaddafi and Turducken. Yes, but if you could get a Turk Gaddafi, that would be, I think, the ultimate. Culinary characters unlocked, ladies and gentlemen, it's David Page. And I think, David, that you fulfilled the statement that you made at the beginning of this interview. And I better damn well be amusing. Oh, the crowd went wild. Let it be stated that I am tipping my cap in appreciation. Hey, thank you. It's been great. Take care. The best five minute one podcast. Don't forget my favorite part.
