Frederick:
Welcome to tonight's chat with the TOO HOT TAMALES, Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger, hosts of the of the TV Food Network shows Too Hot Tamales and Tamales' World Tour, radio show hosts, authors of four cookbooks, and chef/owners of Border Grill in Los Angeles.

Kenny:
Highly recommend the place if anybody is in town.

Frederick:
Mary Sue and Susan will be joining us separately tonight, to make answering of questions a little easier. During the first half-hour we will be chatting with Mary Sue, and during the second half-hour we will be chatting with Susan. We'll let you know when they change.

Frederick:
Welcome Mary Sue! Everybody, ask away!

Mary Sue Milliken:
Hello, everyone!

Staff:
Welcome Mary Sue Milliken!

Frederick:
Are you enjoying making your new show, Tamales' World Tour?

Mary Sue Milliken:
Well, yes! It's been great to sort of break out of Latin cooking and be able to do some of the food we did at our first restaurant, City Cafe, which was food that represented all the different kinds of ethnic foods you might find in a city. That was in LA as well.

We had really been missing that food, so it's great to have a show where we can share it with the viewers and public. And then we get to eat it, of course.

PaulMc:
Mary Sue, how much of what you cook on TV is used in your restaurant?

Mary Sue Milliken:
Well, it depends. The Too Hot Tamales series featured a lot of food that could be found at our restaurant, depending on the day and what the specials were, because Border Grill has a Latin-inspired menu. The new series, however, has food that we used to serve at City Restaurant. We haven't decided, but someday we may re-open City Restaurant. We'll keep you posted.

PaulMc:
Are all your recipes your own or do you have a staff that helps?

Mary Sue Milliken:
Most of them are ours. Well, no wait a minute. Most of them -- let's see. Most of them become ours after they've evolved through a process of a few drafts, and then a testing or two. But they often begin as other people's recipes, as staff members' grandmothers' or great uncles recipes that we modify .... We're good collaborators, and we enjoy the process.

Staff:
What was the circumstance that brought the Two Hot Tamales together to open your first restaurant together?

Mary Sue Milliken:
We met in Chicago, working in a restaurant called Le Perroquet. After moving on and working apart for a while, we ended up being in France together, by coincidence -- me in Paris, Susan on the Riviera -- but keeping in touch. By the end of that year we had decided that we wanted to go into business together. This was in 1980. We were broke. (laugh)

But nonetheless, we came back home -- me to Chicago, Susan to California -- and within six months we had the opportunity to work together in a little cafe on Melrose and snatched it up. Pretty soon we became part owners of the cafe because the owners weren't restaurateurs -- they didn't know how to run a restaurant. That place started out with two hot plates, so it's been quite an evolution over the last 17 years.

LobstahBob:
If you're going out for a meal, what sort of restaurant (or particular restaurant) do you seek?

Mary Sue Milliken:
That's a good question. I'm pretty adamant about seeking ethnic dives, that's my favorite kind of food. Ethnic dives that are sort of family-owned and operated.

Mary Sue Milliken:
I especially love Asian restaurants, like Korean barbecue, northern Thai, Japanese noodles -- I have half a dozen in LA that I go to with my family pretty regularly.

Oscar:
Excuse my ignorance, but what differentiates Northern Thai from Southern?

Mary Sue Milliken:
That's a good question! Northern Thai rarely uses coconut milk, if ever. And where most of the spicy salads originate, and more of the sticky rice. It's near the Laos border, so it's got more of the Laotian style --It's actually called Issan style.

jgawronski@usa-net.net:
What restaurants do you frequent in Los Angeles?

Mary Sue Milliken:
If you're in LA, be sure to try Totoraku on Sotal, Taiko on San Vicente, Yabu on Pico, or my favorite Thai restaurant, which is well worth the trek: Renu Nakorn, on Rosecrantz in Norwalk. Well worth the forty-minute ride from downtown.

PaulMc:
With all you're doing on the TV shows, how much time do you spend in the restaurant?

Mary Sue Milliken:
Believe it or not, I'm there pretty much five days a week, and Susan works at least five nights a week -- except when we're out of town, which is maybe one week out of five.

Asher:
Do you ever plan on opening any new restaurants?

Mary Sue Milliken:
We're thinking about opening another Border Grill somewhere in Southern California, and maybe a City Restaurant, if we find the perfect location -- in South Hollywood, say, our old neighborhood.

Kenny:
I understand the Tamales' World Tour is doing Thai food this week. Did you adjust your recipe for American ingredients?

Mary Sue Milliken:
We always try to make our recipes as accessible as possible without sacrificing the integrity of the dish. So oftentimes we'll show the dishes with the ethnic ingredients, and we'll suggest substitutions for people in Peoria -- no offense -- you know, "ethnically-challenged" areas. (laugh)

Staff:
What would you say is the secret of your success in the food biz?

Mary Sue Milliken:
Our success in the food business comes from passion, and loving to eat, and being very curious and diligent hard workers from the Midwest.