Quick-Fire Quips is a speedy questionnaire where we get to know people who stand out in the State of Alabama! In this episode, Alabama Public Radio host Baillee Majors talks with Kelsey Barnard Clark, a Dothan chef and owner of restaurant, KBC, who won the 16th season of the reality TV cooking competition, Top Chef, and now she has her own show on Netflix.
Baillee: hey, Kelsey! How are ya?
Kelsey: I'm good. How are you?
Baillee: I'm good. So happy to have you on!
Kelsey: Happy to be here.
Baillee: Okay, tell me about the Netflix show. Tell me about Next Gen Chef.
Kelsey: It is a reality show. It is a competition. We've seen a lot of food competitions, but I think the thing that sets this one apart the most is that it's very young young in their career. So, they're very eager. They're very passionate. It's a show full of dreamers, and I think that the world needs more of that.
Baillee: Now that introductions are out of the way, let's get you warmed up to answer the questionnaire. And to do that, I want you to say Quick Fire Quips, three times fast.
Kelsey: Okay. Quick-Fire Quips. Quick-Fire Quips. Quick-Fire Quips. Quick-Fire Quips. Quick-Fire Quips. Quick-Fire Quips.
Baillee: (laughs) Okay, perfect! Here's the first question. What is the first word that comes to mind when you hear Alabama?
Kelsey: Comfortable. You know, I've lived in New York, I've lived a few places. I would say, for sure, it feels so welcoming here. You can just relax, take a deep breath. You can choose to go slow. You don't have to keep up with the hustle. There is not really a hustle here. I think that's just really a breath of fresh air if you choose to do that here.
Baillee: What's a bad stereotype or something that people get wrong about Alabama?
Kelsey: I think that some people don't feel like everyone is welcome here. I understand that there are some confusions about the South in general, but I think that what most people would find is, it's more just more welcoming than one might think.
Baillee: What is a local hidden gym that more people should know about?
Kelsey: There's a lot of hidden gems to me, but I would say more than anything... find the hidden gems in your town and support them. If they're hidden gems, then they're not being not supported.
For me, I love Hunt's Oyster Bar [Hunt's Seafood Restaurant & Oyster Bar], which is in our town in Dothan, and it's not hidden. It's not a hidden gem at all. But these are hard working people that work every day to keep this restaurant open. If it weren't for people talking about it and going there, that wouldn't be the case.
So, I'd say, wherever you are in whatever town you are, support your businesses. Those are the actual gems, and let's not keep them hidden.
Baillee: I would argue that Dothan is pretty well known for the Alabama Peanut Festival [National Peanut Festival].
Kelsey: Yes, this is true!
Baillee: Have you ever been? What's your favorite fair food to get?
Kelsey: If you're from dozen, and you feel that chill, you're like, "It's here!" Have I been? Yes, every year for my entire life, multiple times a year!
My favorite food is The Corndog Man, hands down. You have to support The Corndog Man. He passed away a few years ago, but his family still does it.
But I love a turkey leg. I love an elephant ear, a lot, but mostly, and most importantly, boiled peanuts. You cannot go there and cannot leave without boiled peanuts!
When I was young, that was the only place that you could really get kettle corn... that you see in the stores now. We would buy like 20 bags of kettle corn when we went to Peanut Festival. That would last me, I don't know, probably a month, which I know you're like, "20 bags in a month?" Yes, I said that, right.
Baillee: No, I get it! I get it!
Kelsey: I was so obsessed. I'm still so obsessed with it. So all those things, all the food, actually, is really what I mean!
Baillee: What's something that you wish more people knew about the culinary community?
Kelsey: I think that the persona is that restaurant owners and chefs are these, like tough grizzly, can handle anything type of people. We act that way, for sure.
But I think that it's more important to be aware that all of us are incredibly sensitive, incredibly passionate people,-pleasing people. That's how we got into this industry, is that we love, love, love making people happy, and we hate nothing more than when people are unhappy.
I think just that is something to remember, and [it] goes back to the saying of, "You never want to know what anyone's going through. You never know what anyone's thinking."
And I would say, before you get on your computer and type out this horrific Google review about a restaurant, did you speak to anyone first? Did you talk about it? Because I think that people will be very surprised how much hurt that can bring and how hard this industry is.
It's very hard to make money, and it's very hard, in general. At the end of the day, you're talking about a very hard career, very hard jobs, and very sensitive people. So, I think that would be my biggest thing is just kind of trying to flip that switch a little bit.
Baillee: If you had to make one dish for someone very famous, what dish would that be?
Kelsey: I think I would want to make my version of Southern food with people who've never had southern food for real... and just hear their feedback, whether it was good, bad, I would learn.
I think that the best version of you is you, and so cooking your food and cooking yourself and talking about the stories and sharing them with people is the best thing. So for me, it would probably be Daniel Boulud, Julia Child (who is my idol that I've never met) and a long list of other French chefs that I have studied or worked under my whole life.
Baillee: Now, keeping on Southern food, what is your go to dish to bring to a potluck?
Kelsey: Deviled eggs. My book, Southern Grit, has, I don't know, 20,000 recipes for it, and it kind of became my thing, because it was the first thing I cooked on Top Chef.
When I tell you the whole room of chefs was like, "Is she out of her freaking mind? You're on Top Chef, and all you're gonna do is bowl some freaking eggs?"
Baillee: They don't get it!
Kelsey: No, they don't get it. It's not about boiling eggs. You can make it so delicious.
Baillee: You mentioned Top Chef. What is something that people get wrong when it comes to reality TV?
Kelsey: Specifically with Top Chef, a lot of the reactions we're having weren't to the thing that is being shown. So for example, my friend Sarah is like, "I cannot believe she did that." And then there's a clip of me being like, "That's the worst!" And I was literally talking about a steak.
We're not actually mean. It's just imagine living your life and every single thing being filmed at all times, and yet people are just pulling like clips from your day. Everyone has bad moments in their day. Everyone says things that wasn't the best thing... Imagine that on a camera, 24/7, for however many weeks.
Baillee: That sounds horrible!
(Baillee and Kelsey laugh)
Kelsey: Right? And we sign up for it!
Baillee: Do you have any superstitions or irrational fears?
Kelsey: Oh, for sure. I'm OCD, and my OCD is just obsessive thoughts. They're not rational thoughts. My biggest one is being canceled by things that I have never done, nor would do.
Baillee: What's your favorite getaway spot in Alabama and why?
Kelsey: A few! Mobile is where my family's from. You can't beat mobile and Fairhope.
The food scene in Birmingham is unreal. I cannot believe that Top Chef has not done Birmingham... I'm not saying that "It's incredible for Alabama." No, I'm saying the food scene is great, period!
Baillee: Here is our last question. What does Alabama need?
Kelsey: Alabama needs less of the same and more of the different. Because the one thing that I think is a little bit stuffy and stifling about Alabama is you will meet 17 versions of the same person everywhere you go.
For me, nothing is more intriguing than someone who is going to give me a different conversation, or they're from somewhere different. I think that what the world needs is people from other places so that we can all learn and learn how to get along better, and learn how to be better humans, and learn how to respect cultures better and also embrace the culture.
I want nothing more than for my children to know all types of people and know that they can be whoever they want to be, and not 17 versions of the same person.
Baillee: That's it for today's quick fire quips, a speedy questionnaire where we get to know people who stand out in the state of Alabama. That was Netflix star and Chef Kelsey Barnard Clark from Dothan.
Keep up with Chef Kelsey Barnard Clark online and on social media:
- Website
- Facebook
- Instagram
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