The LoCo Experience

EXPERIENCE 239 | Keep Your Burritos Local with Paul Michaelson, Owner of Matador Mexican Grill

• Ava Munos • Season 5 • Episode 240

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Paul Michaelson left an early stage financial planning career track soon after graduating from CSU to launch a 2-location Taco Del Mar franchise in Fort Collins, in partnership with his brother-in-law.  When the franchisor proved to be more of a hindrance than a help, they split off to become Matador Mexican Grill off Harmony and Timberline, and Toro - a quick-serve restaurant in Campus West, reliant upon the Matador’s kitchen - and about 10 trips across town each day for Paul!  

Toro soon disappeared, but Matador has become a Fort Collins landmark, and staple food source for white-collar and blue collar, takeout and traveller alike.  My relationship with Matador began when I was a banker at Capital West Bank, kitty-corner across the street, and at least every other Wednesday I would go in for their smothered burrito special, ghost sauce on the inside and bathing in Matador’s delicious hot green chili.  Drink two Arnold Palmers while eating my burrito, building a sweat and then a shiver - and returning to the office in an altered state was my habit on Wednesdays, and it’s been a joy to reconnect with Paul as a collaborator of the Hot Nugs Conversation Series with Fort Collins Mayoral Candidates.  

Paul’s is a journey of resilience, dedication, customer loyalty, and continuous deliciousness and creativity, so please enjoy, as I did, my conversation with Paul Michaelson.  

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Music By: A Brother's Fountain

Speaker 4:

Paul Michelson left an early stage financial planning career track soon after graduating CSU to launch a two location Taco Del Mar franchise in Fort Collins. In partnership with his brother-in-law, when the franchisor approved to be more of a hindrance than a help, they split off to become Matador Mexican Grill off harmony in Timberline and Toro. A quick serve restaurant on campus West, reliant upon Matador's Kitchen and about 10 trips across the town each day. For Paul. Toro soon disappeared, but Matador has become a Fort Collins landmark and staple food source for white collar and blue collar takeout and traveler alike. My relationship with Matador began when I was a banker at Capital West Bank Kitty Corner across the street, and at least every other Wednesday I would go in for their smothered. Burrito, special ghost sauce on the inside and bathing in Matador's Delicious hot green chili. Drink two Arnold Palmers while eating my burrito, building a sweat and then a shiver. And returning to the office in an altered state was my habit on Wednesdays, and it's been a joy to reconnect with Paul as a collaborator on the Hot Nugs Conversation series with Fort Collins mayoral candidates. Paul's is a journey of resilience, dedication, customer loyalty, and continuous deliciousness and creativity. So please enjoy as I did my conversation with Paul Michelson.

Speaker:

Welcome back to the Loco Experience Podcast. I'm joined today by Paul Michelson. Correct? Is that how you say it? It's kind of a confusing name.'cause it's,

Speaker 3:

it's'cause it's simple.

Speaker:

Well, and there's not, it's it's a rare one. Yeah. It reeds just like it. It's, yeah. Apparently it sounds just like a res Right. But I ha I see a lot of mickelson. Yep. Like you don't have the a EL on the Michelson.

Speaker 3:

Uh, it's spelled SEN on the n instead of ON, which it's two three different.

Speaker:

So it's not Michael's son, it's Michael's sin. So more like. Danish style or something? Uh, I believe so, yes.'cause I, I think there's Sins and Sons depending, the Norwegians were more the sons and the Danes were more the sins.

Speaker 3:

Alright. I,

Speaker:

you look like a Viking kind of of some sort a little bit. So you are the owner of Matador Mexican Grill. Yes. And, uh, you are a collaborator also on the Hot Nugs conversation series. Mm-hmm. Uh, because of your affinity for making wonderful hot sauces. Uh, which I've known for. Do you remember? Um, me from way back in the day? Vaguely. Vaguely. Yeah. Because I worked across Kitty Corner across the street at Capital West Bank. Right, right. When you were first kind of opened out there. Okay. Yeah. And at least every other Wednesday I would come in for your smothered burrito special. Yep. Right on. Was kind of my thing. So

Speaker 3:

that's still the most popular, is that right? Yep. By far. That's the busy day.

Speaker:

Yep. Which we could have. Four more busy days like that.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Speaker:

So, uh, I guess for people that are aren't familiar, tell uh, tell folks about your, your shop. Uh, just kind of overview,

Speaker 3:

uh, mission style burritos. So they're big burritos, rice and beans, meat and all the fixings kinda, uh, the birthplace is, uh, the mission area of San Francisco. Okay. So little, little south of the bay. So that notion

Speaker:

of like, like having a full meal sized burrito almost. Yeah. All day burrito,

Speaker 3:

uh, Chipotle, Qdoba do something similar, of course locally, big city, um, illegal pizza, so that, that, that kind of giant style. Mm-hmm. Uh, and it's a kind of choose your own adventure. You walk down the line, you point to the ingredients you want, and we make it right in front of you and then roll it up and hopefully you enjoy it.

Speaker:

Um, how many square feet you got over there? A couple thousand.

Speaker 3:

Uh, it's pretty small. It's actually, uh, 1650. Okay. So

Speaker:

with the kitchen and everything? Yeah. Okay. So seating for 40 or something? Yeah. Right. At that, I think without the patio.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. I think once you hit 40, you need to get an extra bathroom. So I think we intentionally shot for 39 or whatever. Fair

Speaker:

enough. And probably a lot of go food, a lot of catering, things like that too. Or what's your, what's your mix?

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Um, uh, there's really two different day parts. There's the, the morning slash lunch is, uh, pretty heavy in store and then afternoon evenings pretty much takeout for everybody.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm. People grabbing burritos on the way home.

Speaker 3:

Right.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Uh, catering side picks up, uh, graduation time, uh, summer parties and then Christmas parties. Yeah. Seasonal, kinda seasonal stuff. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah. That's gravy on top and everybody has to work a little harder'cause Right. The staffing probably doesn't change too much in those short seasons.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. You normally, you don't, uh, get to choose when you're gonna do those. A lot of'em are just next day and it, the schedule's already out and that's when your,

Speaker:

uh, head dishwasher roll kicks in more effectively. Yes. Yeah. So when do you find time for all the creativity?'cause it seems to me that. Your business is definitely a platform for your creativity.

Speaker 3:

Uh, y well, when you're, you're around food all the time, you're always talking to people about food. You're always doing food things. You're watching food shows. Uh, and you, you never know when inspiration's gonna hit. Uh, I remember one of the sauces that I make is a maple jalapeno sauce. You do it for our breakfast britos. Mm. And uh, I was actually at Sam's Club one time and I was staring at the honey. I couldn't remember if we had enough honey or not. And I put my arm up and I knocked over a Mrs. Butterworth. I'm like, well, you put jalapenos in that. Mm. So very popular sauce and a lot of people love it. Yeah, it is great with breakfast burrito. So, uh, I mean, you're just kinda always thinking about food. You, you're kinda a fat kid, so it just never stops. It's just goes in there.

Speaker:

Yeah. Yeah. Um, and staff of probably, what, a dozen or something? A little more than now? Uh, 17 right now. 17. Okay. Uh, and mostly part-timers kind of rotating shifts or more, more full-time.

Speaker 3:

Uh, actually more full-timers we've got, uh, okay. So we'll be, uh, 16 in October. Okay. And, uh, I, we've got half a dozen people that have been there for 10 plus years. Wow. So, uh, most of the staff doesn't change very often. Yeah. Uh, we'll get some high school, college kids, part-timers kind of rolling through the evenings, weekends, uh, but the core has really been there for most of it. Really. That's

Speaker:

really cool. And how many are on at a time, typically, like, full, full team on deck for the lunch rush on Wednesday?

Speaker 3:

Yeah. We'll, we'll run four, we'll have three on the line and then we'll guy in the kitchen. Okay. Uh, dinners will usually drop down to three. Okay. Uh, and then three to close to finish it off. Okay.

Speaker:

Um, and what's your most popular,

Speaker 3:

uh, you know, uh, I, I call it the bro Rito'cause all the high school kids get it. Okay. The, uh, jalapeno cheddar tortilla, white rice, black beans, queso chicken. Just like that. Yep. So even though we try creative and fun stuff all the time, it's still grilled chicken is always the number one. Is that

Speaker:

right? Yeah. I didn't realize, I thought, I thought beef was a lot heavier in nutrition than chicken on almost full spectrum. But chicken ounce rounds on protein especially is magnificent. Right. You know, it doesn't have the multivitamins, this and that, but you know, it's a lot cheaper than beef these days, which is a good population. Yeah. I imagine you have to charge more for your beef even than you used to, or do you have to keep it paired? Any kinda, um, few smaller scoops.

Speaker 3:

Well, I've tried really hard not to shrink ation anything. Right. Keep it, keep, uh, people consistent with what they're getting. Uh, and that, that's just one of those things that goes up and down. You can never predict when it's gonna happen.

Speaker:

Just kind of, kind of hold to it a

Speaker 3:

little bit. Yeah. Some days it's great, some days it's not. So. Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah. So it goes, so what, what, uh, what. Caused you to get into the burrito business. Like what was the setting I want set me, set the stage for me and we'll go back into the, all the way back machine at some point, you know, uh, set the stage for when Matador first opened. You said 16 years

Speaker 3:

ago? 16 years ago. But prior to that, um, my brother-in-law, uh, his uncle is a subway guy. He owns a bunch of subways in Nebraska. Oh, okay. South Dakota. Um, I don't even know. Dozens and dozens. Yeah.

Speaker:

Did really good at it.'cause he is got a really nice car and all that. Right?

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. Um, and then he was approached by a franchise called Taco Delmar. They're based outta Seattle. Yeah. Uh, very similar to Subway. Yeah. There's one in Longmont I've stopped at before. I think. Um, I think they're all. All West Coast. Now they've, they've had some issues, but, oh, is that right? So, uh, he was approached by those guys because it's very similar to the Subway model. That's what they were trying to copy. Yeah. And, uh, he decided he was gonna open a few in Nebraska. He said, Hey guys, this looks like fun. You should, yeah. Get in. We can, you know, grow together with this thing. So, uh, we opened up Taco del Mar. Okay. There's one next to Jim's wings. Okay. James West. And then the one, the location we're at now. Oh. On Harmony and Timberland. Okay. And, uh, it just wasn't gonna work. Didn't catch on. No, it was, it was subway model, so everything was microwave food. Everything was pre-made. Like we didn't have any kit kitchen time, no prep time, like everything came. Oh, gross. Yeah. And I, I was a finance guy when I, I went, that's went to school for finance and economics, so I didn't know what I was doing. So. And

Speaker:

what was your place in life? Were you, um, like, had you worked in restaurants and things too, or Not really? Some fast food in high school, but yeah, it was

Speaker 3:

never, uh, never a restaurant guy.

Speaker:

But you were a finance guy, so you were quickly seeing the, the bloody red ink on the bottom of your profit loss. Right,

Speaker 3:

right. So, uh, we ended up taking them to arbitration and, uh, to, to break our contract. Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

And since we had invested so much time and money, we just decided we're gonna do our own thing after this, if we can finish this off. So. We were able to break off from them.

Speaker:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

Uh, and then we created Matador.

Speaker:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

And, uh, had no idea. So like, why

Speaker:

you're fighting with them to break off. You're like, how about a bull with a circle around it or something like that?

Speaker 3:

Uh, traded, uh, a, a loyal customer, some fish tacos for her expertise in the logo. So it was great. Uh, I got

Speaker:

my first logo for$75. So it sounds like you need to do better. Yep. Your stock

Speaker 3:

is your universal delicious food. So, uh, but it, it took so long to finish the arbitration. We didn't know when we were gonna actually break out or if we could Oh, so you started even before, so kind of, I mean, you know, started Washing Food Network and your Okay. You know, I didn't really know what else to do. I'm still having to run the restaurant full time, so I'm, you know, watching videos on YouTube. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, trying to learn anything I can about food and. I mean, I was a mediocre cook at best. Okay. I don't know to argue now, but Yeah. Yeah. Uh, going into this, so, yeah. Yeah. Uh, it was really just kinda all exploded at once. It happened basically overnight. We weren't ready for it. Uh, so we closed down for about three weeks. Okay. Painted it, got new equipment. Yep. Uh, one thing with Taco Delmar was there was no grease trap. There was no vent hood. Right. So it was just all microwave. So we had to, we had to basically learn how to cook and we had to put a kitchen in the spot we, we were in.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 3:

So that's kind of why our spot's so small.

Speaker:

Mm. Seating wise.'cause we

Speaker 3:

didn't need that room. Yeah. Yeah. For the kitchen.'cause it just didn't exist. Do

Speaker:

you feel like it could constrained by the size? Like should you have, or is it just more space, more money?

Speaker 3:

Um, there's days Wednesday you definitely want some more space in the right. Um, I, I think if there's more room, I think people would probably be more apt to, to stay. Yeah. Instead of go, I, I can definitely see on a busier lunchtime, uh, people look around and go, well, I'll take it to go today.

Speaker:

Yeah. Yeah. So, but more, more take it to go than. Walk back outside. Right, right. So that's a compliment to your chefs as well, I would say, you know, and, and the relative, like, actually there's pretty good restaurants down in that corridor now. Like when you opened you were like, nobody, there was nobody. Yeah. Uh, I mean, there was a few, but not much. Uh, now there's like, probably five does pretty good food over there. Yeah. And, uh, oh, even the Down by Ace Hardware, the Mexican restaurant there. Uh, Lebo. Navita. Yeah. Yeah. I like that shop too. Yeah. Yeah. It feels like a Mexican resort to be there. They're just very polished and very well-trained staff. All that absolute. So, uh, so you're going through this mayhem, but bring it together like, uh, well, the,

Speaker 3:

the numbers still weren't there. Okay. We knew we still weren't good enough, so it was just kinda one of those things where we're gonna look at every single item we have. We're gonna try and make the recipe better. Mm. And then we're gonna go to the next one. And then slowly over the course of months we started dialing stuff in and more people trying. So just continuous improvement project. Yeah. So it took us about two years to really get moving. Okay. And then once we hit that point, you know, sales were good enough to, to keep doing it and keep fighting. So, um, and then, you know, but it was a couple years really of getting it, was it to the Black ink, even

Speaker:

without the franchise fees and all that. Right. Well, glad you made it. Yeah. It would

Speaker 3:

be weird to not have a Matador in town, I think for, I would feel kind of awkward about it, but, well,

Speaker:

and you eventually did an expansion. To a campus West thing too? Or was that part of the Taco de Marr? That was the Taco del Mar. Oh, so both locations were Matador for a while? Well, we couldn't put something, a

Speaker 3:

kitchen into the campus West store, so we called that one Toro. Oh, Toro. That's what I, okay.

Speaker:

Now I remember.

Speaker 3:

Toro's a, uh, mission District Burrito joint in San Francisco is fantastic.

Speaker:

We wanted to try. Okay. Okay. So

Speaker 3:

we did do a, a pilgrimage to the Mission district before we opened to Gotcha, gotcha. Just eat as many burritos as we can to see what everyone else is doing. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker:

So market research.

Speaker 3:

We didn't want to ruin the Matador name by having that weird off restaurant. So we were actually cooking all the food at the Harmony store and I would drive it over there every day. Interesting. And we warm it back up almost like a food

Speaker:

truck over there or something. Yeah. But that was pretty short lived. That was'cause you had a lease on the Taco de Mar place anyway, so you might as well try it.

Speaker 3:

Right. And we were doing okay over there. We were making enough money to, to at least keep, pay the rent,

Speaker:

whatever. Yeah. So, but you weren't passionate about that kind of concept and the food just not being as fresh and stuff.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, and it was such a pain. Some days I had to drive back and forth three times because was like, we were outta a chicken, we had a steak, you guys are killing me.

Speaker:

Um, and so, and then so kind of just came back down to one store and just called, called it good. Have you had dreams of expansion or you got a great brand and a model, but maybe it's not that easy.

Speaker 3:

I, I think we need to make sure our processes are written down in black and white. You know, so you've got all these long time

Speaker:

employees and stuff like that. Right. And make that not, yeah, it's an email and everyone already knows what's going on, so it's, it's not big deal. That's an interesting thing, just creating an environment where I. You know, you have this kinda long-term effect. And even when you have new employees, the long-term employees are like, Nope, Bob. We don't do it that way. Right. You know, whatever. Yeah. Um, tell me some of the main things you've learned, like from a like finance perspective coming in, especially sounds like where you, uh, a local graduate?

Speaker 3:

Uh, yeah. I went to CSU. Okay. Um, my first, um, big boy job in finance. I got, uh, interviewed on September 11th, 2001. Oh. I was actually, uh, gonna drive my wife to work and take her car to Denver for the interview. Okay. And they were gonna open an office, Fort Collins that I was gonna hopefully be a part of. And while I was waiting for her to get ready. Oh, no way. Watching tv. And then it happened, and then I'm driving to Denver and I called him and I'm like, are we still doing this? Like, yeah, it's still on. Like, we don't know what's going on either.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

And I get down there and they're like, well, let's just go in the conference room and watch the news and see what happens. And then after a couple hours of that, they're like, well, I, we're done for a while. We, the stock market's closed, so we're we don't have any work. If you have the job, you got it. And I'm like, okay, well I, I have to take some licensing stuff and Okay. Series, series 6 63, whatever, uh, life insurance. So I got time to study'cause the stock market's closed. It's great. Uh, they ended up opening a Fort Collins office and then they just fought through people and then, uh, kind of did. Okay. Yeah. And then that's when my brother-in-law approached me and it's like, you know, gotcha. We have another option here. We can make money on this side. Yeah. Yeah. And have a little fun with it. And I'm like, oh, let's, let's do it. Yeah. Yeah. It sounds more exciting than what I'm doing now. So

Speaker:

has that been, uh. Like all consuming a lot the whole time? Or do you get to kind of goof around? Do you take two weeks off, three weeks off a lot? Or is that head dishwasher thing always valid?

Speaker 3:

Uh, no, like I said, we do have fantastic people working there. Yeah. So I can walk away and, and, and be okay. Yeah. Um, there's a lot of things though that like a lot of the hot sauce recipes aren't even written down anywhere. So if I go away for too long, I have to make a giant batch of sauce that's gonna last for the entire time that I'm out. Or, you know. Is

Speaker:

it like the Coca-Cola recipe? The what?

Speaker 3:

Yeah. I mean, I was justing the day,

Speaker:

like, the funny thing is like, say you're making a jalapeno maple sauce, but some batches of jalapeno have like all the flavor or all the spice or all the both, and some batches you need twice as much probably just to get the same kind of flavor profile. Right.

Speaker 3:

Uh, that's the one kind of neat thing about hot sauce is you throw everything in a pot, blend it up, taste it, you know, if it's not right. Yeah. You just add more to it. It's like making chili. Just kidding. Yeah. Keep tweaking it and going forth. So it's always fun to do.

Speaker:

What's your, is that like part of your, like instead of having a, a multiple location or trying to spawn a franchise or something like that, you've really had maybe some investment in the product side in, uh, yeah. Both your own and making hot sauce for Sean and things like that? Or is that more just a one off?

Speaker 3:

Well, no, I think it's something that's, uh, really trying to offset the, the unpredictability of what's going on with restaurants right now. Right. Um, with COVI was weird. Everything's been weird since then and things are happening in the restaurant industry that I have no idea what's gonna be next. You've got people like Chili's are killing it really? Applebee's is getting crushed. Like they're what? They're the same thing in my mind. So, I mean, there's just stuff like that. Chipotle's doing really well. Um, kedo is doing really well. Um, and then you had stuff with Chipotle, like, uh, in, in, no offense to them, I know they're a great clean organization, but they had problems with some food poisoning and, and some, yeah, yeah. Issues. And they don't seem to get tarnished by that at all. Like people just go back in droves. Right. Which is great. I mean, good for them.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Uh, but normally like Jack and you, you,

Speaker:

you kinda get away with that. No, I would be crushed.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Uh, Jack in the box years ago had, uh, some deaths in the Denver area. They had Oh, I remember that. Uh, I don't know how many locations, A dozen locations. And then I think, uh, two or three young people died. Mm-hmm. Um, and then they ended up closing like all the restaurants in Colorado. Right. So, I mean, it, that's kind of some crazy scary stuff. So, um, some of those things affect people, some of'em don't, it doesn't make any sense. Yeah. Like all the stuff that I thought I knew about restaurants, I, I don't know if I know anymore.

Speaker:

Yeah. I don't think I,'cause I, I had left banking to try to get into the restaurant industry. I don't know if you remember that, the food trailer or that around town, but I don't know if I recognize the liability of that. Right. Like you're running on low margins and stuff already. Yeah. And I imagine that's kind of worked into your insurance policy a little bit, right? Sure. Like you just pay more insurance than it feels like you should, but part of that is you might just kill somebody if you're lucky. Maybe it'll be a few people if you're unlucky, you know,

Speaker 3:

not you, but people. Well, one thing about our, our, uh, system at Matador is everything's pretty, pretty simple. Um, pretty bulletproof in terms of our process operations. You get the hot going

Speaker:

or the cold cold, right? Um,

Speaker 3:

yeah, some places, uh, like serve raw seafood, you know, you've got a whole another host of issues, right? Right. Uh, staying away from things like that puts, puts your mind at ease a little bit too.

Speaker:

Well, and just having a fresh first approach to everything, right, like that was kind of what part of why Toro didn't survive is'cause it didn't feel right to not have a fresh first kind of approach. Right.

Speaker 3:

And people see a microwave and they're like, mm, I can do that at home. I'm not paying you for it. Fair enough. It's just not nothing.

Speaker:

Um, let's zoom back to, uh, to little Paul. Can we? Yeah, sure. Like a 5-year-old Paul. Where, where, uh, where were you and what was kind of your family dynamic? Were you from a family of entrepreneurs? Uh,

Speaker 3:

no. When I was, uh, probably four-ish, my, uh, parents got divorced. So raised by a single mom with grandma. Okay. Here, here, regionally. Uh, born in Denver. Okay. Um, and then moved to like Steamboat area during high school for a little bit of time.

Speaker:

Did, did you keep a relationship with, with your dad too? Uh, yeah. Yeah. Some, okay. A little bit. But mostly was raised with your, with your mom.

Speaker 3:

Right. And then, uh, grandma was really close by as well, so, uh, spent a lot of, you know, summertime with mom's at work with grandma. Sure. Uh, so she was kinda the babysitter for us. Um, I just wanted to be Luke Skywalker. That's all I really remember about

Speaker:

that, was about that time. When can you circle me? It feels like I'm. Five or 10 years older than you probably, but I don't know.

Speaker 3:

Um, I'm 49.

Speaker:

Oh, you are? I'm 51.

Speaker 3:

Uh, first movie I saw in theaters though was Return to Jedi. Okay. And that was the coolest thing I heard. It was the coolest thing ever. That was amazing. Um, so that was it. Just playing, playing games with friends and playing Star Wars and that was it.

Speaker:

My, my dad was a motorcycle mechanic that started a farm evenings and weekends and was really just busy working all the time. Yeah. But Star Wars was one of the earliest things I remember really bonding with my dad over was our mutual love of Star Wars back in the day. You know, so I, I never really voiced that. Thought before, but it's interesting to me. So you're, are, you're in Denver still? Did you say Steamboat somewhere?

Speaker 3:

Uh, yeah. I went to high school in, uh, a little town south of Steamboat called Oak Creek.

Speaker:

Okay. Yep. Um, been through there on my motorcycle. It's a nice motorcycle road over there. Yeah, absolutely. Actually they got a great little tavern in there. I stopped at last time.

Speaker 3:

Fun place to, to finish growing up, I guess. Mm-hmm. Through high school, uh, then, but you were

Speaker:

in Denver proper while you, let's, let's go back to your, that area. So west side a little bit. Did your mom stay single?

Speaker 3:

Do you Um, I wanna say I was 11 or 12 when she, uh, remarried. Okay. Um, uh, Jim, he's, he's dad now. Cool. Um, uh, he's an electrician up every day at six o'clock in the morning climbing ladders. Busted his butt doing stuff. Yeah. Uh, always was the first to do dishes'cause his hands were dirty when he got home, so he was, might as well

Speaker:

do dishes. It'll get my hands a lot cleaner than they otherwise would be.

Speaker 3:

Uh, so part of being the head dishwasher, he taught me absolutely everything about electrical and plumbing and because he. One of those things that if it's broken, we can try and fix it. Yeah. It's already broken, so. Yeah. Yeah. Why not? And you know, you don't have a lot of money to go buy a new one. Right. So we'll figure it out.

Speaker:

Yeah. I've gotten kind of lazy that way. Like when I was, you know, in my first few years of marriage and stuff, I was retiling bathroom showers and Sure. You know, re sheet rocking walls and learning how to do all these different things. And even trying my hand at some electrical stuff that was way above my pay grade. Right. And now I'm just like, eh, I'll just kind of pay somebody 250 bucks to do that instead, or a thousand bucks or, but it would be better for me if I just did a lot of that for myself.

Speaker 3:

Kids is nice. Having kids is nice because you can teach them while they do it. Oh yeah. And you just kind of coach sometimes. Were you

Speaker:

a, a, a only child in this?

Speaker 3:

Oh, actually I'm the youngest of, of seven. So I was uh, what, um, half brothers and sisters for the first five, and then I have sister and your dad's kids or your Yeah. Dad's.

Speaker:

Oh, so you kind of maintain a relationship with your siblings, uh, along the way, but also then, right. And then how many with your mom during the, her single years? My sister and I, so Oh, just the two.

Speaker 3:

Okay. Um, she's four and a half years older than me, so I'm Okay. I'm the baby by ways.

Speaker:

Gotcha, gotcha. Yeah. So you're like the trailing indicator on Right. Marriage or whatever. So she remarries Jim, did you say? Or John, yeah. And he became dad pretty quickly. Pretty cool guy.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Um, you know, fishing, camping, all the fun stuff you wanna do when you're a kid. So dig it, dig it. Um, and then you

Speaker:

get to move up to Oak

Speaker 3:

Creek and then it was 24 7. It never stops. Like, you can't turn around and not climb a mountain somewhere. Just

Speaker:

like, yeah.

Speaker 3:

Almost overload.'cause it was so much fun up there. But yeah, I would definitely, sounds like you miss it a little bit. I, I do. Uh, if, if I thought I could make a living there, I would go back and. Well, and jump in there for sure. Well, if

Speaker:

you had a matador up there, then you could drive back and forth with emergency food deliveries.

Speaker 3:

You, you could probably, uh, do fairly well with the restaurant Steamboat, but I creek's probably, I think so.

Speaker:

The right kind of thing. I don't know if there's a Yeah. Not an Oak Creek.

Speaker 3:

Sorry. It'd be tough.

Speaker:

Yeah, it'd be pretty tough right there. Although, I think, who did I, oh, I was, I had a, I had a burrito today. Oh. At the tabletop networking event and somebody called it peasant food and I was like, well, yeah, that's'cause the peasants kind of made the best food. Like that's where cooking, we got the creative is the bet. Yeah. Maybe your ingredients aren't the best, so you gotta figure out how to use it. Right. Carnitas, you want this, you know, fatty chunk of pork shoulder, you know. Right. It's, it's gonna be six hours before you can really eat it, but as long as you can keep a slow fire on it, it'll be fine. Yeah. You know? Right. Uh, and most of the best, that was why like. Uh, Anthony, what's his name? Bourdain. Like, he traveled in all these poorest countries, mostly because that's where the art of cooking has been the most Sure. Improvised, right? Like, and so anyway, I was like, well, peasant food is really a compliment. If you actually know anything about cooking, you'd dummy. Sure. Uh, anyway, I digress. Whoever that was that I was talking to this morning, if you hear this, I didn't, I didn't say it out loud.

Speaker 3:

Uh, no. My, uh, so my stepfather Jim, uh, grew up on a farm in eastern Kansas. Oh, cool. Or Western Kansas. Sorry. Yeah. Peasant country. Um, kind of So they did everything. Yeah. He's milking cows before he goes to school in the morning. Yeah. Uh, but kind of learning the connection of the food grandma made and how they made it.'cause you know, you slaughter a cow. Mm-hmm. All the good stuff goes to the guy paying the most, and you're left the scraps. Right. Right. So,

Speaker:

yep.

Speaker 3:

You learn to, to do with what you can. Your canning meat, which is I thought was crazy weird. Right. Making your own sausages. Right. Um, but you know, they, they lived very well. That's cool. You were doing that too? I, I tried to do everything, so I, yeah. You know, I go, I've done a bunch of canning, I've done a bunch of sausages. That's cool. Just trying to figure out how to do it. My brothers have

Speaker:

like, made their own venison sausage and stuff like that. Yeah. And it's cool to be able to do, I, uh, had a post on X the other day. Somebody said, uh, don't be afraid of canning people. It's not that hard and it's way better than the stuff they put in the, you know, manufacturing places. Whatever. I was like. I am not afraid of it, but I don't like how it takes me six hours to make nine jars of salsa.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, yeah. That's definitely it.

Speaker:

You know, so you need that commercial capacity. That's one of the nice things about hot sauce, I aspect is like in a 10 gallon pot, you can make a lot of jars of hot sauce.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, absolutely. Um, you

Speaker:

know, or I imagine you got like slow cookers even so you can leave that stuff kind of simmer for a long time. Let those flavors develop and whatever.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. I think the biggest pot I have is, uh, 30 gallons.

Speaker:

30 gallons.

Speaker 3:

It almost, you're tired of bottling hot sauce after you get through there. So you gotta take ies. How do you bottle it? How do you put it in the bottle? Um, I, I use a. A pitcher and then I put it into a, uh, pancake batter dispenser. The little cone with a little Oh yeah. Thumb hit on it.

Speaker:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

And so I'll get a, a row of bottles going and just boop boop boop boop. If I have

Speaker:

you make our hot sauce next time, will it be a little higher up in the neck? I feel like that's a little bit low. Uh, it should be to

Speaker 3:

the rim when you fill it up. Yeah. So it

Speaker:

looks like it's full. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3:

Well, you, you do bottle it when it's really hot. Yep. And then you cap it, the bottles will probably, probably

Speaker:

sterilize and hot. You just bring'em outta the dishwasher or something like that.

Speaker 3:

Right. So then when it cools, it'll definitely come down a little bit.

Speaker:

I see. Too

Speaker 2:

much.

Speaker 3:

Too much. And that, that kinda gives you that vacuum to keep air out too. So, you know, if you open one up, it should give you a little pop.

Speaker:

Oh yeah. But it's not like canned, canned officially, but just because of that vacuum of all that heat,

Speaker 3:

you know, that's one thing that's, that's still trying to figure out in my head because most commercial like jams and jellies, they're not canned. Like you'd canned it at home. Yeah, it's just hot filled. Captain you. Right. So you're not pressure can, they're

Speaker:

not even pressure can yet.

Speaker 3:

Right. Um, depending on the food. So if it's, if it's a low pH, they're just Right. Heating it Yeah. Putting it in there and you're done. Um, some stuff like, you know, tuna or spam or whatever. Yeah. You definitely have to get that thing hot and cookie. Well, so

Speaker:

hopefully nobody gets in trouble over this, but at, at Ginger and Baker, uh, our, our rotary club meets, uh, every Thursday morning, which come visit sometime if you like. Yeah. But, uh, there's this hot sauce that she makes. It's a little bit like your centennial son or Sean's centennial son, but more red and chunky. Right. Um, and it's delicious. I love it. And in recent weeks, uh, uh, like it hasn't been there for like a month or a month and a half and before that for a few weeks, it was like kind of. Bubbling out of the jars and stuff a little bit. And I would guess that be because it was actually fermenting or doing something funky in there.

Speaker 3:

Right. That's actually a sauce I make for them.

Speaker:

Oh.

Speaker 3:

So, well I make the one that they, that's bottled and they sell.

Speaker:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

They make their own for the restaurant as well.

Speaker:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

So when I make it, I have to pasteurize it to put it in the bottle. And I'm sure this

Speaker:

is for theirs, for just at the restaurant.'cause

Speaker 3:

there's, he actually called me up and he is like, why is this happening? Gotcha. It was

Speaker:

delicious actually. More delicious. The stuff that was all

Speaker 3:

bubbly

Speaker:

and fermented. I was like, gimme more of that. Well,

Speaker 3:

it's a fermented sauce to begin with. Oh it is. So they're just getting a little extra in there. So it's,

Speaker:

or that dangerous seems

Speaker 3:

No, no, absolutely. The pH is so low, nothing's going in there.

Speaker:

That's kind of what I, that's kind of my assumption is when there's like a bunch of funky stuff in there that's like bacteria's not gonna go in there and grow. Nothing that's gonna kill me.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. It turns out, uh, sunlight hitting those on the patio just warms it up to that magic temperature. Oh. And they kind of, it restarted the lacto fermentation that was going there. So, yeah. Interesting.

Speaker:

Cool. Yeah. Well, I guess I didn't tell any secrets'cause you already knew about that one. Sorry, ginger, I mean, to spread your, uh, pretty secrets, but it was like I was loving it. The Rotary Cup people were, a couple people spooned their shirts and stuff. Took the covers off.

Speaker 3:

That's great. Uh, no, they have the red one and then, uh, seasonally they do a green one as well. Mm. So it's a jalapeno one instead of a Fresno, but

Speaker:

Okay. That's with Fresno Pepper is the kind of core, the bright red. Yeah. That's a really good sauce. It's beautiful. Do you, do you agree that it has kind of some similarities to that Centennial Sun flavorings? Uh, that's a different, that's a scotch bonnet or something, right?

Speaker 3:

The Centennial Sun is actually, um, a soft Sean makes, and, uh, I, boy, I can't remember what's in it exactly. We'll have to ask him. But, um, no Fresnos in there anyway, it reminded me

Speaker:

they have kind of similar to my taste anyway, but

Speaker 3:

the, so the purpose of that sauce, we were doing a competition. It was, uh, old Town Spice Shop, me and then, uh, sauce Daddy outta Loveland. Okay. And so we did a random country on the internet, just random country picker. Okay. And it gave us El Salvador. Okay. So then we were all just broke away and each made our own version of what we thought a sauce from El Salvador would be. Okay. And that's a very similar flavor profile that you would definitely get. So I dig it. Yeah. Kinda fun. So we'll probably do that again soon.

Speaker:

We jumped off. You were loving high school life up in Oak Creek. Oak Creek. Yeah. And uh, you know, once you got old enough, partied up in Steamboat when you had a chance and things like that, or what was the setting as your high school proceeded?

Speaker 3:

Uh, Steamboat was a different country than, so you

Speaker:

didn't want to go there? No. It your country kid. It really wasn't.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, it, um, it basically tourists, steamboats run by tourists. Right. The locals in Steamboat are great, but Yeah. Everyone from out of town, they're just coming to So you just avoided that. That was for the weekend. Yeah. Culturally

Speaker:

you were like, yeah, we'll be down here. Right. Yeah. Okay. And so like, uh, proceed me to the next stop or was it, was it to back down to CSU for, for college

Speaker 3:

after, uh, exactly. Yeah. Um, I thought I wanted to do, uh, some electrical engineering that was Okay. Big time in the stereos and car stereos and Okay. Goofing out with that. I dig

Speaker:

it.

Speaker 3:

And uh, that was really

Speaker:

cool in our day too. Yeah. Alpine systems and this and that. Right.

Speaker 3:

Um. Started taking classes and I'm like, this just isn't fun. Like, not really what I wanna do. So I thought I don't, since, I don't know, I'm just going to get a degree in economics and I'm sure this will help take me anywhere. And if I find something that catches on in the meantime, then yeah, you know, I can, I can always use this as something, take it. So that's kind of where it went from there. So

Speaker:

if you had become like a stock brokery kind of guy or investments manager, you know, sell a little life insurance and things like that, and you had built a, like, you probably couldn't have that beard looking that scraggly. No, definitely not. Um, this is

Speaker 3:

definitely revolt. I'm wearing a suit and tie every day is

Speaker:

So you, you wouldn't have become like, successful in that fashion probably is what you're thinking. They didn't like

Speaker 3:

it. Yeah. Yeah. The, the worst part of it though is really cold calls. You're, you're still making phone calls to people. Oh, it's,

Speaker:

it's a miserable, like, even if you're really smart and handsome or, or beautiful, if you're a woman, it's still gonna take you five years to make a decent living in that industry and 10 years to like. And then if you can do it for 20 years, then you're kind of like rich.

Speaker 3:

Right? If

Speaker:

you're good at it

Speaker 3:

right now, I remember we would send out these postcards. We paid some company to send'em out and they would fill it out if you wanna learn more about life insurance, retirement plans, whatever. Mm-hmm. And they would mail it back to us. And then you call'em and you say, Hey, I got your postcard.

Speaker:

Oh,

Speaker 3:

when can we sit down and talk about this? And they're like, it. That was essentially the most Right. It's the warmest cold call ever. Right. And and maybe get 5% of those would would return on you.'cause people just get so mad you're calling.

Speaker:

Interesting.

Speaker 3:

And nowadays, I don't even know if you could make a phone call'cause your cell phone blocks half the stuff anyway. Yeah. And no one's gonna answer a number that's not theirs. Yeah. So

Speaker:

I, yeah, I don't relish the thought of getting into that industry in today's world especially. No, definitely not. But they, people need to. Yeah, absolutely. Because there's like. A whole bunch of silver foxes out there now that need to retire.'cause they're not interested in developing technology or better systems to serve their clients and stuff. They're just like Right. Golfing a lot and fucking around and still collecting a big paycheck from a lot of these people. Right. So, um, I guess from a, from a business perspective, that is, uh, like kind of the, the journey, right? Aside from the hot sauce, uh, future hot sauce victories and, and really is there money to be made selling hot sauce, like on the internet,

Speaker 3:

things like

Speaker:

that? Is that a actual growth area or is that

Speaker 3:

maybe

Speaker:

there's some margin there ish. There's a

Speaker 3:

pretty good clip from, uh, Mr. Wonderful Shark Tank. Okay. Uh, they asked him, what's the worst business you could possibly get into that you'll never be a part of? And he said, hot sauce. Oh God. Because it's, it's honestly a really easy process and everyone can, can do it. Yeah. Yeah. So. Everyone is doing it right. So, um, like since we have the brand of the restaurant, I can kind of use that to Yeah. You've got

Speaker:

like a retail showroom almost to, right. So then making,

Speaker 3:

making sauce for Ginger and Baker, they're using their label on it.

Speaker:

Yep.

Speaker 3:

People that are fans of them, that sauce. But do you

Speaker:

make like a buck a bottle, two bucks a bottle or something to be the, I mean, maybe three at the most, right? Like not a lot. No, it's definitely not a lot, but, but I guess if you do whatever, a thousand bottles, that's 3000 bucks or something. Right? Yeah. Which is

Speaker 3:

fantastic when back to school season starts and no one comes to the restaurant because they wouldn't had to buy new shoes for their kids. Right.

Speaker:

So it's a bit of a stabilizer and also I guess it helps you feel. The gap time on your equipment?'cause you can kind of make these things Sure. During the times when otherwise staff are slow. So you're just like, hey. Right. Stir that 20 gallon pot right. Once in a while.'cause I'm making salsa, uh, sauce in there. Yeah. Huh.

Speaker 3:

Uh, someone like Sean does great with online hot sauce sales. Yeah. Because he sells to a bunch of small grocery stores and, and, and places like those. So, um, he can reach out a lot further than I can and Right. My brand isn't well known outside Fort Collins, so no one's really gonna come after And you self distribute

Speaker:

pretty much. Right. Gotcha, gotcha. And do you make all of Sean's sauces for him?

Speaker 3:

I do. Um, he essentially doesn't wanna deal with the licensure, so he is just straight Oh. Powders in, in, in seasonings. I see. So he doesn't do anything liquid or any fresh peppers is really the Okay. Fresh ingredient. So he's just

Speaker:

a reseller of anything saucy.

Speaker 3:

Right. So, yeah, I just make it, I bottle it, I give it to him, he puts his own sticker on it and it's out the door. So. So let's talk about hot sauces

Speaker:

and peppers a little bit'cause it seems like you've kind of built some expertise there.

Speaker 3:

I, I have, my wife, uh, actually bought me a mini fridge to keep in the kitchen for hot sauce, so it doesn't go on our regular refrigerator anymore. She's kind of tired of it, but it's one of those things that, you know, you travel somewhere, you just pick up whatever random sauce. So yeah. Yeah, anytime she goes somewhere, she'll bring me back a bottle of hot sauce from Iowa or California. So. Interesting.

Speaker:

But it ages as well, as long as it's kept. Cool. I reckon. So like, I guess, talk to me about your favorites. Maybe not your blends, but maybe your favorite spices and profiles or specific sauces that when you're like, I'm aspiring to build, build something that Tasty.

Speaker 3:

Well, I think every hot sauce has its place. So even something like Tabasco I think is fantastic on.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Uh, that red sauce from Ginger and Baker's gr on eggs

Speaker:

pizza, it totally is.

Speaker 3:

Um, one of my all-time favorite hot sauces is, uh, a raspberry Chipotle from Tabasco interest, which is super crazy. Um, so kind of, it depends on the food with which kind of direction I would wanna go with hot Sauce. But, uh, for the most part there's not a lot of great commercial stuff out there. Okay. So like the, so the

Speaker:

name brand stuff is Yeah. Kind of boring, right? Um,

Speaker 3:

so yeah.

Speaker:

If you sriracha got crazy. Yeah. Yeah, right. Like, everybody started using Sriracha to the point where they like ran out of it or something.

Speaker 3:

Right. There's, I think there's some crazy, uh, uh, fighting, trying to save money with the farmers that have been supplying'em forever. Yeah. Something, something. Yeah. So it kind of bit him, but, um, finding that local little guy like Sauce Daddy, because he's doing crazy stuff.

Speaker:

Okay. He's focused on it.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Like Sean just did a rhubarb and green chili. Yeah. What's that about? So I don't even know why you splash those two together, but

Speaker:

Right. What you use it on?

Speaker 3:

I'm, I'm in, I'm all for it. So you dig it? Yep. Take my money. We're good. Um, for me, my favorite sauce that, that I make, uh, is the ghost pepper sauce. Okay. Um, the

Speaker:

one you put in the, that I used to put in the, you had it with, uh, the smother Frito. Oh, right. Oh yeah, that one. Yeah, that was,

Speaker 3:

um, there's a lot of curry in there and a lot of mustard. So things that you wouldn't necessarily associate with hot sauce. Yeah. So, um, and then peppers. Lots of peppers,

Speaker:

huh. I bet the kind of savoriness of sorts of the curry kind of dampens a little bit. Is that kind of the goal? So it sneaks up anymore. It doesn't hit you right in the face right away.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. And, and there's some interesting, different peppers do different things to different parts of your tongue and mouth as well. Yeah. Right. So mixing peppers is always fun because sometimes you'll just get huge lip. Sometimes it'll be the back of your throat. Right. You know, sometimes it's just gonna blow up your entire head. So mixing them together and getting the right combos is always kind of fun.

Speaker:

That first hot nugs conversation with Shirley, like towards the very end of it, uh, she was like, oh, you are so sweaty right now. I was like, I know. I told you what's gonna happen Shirley. You can't, uh, can't blame me.

Speaker 3:

I love it. That's my favorite. We just start sweating and, you know, if, if I eat something too hot, my ears start to ring. Like I was at a concert. Just kind of a That's what I know. I did it too much. A little too hard.

Speaker:

Okay. Um, I feel like it's a good time to take a short break. Sure. Alright. And we're back. Um, so one of the things I realized when we were like, oh, we got, kind of came all the way full circle in this timeline is like you met a girl somewhere along the way and'cause. Married didn't have that. And uh, and you have children,'cause we were talking about teaching them how to do plumbing and different things like that. Right. So let's, let's dive into that chapter. Were you in college? Did you find her in Steamboat or, uh, no. She in college, Oak Creek.

Speaker 3:

Uh, my best friend ever, uh, Steve ran the, uh, cinema Saver six on Drake and Ches.

Speaker:

Oh, sure. You

Speaker 3:

used

Speaker:

to

Speaker 3:

go there from time

Speaker:

to

Speaker 3:

time. So, uh, free movies, basically, right? Nearly, yeah. Like$2

Speaker:

movies back in those days.

Speaker 3:

And, uh, she was an employee there at the time. Okay. And, uh, you know, he'd have a couple parties. Like he always did Academy Awards party at his house. Oh. Uh,

Speaker:

so he was an actual cinema guy.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Big time. Runner of the theater. Big time. Yep. Uh, but, uh, just kind of bumped into her a couple times by chance. And then she mentioned to him something like, oh, he's kinda cute. And then I was like, wait a minute. She thinks I'm cute. It's on you. That number. Yeah. What's

Speaker:

her name?

Speaker 3:

Jacqueline.

Speaker:

Hey Jacqueline, you'll probably listen to this.

Speaker 3:

She probably will.

Speaker:

Good. A and so Steve mentions that Jacqueline thinks you're kind of cute and uh, did you ask her out right away or how does that go down?

Speaker 3:

Uh, yeah, and this is kind of awkward, kinda showing my age, but we didn't have cell phones, so there's no texting, right? Sure. Yeah. Uh, just hoping to

Speaker:

run into her somewhere, kind of,

Speaker 3:

um, her dad, CSU professor. Okay. Um, he was in love with the name Deacon. So the caller ID on his phone was Deacon.

Speaker:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

So I didn't know, but I see this on caller, ID pop up. I'm terrified, right. So I'm like,

Speaker:

is a

Speaker 3:

church guy calling? I don't know what's going on. I don't dunno what I'm doing, but it was, uh, you know, you make a phone call and be like, Hey, if you're free, I'm gonna be at the library this afternoon, swing by. So I'm just sitting at the library, see if she'll swing by. So you kinda try and make those chance meetings and hope they keep increasing with frequency. Uh, and then, yeah, we just had fun and. Here we are 25 years later.

Speaker:

Wow.

Speaker 3:

Yeah.

Speaker:

So this was in college. Were you, did you date for a while and then get married or? Yeah, actually,

Speaker 3:

uh, our very first real date I took her, uh, flying What? So, uh, like at an airplane? Yeah. Yeah. Um, okay. Why, why? Okay. I got a lot of great stories. He goes for days. Uh, my brother Dan is a former Marine Okay. In, uh, airplane mechanic. And now he works for the FAA, but at the time he worked at the Fort Collins level Airport. So, okay. The entire time I was in college, I was working at the airport too. I was a, a line guy. I pumped gas, you know, the guy with the WS guy and people. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, when you're out there, you got the ability to trade favors. Yeah. Become, you know, like, I'll, I'll become friends. I'll you airplane in the hangar tonight. I know it's gonna be cold. We won't charge you. And then he'll take me for an airplane ride a week later. Right. So I'm doing favors for people and I'm getting some free flight time. So I was able to get my pilot's license for virtually nothing while I was there. Basically just gas.

Speaker:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

Um. Then, yeah, I had my license and I said, Hey, let's go. We went to Olis, which unfortunately is now closed.

Speaker:

So it's like some dude just like loans you his plane.'cause you got your license or Yeah. You, you join a club. Okay. Um, a

Speaker 3:

lot of the, a lot of airplane owners rent their airplanes to clubs and then Oh, I see. By, by the hour.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. So just a little two seater. Yeah. Take her up. We're flying around. Um, flew over her house and she got to see the lights and everything and I didn't know she was absolutely terrified the whole time. Okay. So a couple weeks later, I rent an airplane again for the 4th of July and we're circling Lake Lovelin just watching the fireworks from, from the air over Lake Lovelin. Oh wow. And you could see Greeley, you could see long miles in Fort Collins is super cool. Uh, but now every time you ask her about. Either one of those airplane rides. I was flying sideways and doing barrel rolls and she thought she was gonna die the whole time. Oh my gosh. So it was kinda, yeah. Yeah. But, uh, kind of a shocking first date. I think that's, that's what you're supposed to do was really, you know, well, apparently an impression. Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Um, but then were you just dating like through college and then you got married later, or you started having kids right away, like telling about,'cause it was quite a while before you opened Matador after that still, right? It was,

Speaker 3:

yeah. Yeah. Um, I proposed to her the night of my graduation party from CSU. Oh wow. Uh, and we were. Having some drinks and I may or may not have gotten sick in the dumpster by our apartment. And then is it after that you proposed? I proposed a little bit after that and then she said, well, we'll talk later.

Speaker:

Always proposed before you vomit in the dumpster, but keep going.

Speaker 3:

Should have known. I should should've. Well, what can you do? Sliders was selling 24 ounce microbrews for$2. Like you can't, and you just graduate college like it's gonna happen. Yeah. SelfControl wasn't really as, nah, it was dumb. Uh, my saving grace though was I did tell her sister at the graduation party, I'm gonna ask her tonight. Okay. So

Speaker:

before the, the, the bubble. Right, right. Okay. So she was at least flattered by that, but Right. So I didn't want that to be the circumstances. I up a little bit and

Speaker 3:

yeah. Kind of talked myself outta that. But, uh, first thing you know, next day, next time I talked to her, she, did you meet what you said last night? And I'm like, I don't know what I said. Like, yeah. If it's about the, will you bear me thing then? Yeah. Yeah. So we did a picnic and, and uh, I ended up putting a ring in a cracker jack box and went to the zoo and Cool. Did it right later. But, uh, yeah, that was, uh, the first time there. Uh, so I was what, 23 when I graduated. So we got married a year or so later, so probably 24 when we got married.

Speaker:

And then what did you do those first couple years in? Because you weren't doing the financial planner thingy yet, I guess.

Speaker 3:

No. Um, I was working, uh, for my father-in-law. Okay. Uh, so he was a groundwater engineer at CSU. Passed away a few years ago, unfortunately. But, uh, he had a little side business. He had a lot of, uh, students from the Middle East. Oh, interesting. Uh, they were working on their groundwater, PhD, whatever. Yeah. So he's he's teaching all these guys? Yeah. Yeah. His, his craft. Uh, and he started this environmental cleanup company in Egypt. Okay. Interesting. So. One of his old students. So we, we made a few trips back and forth and we were cleaning up, uh, basically drill cuttings. When you drill a hole, you pull it up and it's full of oil and they just spill it in the middle of the desert. They don't care. Yeah. So we would go and, uh, pressure like BP in England. Yeah. Yeah. To tell'em that needs to be cleaned up. Yeah. And we say, but we can do it for you. And then we go and try and clean it up for'em, you know, spread it out in the desert. Throw some fertilizers, some microorganisms on there that eat the oil. Yeah, yeah. Keep tilling it with a tractor every once in a while and then yeah, pretty soon all the hydrocarbons are gone and have nice, clean, fresh oil. Interesting. Uh, and then drilled a lot of monitoring wells. Yeah. There was one place, uh, in Sues city where that's quite

Speaker:

a, uh, fascinating side journey.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. There was a, a project in Sues city where the ground caught on fire and they couldn't figure out why. Okay. So, uh, we ended up drilling a bunch of wells on the around town and we ended up, uh. Making a canal where all the groundwater would flow into this canal and we could pump all the hydrocarbons out and reclaim it, but Wow.

Speaker:

Like a filter virtually. Yeah. They were

Speaker 3:

just spilling oil everywhere. Yeah. Dang. So did a lot of those, those fun little projects like that. It was really well, and probably

Speaker:

raised a ton of awareness to the, the problems.'cause it seems like that kind of stuff doesn't happen as much anymore.'cause you bring some awareness and it costs a bunch of money and then you're like, oh, you mean I can't just let this?

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Well the, the, when the one project where the ground caught on fire, all, they just, they couldn't get it out. They didn't know what, what the problem was. So they just ran a bunch of asphalt over it and paved it. Oh, just let a beer in. And then they started working on it. Then like, using the facility again, like after who, if, who knows what's going on on the ground there, like if there's still,

Speaker:

it is just a low burn probably. Yeah, we're fine. Yeah, it's fine. Yeah. Okay. Gotcha.

Speaker 3:

And there, there was a lot of stuff in, in Colorado to do too, so. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker:

Um. So you're just kind of a, a junior but capable person running around doing all this stuff with your father-in-law. Right. It's a good sentiment that you like, enjoyed his company. He welcomed you into the family. Yeah. He's fantastic. Yeah. Cool.

Speaker 3:

Uh, he's had, so he has six kids. They're all engineers and they all married engineers except for me, I was the one guy that was not enjoying that circle.

Speaker:

Got it. So like when you're at big holiday parties or family reunions, you're like surrounded by engineers the whole time. Right, right. Interesting. They're the cool engineers. Well least you cook for them. Yeah. Uh,'cause most engineers can't cook. Yeah. They're not, it's too precise. Right. They're like, I need to know exactly how many teaspoons of salt You're like until it tastes right. Yeah. Then their head blows up. Right. So, and how many children?

Speaker 3:

Uh oh, I have four. Four, uh, three girls and one boy. Okay. So, uh, oldest Cassie is, uh, junior CSU. Oh wow. And then we have, Samantha is a kinda on the fast track to get out. Uh, in three years outta college. So she's in, uh, Morningside, Iowa. Oh, wow. Or Sioux City, Iowa. Morningside University. Okay. Yep. And then son James is a senior at Rocky. Okay. And then the youngest, Jesse just turned 15, and she's also at Rocky.

Speaker:

And where's James going? Does he know?

Speaker 3:

Uh, no. Um, Samantha and him want to try and go to find a school where they can both go together, so. Oh, really? She work on

Speaker:

her, her graduate degree, her graduate degree, work on his undergrad. Yeah. So that is very charming. Um, yeah. A sibling relationship. That is Right. Uh, good job fostering that. Right. Well, and it goes to, one of the things we talked about during the break was. Like, you're kind of all about friendships. Yeah, absolutely. Like your, your, your clients or friends. And even, you know, when, when you and I first met, I remembered you as Paul, the friendly guy that owns Matador, you know? Right. And, uh, um, that seems to be kind of a theme of even your, your workforce, your client base, your family, your siblings wanting to be friends with each other. Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Well, it's, it's hard to, when you're working with someone, and especially after 10 years, I mean, you know everything about'em, you know, you know how their family's going and, and a, a part of really good times and a part of really bad times too. Sure. Uh, so it just kind of naturally develops, but, um, you just always try and help, help people out and, and, and make friends as many as you can because it always comes back to you and it always, yeah. There's, there's always a benefit to it. It comes back around.

Speaker:

Yeah. Even if you're not counting.

Speaker 3:

Right. Right. So I always try to be the guy that, uh, uh, overdoes it. Yeah. Going out and, and. Hopefully that has invited us to some customers and brought us some business and, and helped us grow. Oh, I'm sure it has. Um, and that's how I kinda like social media. I'm not super active on there anymore'cause there's just so much garbage, but Yeah. Uh, every time I throw stuff out it's honest me talking and it's what's going on and yeah. And kinda keep it, keep it straight.

Speaker:

Another thing I remembered about those earliest days of Matador was like you mentioned that even still the smothered burrito special remains your busy busiest day. And that's like if I tell somebody about Matador, if I learned somebody that I would say when I learned that somebody lives on the Harmony Corridor or works in the Harmony corridor, I always tell them about Matador and often about specifically the Wednesday Smothered Burrito special that I used to always do, I didn't even really know, I mean, I hate to say it, but I live North Side now. I just don't get down there much. You know, if I'm in the neighborhood, I love would stop in, right? But that is the experience that I recreate and share with people as far as what I remember about Matador.

Speaker 3:

You know, a lot of people have, uh, their first experience with something really hot. Mm. So, you know, you have someone coming gimme your hottest and you can say that in a lot of restaurants and you get away with it. Yeah. Uh, but we've got some pretty hot stuff and I can meal except for like Indian

Speaker:

food kind of thing. Uh, yeah. Or maybe some, some

Speaker 3:

Thai or you can really crank it up. But no one expects that.'cause no one else has anything even remotely is hot. Yeah.

Speaker:

Yep.

Speaker 3:

But I'm super happy if you come in and I blow you up and ruin your meal and I make you another burrito.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

You're gonna talk about that forever.

Speaker:

Yeah. Yeah. So. Well, and there's the experiences that you remember at the time, like riding a roller coaster. Right. And there's the other experiences that you remember like being on the pot at three o'clock in the morning the next day because you had way too much hot sauce, which makes

Speaker 3:

it even a bigger story. Right. But you

Speaker:

still remember it almost

Speaker 3:

more fondly somehow. And people see, come back and tell me those stories too though. Right. So there was some pretty nasty text messages at two o'clock in the morning before that. That's all right. Ola killed me.

Speaker:

Yep. Yes. Um, you wanna play the ping pong ball game? Yeah. Fire away. So, and we usually have a, sometimes have a prize associated. Would you give like a$25 gift card if somebody, uh, is the first to comment on one of these answers? Absolutely. Cool. We will gather that and get it out there on the socials. So we're gonna pick three of these balls. Okay. And I've got questions associated with each, so I'm just gonna hand this to you. You can grab it, dig down deep if you want to. Uh, but number nine. Number nine, what's the strangest way you've ever injured yourself? Ooh,

Speaker 3:

boy. I don't know. I, I, I've had one broken bone my entire life and I think it was. Just a slide in normal kindergarten.

Speaker:

Okay. Yeah. So like it came down a slide and broke your ankle.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Broke my foot. Kind of funny. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I'm always pretty careful trying not to do stupid stuff and I

Speaker:

Your fingers all appear to be intact.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Like, no scars. Well, I know you like to drink

Speaker:

bourbon or rye whiskey especially, and like you haven't even cut off the end of your finger a little bit. No. Yeah. Yeah. I, I really don't enjoy

Speaker 3:

pain. So it's like you get, if you're a boxer, you get in a fight, you try not to get hit. Right. So try not to hurt myself, but, alright. Uh, yeah. Nothing major has ever been broken. So. Interesting. I have

Speaker:

so many injuries over time. Uh, even in the outdoor camping and all that stuff, you just didn't, you just get out of the fray.

Speaker 2:

Uh, yeah. Your dad taught

Speaker:

you to be smarter than that. Yeah, I think so. I don't know. I think my dad fell down on that job'cause I've been through some stuff. Anyway. Next ball, please. That was a lame answer. I'm sorry. No, that's cool. Never won. Just happens. What's your favorite childhood memory?

Speaker 3:

Oh my. Um, boy, I don't even know. There's so many great, great moments that I can remember. Uh, some sorts rode deck of cards. I wanna say one of the best things ever. Um, my older brother was off at the Marines and he came back and he brought me a GI Joe helicopter. Uh, it was right around my birthday and it was, you know, pretty good sized helicopter. Yeah, it had a little trigger on it that would make the rotor spin, so that was one of my favorites. Plus he was a military guy. You looked up to him, seems like. Anyway, that was really neat.

Speaker:

That's pretty cool. Yeah. Next question. I'm gonna try to get, I usually pick the, the sassiest answer. Uh, and so far those two are, the second one was better than the first one. Yeah. But, uh, not too exciting yet. 19. 19 is 19 said, what's your go-to excuse when you want to get out of plans? Oh, you gotta work something.

Speaker 3:

Something happened to Matador. That's easy. Something broke. Yep. Most of the time it's that way Anyway, so that'll be our,

Speaker:

that'll be our winning. So first to comment, um, time-wise, not first that we see, but we'll, we'll check all our platforms before it nominated winner, but that gotta work at Matador. The dishwasher's broken or something like that. Uh, is, uh, Paul's excuse. So if he tells you that,

Speaker 3:

might I try that at home too, too, too, you know, might be an

Speaker:

excuse. The kids are fighting,

Speaker 3:

I gotta go back to work. Something happened.

Speaker:

My sense is that, uh, with Jacqueline, you would always prefer to hang out with her. Has that been, that friendship been true the whole time?

Speaker 3:

Yeah,

Speaker:

she's

Speaker 3:

my favorite. He's fantastic.

Speaker:

And how many years married did you say? 25. 25. Paul, now is the time in the show where for particular guests, I offer them an opportunity for an infinity shot.

Speaker 3:

Excellent.

Speaker:

Do you know,

Speaker 3:

I'm aware of the infinity bottle, so I the bottle is there. Yes. Excellent. Okay.

Speaker:

And so, uh, the Infinity shot is a, a weed ram of every lour that comes through the podcast studio. Okay. Um, and so it's 35% bourbon, 35% rye, 20% tequila, and 5% other, including a little splash of gin. Okay. From I, I bought the mob. Uh. Mob mountain gin today just for kick.'cause I felt like the infinity bottle should have a little floral accent. Sure, sure. Um, so I'm gonna go grab that and then you can, we can do tasting notes on that instead of hot sauce.

Speaker 3:

Perfect.

Speaker 2:

R

Speaker 3:

thank you. Uh, I, I can smell the gin.

Speaker:

Can you

Speaker 3:

really? For not having very much in there. Yeah. Yeah. It

Speaker:

can't be more than 10%, maybe seven or 10%. Oh, I can smell it too.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. That's one thing with hanging out with Sean. He's a smeller. He smells everything before he tries to Yeah, me too.

Speaker:

Pretty much with hot sauce too.

Speaker 3:

Everything, yeah. Everything gets the nose treatment first.

Speaker:

Hmm. It changed it so much. Adding that little bit of gin, but maybe the, I dunno, it's weird.

Speaker 3:

It's not bad.

Speaker:

No, it's not bad. No, no. I mean it's, that's kind of my, that's kinda my recipe when it comes to food in a way is if you put a bunch of pretty good stuff together, you get pretty good stuff. Yeah, absolutely. You know, it's kind of a quality of ingredients a lot of times and stuff like that. Um, and obviously technique matters. Sure. Right. But you put good stuff together and it's hot

Speaker 3:

sauce, soup, chili, kind of. Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker:

Yeah. Soup's a good example as well. Like you just, I have, I, uh, you probably do too, a cleaning out the fridge soup, have you minute Oh yeah, absolutely. That recipe's, uh, at least once a month at my house,

Speaker 3:

uh, I usually do a, uh, a big Christmas soup of some kind, so we get turkeys. So we have a carcass, a Turkey carcass that I'll save. Sure. Yep. In-laws will have one. We'll have a hand bone. So I'm getting, you know, scraps from a bunch of different places. Oh, cool. And we're making a giant pot.

Speaker:

Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 3:

And then, uh, I'll just make like some Turkey ham noodle soup.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Uh, and then throw'em all in little, little deli containers and freeze a bunch of it. And then we've got soup for a year. I've never.

Speaker:

Had ham with my Turkey soup before that. That seems obvious. Like when you've got left, why not just throw that in there too? Right. But it's otherwise kind of a chicken stock base with carrots and onions and celery and maybe some turnips potatoes.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. I've been getting kinda lazy with it lately, but I love saving just all of the vegetable trimming you have and then, you know, you throw it in a a Ziploc bag, throw it in the freezer.

Speaker 2:

Hmm.

Speaker 3:

And then when it's time, dump it all in there. And if you wanna go crazy when you're making your stock, take all of the solids outta there when you drain'em and then run'em through a juicer and you get this crazy thick Oh, interesting. Crazy stock,

Speaker:

huh? I have not done that before, but that's interesting.

Speaker 3:

Um, and then it, it's super concentrated. Sure. We do, uh, ramen night every once in a while. So just bunch of noodles. Yeah. Bring out that stock, heat it up and then you can throw whatever you want in there. Kinda a ramen bar at home kind of thing.

Speaker:

Yeah. You can throw the hard boiled eggs on there and whatever else. Yeah. But that's the easy part, right? Huh? Cool. I dig it. Well, let's drift into the Loco experience segment because you said you got a bunch of crazy stories like airplane wides on first dates and stuff. So the loco experiences typically are the craziest experience of your lifetime that you wanna share with our listeners. Um, but if you've got two or three that are doozies, I'm, I'm all ears.'cause, uh,

Speaker 3:

yeah. Well, I

Speaker:

like the good stories.

Speaker 3:

Uh, one of the, one of the craziest things, but, but you're also risk

Speaker:

averse it sounds like, at least from a physical standpoint.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, absolutely. Um, so one of those trips to Egypt, we were actually going to the middle of the western desert, so absolutely middle of nowhere Egypt. Okay. So if you go from Cairo, uh, 60 miles south and then you go a hundred miles west, okay. We're literally in the middle of nowhere. Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, the sand dunes are nothing like you. Saw growing up on national geo gravity, or at least that I remember, it'd be long stretch for maybe a mile flat. And then there'd be a giant a hundred foot sand dune and then long stretch giant sand dune. So that's the way the environment was there at least. Interesting.

Speaker:

And those dunes probably move around a little bit over time. I'm, but they kind of are collectors of sand.

Speaker 3:

The road's terrible. Yep. The driver doesn't wanna be there, you know, I don't speak Arabic. He might know nine words in English. Right. We've got a guy with us that translates, that helps us, you know, dig holes and whatever. But, uh, my brother-in-law and I are sitting in the back of this suburban and we come around one of these, uh, big sand dunes and there's three or four guys outside of a little, you know, little short, early eighties, uh, Toyota white pickup.

Speaker:

Okay. Yep. Just like my grandpa used to have. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Super. Uh, tiny thing. Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Uh, and then two hamsters

Speaker:

for an engine.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. Yeah. So we're cruising down this road, you know, we're bouncing all over the place. We're just getting beat up in here. Okay. Fly by those guys. They all jump and hop into their truck and they come tearing off after us. Okay. So we're on a single laid road. They're kind of in the ditch bouncing up next to us. And I look over and they've got, you know, scarves over their faces and they've all got guns. Oh. I'm like, this is, that was a checkpoint. You just passed. We're gonna die today. And the driver's just window up, doesn't care. And the, the guy in the pickup is halfway outta the truck, beaten on the driver's window, and he finally rolls it down and looks at him and, uh, shouting on the Arabic, I don't know. And he said, no. And he rolls his window up, the guy did it again, and then he rolls it down and he just grabs a bottle of water and slaps it over and hits this truck and it just blows up on the windshield. And they, they pull off and, uh, and stop. And then my buddies, I'm like, we asked him what happened. Yeah. He said they wanted our gas. Okay. And then they wanted our water, gas pirates, basically, because they're stuck in the middle of nowhere. Yeah. Yeah. And then, uh, they wanted our water, so he gave him the water and he kept going. It's like, so from then on we started hiring airplanes to get in and out or flying, flying airplanes, kicking and out. A lot of those oil finders have their own airplane and they fly their employees in and out. Sure. We stopped traveling on the roads after that.

Speaker:

Yeah, that seems a little intense that, uh, if the insurance agent hears about that he is gonna want a little higher price for the policy.

Speaker 3:

I did not tell my wife about that one for a while. Yeah. Until after we were done with all of our Egypt trips. So that was a

Speaker:

So you did that for a while, right? Like five or seven years or something? Or three or five years?

Speaker 3:

Um, I can't even re I wanna say six trips total. Maybe we would go for like four or five, six weeks and then come back for a while and then do it again. Okay.

Speaker:

But there was other work around here too.

Speaker 3:

Uh, yeah, he was still, um, as a professor first off. Sure. But think he had another, another side business that he was, uh, working as well. Uh, that he employed all of his kids at some point or another. Oh,

Speaker:

interesting.

Speaker 3:

So great First jobs, great experience, great money to help him get through college. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, but he was like, he was the guy that just put everyone in his family first. Like he absolutely made sure everyone was set up and perfect. So,

Speaker:

yeah.

Speaker 3:

Um, yeah. Um, I don't even remember any of the real projects I was doing in, in town here'cause they weren't as big as Yeah. Born as flying. Right, right, right, right. Um, but they all, you know, a lot of advanced degrees from those guys that he helped him get through, get through college and, and, and keep working. Uh, I think my wife's the only one now that's actually still working in engineering. Everyone else has kind of done other stuff. Some software development or interesting entrepreneurial of some

Speaker:

different things.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. So everyone, well, maybe part-time out of another one, but yeah. Uh, my wife's really the only engineer. And what she, what kind of

Speaker:

engineer is

Speaker 3:

she? Uh, so she's a civil engineer. Okay. And, uh, she does, uh, storm water. Okay. Um, so you, the CSUF flood that came through. Yeah. Yeah. So she designed that, uh, Fox Meadows area on the west side of town Yep. To kind of cr capture any kinda runoff that would Oh, wow. Interesting. Slip through CSUI

Speaker:

think. Uh, what are your worst spots when it rains heavy. We've had some nice rains the last couple days here. I know. Lame kind of riverside area. There is a little,

Speaker 3:

yeah. Little thick

Speaker:

sometimes.

Speaker 3:

It's funny when it, when it gets really nasty, you know, my wife wants to go drive around and look at the projects. How's that one to hold up? How's that? Uh, we have a lake at Matador. Oh, do you? Every time it rains, we there in the parking, parking lot there just completely floods over. That's Oh, what's it drain out to? Or is it just, just the problem? Just broken pipe. That doesn't work. Yeah. Oh, interesting. It was gone for a little while and I think the landlord came and maybe worked on it for a little bit. Yeah. And now it was back yesterday after the,

Speaker:

if he listens to this message, then uh, he's on notice. Yeah. Um, what would you wanna share with, with anybody out there, uh, especially about this hot nugs conversations that are gonna be released in the midst of this episode coming out? Like, are you a fan or was Shawn a fan of the hot nugs? How did, where did this come from?

Speaker 3:

Uh, well, I, I, I'm pretty sure Adam threw out the idea at first. Oh yeah. And then, uh, Sean and I, you ran with it. We work right next door, right. Yeah. His, his shop's right next door to the restaurant. And

Speaker:

you guys have been friends for 20 years, so,

Speaker 3:

uh, maybe not quite that long, but 10 for sure.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Um, yeah. And it just kinda like, yeah, let's do it. It, it's neat'cause it's a, it's a personal conversation with someone and it's not. I mean, you're, you're, you gave them the answers or you gave'em the questions. I mean Sure. So they were prepared so they don't look dumb, but you're still getting an honest answer and you're following up and you're getting them as a person and Yeah. Politicians suck. So having the person, how can you

Speaker:

vote based on comparing websites?

Speaker 3:

Right. So I I, I love the aspect of, of getting in there and, and you know, whatever story, what have you broken or, or, you know, those things are, I don't think we've got anything scandalous so far. Right. But that side of it's a lot more fun at, at least local politics I think are kind of important. Yeah. Um, and it, it's more who that person is, I think. Yeah. Is Butterfly.

Speaker:

Well I was sweating a lot more than Adam was in, uh, our

Speaker 3:

conversation this

Speaker:

week. So

Speaker 3:

I think he's secretly training for the crazy hot he was killing.

Speaker:

That wouldn't surprise me. Yeah. Uh, we're building up to it. Well, um, I'm looking forward to my next trip. To Matador and, uh, my next conversation with you. Yeah. Thank you so much. So thanks for being here today. Yeah. Thank you guys. Be Paul.

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