Thermodyne foodservice is a company that provides high-quality cooking and holding equipment for restaurants, hotels, catering and other foodservice businesses. Thermodyne's patented Fluid Shelf technology ensures even heat distribution and precise temperature control, resulting in better food quality, safety and shelf life. Thermodyne offers a range of products, from countertop warmers and steamers to full-size ovens and cabinets, that can meet any foodservice need. Join Aaron Bremer where he shares his journey.
Thermodyne foodservice is a company that provides high-quality cooking and holding equipment for restaurants, hotels, catering and other foodservice businesses. Thermodyne's patented Fluid Shelf technology ensures even heat distribution and precise temperature control, resulting in better food quality, safety and shelf life. Thermodyne offers a range of products, from countertop warmers and steamers to full-size ovens and cabinets, that can meet any foodservice need. Join Aaron Bremer where he shares his journey.
This is the Restaurant Technology Guys podcast, helping you run your restaurant better.
Jeremy Julian:Welcome back to the restaurant technology guys podcast. I think our audience out there for joining each and every time, as I continue to say, you guys have lots of choices on how you guys spend your time. So we appreciate you guys hanging out with us today. Today we are joined by a member of a team and I'm going to let Aaron introduce himself a little bit here. It is actually kind of cool. And I'm excited to hear what Aaron has to share. Just about kind of what they do in his profession. But before we jump into that. Aaron, why don't you give everybody a little bit of an understanding? Who was Aaron? Where did Aaron come from? What's Aaron get to, you know, before we jump into kind of what you get to do for a living, I'd love to to understand understand a little bit more about about who Aaron
Aaron Bremer:is. Absolutely. So like I said, my name is Aaron Bramer. I'm currently director of sales for Thermodyne Food Service Products. I have a background in the culinary and hospitality industry. Worked in a lot of fine dining went to, went to culinary school, have a culinary degree, worked in a bunch of different restaurants hospitals and such. Been in hospitality almost my entire, you know, working career from the time I was 14 years old, working in small time restaurants, washing dishes to working in my parents restaurant growing up as a kid. And, you know, the hospitality industry is really about all I've ever known in terms of a workforce. So, you know, it's kind of something that's been embedded in me for years and years and, you know, went on to get a culinary degree, went on to work in a bunch of different restaurants actually use thermodyne products in the restaurants that I worked in. And that's kind of how. You know, I got familiar with Thermodyne and that's kind of how the whole journey for me being on the team now got started. You know, years ago I did serve as the Corporate Chef and then as things progressed, you know, I did come into the Director of Sales role here in the past few years and just been kind of working at that ever since.
Jeremy Julian:Very cool. Just cause I'll get crap from our listeners. You know, talk to me a little bit about why jumping from being in the kitchen to now working with which kitchens on the outside. Cause you know, I, we tease long time listeners will will have heard me talk about this. I think there's a, there's a, there's a place for people that, that, you know, we're in the restaurants and, and ultimately had to get out. But but I'm sure our listeners would love to know the story. How did that, how did that whole thing take place?
Aaron Bremer:Yeah, I mean, the restaurant industry is anybody will tell you it's brutal, you know, it can be very, very rewarding. You know, it's, it's a passion. It's a craft, you know, you got, you got to love what you do. But I mean, at the end of the day, it takes a toll on you mentally, physically. Emotionally. And, you know, it, it was something that I did for, you know, better part of a decade. And, you know, I loved what I did and I was very good at it. And I had, I made a lot of good, met a lot of good people there, worked with a lot of great chefs, had a lot of great partnerships that I formed thermodyne being one of them. But, you know, at the end of the day, it was something that. Put so much stress on the other areas of my life that, you know, things, things had to change or they were going to go in a downward spiral real quick.
Jeremy Julian:So I wouldn't say, or they were going to change without you, without you being able to have the steering wheel on that on that I hear.
Aaron Bremer:Yeah. So, I mean, I, I knew, I knew that staying in the hostility industry was what I wanted to do. So, I mean, having to find a transition that was still kind of in my wheelhouse was was something that was definitely on my radar. And, you know, I didn't make a decision quickly or lightly, but at the same time, I knew I needed to make.
Jeremy Julian:Well, I appreciate you sharing that. So talk to me a little bit about Thermodyne. I've, you know, I've heard the name, I've heard the name in the restaurant industry. I've seen you guys at trade shows, but for those that are less familiar with what it is, like give me a little bit of the orange origin story, if you don't mind. And then we can talk about all of the. Quite frankly, ridiculous products that you guys have come to market with over the last number of years. Cause it's, I mean, doing a little bit of research on what y'all do, it's insane what you guys do. And I think for somebody that comes out of the culinary background, it's probably a very very cool conversation that you can have with people, but tell me a little bit about the origin story, where's Thermodyne come from and then kind of, what do you guys get to do today as as technology continues to advance? In the world.
Aaron Bremer:Yeah. So thermonet, we've been around about 35 years now. We were originally developed down in Jeffersonville, Indiana for a guy by the name of Colonel Sanders. I don't know if you're familiar with him or not, but the original story was looking for a way to hold fried chicken and nobody at the time could seem to hold it, uh, at a good temperature while also maintaining a good texture for the chicken. You know, it was either coming out soggy or dry or burnt or. Anything you can think of. And it wasn't maintaining its quality for a set amount of time. So they were pat the story goes, it was the original owner and another scientist down there kind of came up with the technology for fluid shelf realizing that there was a demand for, you know, circulating liquid through tubing through pipes that could then transfer the heat that way. It was a more stable way of keeping temperature. Whereas you look at, you know, a lot of cabinets that would use heating elements or coils those would pulse, kind of give you an average temperature and they would rely on humidity. Whereas with our cabinets, we're solely relying on the conduction heat that we're producing. So kind of what makes Thermodyne different from a lot of our competitors and such is. You know, we're using conduction, you know, conduction is you're setting something on top of one another and that heat source from the shelf transfer to the pan transfer to the food is what's keeping it warm. There's no fans, there's no circulating of any hot air or any liquid or any humidity in our cabinets which we feel gives a real advantage for that niche of keeping hot food hot and keeping crispy food crispy. You know, I mean, you go into a fast food restaurant and you're going to do. Any kind of establishment and you want, you know, crispy chicken, and if it's not crispy, you're disappointed. So we've, we've found that it was definitely a high demand for certain consumers, keeping products at the sustainable and optimal. Texture. So with that, I mean, we pretty much for the past 35 years, you know, we've been mass producing these conduction holding cabinets and cook and hold ovens that, you know, with the way that they're built with Howard's pumping fluid through each shelf and bringing it back up, recycling it and reheating it. We're able to give a much more precise temperature. Whereas, you know, a lot of other cabinets in the industry, right. You know, they're pulsing to give you more of an average, you know, they're going 10 degrees above 10 degrees below to hopefully give you more of that average temperature, whereas we're just heating that liquid to a very precise temperature and pumping it through the cabinet and reheating it. So it's, it's a distinct advantage, kind of the way that our cabinet is set up and how we are using. The heating elements in the pump to heat the shelves.
Jeremy Julian:So I literally was writing down questions because I have so much that I want to, I want to go through. So talk to me a little bit. So that's really where you guys started. I know you guys have got more products than just the heating shelves, but I'd love to stay on that train of thought to, to, to stay here, I guess. I personally, I do enjoy cooking. I've never been to school to cook unless you count YouTube university and or the food network. So there's that. But you know, years ago I was, I remember getting a sous vide for personal use and, and I think to myself, you know, what I'm listening to you talk about it and the sous vide and, and, or the, these, you know, these heating elements that put stuff in water. It sounds a little like what you guys are doing. Talk to me a little bit about that because obviously we're talking about commercial kitchens. We're not talking about my kitchen where I'm going to throw three chicken breasts into a sous vide, like different, totally different element and totally different concept. But talk to me a little bit about, I guess, is it similar? Is it different? Because what I've heard from some chefs about kind of sous vide cooking is it's almost impossible because you've got. This boiling hot water that's now in this environment. You can't do that in a kitchen where you got 40 people running around. So I guess, how would you equate those two things for those that may be familiar with the sous vide, but not with Thermodyne and kind of what you guys do?
Aaron Bremer:Yeah, I mean, it's all about understanding what you're doing. I mean, you know, what is sous vide cooking? You know, sous vide cooking is cooking under vacuum sous vide under vacuum. And basically you're putting that sealed bag in a temperature controlled water bath that is at a very precise temperature. Which is the same thing that we're doing. We're having a very precise temperature on our cabinetry. I mean, we're heating liquid just like you would in a sous vide machine and we're flowing it through each shelf. The only difference is when you're cooking in a traditional water bath or immersion circulator you are heating that liquid that is then encompassing and surrounding the sous vide product. Whereas with ours, you're just setting it, you know, on the shelf. But it's the same concept of we're heating it to a very precise temperature and maintaining that. So I mean, very, very similar avenues for, you know, an immersion circulator, a sous vide machine compared to a thermodyne cabinet. Same concept. And we do have a lot of customers that are doing sous vide cooking in our cabinetry. nOw grant, they're not doing, you know, 1, 2, 3 chicken breasts here, 1 pork chop here, you know, they're, they're mass producing prime rib and pork butt and ribs and top rounds, big, big pieces of meat that they're cooking hundreds of pounds of every day that, you know, in the sense of trying to cook, you know 25 pound top round in a sous vide doesn't make a whole lot of sense, you know, especially if you're trying to make, you know, 4, of them a day, depending upon what they're doing. It doesn't make any sense to have them in a water bath like that, but for one of our large cabinets that can hold You know eight top rounds. No problem. Yeah, it's it's a no brainer It's definitely a very sought after thing to be able to simplify the process
Jeremy Julian:Yeah, and and that was I guess one of my questions as you were going through it That same chef that I was talking to about sous vide he happens to run a casual dining brand that has What they call center of the plate proteins and they used to cook them in a standard oven like you would anything else you talked about a prime rib You talked about ribs. You know both the primary event of ribs and they came out with like a double thick pork chop Talking with him about that And kind of the the format that you used to have is you used to have to Put those things in there when you talked about the inception of what you guys were doing what at least I understood to be is, is it was a holding, holding, you know cabinet versus a cooking cabinet. You've now kind of, I guess, converted to cooking. Is it, is it both? Is it a little bit of one in the same? Talk to me a little bit about kind of that because again, one of the things that I love about My own sous vide is, is, you know what? If I'm 20 minutes late getting my, getting my chicken breasts, it's not going to ruin it because it's kept at the exact temperature and it's never going over and it's never going under. My understanding from talking to that chef is, is devices like yours help with that because you've got kitchen staff that gets busy and they forget. And, and, and such. So talk to me a little bit about. Difference between holding versus cooking and kind of where you guys are at on that, that continuum as well.
Aaron Bremer:Yeah. I mean, so just over the years and decades, I mean, looking at our product and, you know, realizing, Hey, we have the distinct ability to maintain an exact temperature, you know, while early on, you know, we saw it as this perfect holding cabinet that could. You know, maintain that perfect temperature to keep product nice and it's nice, precise temperature that it wanted to be at, you know, the optimal temperature, but then, you know, we started thinking, well, you know, if we can hold this precise temperature, why can't we hold this precise temperature through a cooking process? You know, if we wanted to cook an entire prime rib and have it be exactly 135 degrees, why couldn't we put it on our 135 degree conduction plate? and slow cook it and through trial and error. I mean, we figured out that, yeah, we can do that. It can be heated to a precise temperature and maintain that temperature, you know, whether it's coming up through the cooking process and the holding process. You know, there was all kinds of exploration as to, you know, if we're cooking this product at this temperature, what is the outcome versus this product at this temperature? And I mean, there was definitely a lot of, it was a learning curve as there is with, you know, any product. But kind of once we understood, you know, what we were capable of doing and what our tree hands for heat transfer was, and you know, being able to. Transfer the heat from the shelf and do, you know, thermal mass of the density of pork, of chicken, of rice, of, you know, mashed potatoes, you know, I mean, you name it, I mean, whether it was us wanting to slow cook a product that we realized that we could do, or whether it was us saying to, you know, consumer, Hey, you don't have to, you know, reheat all your sauces on the stove or all your mashed potatoes and rice in a steamer, redo any of this. You can put it all here in our cabinetry. Thank you. That has a very precise temperature. That is a consistent, gentle temperature that can re thermalize product as well. You know, it was just over the years learning about what the capabilities of our cabinet was and what it could do. And then it's just, you know, educating consumers on what our product is and what it can do. And, you know, you come to us and say, Hey, I run this kind of hospitality establishment, whether it's healthcare, school, fine dining, quick service restaurant, you know, my issue is I can't reheat. 50 pounds of mashed potatoes for my lunch service, or I can't hold chicken tenders crispy long enough. And, you know, we kind of look at it and say, all right, well, here's our products, here's what we know our products can do. Then it's, you know, people like me talking to consumers of, Hey, this is how we're going to help you. This is how our product is going to exceed your expectations. And this is how we're going to get you to where you want to be and solve all your. Solve your issue that you have in here now.
Jeremy Julian:Well, I I have to tell a quick story real quick Aaron, if you don't mind, which is, um, I, I live in Texas. I happen to get a chance to go to Goldie's, which is one of the, you know, it's number one, number one, Texas barbecue place in the country, or not in the country, but at least in Texas and they make their brisket. And so I was like, ah, checking out Goldie's. I went, I waited 90 minutes to get my, you know, to get in the door. The best brisket I've ever had in my life. I recommend anybody. I've got my shirt in my closet. I didn't wear it today, but but fantastic brisket. And again, watching my YouTube university, I had a couple of people that had videos that they had learned how they did their stuff. And so they would cook it to a certain temperature and then they would put it in their holding thing. Inside of tinfoil for 24 hours. Well, the next time I try to go cook brisket on the, in the backyard, I decided I was going to try and pull that off. Well, unfortunately my oven and, or my smoker wouldn't get down to that temperature. So I had a 40 brisket that got ruined over this darn thing. And I, and, and again, I mean, I'm, I'm Teasing about it, but it's true because I, I know when I took it off the, the smoker to put it and wrap it, it was at the right temperature. I attempted, I knew it was where it was at, but I couldn't keep that consistent temperature. And so from a consistency perspective, and really that is one of the things that goalies talks about is, is that consistent product. That they can deliver day in and day out week in and week out because cooking is a science cooking is, you know, difficult because you got different cuts of meat. You got different ways that things are going to go about it. But if you can hold it properly, ultimately you can get that consistent product. I guess tell me a little bit both between your culinary background and then now being at Therma die and talk to me a little bit about why that's so important to restaurant tours and why it is in the consumer. I mean, in the, in the, in the minds of restaurants, why they need to have these things because it's critical. In my opinion.
Aaron Bremer:Yeah. I mean, I mean, you look at something like brisket or pulled pork or prime rib or top round. I mean, you think it's something that you want to cook, you know, to a very precise temperature. And if you're not able to hold it at the temperature you want it to be at, you know, per se, you could overcook something by 10 degrees or you could hold it. You know, if you want to hold a prime rib at a nice rare, medium, rare, you know, 130, 135 degrees, and your cabinet is not well enough insulated or well, the thermometer on it is off or any, any variable that could change the temperature inside that cabinet, you know, you're going to have unsafe product at that point, because you were trying to keep it, you know, at that bottom range of where you want it to be, but if it's not performing optimally or not transferring heat well enough, And you're gonna get an unsafe product or you're going to get an overcooked. So, I mean, there's certain aspects where really you want to be able to hold it at that very, very precise temperature. I mean, brisket, another great example. I mean, you put it in, you know, you spend 12, 14 hours, you know, smoking a brisket, getting it right where you want to be. Yeah, and then you're in the home stretch or, you know, you're doing up 20 of them and you're serving it, cutting it that day. And you know, your cabinet is off by 30 degrees. You know, you could either have shredded brisket or you could have cold brisket or you could have brisket that's just not safe to serve to people. So, I mean, or
Jeremy Julian:brisket that turns into a hard as a rock because I overcooked the darn thing is ultimately what happened. I threw away the entire flat of my brisket got thrown away. My buddies are like laughing at me because the point was fatty enough that it kept the, it kept the heat. Okay. But the but yeah, no, but, but I think it's important for people to understand which Really, I guess Aaron leads me down this path that says, why don't more people do this? And again, I was talking to the chef from this other brand that. that went to the center plate items. And they struggled because, you know, they'd have to stick this top around or they'd have to stick this prime rib and they'd season it. They'd stick it in the oven. And if it got overcooked or it was just the consistency was really, really bad. They had the very same problem with their, with their rack of pork ribs. And as they got to a place where they were using, you know, your guys's product, quite frankly, I don't even know, you know, I know they use your guys's product because he and I talked about it. I didn't know the name of the company, but he was explaining to me how the oven work. At the end of the day, like it's become a game changer for this brand because it's a casual dining brand, but they're giving an elevated experience that you can often only find in a place that's chef driven. But it's at a casual dining brand that goes across the country because they're using product like yours. Talk to me a little bit about kind of that, that whole continuum and how that, why are not more brands not considering using products like what you guys have to deliver proteins in this way. And, and, you know, not just proteins, all of the, all of the products that you guys have.
Aaron Bremer:Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of competitors out there. I mean, Thermo diet is just one of many, many holding cabinets, cook and hold options on the market. So I mean, it, it comes out of personal preference. I mean, what people are familiar with, what they've used in the past. But I mean, you get Thermadyne next to, you know, competitors or similar products and, you know, a big thing we always come down and do is a yield test. You know, I mean, say you're a deli and you're making roast beef and you're serving, you know, 300 pounds of roast beef every day, and I come in and let's say you. Put your 300 pounds in a thermodyne oven and you yield 290 pounds of usable product and competitor comes in and yields 275 pounds. You know, we had 15 pounds better yield while, you know, add that up over the course of a year and the yield right there is enough to justify, you know, purchasing a better piece of equipment, a new piece of equipment, a different piece of equipment. I mean, yield is a, is a big thing that a lot of people don't always consider. I mean, you really gotta be in the industry or around it to understand like, anyway. Yield is a big thing. Cause I mean, just cause you buy a 20 pound piece of meat doesn't mean after it's cooked, you're getting 21 pound portions of it. You're getting, you know, maybe 16, 17, depending upon what it is. And, you know, it's just, it's just educating and educating yourself and educating your consumers and your employees that, Hey. Just because this product turns out or just because this piece of equipment turns out a great product doesn't mean that it's going to create us the most profit over time, or it's going to have the longest most longevity over time. It's, it's just understanding what you're using it, what piece of equipment you're using and what you're using it for and, you know, how it's going to get your ROI back of, Hey, you know, we invested an extra 20 percent from this piece of equipment over this piece of equipment. But this piece of equipment over here is going to pay for itself a heck of a lot faster than this one is, or hey, the reason we bought this one for more money was because we knew it was going to give us a better yield over the course of a year and we're going to be in the green past that.
Jeremy Julian:Yeah, no, and I, and I, I love that, that concept. It's just, to me, it was one of those things that was really surprising to me when I would talk to restauranteurs, just how, I don't say how few, it's not something that I hear a lot about. I hear a lot. About regular friars and regular ovens products like yours. It's, it feels like it's, there's been a bigger push towards them because again, quality of product and, and quality of delivery and, you know, everybody talks about, you know, if you can get consistency, it's, it's, it's critical.
Aaron Bremer:Yeah. I mean, consistency is a big thing. And I mean, especially over the past, you know, four or five years. I mean, you look at staffing being a big thing. I mean, you think of, you know, people coming in and roasting prime rib and in their oven, you know, in their convection oven, you know, for three hours for dinner service, you know, why would you do that when you could have a piece of thermodynamic equipment that could cook it. All night long the night before come in and be ready to go and you're not tying up your ovens, you're not having to bring prep cooks in an extra hour or two early just to get prime ribs cooking, you're not using all that gas from a gas convection oven, you know, our equipment is very energy star rated, very, I'm sorry, not energy star rated very efficient when it comes to electricity consumption you know, just looking at it from that aspect, you know, it doesn't have to be under a hood. So, I mean, you're saving money on hood space, which these days is, You know, it's, it's very, very expensive, you know? Yep. Well, and I'd
Jeremy Julian:love to take that, that path. Talk to me a little bit about how, you know, I'm going to say the product works because I think you've talked a lot, a lot about that, but the, the energy savings, not just the space savings, you know, throwing that, that same prime ribbon in a regular oven takes up a bunch of space, you've got just lots of different, you know, we've had different people on the show in the past about. Hood cleaning and, and just all of that, but you guys have, you know, this different methodology that, that saves energy costs, you're not dealing with, you know, gas and just, just all of the benefits of having this type of product. You started to allude to it, but let's double click, I guess, on the cost savings because you're keeping stuff at consistent temperatures. It's staying there the time, you know, you're not having a heat, cold heat. I mean, that's just, that's a lot of, a lot of work and a lot of energy. Dispersed without a whole lot of benefit when you got to heat an oven up and then cool it down and heat it back up. So talk to me a little bit about what that does for people's overall energy consumption as a restaurant, because that is a huge cost for them.
Aaron Bremer:Yeah, I mean, you look at something, you know, a piece of equipment and you're looking at how much BTU is putting off, you're looking at how much energy it's consuming, you're looking at all different avenues of it. And, you know, for ours, I mean, being a slow cook and hold oven or a holding cabinet, I mean, we're not getting above 230 degrees inside the cabinet. So, I mean, it's not a piece of equipment where, you know, a salamander or convection oven or griddle or broiler that's putting off all these BTUs that are pushing out into your kitchen, you know, it's raising the temperature of your kitchen up and therefore, you know, your air conditioner is working a little bit harder to try and make it somewhat manageable for your staff to be in there as well. And yeah, I mean, it's just, it's, it doesn't produce a lot of heat. So therefore it's. Helping you in that fashion. And really, I mean, all that's in our cabinetry is, you know, a pump and a couple of years in a tank and we're just circulating and reheating fluid over and over again, and those heaters are drawing very minimal voltage and amps to them. So, I mean, really it's, it's a cost savings of a, you don't need the electrical hookups that you would need. For a bigger piece of equipment, you know, everything that we have is single phase 220 or 110 volt. Nothing bigger than that. And really it just comes down to, you know, the simplicity and the small footprint that we have for a lot of our pieces of equipment. And just with that conduction of the cabinetry. Keeping all the heat inside the shelves, you know, it's not, we're not losing any heat as as the doors come open or close and the only heat you're losing is heat that would come radiant heat coming off of, you know, hot product or in there. All that energy is consumed in those shelves and, you know, it's not going out into your kitchen in that form or fashion. So, I mean, it's really kind of helping keeping the entire entirety of the cabinet at a consistent temperature.
Jeremy Julian:So, Aaron, I'm going to ask one last question kind of on the the, the cooking and, and hot product side, you were a chef and I promise you at some point before you use thermodyne products, I'm sure you had some, the belief in your mind that you could do it better. You could do it better through the oven. You could do it better through the BTUs on the, on the steam table. And you're chuckling on video for those that are, that are not watching on video and are, and are listening. Talk to me a little bit about what you would say to that chef that might be classically trained that says, No, no, no. I need to be able to control the heat. I need the product to be exactly the way that I want it to be the time that it goes out the door. Because I promise you, you guys have that. I mean, I, I can only imagine you've got these people that are like, no, I've done it this way forever. Don't get this stupid new equipment out. Get this new technology out of, out of my face. I've been doing prime rib the same way for 30 years. You're dumb. Let me do what I'm going to do. Talk, talk to that person that might be listening to the show today because. You know, a crispy outside to a prime rib and a nice soft, warm center, like is something that people want. And yeah, I know you guys can get that with your product, but a lot of people that are classically trained either don't understand what you guys can do or have their own belief in themselves that they can do it better. With the traditional products that we might be we might be used to in the restaurant industry.
Aaron Bremer:Yeah. I mean, you know, I was classically trained at culinary school, you know, all the old school French techniques roasting in the oven. And a lot of it came down to, you know, you, you look at the process, like we'll take prime rib, great example, great dish. Everybody's had it, everybody loves it. Right. Prime rib. And you look at it and you season it, you roast it in the oven, you know, you're constantly monitoring the temperature of it. Cause you know, you're cooking something. In a hotter oven, you know, two, three, 400 degrees, you know, depending upon what kind of method you're using, you know, that's a very hot temperature. And if you forget about it for an extra five, 10 minutes, you know, you could be degrees over. You could be, you could ruin an entire product. You could ruin. piece of beef that's, you know, hundreds of dollars. And for something, especially like that, you know, when you look at the more heat you're going to apply to something, the more shrinkage you're going to get. So if you put entire loin in a hot oven, you know, 400 degree oven, let's say even you roast it there and, you know, you finish it and you're monitoring it until it's, you know, 115 degrees, 120 degrees, 110 degrees, whatever your sweet spot is. And then you say, all right, now we got to pull it out. We got to let it rest for two hours. We got to let it. Do its thing. And as it rests, it'll come up to that one 25, one 30 wherever you guys want it to be, and then we put it in the holding cabinet to then let, then we serve it at dinner that night as we're slicing it and I could look at you and say, okay, that's a, that's a great technique. That's, you know, that's a lot of moving parts. That's, that's the way you do it. That's the way you do it. But here, let me show you a thermodyne cabinet here that, you know, I'm going to put this in the night before. And mine's going to slow cook overnight and I'm not adding a whole lot of heat to there, therefore I'm have a better yield. I'm going to break down the meat more because I'm putting it at a lower temperature and cooking it longer. And once mine hits, you know, you can set it up for, it's a one or two stage cycle of, you know, if you know, you want to get those juices flowing a little bit early, you know, you put it in at 150 degrees or 140 degrees, 170 degrees, whatever that sweet spot is, and set it to where it's going to register a temperature for one of our probes that, you know, is tied directly into the board on our controller that says, okay, this prime rib has been cooking for X amount of time. Now our probe reads 100 30 degrees. Now it's going to hold cycle or, you know, 120 degrees, 125, whatever your, whatever your sweet spot is for a prime rim. And it's just going to hold there until you're ready for dinner service tonight. And I come in and my prime rib is cooked, ready to go, it's rested. And I didn't have to do a darn thing that day, whereas, you know, competitively, if you're old school, you know, you're slow roasting it, you're pulling it out. You're letting it rest. You're transferring it to another cabinet. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's just a simpler process that, and I guarantee you, I'm going to get a better yield on my product because it's slow cooked. It's a very
Jeremy Julian:good consistency alone. I just, I keep, I keep going back to that product is going to, I mean. Yes, you're, you know, you're, but every time it's going to be cooked the same way versus somebody letting it rest for an hour and 50 minutes versus two hours and 10 minutes. Just that difference in resting between getting into the cabinet has the potential. And
Aaron Bremer:you look at, you look at it too, as you know, traditionally you cook it, you know, Your insides are going to be a little bit more medium. Well, you know, you kind of get a little bit rare as you get to the center. Whereas if you're using a more gentle cycle, even if you're sous vide, you know, an entire primary, which, you know, can be done, it's not optimal to do for, it's not a sustainable way to do it in my opinion. But not for
Jeremy Julian:a restaurant doing 30 of them a night.
Aaron Bremer:Right. I mean, I mean, if you're doing it every once in a while as a special, or, you know, you're, you're doing as a home chef for Christmas dinner, you're like, Hey, more power to you, but. You know, if you're a high volume restaurant and you want to serve prime rib every night, I would highly suggest getting some getting into the cook and hold game. It's going to make things a lot easier on you, but you know, from something that can do a slow cook and hold, you're going to see more consistency, consistently even temperature across the board from the end cuts to the middle cut. Just because of that lower temperature and not really that harsh heat all around the the loin, like you would see with like a convection oven or something like that, or smoker even. Whereas when you get more of a gentle cook and hold like Thermadyne has, you're going to see a more consistent product.
Jeremy Julian:Well, I I appreciate you going through all of that. And quite frankly, selfishly I've learned quite a bit and I want one of these things from my house, and I know I can't, I mean, even though they, they, they work in one 10, I, I'm like trying to figure out, all right, how do I work one of these into my to my home kitchen?'cause as my friends all like to tease me, I, I like to cook a lot and I enjoy trying out new products. So I know this is, you know, cook and hold is not the only thing you guys do. So, aaron, why don't you talk to me a little bit about just kind of some of your other products that you guys have, that you guys, you know, you guys have got some products related to chilling equipment, holding cabinets, you know, you guys have got more than just, you know, just this there's the steam tables. Like talk to me about kind of your guys's full product line. If somebody were to go check out the website, which will. Direct them to here in a few minutes. What else are they going to find? And let's talk a little bit about, you know some of those other products.
Aaron Bremer:Yeah. I mean all the technology is the same in all of our products. I mean, you know, the, the theory of we're taking a liquid and getting it to a very precise temperature and maintaining that temperature. Is the, is the real advantage for all of our products. Really for us, what we distinguish as more of a cook and hold unit is something that's going to have our newer touchscreen smart controller in there that allows us to go from a cooking temperature to a holding temperature. So for instance, like if you want to do, let's say pull pork. That, you know, you need to get that pulled pork to 200 degrees for it to shred. You put it at a, you know, you, you get your recipe built in there and you put it at 200 degrees for 12 hours. And then after your 12 hour mark, or after your probe reads 200 degrees drops down to maybe like a one 45, one 50 to kind of hold it there as a holding. So really you're seeing more of a cook and hold there, whereas with our traditional cabinetry, you know, it's just a simple controller of, you know, up and down set temperature. And it's really, it's, it's a very reliable, it's a very strong piece of equipment that you're getting an even consistent temperature. You know, there's not a cold spot, hot spot, you know, don't put something on the top shelf. Don't put something on the bottom shelf. That's a cold spot hot spot or, you know, something like that. I mean, it's consistent from top to bottom, front to back. And really you're able to optimize space at that point. And You know, when we say, Hey, you can hold X amount of hotel pans in our cabinetry, you know, we mean you can hold X amount and that they're all going to be consistently the same type of product. Or temperature as well. So kind of elaborate more on other pieces of equipment. You know, we do have units that is a steam well on top that has a thermodyne down below it, you know, thermodyne holding cabinet and really where we see that used a lot in is, you know, back of the house operations for a lot of restaurants, but, you know, schools and healthcare that, hey, you know, we're mass serving you know, 400 patients a day or 2000 students a day. And You know, I know I need, you know, five pans of mashed potatoes or five pans of rice pilaf. You know, you put your one up here on the steam well and you have your backups right there below you. It's not a holding cabinet behind you. And especially for you know, schools that are serving satellite lunches, you know, whether it's prepared, you know, over here in the commissary cafeteria and then they're wheeling that entire piece of equipment, you know, down the hallway or down to across the courtyard or wherever their satellite kitchen is set up at. You know, it's wheeling one whole vessel, setting it all up. You know, with a lot of our accessory packages, you can have it to where, you know, you have tray slides, plate holders, sneeze guard, you know, anything you would need to set up a mobile serving line, you know, serve your students there, pack it back down, wheel it back over and, you know, that's, that's their versatile serving line as well. And then the last piece of equipment, we have what's called a dual purpose unit. It's basically a thermodyne holding cabinet that then has a refrigerator condenser on the bottom. And really kind of what that allows us to do is using programmable controller. Let's say, for instance, you're running a nursing home or hotel or any sort of large large venue, large catering. And, you know, you have breakfast for 500 people every morning or an event for that, or it's a hospital or nursing home that serves, you know, the same 100, 200 patients every day. Really you're able to put that product in there the night before, put it on a chill cycle and program it to have a re thermalization cycle kick on it. You know, three, four, five in the morning, whatever it needs to be. And it goes from that chill state to then the heater tank up top is kicking on. It's, it's heating that fluid now. So the refrigerator condenser cools that liquid and we're just using conduction to put cold fluid through there. Keep all the product nice and cool. And then you know, once that controller switches from a chiller state to a re thermalization state, that liquid is then getting heated, and we're pumping that through the shelves, and we're re thermalizing the product after it comes into that heating cycle. So basically, you know cooks, chefs anybody can come in. You know, 20, 15 minutes before they're going to serve stuff, open the cabinet door, pull it out, put it in the serving line and everything's ready to go. Whether it's oatmeal, eggs, browns, grits, you know, anything that can be re thermalized. You can put in that that cycle. And it's going to save you got, you know, think about it. You save, you know, 30 minutes, every cook, every day, you know, whether it's a, they don't have to come in quite as early, or you can get away with doing with two cooks, what normally you should take you for, you know, it's a cost savings there. And, you know, we've done cost analysis on that for different operations that saying, you know, if you replace one employee, or if you replace, you know, 30 minutes a day with four employees, this piece of equipment will pay for itself in a year.
Jeremy Julian:Yeah, super, super quick on that. I guess leads me. I know I said I was done asking questions, but I as you were talking through that I'd love to understand for those that are less familiar with this style of cooking. Do you guys have ways to help them? You know, I'm I'm a chef for a group of restaurants. I got. 20 restaurants. I'm, I'm want to buy your guys equipment and I want my Friday night special to be prime rib, but I don't know how to make prime rib other than a nutritional oven. Or I'm that nursing home and I know that I, I want to be able to do this. Is that stuff that you guys as part of your deployment are, are willing and able to help these people with? On how to use your guys's equipment and how, how it how it's going to, you know, if I'm, if I'm a listener out there and I'm like, Oh, I really want this, but I don't have a clue how the heck I would use it. Even if I had it, help, help our audience understand what
Aaron Bremer:that would look like. Yeah. I mean, we have a whole we have a whole library of resources on our website you know, from recipes to procedures to. Just various operational things for it as well. But really, if you have a niche or you have a project that you're trying to accomplish, I mean, getting in contact with us and, you know, we have a full team here of chefs and salespeople, engineers that can kind of help walk you through every scenario, you know, as well as a full on production kitchen. And we do do a lot of hands on demos. We do Zoom calls, Teams calls webinars, just kind of educating people on our product and kind of troubleshooting it. And like you said, like, you know, people approach us like, Hey, I'd really love to be able to. You know, I've served all you can eat fish on Friday nights and I can't keep up with my fryers and, but I don't want to pre fry all my fish because then it loses quality because I've never found that right piece of equipment. You know, that's when we kind of get our chef team involved, you know, we get our sales people involved. Hey, you know, why don't you guys, you know, tell us a little bit about your procedure, you know, what are you doing, what's the recipe, you know, what kind of fish you using, how long you want to hold it for ideally, you know, there's. It is 10 15 minutes a game changer for you if you can hold that long, or does it need to be, you know, 30 45 minutes, you know, tell us about your project, and then from there we really go to work and, you know, kind of, um, do more of an analysis of, alright, you know, here's, here's their gap, here's, you know, the gap is, hey, you You know, we need to be able to cook and hold more fish. All right, now we're going to kind of go to work and see what we can get done. And, you know, Hey, here's our best feedback. Here's our input of, Hey, if you did, uh, if you use this thermodyne with this configuration of pans and lids and grates and risers and all kinds of accessories that we offer and you hold it at this temperature, you know, we feel that the ideal time is 12 to 15 minutes. It is still, it is still as good as straight out of the fryer. But you know at 20 to 25 inch you're losing a little bit of texture and in our opinion It's probably not ideal to keep that long, but that's our feedback, you know, here's our Here's our presentation as to what we think it is, you know from there Then it's in your court as to you know, how you feel about it And when we do, we do offer demos as well, you know, we, we truly believe that seeing is believing and, you know, with our product, it is a little bit different than anything else that's out there. So, I mean, you know, for customers, we will say, Hey, you know, 60 day trial, give our piece of equipment a try. If you like it, great, you can purchase it. If not, ship it back, know our feelings, but we appreciate you trying it out. And, you know, we hope, but we hope that you love the product, but we understand, you know, business is business and people have decisions to make on their own, but we, we have a very high success rate of people seeing our product and think and realizing like, Oh my gosh, this makes my life so much easier, you know, whether it's the dual purpose unit of putting product in the night before and being able to come in and it's hot and ready, or, you know, the quick service of, Hey, you know, this conduction heat really holds my fish nice and crispy or Hey, okay. Yeah. You know, we can pre fry a hundred chicken wings on Monday night and we never run out and we're, you know, we have seven minute ticket times on wing baskets. So it's a big variety of things that we can offer and you know, we have a big we have, we have a team here that's been here for a long time and are very knowledgeable on the subject, you know, whether it's operations of restaurant or whether it's how equipment works or just the demands of the people in the hospitality industry. We try to relate to them as best as we can and, you know, try and close those gaps for them. Thank you.
Jeremy Julian:I love that. I love that. And, and doesn't hurt that the origin stories come from you know, Colonel Sanders. So there's always that. So Aaron, you, you alluded to the, to the website. Why don't you throw that out there for our audience? You know, how do they get in touch with you? How do they get in touch with your team to learn more about what you guys can do for people? Because You know, if I had a commercial kitchen, I promise you, I'd be figuring out how to get one of these. And I'm still trying to figure out how to get one of these shown up to the house, you know, showing up to the house. Just don't tell my wife. She'd be like, what the heck is that thing? And what do you need that thing for? So so how do I get in touch with you? How do they get in touch with your team and learn more about what you guys can do for them?
Aaron Bremer:Yeah. So the website is T nine T D Y N E. com. You can go on there. There's a whole list of, like I said, resources of products spec sheets, you know, how to videos, recipe videos just kind of showing the utilization of the product. All of our numbers are on there, you know, whether it's parts, service, sales, anything like that, give us a call. We'd be happy to help you guys out. Our request, the demo form is on there. You know, if you think you have. A niche to start cooking primary, but you really want to try it first. You know, fill that form out. It goes directly to me. I'll get in touch with you and we'll get the ball rolling.
Jeremy Julian:I love it. I love it. Well, I appreciate you educating me and making me envious that I don't have a commercial kitchen here at home. But I, yeah. Oh, I. I just did the outdoor kitchen. I've got the pizza oven. I got the flat top and I got the grill and I got the smoker. And my wife's like, you're done. You're done with cooking equipment. Every time I show up, there's always something new. So Aaron, thank you so much for sharing. To our audience guys, I know I shared this at the onset. You guys have lots of choices. So we appreciate you guys spending time with us. If you haven't already subscribed to the show, please do so. Whether you're listening on audio on your favorite podcast player or on YouTube. One last thing that I would ask you to subscribe to is once a month, we send out a newsletter with all of the shows and any other blog posts and anything else that's going on with restaurant technology guys, Aaron, thank you so much to for joining us and to our audience, make it a great day.
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