0:01

This is Are You Kidding? Podcast? I can listen

0:04

with my kids with brothers Sebastian

0:06

and Brandon Martinez, who are kids helping

0:09

kids. Thank you Enriquie

0:11

for that intro. I still love that one. So Brendan,

0:13

guess who we're going to be interviewing today. We'll

0:15

give you a him. He's one of the best at baking. Who

0:18

could it be? Whoa? He's standing right in front

0:20

of us. He's Dove Goldman. So

0:24

how are you doing? The crowd

0:26

goes good,

0:31

But before we start, I want to I want to say a

0:33

funny joke. Okay, so,

0:35

well, what do you call an island

0:38

populated entirely by cupcakes?

0:41

An island populated entirely

0:43

by cupcakes? Delicious?

0:46

I don't know. Well, besides

0:48

that desserted that

0:52

was pretty good. Yeah,

0:56

So so we know you're like

0:58

the best baker. I'm

1:01

alright, So, so why did you start baking?

1:03

So? Um? I was in

1:06

college and I knew I wanted

1:08

to be a chef, and so I went to

1:10

the best restaurant I could find in

1:12

the city. I was living in Baltimore, this place

1:14

called Savanna, and the chef was amazing, and I

1:17

was like, if I'm gonna you know, I want to be a chef. I want to

1:19

work for the best. And so I

1:21

went and I'm like, hey, I want to be a chef. And she's like,

1:23

you don't know how to cook. And I was like yeah,

1:25

but I want to learn how to cook. And she's like, yeah, but you learn

1:27

how to cook somewhere else. This is a place you come when

1:29

you already know how to cook. And I was like, come

1:32

on, I really want to learn how to cook. And she was like, i'll

1:34

tell you what. I'll let you. I'll

1:37

let you bake corn bread for me, but like one

1:39

day a week. And I was like, okay,

1:41

I'll do it just to get my foot in the door. And

1:43

so I I went in and I baked corn bread

1:46

and I started baking the corn bread, and

1:48

then I started baking the biscuits, the buttermilk

1:50

biscuits, and then I started making cookies,

1:52

and then I started making different kinds of cakes. Then

1:54

they taught me how to make ice cream, and so I

1:57

learned all this pastry stuff, even though that's

1:59

not what I wanted to do at

2:01

first. I want to be a chef, like fire

2:04

and sweating and knives and

2:06

you know what I mean, Like, you know, like when you see like people

2:08

cutting and cooking and going crazy, that's

2:10

what I wanted to do. But the only job

2:13

she would give me was baking. And because I was I

2:15

just wanted to work for I was like, Okay,

2:17

I'll learn anything you want to teach me. And

2:21

while I was doing it, I've like realized

2:23

I was like, you know, like I like cooking, and I would do

2:25

some cooking, you know, but I

2:27

really like the baking. And I think the reason

2:30

why it was that baking

2:32

is so analytical,

2:36

you know, like you have to follow a recipe,

2:39

you know, you have to do some math,

2:41

you have to um know

2:43

a little bit of chemistry, you know, and there's

2:45

like there's so much science that goes into

2:47

baking, and I think I just like

2:49

to think about stuff, you know, And so I

2:52

think that baking to me was just so fascinating

2:54

because it was like every time you put something

2:57

in the oven, it's like a science project. Yeah,

2:59

baking is pretty are compared

3:01

to cooking because if you get one thing wrong,

3:03

the whole like if you're making cake,

3:06

it's pruned, yeah, and you can't like go

3:08

back and fix it. You got start over a

3:10

challenge. Yeah, and we all know you're

3:12

a good baker, a great bagger, but you're

3:14

also a great chef because and you

3:16

went on Iron Chef, So how was that? It

3:19

was really fun? So I got to battle my friend Michael

3:21

Simon, who was a very very amazing

3:23

cook, and uh we

3:26

had a good time, you know because like, I don't think

3:28

he was expecting that I that I knew how to

3:30

cook as much as I did, and I

3:32

had never been on Iron Chef, so I didn't really know what

3:35

to expect. So we're like, we had a really fun time.

3:37

So you're like the underdogs. Oh

3:39

yeah, like in a cooking competent, in any competition,

3:42

on the underdog always there's

3:45

a lot of people out there that are much better at me

3:47

than basically everything. So

3:51

so when you were fourteen, why did you make

3:54

sandwich? Is like bigger than usual? Okay,

3:56

So I was working at this bagel shop, right, and

4:00

uh so my job was like making these

4:02

sandwiches, but almost got fired because

4:04

I kept making the sandwiches too big. Right. The

4:07

thing is is like the way

4:09

they taught me how to make the sandwich, it was like, okay,

4:11

you take the bagel, you put like one slice

4:13

of cheese and then like two slices

4:15

of meat and then like a tomato, and

4:17

I'm like, looking at it, I'm like, that's

4:19

not the sandwich i'd want to eat. Yeah,

4:24

well not even just creative. I just want a bigger

4:26

sandwich. So I'd be like, you know what, how

4:28

about three slices of cheese, how about

4:30

an inch of meat instead of just two

4:33

slices, you know, making like big sandwiches

4:35

that people really get excited about, which is cool

4:37

because people really enjoy the sandwiches. But

4:40

they were selling the sandwiches for a certain

4:42

amount, right, so say three dollars fifty

4:44

cents. They had figured out that like, okay,

4:47

a bagel plus one piece of cheese plus

4:49

two slices of meat plus one tomato, uh,

4:51

and paying meat, paying my salary of the

4:54

sandwich should cost three dollars and fifty

4:56

cents. Once I started adding all this extra

4:58

meat and all this cheese to it, it made the sandwich

5:00

way too expensive. And so we would

5:03

still sell the sandwich for three hours or fifty cents,

5:05

but it might have costed four hours

5:07

to make, and so they were losing fifty

5:09

cents on every sandwich. I was selling so they

5:11

didn't like that, but they were better sandwich.

5:14

Yeah, they were better swig. They should

5:16

put that on the menu, like raise the price

5:18

to like four dollars. Yeah,

5:20

you'd be like, okay, you want like the regular sandwich like

5:22

here it is, you want like the duff like Dagwood.

5:26

Yeah, you know it should be the Dove special.

5:29

And if I want to a bagel shopping out a bigger sandwich,

5:31

I would be super happy. Yeah,

5:33

and it brings more attention to why would't

5:35

they like that? And the thing about bagels is like

5:37

the bread is really substantial, you know, it's

5:39

super chewy. You gotta really get in there.

5:41

You want a lot of meat because like that bread is gonna drown

5:44

out anything that you put on there. If you

5:46

have like two slices of wonderbread, you can put piece

5:48

of cheese on it and like you'll taste it because wonder

5:50

breads like air. But a bagels, like

5:52

you know, I love everything. Bagels

5:55

like disguises the flavor. Yeah

5:57

yeah, you know it's just too much and it's just like

5:59

it's hard to get your mouth through it, the

6:01

whole thing. So if you could go back

6:03

and talk to you to the young Duff, Well,

6:06

advice would you give yourself? Oh? Man,

6:08

if I could go back and talk to the young

6:11

Duff, I would probably I

6:15

would say, um huh,

6:19

I want to say, don't be arrogant. You

6:22

know, I think that was that was like

6:24

like I like, I used to think I was like the

6:26

best at all this stuff, and you

6:29

know, like as I got older, I realized

6:31

I definitely wasn't. And

6:33

I feel like I never like I wasn't able to like

6:36

really truly start learning until

6:38

I realized that I wasn't the best,

6:40

and I had a lot to learn. Yeah, you're

6:43

never perfect. You gotta keep stay

6:45

humble, Ye, stay humble. So

6:48

we all know that you had a bake off between

6:50

you and Buddy. So are we're gonna have a part two

6:53

of that? We are, So

6:55

Buddy's gonna come back, you know, with a new plan

6:57

and new idea. Yeah, I think.

6:59

So. He's a tough competitor, man, that guy

7:01

is a good cake decorator. Do you think he's your

7:03

biggest competition? I

7:06

don't, you know, it's fun. I don't think there's really competition

7:08

in you know, in

7:11

the world of baking. You know, there's there's

7:13

there's so many different kinds of things

7:15

out there that it's not really about

7:17

like who's better. You know, it's like who's doing something

7:20

interesting? You know, it's being

7:22

who it's like more creative, who's

7:24

making the cooler stuff? Yeah, totally, just

7:26

like you know, I think that um,

7:29

you know, like everybody kind of brings their own

7:32

point of view to it, you know what I mean. It's just like

7:34

podcasts, right, I mean, think about how many

7:36

different kinds of podcasts rut there. You can't really say

7:38

that, like this one's better than that one. It's it's

7:40

more like, Okay, well this one's interesting. This one's

7:42

interesting for a different reason. And

7:45

we know you have, like you have a bakery,

7:48

charm City Cakes. How tough

7:50

was it to like open it and like bring

7:52

attention? Well it was.

7:54

It's funny because I when I opened

7:57

it, I didn't really want to. I

7:59

wasn't trying to like have like a

8:01

long business. I

8:03

was um in my early

8:05

twenties, and I wanted to

8:07

be a full time musician. I wanted

8:10

to be in a band, And so I

8:12

quit my job and started selling cakes

8:14

so I could pay my rent. So then I could go

8:16

being a band and like, you know, go play

8:19

concerts and like record albums

8:21

and go on tour and do all that stuff, and

8:23

having a full time job, you can't do that. So I knew

8:25

that if I was making cakes, I made my own schedule.

8:28

So what instrument did you play? I'm a bass player.

8:31

Oh well, a long

8:33

time ago, I played the piano and my

8:35

brother played the I played the drums and the

8:37

guitar. Really. Yeah, wasn't

8:39

good at guitar, but I was. I was pretty decent at drum.

8:42

Yeah. Yeah. And you guys like whack it. I

8:45

don't know, it just makes you feel like really

8:48

like hardcore. Yeah, yeah,

8:50

totally. But the thing about drums and I

8:52

think is really fascinating and just everybody

8:55

can everybody's a drummer, you know. I

8:57

mean whenever you listen to the song, you know, you're always happening

8:59

and you're always doing and stuff. But like everybody

9:02

has h you know, a heartbeat,

9:04

and everybody's heartbeat is a rhythm, and everybody

9:07

is like you know, when you're when you're

9:09

like still a baby, like you know, in your mother's

9:11

womb, all you hear is a heartbeat,

9:14

you know, And so it's like we're we're sort of born

9:16

with like this sense

9:18

of rhythm that I think that's why. You

9:20

know, rhythm is really powerful. That's why the drums

9:22

of the I think the funnest it

9:26

something about it's just so cool. Yeah. Right,

9:29

It's just like there's like rhythm

9:32

creates like like it's I know, it's

9:34

weird, but it's like rhythm kind of creates like a satisfaction,

9:37

you know, and like same thing with like harmony. You

9:39

know, like you know when when you hear a harmony,

9:41

like it sounds good to people, right, and then

9:44

you hear something that's dissonan and it's like you can tell

9:46

they're like that doesn't sound quite right.

9:48

But like the same harmony sound good to

9:50

lots of different people. Are the same thing with rhythm. When

9:52

you when you're creating rhythm, especially when

9:55

you're doing it in a group with other people, there's

9:57

something like you really feel

10:00

connected to all the other people. I

10:02

think being in a band was really good for you. Yeah,

10:04

the band like it brings out the vibes, Yeah,

10:07

totally, it really does. What was the name

10:09

of the band? I had a few different ones. One

10:12

was so I had to it was the name of the

10:14

band. We were all instrumental, like a really weirdo

10:16

band. Um. I was in an email

10:18

band called Today Romance, right

10:20

it's good. And then now I'm in a band

10:23

it's all chefs and we're called

10:25

fag Rock. So

10:28

what is the chefs? Uh?

10:30

So my sous chef Jeff man Thorn. Our

10:33

singer is Bruce Colman, who's

10:35

a chef out in Los Angeles. And then our

10:37

drummer is this guy Frand who works

10:39

in front of the house at a restaurant in

10:41

Los Angeles too. What's the next concert?

10:43

Uh? You know, Bruce just moved

10:46

to Vegas and so I

10:48

don't know if we have anything planned. That's

10:51

how Yeah, our

10:53

singer moved away, so you know, we sort

10:55

of figured out. So is there anything

10:58

that people request that you hate making?

11:06

Not really, No,

11:09

I don't think because I mean, you know, it's like there's

11:11

a lot of stuff that you know you can find

11:13

would be like tedious, but the

11:16

trick is to make it fun for yourself, you know

11:18

what I mean. Like, I'm sure you guys have like a class

11:20

that you like history. I don't want to go to

11:22

his, but you can make it fun for yourself,

11:25

you know what I mean? Like I actually love

11:27

history because it's like stories. You

11:29

know. That's like one of my favorite classes too, because like

11:31

you learned so much about what happened

11:33

in the world. Yeah, and like you

11:36

not only learn not only do you learn what happened,

11:38

but you kind of learned like what to

11:40

do the next time something happens.

11:43

Hopefully that's the goal. I

11:45

don't want to make the same mistake twice. You never want

11:48

to make the same mistake twice. For

11:51

me, I like history, but I'm

11:53

in sixth grade and it's it's

11:55

not that easy.

11:57

Ye. So but

12:00

if you like turn it into a story,

12:03

you know, like if like did you see

12:05

Star Wars? Yeah? Right,

12:07

so, like you know you can tell me the story is Star Wars.

12:09

So if you turn like the history that you're learning

12:12

into a story and make it real for yourself,

12:15

you'll remember everything. Yeah,

12:17

that is, It's true. I almost

12:21

So, how do you feel about judging kids baking

12:24

competitions? Judging kids

12:26

baking is one of my favorite things. It's my favorite

12:28

show. I love it. You know, this kid is incredible

12:30

and it's like, you know when they come in and they can

12:33

like they know how to do stuff that like I didn't learn until

12:35

I was like thirty like what man

12:38

I wish I had YouTube. It's

12:40

like for us when people, like people,

12:42

when they look at us and we're like kids with a business, they're

12:44

like, no way, And then when

12:46

they realize that it's actual thing, they're like, that's

12:49

crazy because like, not a lot of kids have their

12:51

own company. Usually it's just adults people

12:54

who were just like, I

12:56

don't know, just really up there in

12:59

their forties stuff. But when

13:01

they see us and they said twelve yeld

13:03

CEO, it's crazy. Yea, yeah,

13:05

I think you know. The nice thing is is that, like

13:08

I think you guys are learning a lot of lessons that takes

13:11

a lot of other people a lot longer

13:13

to learn, you know, and you're you're gonna be you're learning

13:15

stuff now. You're gonna have it way here for the rest

13:17

of your life. You know. It's really good. This

13:20

is this is amazing. Thank you. I

13:22

love these socks. They are really cool.

13:24

Which one should I wear it today for?

13:27

In my opinion, my favorite one out of all

13:29

of these is the aweso as of awareness songs like

13:32

pops Out and it's just like so vibrant, yeah

13:34

it is. Yeah, these are really great

13:37

and all of them for good cause as well. So

13:40

do you prefer judging kids or adults

13:43

when it comes to baking? Man,

13:45

that's a good question. I think, Um, you

13:47

know that they're different, you know. I think it's

13:49

like with I find that kids are

13:51

a lot more uh,

13:55

enthusiastic, you know, because things

13:57

are still like really new, and

13:59

you know, I find that I kind of bake like

14:01

a kid because like, like

14:04

even now, like you think about like how many trades

14:06

of cookies have I put in the oven? You know,

14:08

probably thousand.

14:12

I've been baking a long time. But um,

14:16

today, still when I put

14:18

cookies in the oven, I'm excited

14:20

because I don't know if it's gonna work or not, you

14:22

know, and it's really exciting. I'm like, are they gonna

14:24

rise, are they going to do what they're supposed to do? Are they going

14:27

to stay together? Did I put the right amount of flower?

14:29

You know? All the all those different things. It's

14:31

still exciting for me, you know. And like when things

14:33

work, like when a muffin rises, I'm like, oh my god, it

14:35

worked. This is great, you know. And

14:37

so I think that there's a there's

14:40

like a enthusiasm

14:42

that I really share with kids. Um,

14:45

But with adults. I find that

14:47

I learned so much, you

14:49

know, like when I'm judging like

14:51

the shows, like with the adults on it, Like the

14:54

people i'm judging know just as much,

14:56

if not more than I do. And

14:59

I'm the I think that I've become

15:01

a much better chef by judging all

15:03

these shows and and watching

15:05

people who are really really good

15:07

bakers and like really serious about it, like really

15:10

know what they're talking about. So I don't know, kids,

15:12

adults like they're fun for different reasons. Yeah,

15:14

And speaking of like you when

15:16

you watch the cookies rise, I

15:18

kind of do it for popcorn, like when you

15:20

put the bag in there. I just like watching

15:23

the bag pop. I don't know why, because it's awesome.

15:25

Yeah. So so wait, have you ever had Jiffy

15:27

Pop? Um? You've

15:31

never had Jiffy pop? Well,

15:33

I mean you gotta go get Jiffy pop. I'm

15:36

talking about right now. Jiffy pop

15:38

is so much cooler than microwave popcorn.

15:41

You know what Jiffy pop?

15:44

Alright, So, so Jiffy

15:47

pop. You buy it in the store

15:50

and it's it's it comes in its

15:52

own pan, and you

15:54

put it on the fire, you put it on the stove,

15:56

and you cook it, and then as the

15:58

popcorn starts popping, it's

16:00

in like this weird like foil

16:03

thing that's like a spiral, and

16:05

so as it pops, it like and

16:08

it like gets bigger and bigger and bigger, and like it's

16:11

like becomes this thing. But you gotta pull it off right away.

16:13

You can pull it as soon as like it's you've got, It's got

16:15

to be done. You're leaving on there too long. It all burns

16:17

on the bottom. And burnt popcorn

16:19

tastes like garbage. Yeah, I

16:21

hate worst. I

16:24

won't even eat it. It's super

16:26

bad. Yeah, So so

16:28

we all know. So what do you like doing

16:30

better? Baking or cooking? Well,

16:33

you know, I do like them both. I

16:36

think it just depends on what kind of mood I'm in. That's

16:38

like picking your favorite Like that's like saying,

16:40

like what's your favorite Zeppelin song? You know what I mean?

16:42

Like just depends on your mood, you know. Like sometimes

16:45

like you're in the mood for stay way and to have Sometimes

16:47

you're in the mood for in my time and do you just

16:49

never know, you know, Yeah, sometimes

16:52

I'm like in a different mood to like wear some

16:55

socks like I don't know what's stock to wear. Sometimes

16:57

I'm in I s

17:00

somewhere in this food or the

17:02

stand to cancer stuck right, You just don't know.

17:04

It's just like you gotta you know, you gotta wake up. You just gotta

17:06

feel. You gotta trust your gut, you know, not trust

17:08

your well, your heart tell you. Yeah. Absolutely,

17:12

so we know that you you like,

17:15

we know that the practice of zadoca

17:19

zaca it's very important

17:21

to you. Do you think that philanthropy,

17:24

philanthropy and businesses should go hand in

17:26

hand. Oh, yeah, absolutely, you

17:28

know, I think it's uh. I think it's really important

17:30

that you know, not only do people

17:33

run their companies ethically, you know, treat

17:35

their employees well, you know, do the right things, you

17:37

know, making the right decisions, making sure that

17:39

you know your carbon footprint isn't too big, making

17:41

sure you're hiring practices are you know, all that stuff

17:43

like making sure you're running a good ethical company.

17:46

But you know, companies exist

17:49

at the pleasure of their communities, and

17:51

it's really important for people that own

17:53

companies to be involved in their communities. I mean,

17:56

the people in my community in Baltimore

17:58

are the people that buy my cakes and

18:01

I need to be taking care of my community

18:03

because they're taking care of me. They're coming in and you

18:05

know, they're buying cakes, and that's that makes it so I

18:07

can pay my rent and keep the lights on and buy more sugar

18:10

and flour and all that stuff. So it I think

18:12

it's really important because it creates

18:14

a you know, it creates

18:17

a more holistic environment, you know.

18:19

So I think, you know, it's really important, and most companies

18:22

do, you know. I I tend to find

18:24

that most of the time, companies,

18:28

when they're when their profit margin is enough, you know, where

18:30

they can actually afford to to do good work,

18:32

they usually do because I find that entrepreneurs

18:35

like yourselves are real

18:38

people that have overcome

18:41

huge obstacles. You know, Running

18:43

a business isn't easy. Starting a business

18:46

isn't easy, and it takes a special

18:48

kind of person to be good at it, you

18:51

know, And usually

18:53

the kinds of people that are good at running

18:55

a business are thoughtful,

18:58

and they come

19:00

from somewhere humble, and they understand

19:03

that sometimes it just takes a little bit to you

19:06

know, everybody needs some help once in a while,

19:08

and you know, I've definitely needed help in the course

19:10

of my business and knowing

19:12

that and understanding those things makes

19:15

it so, you know, not giving

19:17

just doesn't compute for me. Yeah, And

19:19

speaking about giving back, we

19:22

love giving back and if all companies,

19:25

like if everyone gave back the

19:27

world would be so much different. And

19:29

you never know if one day you'll need help.

19:33

Absolutely, So

19:35

we just want to thank you for being here

19:37

and be on our podcast and talking with

19:39

us. So, okay,

19:42

we have an idea. What if

19:44

we can make a baking sock a baking

19:46

sock. Um. Yeah,

19:50

yeah, let's see all you can do like measurement

19:53

conversions on it. You know, you can like have

19:55

a sack that has like you know, like

19:57

like one gallon equals

20:00

sixty ounces, or like three

20:02

teaspoons equal a table spoon,

20:05

or like there's you know, four

20:07

cups in a court, you know, stuff like that. Okay,

20:09

forget to be like, yeah, what is it

20:11

again? That's right. It's like so

20:15

in my math class, for some

20:17

tests they have like the

20:20

no not the teach sheet. It's

20:23

like a it says like what the

20:25

gallant, like how much course are in a

20:27

gallant? And yeah, converge

20:30

to shet We could probably do so yeah

20:32

totally. Yeah, So we just want to thank you

20:34

for being on the podcast. It's been a pleasure talking

20:36

to you. Hey, you guys, this is really fun. You

20:38

know, you guys are impressive. Thank you, it's really

20:40

great. Thank you, thank you. If

20:43

you just heard Are You Kidding? Podcast

20:47

with brothers Sebastian and Brandon Martinez

20:49

who are kids helping kids