Takeout has been a saving grace for many of us these past months. With pressures born out of the COVID-era mounting, it seems like many of us barely have time to eat, let alone make a meal. While constant ordering from apps and restaurants may be great for saving the local economy, it’s not so great for household finances. The Potash Twins are here to save us from ourselves.
Acclaimed musicians and TV personalities, Adeev and Ezra Potash are hosting a new cooking show – Takeout Twins – that teaches even the most kitchen-phobic how to make at-home versions of fast favorites that will rival any restaurants’. The show’s premiere is available to stream on The Food Network Kitchen App as well as all Amazon devices beginning Wednesday, September 2nd.
Recently, the twins Zoomed into the L.A. Weekly podcast to chat about their new show with host and publisher Brian Calle alongside food editor Michele Stueven.
These two are not your typical TV food hosts. There’s no formality in their delivery, their approach is accessible to everyone, encouraging all to get into the kitchen and get cooking. The show’s ultimate goal? Empowering home cooks to make their favorite takeout dishes at home by showing them how accessible and easy cooking their own delicious meals can be.
“This show – Takeout Twins, which comes out September 2nd on Food Network – is something that is such a passion project for us,” explains Ezra. “We made this show for our generation and our peers to be more comfortable in the kitchen. Because delivery is on the rise and takeout is on the rise, it’s so easy to get your favorite foods at your door with the click of a button. We just have this fear that our peers and our friends are not going to establish these basic cooking techniques and kitchen techniques that you just need to be a human being. Unfortunately and fortunately technology has sort of taken a lot of us out of the kitchen and made us a little bit uncomfortable and intimidated in the atmosphere of just making your favorite food which is really not something that any of us should be experiencing.”
Executive produced by James Beard award-winning TV personality and chef Andrew Zimmern, Takeout Twins will showcase the guys’ love of music, food and cooking. Each episode will take viewers inside their favorite celebrities’ kitchens, while the Potash Twins teach them how to make their favorite takeout dishes.
Adeev and Ezra aren’t just known for their great taste, but for their talent as well. Known as the “Twin Horns of Joy,” the two have gained world- renowned notoriety as horn players, having toured the world and sharing stages with a variety of heavyweight recording artists such as John Legend, Chance The Rapper and Diplo, to jazz legend Wynton Marsalis and Late Show bandleader Jon Baptist, amongst many others. It was actually through touring for music that their crossover into food began.
“This show started for us as a way for us to recreate our favorite dishes when we’d eat when traveling for music,” shares Adeev. “The second we’d get home we’d want to order these dishes… there was no way to order them. So the only way to consume these was to make it ourselves. And in that way it educated us in being able to…recognize and recreate flavors. We call in plating by ear because we are musicians…so it’s one way for us to get creative.”
Calling themselves “jacks of all trades and masters of none,” the two have successfully endeavored in making some of the most hard-to-find international dishes from home. Not only for the taste, but for the memories as well.
“[Takeout Twins] is a way to share some of our favorite dishes from the trip, and relive our favorite moments,” they say in unison.
If you’re like Brian, you’ve been cooking more than ever before. Our host has taken himself by surprise with what he’s been whipping up in the kitchen.
“We’ve been saying that because of COVID, the home kitchen has almost become the food theatre, it’s another form of entertainment,” laughs Ezra.
Not to be misunderstood, the twins still very much encourage supporting the restaurant industry. Just not at the expense of your wallet.
“What we have to do right now, because the restaurant industry is facing a massive extinction event, we have to also celebrate our favorite restaurants and our favorite dishes by ordering from our favorite local restaurants. But at the same time, that doesn’t mean you don’t need to learn how to make them, because you know what, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday order it in, but Friday, Saturday, learn how to make it,” advises Ezra.
“The thing about this show, we took the ten most ordered dishes from your favorite apps like UberEats, Postmates, Grubhub, etc… and we made our own recipes based off of those dishes,” finishes Adeev.
The recipes are completely user friendly – made for immediate use, no marinating, no waiting, no bullshit.
“It’s about making your favorite takeout dishes that you order on a weekly basis, and getting into the kitchen and making them at home,” they tell Michele and Brian. “Just to prove how confident we were in these recipes, at the end of each episode we actually order the same dish…we do a side-by-side comparison.”
The twins enlist the help of family members and celebrities on their show, to prove how easy it is to make their recipes, no matter how busy or inept you think you are. Describing their method as “raw and stripped down,” they make sure to drive the point home that if you make a mistake it’s okay, at least you know what’s going into your food.
“We’ve always been really passionate eaters,” say the two, as they describe their transition into the food scene. They grew up in Nebraska, a state not known for its culinary delights, but lucky for them, their parents travelled internationally for work and would often bring back new foods to try. This tradition bred their love of international cooking and put them on a lifelong journey of culinary exploration.
“We always love trying new recipes,” enthuses Ezra. They’re always trying to push themselves – in both palate and career.
Join them in their pursuit by tuning in to Takeout Twins – you may just surprise yourself with what you’re capable of!
The interview in its entirety can be found: iTunes, Spotify, Cumulus Los Angeles.
