14 4.5.
Talk
Since 2004, when David Chang helped
to reconfi gure the dining establishment’s
ideas about what a great restaurant could
be with Manhattan’s Momofuku Noodle
Bar, he has opened more than a dozen
restaurants around the world; hosted
two seasons of his Netfl ix documen-
tary series, ‘‘Ugly Delicious’’; started a
hit podcast, ‘‘The Dave Chang Show’’;
published the defunct, much-loved food
magazine ‘‘Lucky Peach’’; and now writ-
ten a memoir, the forthcoming ‘‘Eat a
Peach,’’ with a co-author, Gabe Ulla. In
doing all that, Chang, 42, has become a
food-world icon, broadened the coun-
try’s palate and made us more thought-
ful about what we eat. None of which
is much help with moving forward in
the wake of the economic destruction
that the coronavirus has wrought in the
culinary world. ‘‘There is a lot of feeling,’’
Chang said, ‘‘that even in good times, if
chefs can’t make their numbers, they’re
going to lose everything. So imagine
what they must be feeling now.’’
Can you describe the state of things on
your end right now? We’re still trying to
sort that out. We made the decision to
close our restaurants before it was man-
dated, and we’re currently in the process
of trying to fi gure out the best way to help
our employees.^1 I’m not being hyperbolic
in any way: Without government inter-
vention, there will be no service industry
whatsoever. There’s so many people that
work for me whom I am incredibly con-
cerned about. Where are they going to get
their next meal? Do they have health care
coverage? How are they going to pay their
bills? But this is the way I’ve been weird-
ly internalizing it: It’s as if aliens came
from outer space and decided to totally
destroy restaurants. I wouldn’t be like,
I can’t believe I didn’t see this coming.
In some way coronavirus is an invisible
enemy that we could not have anticipated.
No one could have.
What needs to happen next for restau-
rants? We may be headed for the worst-
case scenario. Even with more govern-
ment intervention,^2 I’m afraid that it’s
not going to be adequate for the people
who need it the most. I feel like it’s the
polar opposite of 2008, when they helped
the big banks and insurance compa-
nies because they had to or the world
as we knew it would end. And now, in
2020, we’re talking about ‘‘nonessential’’
businesses and people who don’t have the
clout to be able to speak to the govern-
ment. I have a hard time seeing all the
mom-and-pop shops getting help from
the government.
Ideally, though, what would that help
look like? More than anything, David, I
do not want to incite panic and hysteria,
but I think for restaurants and the service
industry, there is going to be a morbidly
high business death rate. My fear is the
restaurants that survive are going to be the
big chains, and we’re going to eradicate
the very eclectic mix that makes America
and going out to eat so vibrant and great.
When the economy is booming, it’s hard
for restaurants to get loans from the bank
because there’s no assets to back them. So
I’m trying to fi gure out what the best way
is. The government should give a greater
bailout package to real estate owners sothat there can be relief for restaurant own-
ers. It has to move up the chain.
And the hope there would be that
bailing out real estate owners would
give restaurants a little bit of fi nancial
breathing room if their landlords were
able to temporarily pause rent collec-
tion? Correct. Most restaurants don’t
own their real estate, so if they are going
to get help, it’s going to entail helping
out the landlords and lenders who are
higher up the chain. Then the next thing
to help the restaurants out would be an
amnesty of accounts payable and bills.
I don’t know how that plays out. This
industry has a trickle-down eff ect in the
sense that you have purveyors, you have
farmers, you have delivery people. It’s a
massively intertwined, connected sys-
tem. So if a restaurant can’t pay its bills,
that’s a problem, but we need to fi gureTop: Chang at
Momofuku Ko in- Bottom: With
the scholar Psyche
Williams-Forson
on an episode
of ‘‘Ugly Delicious.’’
Right: With the
actor Seth Rogen
in the Netflix
series ‘‘Breakfast,
Lunch & Dinner.’’
David Marchese
is the magazine’s Talk
columnist.