Emotionalism with Joe Kwon

Today’s interview is with Joe Kwon, the cellist for the Avett Brothers. Their first major label release, I and Love and You, produced by Rick Rubin, has received critical acclaim and is worth many-a-listen.
Relationship with Food
“I grew up around cooking. My mom is a phenomenal cook. She cooks lots of Korean food, and that’s pretty much how I learned, just watching her. She’d make dinner for the entire family every night of the week. We probably went out to eat only twice a month.”
Local Restaurant of Choice
“In Durham, North Carolina, this place I go to serves Chinese and Korean food, its called China Palace. Its an extremely generic name, but its one of the few places that will serve authentic Korean food at a Chinese restaurant. [Korean food] is defined by the flavors in it, the types of seafood they use, the spices they use. Compared to Chinese food, it doesn’t have as many spices. Chinese food, to some people, can be offensive with odd spices like anise and ginger. Koreans will use ginger, but it will be a little bit more masked. It’s not the featured ingredient in the dish.”
Thoughts on Szechwan Cuisine
JOE: You run into those issues where it’s so spicy that it makes your mouth numb.
EM: I just saw that on a recent Anthony Bourdain episode, when he went to a Szechwan restaurant in Australia. It looked light a foot-high pile of peppers on your plate!
JOE: It’s the peppers with the chicken bits in it? There’s a really good Szechwan place in Manhattan, you’ve got to check it out. It’s called Grand Szechwan on the Upper East Side, its next to a Pinkberry. This is one place that we frequent when we are in New York. My cousin took us there, and they have that dish there. It definitely shocks your senses, I’ll put it that way. You come out of there a different man.
Emotionalism
“Different levels of emotion in food for me…You can express a childhood memory in your food. You can make the most bangin grilled cheese sandwich ever, and it will still remind you of that white bread with American cheese and Campbell’s Tomato Soup that you had when you were a kid. Every time you have that it will bring you right back there. It’ll bring you happiness in a small little way. That’s how food is, it’s a way to reminisce. A flavor will bring back a memory in your mind. A certain dish could have significance to a wedding, a funeral, etc.”
The most cello-ish food
“Butter. Fat… its so smooth. It’s a very good extension of a human being. ”
Favorite food related tune
“A song by Menage and its called “Tomatoes Right off the Vine.”
Editor’s note: This song was recently featured on a ketchup commercial (Your favorite #2 ketchup, Hunt’s).
Favorite food related band
“It doesn’t have food in the name, but the one that pops into my head first is Bombadil. For a while they were branding themselves [using] pickles. It was like pickles dropping out of an airplane.”
Favorite Dessert
Crème brulee
[Related - The Avetts were featured on Ace of Cakes! Check the photo]
Favorite hot dog topping
“The onions at Gray’s Papaya. That stuffs amazing!”
Last supper
“This Korean dish, Champon. It’s a spicy, seafood noodle dish.”
Current Recipe of Note
“One of the recipes on there right now is a fried chicken recipe which has quickly become one of my mainstays, one of my favorites. It’s quick, it’s easy and its super tasty. It took a couple of tries to get it right, which batter to use, dry without better, dredge, no dredge.”
The Avett’s recently announced some of their summer tour, where they will be hitting the Coachella, Bonnaroo and High Sierra music festivals, to name a few. Click here for the entire tour schedule. Be sure to check out Joe’s food blog, Taste On Tour, where he goes through the places they eat on the road.
Butter! Well done Schaier with Denson and the Avetts, good idea for a site! been reading joe’s site for a while, good stuff
I wish I had thought of this as a wedding cake! Very Amazing!
I am smitten by the way you embraced this topic. It is not often I come across a blog with attractive articles like yours. I will make a note of your feed to stay up to date with your succeeding updates.Just stunning and do preserve up the effective work.
Damn, awesome website. I actually came across this on Ask Jeeves, and I am happy I did. I will definately be coming back here more often. Wish I could add to the conversationand bring a bit more to the table, but am just absorbing as much info as I can at the moment.
Thank You
http://www.chineserestaurantdublin.info
You know, I have to tell you, I genuinely enjoy this blog and the useful insight. I find it to be refreshing and quite educational. I wish there were more blogs like it. Anyway, I finally decided to write a comment on Epicurean Musician » Blog Archive » Emotionalism with Joe Kwon – I just wanted to say that you did a awesome job on this. Cheers mate!
Hola,
,
BernieR
I want to thank the blogger very much not only for this post but also for his all previous efforts. I found epicureanmusician.com to be very interesting. I will be coming back to epicureanmusician.com for more information.
I would appreciate more visual materials, to make your blog more attractive, but your writing style really compensates it. But there is always place for improvement
Very shorts, simple and easy to understand, bet some more comments from your side would be great
Good post, I can’t say that I agree with everything that was said, but very good information overall:)
yo fantastic blog yea nice work You are a very smart person!
Women, don’t get a tattoo. That butterfly looks great on your breast when you’re twenty or thirty, but when you get to seventy, it stretches into a condor. ~Billy Elmer
You made some good points there. I did a search on the topic and found most people will agree with your blog.
yummy:) thx for ur share i’d love to follow you~~~~~~~~
I don
Hi excellent website yea nice work. I did not expect this on a Wednesday. This is a great story. Thanks!
Hi, i just thought i’d post and let you know your blogs layout is really messed up on the K-Melon browser. Anyhow keep up the good work.
yummmy:) thanks for the suggestions , i’d love to adhere to your blog as usually as i can.have a wonderful day~~
yo excellent blog yea nice work Your blog is so informative keep up the good work!
I think I’ve read something simillar a few days ago. I don’t remember where, might have been on digg or wikipedia, not sure.
go figure lol!
I didn’t understand the concluding part of your article, could you please explain it more?
Halfway through the page everything seems to cut off! It’s a shame I really wanted to read the rest of the content!
I just found this blog a while back when a friend recommended it to me. I have been a regular reader ever since.
Maybe you should change the blog title Emotionalism with Joe Kwon | Epicurean Musician to something more generic for your webpage you create. I liked the blog post even sononetheless.
I am ready to help you, set questions.
Thanks for the info. Very good post!
Magnificent goods from you, man. I have understand your
stuff previous to and you are just too wonderful.
I actually like what you have acquired here, certainly like what
you are stating and the way in which you say it. You
make it enjoyable and you still care for to keep it smart.
I cant wait to read much more from you. This is really a great website.
Hello, i thihk tgat i saw you visited my web site thus i came
to “return the favor”.I am trying to finnd things to
improve my website!I suppose its ok to usse some of youhr ideas!!
Write more, thats all I have to say. Literally, it seems as though you
relied on the video to make your point. You obviously know what youre talking about, why waste your intelligence on
just posting videos to your blog when you could be giving us
something informative to read?
Press releases can help people find your brand online, and can encourage journalists to write
about you. In that estimate, the number of galaxies equals
the number of stars mentioned earlier. Tomatoes left to sprawl need 3 to 4 feet between plants.
It looks like you’ve asked in details almost everything. Great work! Keep up with doing awesome interview!
Really cool. I love it