Chef Ron Young: Finding Purpose Through Food After Overcoming Adversity

0:00 Let's face the reality there isn't enough wisdom on social media today. There isn't quality messaging to help young adults and adolescents take comfort in knowing that they're not alone in overcoming adversity, whether it be bullying or fighting their inner demons. Bullying is a subject that I know all too well, as my youngest was severely teased and bullied, having threats growing up. Hello, my name is Yogesh Patel, host and creator of the Yog Nation, the Spirit of Gratitude podcast that focuses on bullying, self-awareness and our inner spirit. Join me every week as I have heartfelt and authentic conversations with high-profile guests sharing their own wisdom and experiences on these topics and how gratitude ties everything together.

0:50 Welcome to the Yog Nation, the Spirit of Gratitude podcast on the OneTagration platform. Hello friends, my name is Yogesh Patel, and this podcast focuses on bullying, self-awareness and our inner spirit, inviting high-profile guests to share their experiences on these relevant topics. And if you notice something about the background, it's changed Well, I am so delighted and so excited to have partnered with Phoenix-based Backlot Studios here at their broadcasting center. My next guest has been called Arizona's number one celebrity chef by the New York Times magazine back in 2020, displaying his mouth-watering dishes on his very catchy Instagram handle, azdopechef.

1:31 He is a former professional athlete, having played for the Canadian Football League, and is now a very successful entrepreneur. Chef Ron Young, welcome to the podcast man. Thank you for having me, thank you everyone. Thank you for having me. Absolutely Well, ron, thank you for having me. Thank you everyone. Thank you for having me. Absolutely Well, ron. Let's get to it Again. This podcast focuses on bullying, self-awareness and our inner spirit. Tell us a little bit about your background. My background man. I'm originally from California. I was raised by my mother and you know my dad was in the military, so he spent a lot of time in the military. So I grew up with both of my parents per se, but mostly with my mom and my siblings.

2:14 Yeah, Interesting. Yeah, and growing up you had a learning disability up until high school. Yeah, yeah, growing up my mom had a learning disability so it was something that I've learned. That it's genetics and literally to me can be passed down through family members, because I also see them in one of my kids that I have. That is something that could possibly be a genetic thing through family members. So with that I grew up with it and, you know, with my mom having it, you know she did a good job helping me to adapt to my environments around me with a learning disability. So you know I'm grateful for that.

2:54 But yeah, you know I had my trials through school, college. You know, getting through the day-to-day I always had to take. I've always called the longer route to get to things, but I always got it done. You mentioned trials. Does that mean you were bullied? I used to mask my bullying into with sports because I was so athletic I'd masked all that. It was hard to, you know, bully someone that's bigger, faster and stronger than you. So once I figured that out, I just started working out every day. Yeah, and bullying wasn't one of the things I had to deal with. No one really, you know, came to me with stuff. But I do remember being in class.

3:35 Sometimes when we were in like reading class, okay, and those days when you know she's making everybody read out loud, I remember coming up with ways to have to leave the class or be a class clown or you know, I'm saying find a reason to get out of the situation. Um, but my grandmother, uh, who, uh, was a big part of my life, um, she was a big uh christian and um and believer, and you know she always believed that you know everything could be fixed in that realm and she used to make me read the Bible with her every day and I used to help with my reading a lot, which that's just something I do now every day just to help build my vocabulary.

4:18 Incredible, incredible. And then I'm curious again, being a former professional athlete, tell us about your journey through sports and what did you learn from from that. My sports is a tough one for me because there's so many, so many highs and so many lows for it. But I will start with the highs. You know, growing up sports is a big you know. It helped me get people's attention. That was one of the things that I was seeking. Talking about what we were talking about earlier, about my mom and my dad. My dad was a part of my life but he was busy all the time and so I didn't get that male affection that most young men get to have a father at home and I use sports now that I'm older and I got to talk to someone.

5:03 You know I got to learn this about myself, but I really played for attention. I was seeking attention from male counterparts like coaches and my teammates' fathers. You know, when I played it looks like they developed your, they were like your father figures. Yeah, in a sense. You know, coaches were like, you know, a principal or a teacher. Sure, I used to build relationships with other males. I did a real good job finding, pointing out someone and being like yo. There's something about him that I want to be like that person and I have a lot of people like Doug Prentice. He was a huge part of my life. He was also my IEP teacher, so the person with me oh really, yeah, yeah, you're an IEP.

5:48 Yeah, he was an. IEP. He was my IEP teacher. My daughter was an IEP, so yeah, okay, yeah so he was also my IEP teacher and my track coach. So, with that, two things, with school, I spent all day with him, you know, talking to him all day. School, I spent all day with him. You know, yeah, I'm talking to him all day. And then, you know, we were at practice, you know. So I spent a lot of time with him and, uh, he was a huge influence on okay encouraging me that I could go to college, that I could still. You know like because, I wasn't thinking of it at that time. I was just like you know, if I get sure you know he knew I can get a scholarship athletic wise. He was just letting me he used to build my confidence and let me know like but you can get through school too that positive role model.

6:29 Yeah, yeah, yeah so he encouraged me a lot because I wasn't, it wasn't something I was thinking about doing, but uh, sports helped me, like I said, build my confidence and open doors for me. Um, that other doors, you know, I wouldn't be able to go through because of sports. So, like I said, there has the highs and the lows, yeah yeah. But when I got to a professional league I got to a wall where I realized I didn't really care about playing as much you know later on in my life. And then, once I got to break down why I actually played, once I got to a certain level, it was just like I wasn't seeking that attention. But beyond just the confidence, ron, I mean it looks like Chef Ron, excuse me, there was that discipline that you learned through sports, through sports, everything.

7:10 And that carried over through your cooking. So describe to us how you got involved in the cooking. I got involved in the cooking through going to community college. I started there and then, when I got to the university, I really got engulfed in cooking because I realized I went to a black college called Alabama and I'm gonna shout them out right now the Bulldogs and um, um, they didn't, um, they didn't have a cafeteria closed at a certain time and I realized people on the campus needed food and, um, you know, I just started selling food on campus yeah you know, with some, a couple of my friends, and it became a thing and, uh, we were known for the people selling plates, or plates after, you cooked it okay in college and it got popular from there and I didn't think I was going to cook.

8:01 From that point it was just more of a hustle Cooking gave me. If I could talk about food and cooking, it changed my life man. It gave me a second chance. I was chasing something before in football. I got to a point where football was over, sports was over, yeah, and it took me a while to grow out of that. You know, I kind of went through a small depression, you know, realizing I feel like every athlete does goes through a small depression when it comes to realizing that their sports dreams are over. Right, you know you have to grasp with that thought of like you're not doing that anymore, especially when you get to a certain level. And, um, you know, I just went through that stages of that and, um, you know, once I got through that, food gave me a second chance.

8:42 It just gave me more life and gave me something to go after, things and right purpose. So my whole thing when it comes to food, it was built around purpose. It just gave me new life well with athletes in particular. I mean, for me it's hard to have in the same sentence you can be humble and be super competitive, right? How does that work. It's a mindset you know like to stay humble is a is a personal thing. It's which, it's a discipline. It's something that you have to practice right it's not something that you could just, it's just in you to do. No one just had you just have. You have to wake up every day and practice that and ways you can do. That is how you, you know how you live your life and I like to you know shadow minds with giving yeah and giving to people and that's, you know, giving to people and you know, and going out my way for other people sure helps me because it reminds me what when I help.

9:36 Well, that's again. It speaks to the inner spirit. Yeah, yeah, right, yeah. So, like I said, it's a practice and you know to this day, I do that when I'm feeling up, or even when I'm feeling down. I always know the best thing I can do is invest in other people, and you know to find that balance. You know to find that balance. You know. Now, on the flip side, has there been an event that you catered, or even beyond when you started your catering business, that you ever felt underappreciated, or I would say underappreciated or mistreated? All right, yeah, I'm going to talk about both because I don't want to just give one to the thing, but we'll talk about the mistreat. I've done a bunch of events where I felt unappreciated.

10:19 There was one event that I did for a company and in matter of fact I call him my brother, but my best friend was helping me at the time. Okay. And he was getting frustrated because they kept calling him boy and you know, just a bunch of stuff. Can't do that I've been in environments like look, I've cooked for all kinds of people, yeah, and I've left myself open for that because I don't judge anybody. Everyone lives their life the way they want to live. Sure, you know, as long as you don't disrespect me directly, you know I can blind myself from you. Know how you're treating me in the moment. You know, because it's not about you when I'm, you know what I think about.

11:02 Like I said, it goes back to how you think you know. If I work for someone and I may not, you know, agree with what they have going on. I stick to what I do, but I know the benefit of working with them. I'm going to take whatever they give me and give it to someone else. In a sense, you of working with them. I'm going to take whatever they give me and give it to someone else in a sense. You know what I'm saying? It's the spirit of giving yeah. Yeah, I'm not worrying about them. I'm doing what I got to do to get what I need. So I can continue to push the cause of what we were talking about earlier about the transition of giving and going back and forth. So I never think about how somebody makes me feel. I try not to be in my feelings about sure and everything, but there are tons in the situations where I've, you know, was in an uncomfortable situation. But, like I said, it's a mindset and how you think because you got to remember people.

11:44 We were just talking about this earlier but people see you at where you. They see you at in the moment, yeah, and you're always focused on who you're becoming chef ron is you mentioned. Creating a positive environment in your kitchen is important to you because negative energy can affect the taste of your food. Correct and I actually got that from. I'm going to give her a shout-out right now. Her name is Petra Chang. Okay, I got that from her, and she only cooks in the middle of the night, when it's like the most peaceful. She only bakes, I will say, at a certain point of the day, because she believes that during the middle of the day there's so much energy that it can affect the food.

12:29 And then I've had people. I don't think I can get my wife to cook in the middle of the night like that. Or even when I cook for people, when I'm at their home, how you set the tone. I believe in energy, so when I'm in there I kind of catch the vibe of the people. I'm around, right, you know, and I that is so true I learned to adapt really quick and make sure the music that my energy is matching what their energy is if they want to be turned up you know you got to allow people to be in their environment and what they want and, or if they want to be mellow and be chill, you got to give people that environment You've got to. I feel like me and my team do a very good job adapting to people's environment and making people feel comfortable, and then you throw in great food on top of that and you know, you have a party.

13:16 Absolutely. That's final question. Again, this has been such a blessing to have you. What's next for Chef Ron Young? What's next for Food? Ron young um. What's next for food? vision and chef ron is um, actually I don't think for the audience. They don't know what food vision is. Maybe just a quick bio on that. Yeah, exactly happy you did that food vision a lot of people ask me what it stands for, and it's, it's really not, it's the first word of. It doesn't matter, it's really the vision part it was. It was my purpose, it was my vision of what I want. You know, the, just the infinite imagination of anything, sure, whatever your vision is, I can create that. If it's food, if it's energy, you know whatever I manifestation.

14:01 Yeah, it's whatever you want it to be, that's what it stands for, and to do it and it also stands for. You know, what I've always stood by is to feed nations. I just doubled it down and understood as I grow that I you know you need to start with your neighbor before you can start with nations. So, um, I do. I focus on the people. Speaking of nation Yog Nation, Yog Nation, yeah. So you know, just even that, if I can throw this in here real quick, you know there's a family that humbled me, moments like these. That humbled me is I got to cook for a group and they didn't really have a whole lot of money. Sure, they invited me to come and cook for the family. I remember it was really the ladies, the wives, that invited me and I remember meeting her husband.

14:46 He wouldn't come out the door or his room. He was very disappointed that she paid the amount of money she paid for me to be there to cook for them. Um, these ladies went out their way. They didn't have a whole lot, they just put some tables together. They had their whole family come and we cook, you know, and I treat everybody the same, the same energy. Like I said I walked in, I felt the energy. I gave them the same energy. I'm talking to the kids because they're looking at my Instagram and they're just like you cook for this person. You know what I'm saying, like they're talking to me and everything. But I remember at the end of the dinner after you know the aid and everybody had a good time I remember him coming to me and saying like this was worth it, and gave me a hug and was like I had the best time with my family, right, you know? and that's part of the receiving end, of being on the gratitude side man, and it really changes you because you just like.

15:32 You see how humble and happy this family is just to have me here at their house. That's hard to take in, right, I was the gift and it's crazy to think that I was. You know that people see me in that way. Yes, you know I can bring that type that she believed that I can bring that energy and that to her family and for them to be so grateful to have me there. You know him taking a picture and you know I was just disrespecting the man. I was taller than him. So even for him to stand on a box to take a picture with me, like he wanted to take a picture with me, to take a picture with me Like he wanted to take a picture with me. Stand in a box because you're tall. Yeah, yeah yeah, he didn't want me to see him. He didn't want to take a picture with me standing over him, so he stood on a box to make sure that we were even. No, but he had me funny.

16:13 The dude was funny man. He was really funny. Once we got you know, once he let his guard down and you know, by him just telling me that it was worth. It is crazy. Yeah, to me it was a lot. And that's where you want to take food vision as well. And just continue to touch people. Yeah, so food vision is headed and Chef Ron is headed towards creating an experience for people in the restaurant world high-end and creating experience for people when they leave there. They're leaving there, you know, with infinite imagination and vision and energy and culture and everything man. So I just want to create a space that people are walking out of there refreshed and looking at what I've created and being like, oh, I can do this myself, so that's my goal.

17:01 To do the impossible Well, best of myself, right, you know. So you know, that's my goal. So to do the impossible Well best of luck. Yeah, you'll have me as a supporter. Yeah, and the citizens of Young Nation, by the way. Thank you. That are watching. Ron, excuse me, chef Ron Young, it was a pleasure, thank you, thank you, thank you.