Justine Doiron mostly cooks for the internet, as the recipe developer and content creator better known as @justine_snacks. Eli Sussman mostly cooks for customers, as the partner and executive of Gertrude’s in Brooklyn, though he also moonlights as the meme-maker and video star behind the hospitality industry-focused page @thesussmans. Neither of them ever planned to be a professional poster — before finding their way to food, both of them got their start in the corporate world, Doiron in public relations and Sussman in advertising and marketing. Recently, for Eater, they commiserated over the idea of the content “treadmill” and how they actually eat when they’re not making food for other people, whether that’s in real life or online.
Justine Doiron: What’s the longest-running restaurant you’ve had?
Eli Sussman: Samesa lasted eight years, across multiple locations and various permutations. I now feel comfortable coming to terms with the fact that I closed something. That is a very emotionally challenging aspect of owning a restaurant, especially while being the chef. It’s a creative endeavor paired with a business endeavor, and you have to come to terms with your own ego. Closing something that you’re passionate about [means] you have to admit it’s not working from a business standpoint.
A business, a creative project, pretty much everything has a finite lifetime. You’ve had a great deal of success over the last couple of years. But on set you mentioned this hamster wheel, this treadmill that you must stay on once you are in it. Can you speak a little bit about that? And do you see a finish line for you, or is it not like that?
“A business, a creative project, pretty much everything has a finite lifetime.”
JD: I think the treadmill comes from when creativity meets business. For me, working in food started as a creative endeavor, and it turned into a business quite quickly. To answer if I see a finish line: I’ve never really thought about it in those terms. With how I create content and conduct my business, I’ve been trying to get away from seeing it as solely financial decisions, and start pulling it back into the creativity of the food and what got me into hospitality. I want people to make my food at home and for it to make their lives better. But with that, you want stuff to get seen, which is where the hamster wheel comes along.
ES: As someone who started in kitchens and then made memes and now I do on-camera stuff, I’m always thinking, What is the next thing that I’m gonna “have to do”? I’m putting “have to do” in quotes, because I enjoy doing it, but I am compelled, to a certain extent, to do it in order to remain relevant.
JD: I always think I’m gonna miss the boat on something, like, If I don’t adopt this platform early enough, am I gonna miss the chance to showcase work on that platform? People doing what I do aren’t necessarily moving towards platforms per se, but they’re moving towards business models. The expectation is that I have a team; I don’t.
A lot of creators are moving towards taking something so personality-driven — because we are our accounts — and turning it into a business infrastructure that nobody sees, with recipe developers, blog writers, Substack writers, etc. That team part is relatively unknown, so people still maintain those parasocial relationships with their creators, food or otherwise. But it definitely changes this landscape of the internet and how much people are expected to produce.
ES: We were talking on set about how complicated that is. I just hold my phone, film something stupid, and cross my fingers that anyone will think that it’s funny. Sometimes I think of the idea, shoot it, and post it within about a five-minute span, and that doesn’t often work, like, a lot of things don’t land.
“I think I’m painfully authentic, strictly because I want them to know the real me.”
JD: There’s also a very fine line between what works for you and what you find interesting, and then what also appeals to a ton of people.
ES: How much of what ends up on the screen do you feel like is actually really you, and what is a bit of a character or a persona?
JD: I think I’m painfully authentic, strictly because I want them to know the real me. I don’t want anybody to have a different perspective than what I know to be true, and that’s really hard to accomplish. Have you ever done a voice-over?
JD: Don’t you feel like you just don’t sound like yourself when you do them?
JD: I feel like just by the nature of doing that, I’m already curating something, so with everything else, like my Instagram stories, I try to be so painfully “what you see is what you get.” I will also say, my food is highly curated, because you should see the stuff I eat for actual dinner.
ES: I can identify with that, since I eat basically, like, bodega sandwiches and protein bars and drink Red Bull and Diet Coke and, you know, it’s like, “Oh, you’re a chef. What’s your favorite thing to cook for dinner?”
JD: Even if it’s a five-minute recipe I’m not taking the time and care that I’m putting into food for other people.
ES: Of course. The act of creating dinner for someone in a dinner party setting is putting your very best foot forward. I’m usually eating over a sink or garbage can.
JD: I feel so deeply seen. Mine is usually leftovers of what I made. I feel like, whenever I’m cooking for my viewers or whoever stumbles across my video, I want to make it nice. They’re technically over for dinner. Did you see the TikTok of the sous chef from Bushwick?
PEDEN+MUNK
ES: Is this the person who does what they’re having for family meal?
JD: No, it was just one video that went super viral, but it was a guy who’s a sous chef in Bushwick, and he was basically a caricature of The Bear, walking you through what he ate pre-shift. It’s such a testament to how social media really shows the behind the scenes of restaurants.
ES: Send me that; I want to see that. Something that’s exciting to me about the world of Instagram is that whatever your super-specific talent or topic that you’re excited about is, there are people that are also into that and are either talking or sharing or making content about it.
I would say my stuff is, you know, more niche than yours, because it’s specifically speaking to the people that work back of house and front of house, and yes, I hope people who aren’t in the industry like and understand it. I’m in a very niche world and there’s like, five steps even more niche than me for every single category that you could possibly imagine. I find that very appealing. And for all of the horrors of the internet, I think that it is really valuable to be able to DM someone and ask them how they made something.
“I find us to be kindred spirits: we were working for other people and decided to actively pursue an avenue in which we could try to be the creators of our own path.”
JD: We used to always hear about people talking about the good old days of “you would just walk into a restaurant and give your resume and then you start working.” We’ve taken that connection and moved it online and that’s not always a bad thing. I think we both benefited from it in major ways.
ES: You had a professional career where you were at a desk, and now you make videos and have a cookbook. I sat at a desk, and then I became a line cook and now I do weird stuff on the internet. I find us to be kindred spirits, in the sense of like, we were working for other people and decided to actively pursue an avenue in which we could try to be the creators of our own path. You’re a chef and you do a certain type of thing, and I’m a chef and I do a certain type of thing, but we originated almost in the same space and in the same headspace.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Shot on location at the Blue Room at the Nine Orchard Hotel in New York City
Featured ceramic artwork by Marc Calello, Lindsey Lou Howard
Prop stylist: Sarah Smart
Food stylist: Judy Kim
Hair & makeup artists: Lauren Bridges, Tiffany Patton
Wardrobe stylist: Marcello Flutie
Retoucher: Tomika Davis
Props: Bordallo Pinheiro, Houses & Parties
