What Cooking Ancient Recipes Teaches About Life Today

Today’s guest is Max Miller!

Max Miller is the creator and host of the viral digital series Tasting History with Max Miller on YouTube. Prior to his YouTube stardom, Max was an employee of Walt Disney Studios in the marketing and film distribution departments. 

When the COVID-19 stay-at-home order went into effect in Los Angeles, Max was furloughed and began turning his passion for historic dishes into a self-taped video series. 

Within weeks of his first video on YouTube, Max’s channel and videos reached hundreds of thousands of viewers who wanted to learn more about historic dishes. Max’s channel has been covered in outlets like America’s Test Kitchen, ABC’s Localish, Chowhound, Foodsided, GLAAD, KTLA Morning News, A Hot Dog Is a Sandwich podcast, PopCulture, Rachael Ray, Today, UPROXX, and Yahoo!. 

Max currently resides in Los Angeles, California, with his husband, José, and their two cats.

The Show-Notes can be found at https://www.nextlevelguy.com/maxmiller175/(opens in a new tab)

 

Here are some key points that I would advise you to concentrate on

•  Max was inspired by the stories told by his family "You know the passion for history comes from forever ago when I was a little little kid I I think in large part it came from listening to my grandparents my grandpa and and my nana on my mom's side especially would tell me stories of the great depression and world war II and what it was like growing up in the 1920's and 1930's and it was just such a foreign world to you know an 8 year old living in Phoenix in 1990 or whatever. But the way that they told it I was able to be there. They were such good storytellers and ever since then I've always seen history just as stories now. " 
• Max is self-taught when it comes to making videos, cooking and baking etc. He found the resources he needed to learn as the need to use these skills came up. It is OK not to know everything, you can admit you need help, find suitable coaches and experts to assist where needed, fill in knowledge gaps and improve, even if working towards that 1% improvement every day, you are growing and developing.  
• I love Max's channel in that it allows you to understand our history and how our diets and food preparation and cooking methods are shaped, and how things may change in the future.
• Max started cooking when he watched a well known TV show: "... when it comes to cooking. It actually started with the great british bake off I've always been a fan of eating but I had never baked or cooked anything until I saw that show and and I think it was. Excuse me the accessibility of of that show. It's you know it's so different than an american cooking competition where it's like take these 5 ingredients with squid ink and paper clips and make a gourmet meal"
• If you want to make videos but feel nervous, why not do what Max does and pretend you are speaking to a friend instead of a camera, and he chats like an interaction rather than filming, and takes the stress of himself and just has a conversation. 
• Are you inspired by Max to cook more and not sure where to start as you aren't very experienced in the kitchen? Then Max advises "... soups and stews are just the easiest and most forgiving thing to start with there's there's little work that you have to do. It's usually just put everything into the pot and let it go."
• COVID actually helped Max in getting furloughed, and almost forcing his time to be spent on his new channel. I think we need to remember that all threats can be considered as opportunities if we reframe them correctly.
• Curiosity is a diamond to develop within yourself. Max talks about finding his interest spiking when he finds a topic or area he knows little about and loves that he gets to learn and grow during these episodes. You won't change if you stay in your comfort zone, so you need to step outside what you know, become a beginner again and chase learning and curiosity to find out more in life! 
• The food our ancestors eat, can be a great way to learn about ourslelves, our culture, our health and where we have come from. 
• Fear will always be there when you need to step outside of your comfort zone, the top experts I have spoken to say it is always there. They find that acknowledging it, some actually give it a name and chat to it, and fear loses it power over you. Speak to your fear, try box breathing, realise the fear is there to keep you safe, so figure out how to reduce potential dangers and go for it. 
• "...you say history is written by the winners. Um, and and. I Do agree that that is so often true, but for me history is written by the people who write things down because not every the the Mongolian Empire they were the winners but they didn't write anything down so we actually everything we know or most of what we know about them comes. From the people they conquered who were writing things down so most of it's not very flattering."
• "... you know I was very fortunate that my parents always had us trying new foods and and different things different different types of cuisine. So you know i'm. I haven't always just been a macaroni craft macaroni and cheese and fticaks kind of kind of guy. But um so I've I've always enjoyed trying new things but no matter how delicious something is a new food is. Is never going to give you the same feeling as the food that you ate when you were a kid that just makes you feel safe and you know hindins ketchup on fresht fries or butter. It's the the stuff that you grow up with is. Has a different power over you and that is something that is universal I mean mexican food in general I I grew up eating a lot of mexican food I get a different feeling when I eat it. It's not necessarily that it tastes better though. It does. But it's also the feeling the emotions that are attached to that food"
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