Sruly Meyer to Appear on the Food Network!

Uh, thanks for joining us. Well, our good friend Shirley Meyer, who um I mean we've we've had him on the air to discuss a whole host of things, uh, including plenty about Jewish music over the years. Did any of us ever suspect that we would be speaking to Shirley Meyer to promote an appearance on the Food Network? Woohoo. How did all this come about? We get to find out from the man himself, from the chef himself, from the cook himself. Shirley Meyer, my dear friend, a pleasure to welcome you back to JM and the AM. >> Thank you. Thank you so much for having me this morning. How are you? >> Hashem, so when did you drift into the world of uh being a chef? When did you discover the kitchen? >> Well, I'm the oldest of 10 children. >> Wow. So as I got into the yeshiva space, meaning like you know I come home later than the younger kids, uh the dinner when I came home would be less and less. So when I come home from Yeshiva at 7:30 and there's nothing left, my mother would say, "You're a big boy. Go to the kitchen. Make yourself something." So I always loved cooking. I cooked from a very young age. It was just something that I did on the side. I had never thought about it in any way, shape, or form as anything other than just I can make myself something to eat if I need to. But then about uh six years ago, I uh I was posting like my food on my personal page and I don't know, I just felt like nobody wants to see it, so I stopped. And some people reached out to me and they said, "Why did you stop posting your stuff? I liked it." So one person in particular said, "Just make yourself a different page, like a food page called Surely Cooks." So I was like, "Okay, fine." So I did that and you know, I'm close to about 25,000 followers now. And I I like to use that as an outlet for my cooking creativity side of me, so to speak. Um, I like to write recipes. I post videos of myself making the food and I also do like local stuff or or even from New York or anywhere else. >> Is this is this exclusive? Is this exclusively on Instagram or other platforms as well? It's on, you know, I try to post it to YouTube as often as I can. I'm not so good about that. But it's also on Tik Tok and um Facebook and all those other places, but I mean I it pushes through Instagram the most. >> It seems that what's where you know where I've had the most um positive response and engagement. I'll tell you something funny random story. It just came into my head that during co when everyone was posting Tik Tok videos. I I decided I was going to post there was like a pizza trend at the time. People were like making easy, you know, at home co pizza, whatever you want to call it, >> right? >> But I had very little ingredients and I wasn't going out. So I used a homemade crust and a can of pizza sauce and some like shredded mozzarella. It didn't look amazing, but I figured, you know, it was those early days of co of Tik Tok co. So I posted it. The video blew up. I got 11 million views. >> Oh my gosh. >> But not in a good way. >> What were they upset about? >> Everybody was just like, "This is what you call pizza." >> Oh, that's funny. That is funny. What a way to get What a way to get >> I was like, "Yeah, I was like, I would rather eat soap water than eat this or you know how creative the internet is." >> Can say that again. Stirley Meyers with us. Stirley cooks on Instagram. is on all the different social media platforms, 25,000 followers. We know him, of course, not only a dear friend of ours for many, many years, but one of the authorities on Jewish music, now he has added to his repertoire uh by being a cook, a chef, and getting and getting plenty of recognition, which leads to the next part of the story. Stirley Meyer apparently is going to be making an appearance. Maybe it's happened already and it just hasn't aired. I don't know. we'll find out in a second is going to be making appearance on the food network. Sulie, tell me about this. >> So about um I guess in like October or December like October or September October time, I got a message from somebody on my Instagram and I just we sure thought I was thought it was spam and it was just like, "Hey, we love your page and we want to know if you want to apply to be on our show on the Food Network." And I was like, "This is spam, right?" But I actually knew that it wasn't spam because someone had reached out to me a couple years before and asked me if I want to be on a show and I actually interviewed and almost went on the show but then towards the end of the interview process they asked me when it was going to be I I asked them when it's going to be and I said October which obviously you couldn't it was going to be kipper so I had to say I couldn't do it which was you know sad but uh it is what it is. this is what you know, Hashem has his own calendar. And then they I guess someone must have reached out again now. And uh the first thing they said to me is they said, "We love your stuff and um we know that you're an Orthodox Jew. So we just want to make sure that the kosher isn't going to be a problem." So you let us know and then we could continue on the process. which led me basically to like a week long aa of speaking to different robotim and dianimm and trying to get you know a consensus of what I could do or if I could do it at all or all that type of stuff which was pretty difficult. >> Well, what is it they're asking me to do? What's the theme of the show? >> The theme of the show is they found a hundred cooks from America home cooks. That's the c. They they don't want restaurant chefs or food truck people or you know fancy people who went to culinary school. They want home cooks, regular people who have home jobs or whatever jobs and they just enjoy cooking. So like they found a hundred different cooks from across the country and when you got the green light which took about a few months of of interviews literally they three days later they had us on a plane like everybody in January to go away or California. Okay. Go ahead. >> Yeah, California Burbank there. They had like a big studio there where they shoot a lot of the kitchen related stuff. Um, like literally like I got the email that you're in and two two and a half days later I was in California. >> So, has this thing been all done already? Is it in the can as they say? >> Yeah, they filmed everything in January and it was really exciting. Um, and then I came back and had to be quiet about it last six months which was very hard if you know me. >> Yeah. I don't know how anybody can be quiet about it. >> I'm the marketing guy. I tell everybody. >> So, this was so it's 100 people in a competition. It's some type of game, >> right? So, it's they they did put a little bit of like a game show element to it, which is that, you know, um if you go to their website, Food Network or any of those websites, it's called 100 Cooks, they have all the details over there as well. But the basic gist of it is that each challenge has it a randomized theme generator. So, it could be like um make your best picnic, make your best uh breakfast, make your best, you know, egg challenge, whatever it is. >> Got it. >> And then they pick the number of contestants and then they pick your number. So, each cook has a number 1 2 3 4 5 etc. And then they'll say like this challenge is going to have five cooks. This challenge is going to have 30 cooks. And then they call your number. You come down there, you compete. And you know they know each challenge has its own set of like rules. >> How long how long did the entire game take? Was it days? >> It filmed over two weeks and I do have to be a little bit careful about what I say because of the NBA and all that stuff, but it's filmed over two weeks. >> And is it one of is it one of those elimination things? They they have a 100 cooks and they want to get down to one or it works differently. >> Yeah. So they to they they do go down from 100 to one and the winner could potentially win up to $250 million. >> 250 >> I'm sorry. Oh my god. I wish 250 million 250,000 >> dollars. Uh Shirley Meyers with us now. Um when one is eliminated are they gone or they have to hang around because they don't want anyone to know, you know, in their hometown and stuff that they were eliminated. >> Right. So, I can't comment so much on that, but I will say that everyone is under NDA from, you know, every cook, even the winner or anybody that's involved. >> No, that that I get, but if someone's eliminated after a day and they go home, then everyone knows they're out. Right. >> Right. So, there's like a certain amount of like um subtifuge, is that the right word? Maybe that goes on to make sure that like it's not obvious. >> Interesting. Wow. So, nobody in your life knows how you did. Would that be accurate? >> Um, yeah. >> Nobody You might be You might be a quarter of a million dollars richer and we don't know it. >> It's very funny actually because um I have a friend who went on a different show and he told me that he had to wait for a year for the show to air. >> Wow. and that even the winner of that show can't say anything till the full run of the show, >> right? >> So that's another 3 months or whatever it is. So, you know, and then who knows what the process is then. So, >> hang on. Hang on a second. Hang on a second while hang on a second. We have a we have an emailer who claims that you just bought a new Corvette. So, I guess we now know that you won. >> Stirly Meyer is with us. All right. Bottom line, when does it air? When do we get to see you on TV on the Food Network? Yeah. So, the show debuts June 7th. That's a Sunday night at 900 PM Eastern Standard Time on the Food Network and the following day on HBO Max. >> And it'll go till when? Is it one day or or it'll be airing for a month? Like, how does it work? >> It I think the finale is July 31st if I remember correctly. >> Wow. So, it's going to be >> So, it's like every week a new episode. >> Yeah, it'll be it'll be seven weeks of us uh sitting on Spilkas, as we say. Your friends are gonna your friends are going to be rooting you on for for an entire sphere for seven weeks. >> Yeah, exactly. I have my own sphere. >> All right, there you have it, folks. Excuse me. Our good friend Silly Meyer Silly Cooks on social media. June the 7th. I have a feeling we'll remind everybody. June the 7th, a Sunday at the 900 p.m. Eastern time on the Food Network. That's when the show 100 Cooks will air for the first time. And as Shilly said, sometime after Tishabove, he believes it's the 31st of July. Uh the finale is going to air and we'll find out where among the 100 he ended up. You know what we're hoping for, folks? We're hoping for number one. I want a very close friend to win a quarter of a million dollars. In fact, Thrillley has said, listen to this folks, apparently Sirilly Meyer has been quoted that if he wins the quarter of a million dollars, his first $18 check goes to JM and the AB. Silly, is that true or not? >> As a person that asks me if I won, I started just saying yes. Don't worry, the check is in the mail. >> You had the right answer for me. You got me at my own game. What can I tell you? All right, >> I've been asked a few times. Masletoough to you. As they say at the Oscars, it's just an honor being nominated, right? It's I'm sure it was just I don't know. We don't know what >> they told us while we were there. You're just you're special by being here. >> Exactly. We don't know what the results are, but I'm sure you had a blast. And by the way, you got to come on after the 31st of July cuz I am sure there must have been an encounter or two, positive of course, with either the people running the running the show or your colleagues who who were other cooks about Judaism and kosher. >> Trust me, I stood out over there. >> I would imagine. Do me a favor, keep a list and in August we'll go through it if you don't mind. >> Absolutely. My pleasure. >> Thanks, Roly. Great speaking to you. Congratulations. >> Thanks for having me on. Have a great day. pleasure. Sirilly Meyer, everybody. He'll be on the Food Network starting on the 7th of June. You heard what he said. He'll come on after July when it finally all airs and share some of the good story. The stories you'd only hear on JM and the AM. I'm telling you now, with all the people out there doing interviews and all the folks who think they know what they're doing when it comes to this stuff, trust me, we'll get a story that no one else is going to get. I can guarantee you that. I say that proudly. More coming up. It is a Tuesday morning edition of JM in the A.M.