Deez Interviews: Meet Oset Babur, the restaurant editor who earnestly loves Chili’s, panettone cakes, and non-micro-managed interviews

Happy Friday, Deezers! This week’s interview is our last before we take off for Thanksgiving — so naturally, we had to chat with Food & Wine’s Oset Babur about her fave holiday grub, tip-offs for good restaurants, and a passion project that taught her tons about interviewing and finding the best stories. Enjoy!

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The interviewee: Oset Babur (follow her @baburoset!)  

The gig: Associate restaurant editor @ Food & Wine magazine

The day-to-day: 

I typically eat out between three to four meals per week, but I also really love to cook and be at home, so I try to not go out, say, three nights in a row. I’m on the print team at F&W and I edit our front-of-book section, “Obsessions,” so my primary focus is keeping all of those stories moving through pitch meetings, edits, photoshoots, and layout reviews. 

“Obsessions” is all about what’s trending in restaurants, from ingredients to cooking styles to design, as well as product recommendations, taste tests, and profiles of folks in the industry. 

That means I spend a good bit of time trying to stay on top of what’s new and exciting in food all over the country (!) through Instagram, Twitter, friends, and local blogs. I also work on F&W’s Best New Chefs and Best New Restaurants franchises in the late summer through winter.

What are the biggest misconceptions people have about your work?

A lot of people think that everyone who works in food media is a critic, and that’s definitely not true. Like, I’m not at all a restaurant critic — my job is to objectively report on what’s happening in food right now as a service to our readers. If the chef is a Bad Person or the menu doesn’t have a unique perspective of any sort, that obviously influences coverage, but I’m not in the business of writing restaurant reviews. 

I also feel like people assume I only want to eat at really fancy or new places all the time, which is deeply not the case because I love Chili’s and Five Guys as much as the next person.

You launched The Thirty-One Percent when you lived in Boston — how has the experience of profiling women-owned small businesses influenced your work today?

Conducting so many interviews made me a really good listener. People like to talk about what they’re doing and what they’re proud of if you let them, and if you don’t try to jump in all the time and micromanage the conversation, they’re more likely to open up and share some truly valuable perspective with you. 

On a more specific level, it also taught me to look for the businesses and chefs that don’t have PR or aren’t getting a lot of press — that’s where the stories are!

When you go into a new restaurant yourself, are there any tell-tale signs you look for that give away whether the place is going to be good or successful?

For me, a good hospitality experience is just as important as the food. Having a front of house team that actually cares about answering questions, being friendly, and making sure allergies and aversions are adequately taken care of in the kitchen is so important. It means the staff is invested in the restaurant (and vice-versa!). 

I also definitely get excited about a restaurant when I see that the menu isn’t just serving the same four trendy dishes/ingredients that everyone else in NYC is serving. Oh! Also, I believe in any restaurant that has a really great bread program. Like Crown Shy in NYC — that’s a bread program to write home (or in a magazine) about. 

And finally, what ~ food & wine ~ combo are you personally most looking forward to having for the holiday season??

I get super excited about panettone cakes for Christmas, and I also love a good glass of amaro from St. Agrestis on a cozy night in. Or Nocino, because I’ve lately been into Forthave’s Nocino. Black walnut liquor is perfect for the cold!

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