A brush that chooses
its own colour.
Matan Zaken
Chef & owner, NHOMe, Paris
In conversation with Holger Nauheimer
With a guest appearance by Nyx
If AI helps a chef create a dish, whose dish is it? For Matan Zaken, the answer begins with two grandmothers, a handful of date seeds and a very human idea of hospitality.
Listen to the episode
The chef still holds the brush.
One grandmother cooked the same dishes on the same days of the week. The other moved between Algerian food and French classics. Growing up between those culinary worlds, Matan Zaken learned that food could be familiar, surprising and deeply personal long before he became a chef.
Today, at NHOMe in Paris, he brings another voice into the creative process: artificial intelligence. He is happy to say so. But he insists that a dish needs a starting point from the cook — an ingredient, an association, a vision. AI can suggest a direction; it does not decide what he wants to say.
We talk about the date seeds he had overlooked for years, the confidence to change a menu and why a wonderful meal can fall apart through poor hospitality. Then Nyx, my AI cooking collaborator, joins us with a dish for Matan to challenge. Listen to what happens when an AI brings an idea into a chef’s kitchen.
“It's about the final result. It's not about the way you've done it.”
Matan Zaken · From the conversation
Show notes
From grandmother’s kitchen
to the AI conversation.
A guide to the conversation.
Two grandmothers, two culinary worlds
Stuffed vine leaves, broth-based dishes and a weekly rhythm of familiar meals on one side of the family; Algerian and French cooking on the other. Matan recalls the food that shaped his palate, and how a difficult time at school led him into his uncle’s restaurant.
A remembered dish and a different kind of table
A meal at Michel Guérard’s restaurant becomes the starting point for Matan’s smoked eel, foie gras and onion broth. At NHOMe, diners share one table — but, as he explains, that does not mean they must share a conversation.
Why hospitality can change the food
As a chef and restaurant owner, Matan finds himself paying ever more attention to how guests are welcomed. We discuss the service, atmosphere and personal attention that shape what we remember of a meal.
The idea comes first. Then the AI.
Matan describes working from his own combinations, such as mushrooms and blackberries, and using AI to explore further elements and techniques. A suggestion about roasted date seeds opens up an ingredient he thought he knew. Another exchange develops a dessert around Jerusalem artichoke and chestnut.
Nyx brings a dish into the kitchen
An AI proposal meets a chef’s questions about bitterness, texture and what guests would actually enjoy. The conversation moves between a raw lamb dish, a possible dessert and a different lamb preparation.
Creativity, ego and what comes next
Why are some chefs reluctant to admit they use AI? Matan imagines a dinner inspired by AI-generated images, considers the possibility of Michelin recognition for AI-assisted cooking, and reflects on the emotions that remain our own.
The encounter
An idea meets a chef.
Nyx brings a dish idea to the table. Matan brings a chef’s experience. What happens when a proposal made entirely of words meets someone who actually cooks?
Holger invites Matan to be as critical as he would be with a colleague in his own kitchen. Listen to their exchange in the episode.
The guest
Meet Matan Zaken.
Matan Zaken is the chef and owner of NHOMe in Paris, where diners sit around a single table. Born and raised in Jerusalem, he describes a culinary upbringing shaped by Kurdish-Iraqi and Algerian family traditions, alongside the cooking of southern France.
In this conversation, he speaks openly about using AI in both restaurant management and culinary development — and about the vision, judgement and hospitality he brings to the process himself.
More about MatanExplore further
Links & references.
NHOMe, Paris ↗Matan’s restaurant · Official websiteMatan Zaken ↗Chef profile · NHOMeNHOMe in the Michelin Guide ↗An independent introduction to the restaurantAlso discussed: Michel Guérard; Fanny Rey and Saint-Rémy-de-Provence; Philippe Etchebest; ChatGPT; food-pairing books; and Holger and Nyx’s ongoing cooking experiment.
From the conversation to the kitchen
Lamb. Apricot.
Chamomile. A little green.
The exchange in this episode is the starting point for a dish we are taking into our own kitchen. Explore our working recipe for lamb with roasted and pickled apricots, chamomile vinegar and chervil oil.
This episode features Nyx, Holger’s AI collaborator, speaking with a synthetic voice.
Stories Beyond the Podcast
Your turn
What’s your story?
Has a meal ever stayed with you so vividly that it inspired something you cooked later? Tell us what you remembered — and what you changed.
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