Oct 14, 2019 · 1h 4m · how-i-built-this
Live Episode! Milk Bar: Christina Tosi
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this live episode of How I Built This, host Guy Raz interviews pastry chef and entrepreneur Christina Tosi about how she turned her love for nostalgic home baking, rigorous culinary training, and partnership with David Chang into Milk Bar, an iconic multi-million-dollar bakery empire.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Guy holds 29% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
Guy as informed peer 3.1 Guest teaching 1.4 Guest disagreement 0.3 Guy pushing back 0.3
speaking balance: gold is Guy, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 58:41 Rejecting the assumption that funding was necessary for survival
Tosi rejects the host's premise that she needed outside capital to scale after bootstrapping for eight years, emphasizing that funding was a deliberate choice to enter grocery aisles while maintaining control.
Hardest push from Guy ▶ 47:14 Challenging the economics of low cookie pricesRaz presses Tosi on how Milk Bar sustained profitability given tight baked goods margins and cookies priced under two dollars.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 20:43 Detailed breakdown of restaurant HACCP food safety plansTosi explains the intricate 60-page regulatory protocol required for sous-vide preparation in professional NYC kitchens from receiving ingredients to plate service.
Guy holds their own ▶ 19:48 Host immediately identifies HACCP regulatory significanceRaz immediately demonstrates subject matter knowledge by expanding the HACCP acronym and articulating the exact health department pressures fine dining restaurants face.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | Guy as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | Guy pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Childhood, Heritage, and Curiosity | 4 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Guy Raz demonstrates thorough background research regarding Tosi's childhood, Italian upbringing, and college majors. Tosi pleasantly agrees and elaborates on how baking served as a community and creative outlet. | |
| College Detours and Discovering a True Passion | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Raz asks about her initial career plans with applied mathematics and her decision to leave UVA. Tosi shares her realization that an actuary career lacked passion and details her journey to Italy. | |
| Moving to NYC and Culinary School | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Raz guides the chronology toward graduation and moving to New York City. Tosi explains how baking cookies daily in college convinced her to pursue culinary school as a formal profession. | |
| Embracing the Culinary School Grind | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Raz inquires about family reactions and her experience at the French Culinary Institute. Tosi colorfully describes the disciplined environment and balancing school with restaurant work. | |
| The Fine Dining Crucible at Bouley | 3 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Raz prompts Tosi to describe the grueling kitchen culture at Bouley. Tosi details the demanding prep lists, high-stakes perfectionism, and personal resilience developed on the line. | |
| WD-50 and Tackling Food Safety Plans | 5 | 3 | 0 | 0 | Raz immediately demonstrates domain familiarity by identifying HACCP as food safety compliance for sous-vide cooking. Tosi elaborates on writing the 60-page food safety protocol at WD-50. | |
| The Accidental Invention of Crack Pie | 3 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Raz asks for the origin story of her famous pie. Tosi narrates the spontaneous Sunday family meal improvisation based on southern chess pie that turned into Crack Pie. | |
| Partnering with David Chang at Momofuku | 4 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Raz tracks the timeline when David Chang sought help with the health department. Tosi describes stepping in to help Chang and transitioning into Momofuku's startup culture. | |
| Bringing Baking and Cereal Milk to Momofuku | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | Raz explores the creation of cereal milk and gently simplifies the technique, which Tosi playfully refines by pointing out there is more culinary nuance than just pouring milk over cereal. | |
| Developing Plated Desserts for Momofuku | 3 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Raz asks about her first official plated dessert for Momofuku. Tosi provides a masterclass on balancing nostalgic flavors with technique in her elevated strawberry shortcake. | |
| Mid-Show Break and Teaser | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Standard mid-show sponsor break, station identifiers, and promotional teaser from the host. | |
| Opening Day Buzz and Cookie Creations | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Raz explores the aesthetics and initial menu lineup when Milk Bar opened in 2008. Tosi recalls opening day lines during the financial recession and improvising recipes to prevent waste. | |
| Business Realities, Pricing, and Quality | 4 | 2 | 1 | 3 | Raz presses on the business viability given slim bakery profit margins and low price points. Tosi firmly defends keeping desserts accessible to everyday customers while refusing to compromise on premium ingredients. | |
| The Anderson Cooper Effect and Mail Order Growth | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Raz brings up the Anderson Cooper mention on morning television. Tosi describes scrambling to buy ice packs and mailboxes to fulfill national pie shipment requests. | |
| Operational Hustle and Working with David Chang | 3 | 1 | 0 | 1 | Raz probes into working dynamics and creative friction with David Chang. Tosi contextualizes their disagreements as productive kitchen tension between deeply invested culinary partners. | |
| Scaling the Bakery and Production Commissary | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Raz outlines the rapid store footprint expansion and commissary development. Tosi explains the operational necessity of opening more storefronts to justify the Williamsburg production kitchen overhead. | |
| Industry Influence and Grocery Aisle Ambitions | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | Raz asks whether competitor copycats and funding decisions were signs she had to take outside capital to survive. Tosi firmly reframes, stating outside investment was about ambition and expanding into grocery aisles rather than financial desperation. | |
| Personal Life Changes and Creative Indulgences | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | Raz asks his signature concluding question regarding intelligence, hard work, versus luck. Tosi pushes back on attributing success to luck, framing it as seizing opportunities through disciplined effort. |
Statements from this episode (21)
Christina Tosi Says Milk Bar Will Never Serve Green Tea Flavors
“I will, there will never be anything green tea flavored on the menu at Milk Bar, because it's like the most beautiful PTSD, even though I so appreciate why other people love it. For me, it's something completely different and personal.”
Christina Tosi Calls WD-50 NYC's Last Great Pre-Food-Blogging Restaurant
“It was probably the last great restaurant in New York City that, wait, that, that, oh my gosh, no, stop. That existed before, like, Eater and food blogging and Accenture Access to these great restaurants existed online. It was the restaurant that only existed …”
Christina Tosi: Staff Family Meal Is a Critical Peer Culinary Test
“And the meal that you make for a family meal is an important one because it shows your peers what you're made of, what you think tastes good, what you cook for them is almost maybe more important than what you're cooking for your guests.”
Tosi: Crack Pie had a NYC cult following before Milk Bar opened
“Instead they're freaking out about this, like, gooey, buttery, delicious mess of a pie that they named Crack Pie, and we have since renamed for other reasons but it was this thing that lived in the underbelly of New York City dining before I even opened Milk B…”
Christina Tosi Managed Momofuku's Health Department Crisis for David Chang
“He was like, I did a bad thing and I need your help. Because if you know Dave, you know, like, and most of us that are in it is personal to us, so when someone comes in and, like, threatens to shut down your business, it's everything we've got that's in it, an…”
David Chang Hired Christina Tosi Without a Defined Job Title
“He was like, do you want a job? And I was like, well, what would the job be? And he was like, I don't know. You figure it out.”
Tosi: Fine dining desserts fail when detached from familiar nostalgic indulgence
“For me, the fine dining part of desserts that I have always struggled to resonate with were the ones that feel like they're so far over your head or they're so luxurious that there's no, like, connection to what your taste buds know to be, like, sweet and guil…”
Christina Tosi Claims Nobody Used Cereal Milk in Desserts Before Her
“No one was setting it into a panna cotta, swirling it into a soft serve, or thinking about it, through that lens.”
Tosi: Momofuku needed desserts to be taken seriously as an empire
“And I think at the same time, he knew he was building this amazing, magical thing in Momofuku, and that in order to continue to be taken seriously, he was going to have to take his restaurant empire seriously, and like it or not, that includes desserts.”
Christina Tosi Launched Milk Bar Without a Formal Business Plan
“No, cook would ever do that. No, I was young, and I didn't, Know enough to know any better. I just said yes and jump.”
Tosi: Milk Bar was envisioned as a modern Dairy Queen and Baskin-Robbins
“The original, like, inspiration for Milk Bar was, it's gonna be, like, a modern day take on Dairy Queen slash Baskin Robbins, but I'm also gonna serve a bunch of baked goods, cause that's just what I love to do.”
Tosi: The world did not need more traditional bakeries
“The world doesn't need more bakeries. We don't need more chocolate chip cookies. We need more of the theory of that, but in a way that like inspires and is sticky and is a place that anyone can come and people can get like, just feel a little seen, get a littl…”
Tosi: Milk Bar's cornflake cookie was created from burnt cornflake crunch
“Some of the things that are still on the menu at Milk Bar today, like the cornflake chocolate chip marshmallow cookie, was somebody burnt the cornflake crunch that was used for another dessert And I was like, well, we're not going to throw this away. We were, …”
Milk Bar Was Initially Funded by a Loan From Momofuku
“He loaned me money through our, through the hold co of Momofuku, and it was, I was very well versed at operating on a shoestring budget, because that's how we built the Momofuku empire, and so, It was a loan that we agreed that I'd pay back”
Tosi: Milk Bar cookies were priced at $1.85 at opening
“They were a dollar 85 when we first opened.”
Tosi: Milk Bar cookie price rose less than $1 over 11 years
“Our cookie over 11 years hasn't even gone up a whole dollar in price.”
Christina Tosi Refuses Finance Advice to Use Cheaper Butter
“I am not changing our fancy, very expensive butter that the team that does the financial analysis of food causes, like, please, please, a cheaper butter, and it's like, no, this is what it's built on.”
Tosi: Milk Bar Launched Shipping Using Drugstore Ice Packs and Email Orders
“I went to, like, all the local drugstores and bought those, like, break and freeze ice packs, and then went to all of, like, the UPS and USPS stores and was like, I'll take all the boxes. I'll take all the boxes, and just showed up at the bakery and was like, …”
Tosi: Milk Bar waited eight years before raising outside growth capital
“I think the first time that it started, that I started really taking that conversation seriously was two years ago when I decided to raise money to grow the business for the first time, to actually start taking this business, which was eight years in at the ti…”