Kimbal Musk: Longtime entrepreneur, chef, and restaurateur who co-founded Zip2 with his brother Elon and serves on the Tesla board. He runs The Kitchen restaurants and the nonprofit Big Green, and authored the cookbook 'The Kitchen Cookbook: Cooking for Your Community.'
What this episode covers
Kimbal Musk discusses how cooking became his life's art form, beginning at age 11 when he roasted a chicken to bring his busy family together at the table. He reflects on growing up amid the violence of apartheid South Africa, a brutal childhood under an abusive father, and how those experiences shaped his appreciation for human connection and the value of life. A 2010 snowboarding-tube accident broke his neck and left him temporarily paralyzed, producing a clear inner voice that redirected him toward working with kids and food. He shares lessons from the French Culinary Institute, his philosophy of cooking with love, and the craft of ingredients like salt, carrots, and steak. The conversation also covers his entrepreneurial journey with Elon, from a cross-country road trip to founding Zip2, investing in Tesla and SpaceX, and finding hope in long-term human progress.
The guest's own work
The Kitchen Cookbook: Cooking for Your Community
Kimbal Musk
“a longtime entrepreneur and Chef and author of a new cookbook called the kitchen Cookbook cooking for your community you should check it out”— Kimbal Musk
Also referenced (named, not recommended)
Kitchen Confidential
Anthony Bourdain
“he wrote a book called Kitchen Confidential in the '90s I was in cooking school at the time it was so he romanticized the kit cooking in the restaurant so well his writing is great”— Kimbal Musk
Liar's Poker
Michael Lewis
“this is in late 80s I'm in high school and there was a lot of these books liars poker and others that came out I was like a man this this is awesome”— Kimbal Musk
Lotus 1-2-3
Lotus Development
“I had known about Lotus 123 forever Excel was coming out and I was like hey guys you know that there's a different way to do this”— Kimbal Musk
Who Killed the Electric Car?
Chris Paine
“I was really upset that the General Motors had killed the their EV car there's even a movie called who killed the electric car”— Kimbal Musk
Big reveals from this episode
- Kimbal witnessed someone stabbed to death in front of him getting off a notoriously violent train in South Africa around age 16-17, stepping into the pool of blood and leaving a footprint for 100 paces.
- He frames accepting mortality as the path to enjoying life, arguing we should aim to live longer with the goal of joy rather than misery.
- He recounts watching his brother Elon nearly beaten to death at school, then watching their father berate Elon for an hour calling him worthless, calling it the worst memory of his life.
- Kimbal describes his 2010 inner-tube accident at 37 that ruptured his spine at C6 and C7, paralyzing him in an instant, and his eventual recovery.
- During recovery he heard a clear voice he attributes to God telling him 'you're going to work with kids in food,' leading him to resign as CEO from his hospital bed.
- He explains Zip2's origin: he and Elon got internet vector-based mapping/directions data from navtech on a one-page letter, becoming the first two humans to see online turn-by-turn directions.
- He pinpoints the moment he fell in love with Tesla: flooring an early electric 'mule' on Bing Street in the Bay Area and feeling like he was shot out of a cannon.
- He recounts a SpaceX low point in Kwajalein after a rocket exploded, cooking a big pot of Italian-style chili from a tiny grocery store to bring the heartbroken team back together.
Worth remembering
- Kimbal started cooking at age 11 because his self-admittedly bad-cook mother served things like brown bread, plain yogurt, and boiled squash.
- A butcher taught him his first recipe: put a chicken in a hot oven for one hour; his first french fries failed because he didn't heat the oil first and he threw up that night.
- He recounts a customer at his community table insisting 9/11 was a conspiracy that didn't happen, even though Kimbal was physically in New York and watched the towers fall.
- About 15 years ago a man surprised his girlfriend's proposal at the restaurant by bringing a full university brass marching band through the back door.
- At the French Culinary Institute (same price as Harvard, 18-month program) only 6 of the 25 who started graduated, and a 5'2 chef would scream at the 6'5 Kimbal until spittle landed on his face.
- Master Chef Alain Sailhac taught Kimbal a French omelette/soft scramble technique done in 90 seconds requiring total focus, declaring he didn't trust the other chefs to teach it.
- Kimbal estimates he's made scrambled eggs over 10,000 times and his kids critique the eggs with him every morning; he calls kosher salt his favorite, valued because you can see the flakes.
- The Kitchen in Boulder occupies a 120-year-old former brothel and bookstore with an old tunnel in the basement that once connected to a local hotel.
- Before founding Zip2, Kimbal and Elon road-tripped from Silicon Valley to Philadelphia in an old BMW, running the heater through the desert town of Needles to keep the engine from overheating.
- As a banking summer intern around 1991-92, Kimbal replaced a months-long manual pencil-and-calculator sales-tally job with a Lotus 1-2-3 macro, and was stunned by the bankers' lack of appreciation for the innovation.