17 questions for...Tomasz Czudowski, Owner at Alewino and Muzealna restaurants & Tuba Smaku

Work life balance for me is... a balance that allows me to enjoy everything in life, including work, which gives me great satisfaction with an acceptable amount of stress. I have never treated work as a negative thing. I'm lucky that I was always the one who chose and did what I wanted to do.

My most important daily health habits are…

• First of all – good, quality and adequately long sleep.
• Secondly – ​​a morning walk with the dog. It allows me to activate my body through natural light.
• Thirdly - temporary restriction of eating, i.e. I eat the first meal no earlier than 10 a.m., the last one no later than 9 p.m. The body must have time to regenerate.
• Fourth - consuming a moderate amount of caffeine, although I like coffee very much, I try to drink only one a day, no later than early afternoon.
• Fifth – regular physical activity. I try to walk and bike a lot, mainly in the summer.

The sport I practice regularly is... running, and it has been my sport of choice for 25 years. I run about 50 to 60 km a week, which translates into about 6 hours of exercise. He also takes part in running competitions at distances of 5 km/10 km/half marathon. Regular physical activity is in my blood because I have been hyperactive since I was a child and I played every sport I could. For me, running is also a kind of meditation that helps me clear my mind. I listen to the body, cut through external stimuli and focus on internal aspects that we rarely listen to.

I spend about 10-12 hours a week on physical activity . My wife likes walking, so we try to implement it in our everyday life. Spending time outdoors is very important and valuable to us.

My motivation for sports is... primarily the natural improvement of well-being. The release of endorphins is extremely important to me, it naturally stimulates me and gives me energy to act. The second aspect is more pragmatic, namely I like to eat without restrictions. Practicing sports means that I do not need to diet and I am able to maintain a weight that I feel comfortable with. The third aspect is that being in good shape makes it easier for me to engage in other physical activities - cycling, football, snowboarding.

I don't meditate in a traditional way, but... it's something I plan to implement in the near future. More and more people around me meditate regularly, so it's definitely time to give it a try!

3 years ago I switched to a... pescatarian diet (I couldn't give up fish and seafood), due to emerging publications on improving sports results by giving up meat, but ecological aspects are also important. I am very happy with it, I lost weight, and in terms of energy, on the contrary, I gained a lot of energy. I think the key to this was the fact that there was never an excess of meat in our house, and when it was available, it was always of very high quality. At the same time, we changed our approach to meals, reduced portion sizes and the variety of products in our diet.

I end the day by... spending time with my family. Often on the couch - watching a movie, TV series, listening to music.

I spend… 7-7.5 hours a day sleeping . Sometimes I take short naps (up to 20 minutes) during the day.

Things I do only for myself are... running and cycling, but never in Warsaw. Of course, I ride a bike around the city in the summer, but it is simply my way of getting around. When we go away as a family for a longer period of time, I put away my running shoes and switch to a bike, which is a completely different experience. This activity helps me relax even more, especially for my head.

My little sins are… sugar and junk food. However, I forgive myself for this because I am physically active.

Happiness for me is... the ability to plan and manage time so as to maximize the energy of the day.

I focused on development in gastronomy because... I followed what was happening in our lives, observing and listening to the surroundings. There were two big events that turned out to be turning points. I was laid off from one job, which was a difficult experience for me, so I told myself I wouldn't go back to a traditional corporate job again. I wanted to focus on entrepreneurship and starting my own business. I did this with an MBA friend who quit after a while and my wife took over his role in the company. In the meantime, I received an offer from Google that I couldn't refuse, because I always wanted to be professionally associated with YouTube. While working at Google, I met my current partner - Pascal Brodnicki, and it was a surprise. We were united by our love and passion for gastronomy, and I also had extensive experience in the online video field. Then I decided to leave Google and devote myself mainly to Tuba Smaku, but of course I supported my wife in alewino. In my case, professional changes were organic, triggered by certain random events, but not accidental.

It's worth eating at Alewino... Roasted cabbage broth with kimchi dumplings and herbal oil - this is the quintessence of our thinking about the menu: simple ingredients creating a unique taste experience.

It's worth eating in Muzealna... beetroot and smoked paprika tartare. When I ate meat, steak tartare was one of my favorite dishes. You lose this pleasure when you stop eating meat. Of course, you can choose fish ones, but their taste is completely different than the classic ones. Beetroot and pepper provide a large dose of umami and thanks to this, we have a full sense of taste.

As for fish options - currently we have the season for 'Skrei' cod and both restaurants offer amazing dishes with Skrei.

For me, luxury is... time free from duties, a sense of freedom and not being restrained by everyday tasks. We are glad that we managed to create teams that are able to operate independently. They say that this is virtually impossible in the gastronomy industry, but we managed to do it!

My small daily steps in taking care of the planet are... taking care to generate as little waste as possible. Of course we sort them and we did before it was necessary. We have been taking care of this in our restaurants for a long time. We focus on ecological materials and products. We renovate things instead of buying new ones. Recently, we were building a new premises in our Kukułka confectionery chain and we left the wainscoting and stone on the walls to reuse them. We drive an electric car, we do not overheat rooms, we limit the demand for electricity, energy and heat.

The advice I would give my 20-year-old self again is... focus on collecting experiences, not things. The earlier you start, the richer you will be in the future.

The book and podcast I recommend is… “Good Economics” by Banerjee Abhijit V. and Duflo Esther . I like reading about topics related to economics and the theory itself. How does all this affect the world? I have recently been particularly interested in the topics of circular economy vs. traditional to which we are accustomed.

When it comes to the podcast, first of all, I recommend " Dzikie yeast " , which is hosted by Izabela Kamińska and talks very nicely about wines. We also have a YouTube channel with her. The second podcast I like to listen to during long runs is neuroscientist Andrew Huberman and his podcast “ HUBERMAN LAB ” . While listening, I discover extremely interesting topics. Learning non-obvious things is absolutely wonderful and I regret that I didn't set myself the goal to discover and broaden my horizons earlier. It is said that we learn throughout our lives, but we spend too little time actively acquiring new knowledge. By listening to selected podcasts while running, I combine business with pleasure.