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When Chef Sean Brock is thinking up a new culinary wonder, he follows a strict creative process he has coined The PIE Theory, which stands for Products, Ideas and Execution.

No shit. This formula will help you churn out daring creative work more consistently, regardless of your medium.

It’s practically a cheat code for originality.

Step One: Products

Sean begins by sourcing the highest-quality products in the world. This is where he claims to spend 80% of his time.

For example, if Sean needs an apple for a dish, he doesn’t just settle for a Honeycrisp. He finds a family-run orchard with deep generational knowledge in heirloom varieties of apples and then sources his apples directly from them.

He’s unapologetically picky about the ingredients he uses. The ingredients can’t just be delicious. They have to be farmed, harvested, stored and shipped exactly to his standards.

Step Two: Ideas

Sean creates a list of those products (or ingredients) and calls a gathering of the minds with his most trusted culinary lieutenants.

This is where the creativity happens.

During these brainstorming sessions, Sean is after originality.

In his own words…

“

We want new ideas. We want to create something new over and over and over again. That’s what intrigues me. That’s what stimulates me. That’s what keeps me going. If we have an idea, we have to make sure we haven’t done it yet and somebody else hasn’t done it to be original.

”

Sean puts his money where his mouth is.

The moment he chooses an idea to run with, it gets tossed in the trash; he and his team are never allowed to touch the idea again.

Step Three: Execution

Finally, Sean moves onto execution.

In this phase, he and his team ask themselves the following question…

“

Is the suffering worth the contribution?

”

In other words, how far can Sean and his team pursue excellence while remaining happy and healthy?

Chefs who are after culinary greatness are often obsessive.

While this obsession can lead to a James Beard Award, it can also result in a tremendous amount of undo stress and mental anguish obsessing over small, trivial details that matter very little in the whole grand scheme of things.

To protect both he and his team, Sean encourages his kitchen to abandon demanding, time-intensive ideas whose contribution will go under appreciated by either themselves or their customers.

By Cole Schafer.

P.S. If you haven’t yet, be sure to watch or listen to my interview with Sean.