Beef And Dairy Network - Episode 99 - The Man-At-Beef

Episode Date: July 23, 2023

Paul F. Tompkins, Mike Shephard and Max Davis join in this week as we speak to Queen Elizabeth II's personal beef sommellier, her man-at-beef. TICKET LINK FOR LIVE SHOW AT LONDON PODCAST FESTIVAL ON SEPTEMBER 16 2023:Live-stream tickets: https://www.kingsplace.co.uk/whats-on/comedy/online-streaming-beef-and-dairy Stock media provided by Setuniman/Pond5.com and Soundrangers/Pond5.com Music credit courtesy of epidemicsound.com:Seven Daughters / Fabien TellNational Anthem United Kingdom / National Anthem WorxThe Garden Repertoire / Francis WellsDeep South / Biddy SullivanRinging In My Head / Coma SvenssonLending Your Time / Jonatan MolbergFlower Market / Fabien TellConquer The Battle 5 / Fredrik EkstromBeyond The Ponds / Francis WellsSadn News / Emily Rubye 

The Beef and Dairy Network is sponsored by LactoBulk, the new milk bulking agent from Mitchells. If it's not Mitchells, get back in the truck. Remember, if you use LactoBulk to enhance your product, in most jurisdictions outside of the USA it will be illegal to sell it using the name milk. However, there is no problem because you are able to use the phrases dairy-adjacent fluid, bovine-derived emulsion, and white liquid food. For 10% off your first shipment of Lactobulks, simply use the code I can't start the day without my emulsion.

Hello, and welcome to the Beef and Dairy Network podcast, the number one podcast for those involved, or just interested, in the production of beef animals and dairy herds. The Beef and Dairy Network podcast is the podcast companion to the Beef and Dairy Network website, as well as a printed magazine, brought to you by LactoBulk. Now, this month's episode is about the esteemed position of the man at beef, the personal beef sommelier to the king or queen of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth realms. To hear more about this most prestigious of positions, I spoke to friend of the show, Professor James Harkam.

Hello, I'm Professor James Harkam, and I'm Professor of History at the Wisconsin Cattle College of the Internet. The role of the man at beef is a very ancient role. It dates back as far as the Norman Conquest in 1066, something that was brought over by the Normans, whose nobility always had a personal beef sommelier. Their great love of beef, of course, even stretches as far as giving us the word beef, which comes from the Norman French,

or the beautiful egg, which the Normans themselves foolishly believed that all good cattle were born from. The man at beef, succeeding from the sergeant at beef, of course, came from those Norman noble houses. Of course, every castle, every great hall, every lord would have had his own beef sommelier. But the one who was in personal attendance to the king would have been that which was acknowledged as having the greatest palate for beef. as having the greatest palate for beef, a tongue who could identify the individual, what we would now know as tannins and enzymes that give beef its rich deliciousness,

but which at the time would have been interpreted as a form of benign witchcraft. I mean, there's also a kind of spiritual edge. You can't just reduce it down to tannins and enzymes and chemicals. There's something more than that, isn't there? Oh, of course yes absolutely the the spiritual dimension to beef i think has been recognized since time immemorial but certainly in the period that we're discussing we have to understand that that the the interplay between church and state then was was quite fluid bishop odo the the right hand man of william the conqueror was himself a uh was it was a practicing bishop and as such was entitled to to ride a cow into battle and so the the role then of the man at beef at this stage

is almost as much a religious one as a civic one that's right yes it's a form of communion between beef between God between the king and his people the ability to select the prime cuts of beef was perhaps the highest honour. And indeed, I think, as we know from lists of orders of precedence at the court of Richard II, in fact, many men at beef were paid more than the Archbishop of Canterbury, and were in fact allowed to sit in his seat on special days. The next big development in the role of the man at Beef is in the mid-1800s where suddenly there's a huge change and the Man at Beef, who used to be a loyal British subject, was now an American. Can you explain what happened there? So what we're dealing with here is a

situation where by the mid-1800s it's become imperative to find a kind of diplomatic solution to the tensions between Britain and the United States. And it was ultimately decided that the mannet beef would be provided to the British monarchy by the President of the United States himself as a sort of diplomatic gift. I see, I see. And with the man at beef being sent over by the president, did we send anything in return? Yes, we really must understand this as a form of diplomatic interchange. And just as the president of the United States takes great care when selecting the man at beef who will eventually be sent to represent their nation at the British Royal Court. So we, in our turn, have carefully selected a number of our finest minds, usually in the field of entertainment of course, to go to America and

to work with them as part of that diplomatic process of building goodwill. Think of Cary Grant, Stan Laurel, the Osbournes, and of course in more recent years, the creative team behind the HBO hit show Succession. British writers really will put a shift in for you if you want to eradicate any trace of hope or

optimism from your work. Of course also we sent over James Corden. Yes, again, a diplomatic misstep that may take centuries to undo. Now, you'll have to forgive me for reminding you that it has now been ten months since the death of Her Majesty the Queen Elizabeth II, not just the greatest monarch that this nation has ever had, but also a patron of this very podcast. Indeed, throughout the 1990s, she often wrote into the

show using a pseudonym, Babs Rascal. And who can forget the time she came to the annual British Beef Council dinner and barn dance in disguise as Babs. Of course, we all saw through the disguise, quite literally, given that all she was wearing was a fishnet mesh sequined bikini and cowboy boots. But do you know what? What burst through the gaps in the fishnet, more than anything else, was dignity. Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II was a constant source of strength for the British public, loved since before she became Queen for her service during the Second World War, where she climbed into a German machine gun emplacement and beheaded four SS officers with just a bottle opener. Following her coronation in 1953, the Queen was a constant

public advocate for beef, and many of you will remember her making public appearances with her men at beef at her side. First of all, Sir Django Hardy until 1992, and then Sir Robert Battlebus. And this month, I had the great pleasure to interview Sir Robert. Hello, my name is Sir Robert Battlebus, and I was Queen Elizabeth II's man at beef. Sir Robert, thank you so much for coming on the show. It's a great privilege to talk to someone who has worked in such close quarters with Her Majesty the Queen. It was my privilege as well as my pleasure.

When the previous Man at Beef, Sir Django Hardy, stepped down in 1992, the next Man at Beef was, of course, chosen by the American president, George H.W. Bush. I started by asking Robert how he came to be on Bush's radar. My father, Lucas Battle Bus, knew George H.W. Bush from their skull and bones days at Yale. And, you know, they kept in close contact. And of course, when President Bush was the head of the CIA, he would come over to our house all the time. And I called him Uncle George. And he was just a wonderful man. And he would share with us just all kinds of secrets that we probably, in retrospect,

had no business knowing. But there's a certain Ivy League understanding that you don't, if you're told something that is potentially harmful to the nation or humanity, you can't tell the secret. And if you do, it is frowned upon and they will find you. So they might say to you, for example, hey, guess what? Fidel Castro is still alive. We bribed him to fake his own death and he now lives in florida and works as a fidel castro lookalike um why why are you where did you get that very specific example you know you hear things on the grapevine on the grapevine uh also when you replied to my email it's actually part of your email footer it's got your name and your phone number with a link to your website and then it has a little section with a number of what you describe as fun facts and state secrets.

Oh, you know what? That's on me. Uh, I forgot to change that. That was a thing when I first got email. Uh, I thought it was fun to have a footer. And then I realized it's not really a thing that people do anymore, but I just haven't bothered to haven't bothered to change it. I also probably shouldn't have an AOL address anymore, but, um, you know, if it if it ain't broke uh but apparently it is broke because i should not have that as my footer

yeah but that that's a lie though isn't it because in the footer there's a section with all the fun state secrets and there's like the fidel castro one and there's the one about how hawaii isn't real and there's one about how jimmy carter's peanut farm was actually growing alien eggs and then there's a little gif um which is one of the minions right winking now yeah when you first started your aol email address the minions wouldn't have been out yet so you couldn't have had a gif of one of the minions back then well they weren't out they weren't out to the general public no oh i see they were. They were CIA's thing. That's your words. So you're telling me that George Bush Sr., as the head of the CIA, came up with the idea of the Minions?

This is the most that I can tell you, is that I have seen Minions and been delighted by them many years before they hit the big screen. Wow. That's as far as I can go. Sir Robert got the job of Queen Elizabeth's man at beef when his predecessor, Sir Django Hardy, decided to step down from the role in 1992. However, stepping down from the job isn't simple. Most men at beef will continue in the role until either their own death or the death of their monarch. But if a man at beef wishes to retire, they may do so on the condition that they are then executed by the Pope,

which hints at that religious significance that existed in the medieval era. I've really looked into this and I've gone back into the archives here, the Vatican, the Library of Congress, the works of Dan Brown. And the one thing that really stands out, I think, is how much the Pope enjoys it when they get a chance. It's a day out and, you know, at the end of the day, it's something different for them. He threw that switch with gusto. So, Sir Robert, you and the Queen witnessed the execution of your predecessor by the Pope.

He was in charge of the meat grinder, which made such quick work of sir jango it's been written that your close relationship with the queen was really cemented there at that early stage when you know the fact that you both had to watch this happen kind of brought you closer in a way oh more than in a way some of the blood got on us and um i remember brushing some blood off myself, and she was doing the same. And then our hands sort of glanced against each other. And then we just very briefly, and I want to stress this very briefly, because this was not a breach of protocol. This was just a purely human moment. And although Her Majesty's blood was filled with the divine, she was still a person in some way. And when our hands touched, we did squeeze hands, and then we both giggled a little

bit, and we made eye contact. I immediately averted my eyes, and she gave my hand one final squeeze as if to say, it's all right that you looked at me that time. And from then on, we were, I want to say, friends. That sounds like a really special memory for you. It almost feels like a betrayal to put this image in people's minds. majesty queen elizabeth ii and i um laying on the floor of her bedroom uh just helplessly laughing till tears run down our faces as corgis are jumping on us over us licking us that is a day that i will that i will treasure forever until i am executed so sir robert tell me about the typical day for queen eliz Elizabeth's man at beef. A typical day, I would be told what time the queen was planning on rising.

And I would set my alarm for two minutes before. I would sleep in my clothes and my uniform, which is, it's not dissimilar to the uniform of the beef eaters, the guards you see at the Tower of London, who are obviously misnamed. None of them eat beef. They exclusively eat raven meat. And just to explain, of course, back in the day when that was happening, when they were first given the name, it was thought, scientifically, we now know is wrong, that ravens were a kind of flying small cow, basically, because they're so intelligent. Yes. a kind of flying small cow basically because they're so intelligent yes and they thought that the uh the raven's beak you know it's such a it's such a uh a very you know specific looking and

fearsome beak they thought it was a horn like just a single horn that was growing out of the uh the little cow's head yeah uh right in the front there and you can of course um milk a crow you can and the thing is crows are very very smart. So they will remember the face of someone who has milked them. And depending on how much they enjoyed or did not enjoy the experience, they can either reward you for the rest of your life, or they can punish you every day. If they liked your milking, they can bring you coins. They can bring you coins they can bring you jewels they can bring you the eye of an enemy exactly the eye of an enemy or a nice belt and uh if they don't like you they can bring you coins but from another country and so you can't use them they'll bring you the eye of a friend

they'll bring you not a great belt or like a nice belt that doesn't fit so you're wearing the kind beefy to style like people will probably know what doesn't fit so you're wearing the kind of beefy to style outfit people will probably know what that that looks like you've got the rough kind of the red tunic the hat yeah um but of course it's all leather for the manatee so it's the same exact outfit except black leather and it's uh it is as warm as you would imagine inside that thing and especially when you put the leather hat on, you know, you're talking about a huge heat tolerance that is required for this job. And of course, when you started, that leather had taken on the shape of Sir Django Hardy.

Absolutely. As leather does, it conforms to the body that's in it. Yes. A bit like the kind of, you know, bum groove that can appear in a leather sofa after you've been using it for a few years. That's correct. That's one of the reasons you would sleep in the uniform is to get it to conform to your shape. And it takes decades.

Well, as you say, you'd set your alarm for two minutes before the queen was due to rise. You'd be in your leather outfit. Yes. What happens once the alarm goes off? I stand outside Her Majesty's door and I wait for her to appear.

And this could take, it could take five minutes. It could take hours. I mean, if she's feeling like having a bit of a lay-in and she just wants to, you know, read the paper or scroll through Twitter or whatever.

She was a huge Reddit user, I believe. She loved Reddit. She lurked. She lurked, but she did have a burner account that she would comment on things. She loved the Romancing the Stone series of movies. Romancing the Stone and the second one. The title escapes me now, but she would search Reddit for people talking about those movies. And there's not as many forums dedicated to it as one might like.

those movies, and there's not as many forums dedicated to it as one might like. But if anyone said anything negative about it, she would get in there and she would just destroy that person. It gave her great pleasure to do that. Anyway, so I would wait outside the door. As she would emerge, I would be standing against the wall. And when I heard the door click open, I would immediately swivel around so that I was facing the door as if I'm barring her way, but I'm not. And in my hand is a bouillon cube. And I say, good morning, your majesty. And she would say, good morning, Sir Robert, or good morning, Bobby, whatever she called me. And she would pop that in and just crunch, crunch, crunch. And that was the start of her day. That was her first encounter with beef. And it's, you know, there are, of course,

breakfast meats, but you don't want to give anyone a cube of raw meat first thing in the morning. That's something you have to work your way up to. And that she would go from cooked meat to raw meat over the course of the day. Let's talk then about your friendship again, because you started in 1992. And by the late 90s, the tabloid press began to ask questions about your relationship with the Queen. And there was a sense, wasn't there, that people thought that maybe you had too much power because of your relationship to the Queen, your proximity to power. I remember, for example, back in 2004, I think it was, the Royal Navy named a battleship after you,

HMS Battle Bus. Yeah. And people started to think, well, you know, why is she naming some of our greatest military hardware after this guy who's just giving her beef every day? Well, I mean, okay, there's a couple things there. Number one, that was the Queen's prerogative. greatest military hardware after this guy who's just giving her beef every day well i mean okay there's a couple things there number one that was the queen's prerogative to name that cruiser after me and uh and it was it was her way of honoring me if you ask me uh i'm not a fan of

boats so it wasn't uh the hugest honor but it was not something I asked her to do. My dream was always to have a car named after me and to create my own car. And I did try to build a car once, and it was very frustrating. I bought four tires, and I thought I would just instinctively know what to get next. And I didn't, I, I, I didn't. And it was very frustrating because I put the four tires in place where a car tires would be. And I would look at it every day and say, what connects these? How do they, how do you, what goes on next? And, um, cause I did find a, a, a roof of a car at the dump. Um, and so I had that sort of in the middle. It just strikes me that you're, you're telling me this shaggy dog story about you trying to make a car as a way to deflect from the fact that what I'm asking about, which is the fact that a battleship was named after you.

Okay. That's fair. Because you can correct me if I'm wrong, but you were about to tell that story, but going through every single part that goes into making a car, right? Yes, I was. You've got me there. And that would take hours. Oh, at least. And I was willing to, I'll be honest, I was willing to wait you out on this recording and just keep talking. You were essentially going to filibuster the whole podcast, right?

Yeah. I could tell that. I could tell it was going to happen. Okay, well, good for you. And congratulations. You're a regular Columbo. Well, let's move on because I've got some other papers here from the archive. This is a quote from the Daily Mail back in 2005.

Not only does Sir Robert feed beef into her mouth, he pours poison into her ear. The Daily Mirror wrote, the power behind the throne is the American citizen Robert Battlebus, who last year begged the queen to give her assent to the execution of his brother chudley okay uh there's of course a grain of truth in a lot of that uh but it's surrounded by a tissue of untruths yes i did ask the queen if she would execute my brother. No, she did not do it. Yes. He did end up being executed. No,

I did not do it. Yes. It was someone, the queen asked to execute him. Uh, so I think that, uh, you know,

did I ask the queen to execute? My brother is not quite the same as my brother was executed by someone. The queen asked to execute my brother do you see i think this is my i think you're splitting hairs there to be honest i don't i don't see that at all because she trusts she trusted me to be someone who would always have a little bit of meat that she could put in her mouth, no matter where we were. She trusted me to know which cuts of meat were the best for her. She also trusted me to be a silent witness to whatever she needed to express. If she needed to blow off some steam,

if she needed to scream or yell or kick the wall i was there and she knew that i would listen without judgment and would always say something encouraging if she needed it so for me to ask favors of her will you name this ship after me will you kill my brother it's not quite that cut and dried yeah okay next to. Next to Her Majesty. Okay, I understand this. It feels like you're kind of doing the filibuster thing again because you're aware what I'm going to ask next, right? I have no idea. I have no idea what you're going to ask.

Okay, the obvious next question is, okay, fine, you wanted the big ship named after you. Well, that's what happened. Do you deny, or can you accept, that the fact that the first mission that that boat went on was to sail across the atlantic to south carolina where your brother lives and fire upon his home had something to do with with what you wanted to happen i do not deny that those events took place i am not in any position, nor was I ever, to order one of Her Majesty's ships

to fire on the United States. So you're saying that the Queen, are you saying that the Queen independently decided to get the Royal Navy to fire at your brother's home? Here's what I'm going to tell you. The Queen was a very empathic person. She was very empathetic. And so she knew without my having to tell her that I despised my brother, that we were past the point of no return, that there was never going to be any kind of rapprochement. She knew without me telling her just by pointing on a map where he lived. She knew without me having to say a word when he would be home. This is what friendship is, is that you don't always have to have this, you know, I didn't know that I wanted

her to do that for me. Hello, my name is Timothy Spaglioni. I'm a lawyer, originally from London. I now reside in South Carolina. I received a job offer from the South Carolina Department of Agricultural Fraud. We specialize in fruit fraud, certain fruits being disguised as other fruits. So the job that I was hired to do was to prosecute people who paint apples to look like peaches. Oh, interesting. Wow. So yeah, I guess you can paint an apple to look like a peach. There's a kind of a texture problem though, isn't there? You're talking about the fuzz?

I'm assuming that they're gluing something on to the apple? Yeah, yeah. It's a good guess. And it's certainly what they used to do in the old days. They would use any sort of adhesive material, be it glue, be it toffee. But it was very labor-intensive, but also much easier to spot as well. An apple rolled in super glue, and know with sawdust shavings i'm gonna spot that but these days our challenges are much harder right because i guess it's ai these days you've really hit the nail on the head they the the things they can do now that the detail

in that fuzz it's entirely artificial 3d printed the 3d printed again you've got you've got it in one you know ai will scour the internet because there's there's obviously there's there's quite a few pictures of peaches if you if i mean don't do it now but if you were to google peaches and then press you've got to then go up to image and then that's all pictures i'm i'm a bing user but i assume it's a similar okay i see yeah yeah that's it's it's you know whatever you want to whatever you want to go through, there's loads of pictures of peaches on there. Now, what the AI will do is it'll incorporate all of those,

send that information to a 3D printer. The 3D printer will then render the fuzz for then the peach handlers to roll the apples in. And yeah, I mean, it's just, it's really, you have to look really, really closely, it's just, it's really, you have to look really, really closely if you want to spot that. Well, thank you for your service. It's a pleasure. It's a pleasure.

I mean, obviously we're not here to talk about your job, but that explains how an Englishman like yourself ended up over in South Carolina. We're talking to you because you met your partner, Chudley, whilst over there. Tell me a little bit about that. I was out here in South Carolina, you know, enjoying the work, and I certainly wasn't looking to meet anybody. But I attended an Avril Lavigne concert.

In the rough and tumble of the Avril Lavigne concert, where people young and old, buoyed along by the skateboarding-based music, jostled against one another uncontrollably, Chudley Battle Bus, Sir Robert's brother, had been knocked to the ground. And Timothy, seeing his distress, came to his aid. This poor man had fallen and he had mud all over his clothes, he had mud in his head, he had mud all over his face. So I couldn't really see what he looked like. And he's looking for something to clean himself off with and and i realized i had one peach so i um i i i took the peach and i just gently used it to clean the mud off his face and obviously with with the natural fuzz it's sort of like a like a cotton pad really i suppose it's and and obviously the natural peach

oil that is secreted from the skin is sort of like a like a kind of a makeup remover you know uh and so i'm i'm cleaning it and and as the as his face is revealed as the peach reveals this man's face i've realised just how beautiful he is, how good-looking he is, you know, and obviously he's now very grateful because he's got a very clean face. And just as I get the last in the mud off, he just leans forward and he bites into the peach

and sinks his teeth and you can hear the... Because they're obviously very juicy, you know, it was a particularly juicy specimen you know and and the the peach juice is running down his chin he's smiling he's smiling at me and so i lean forward and i bite the other side of the peach so now we're we're either side of it lady in the tramp style exactly and that that was actually the thought that went through my head i thought to to myself, this is like a fruity version of Lady and the Tramp. One of the sexiest dog movies going. I would, yeah, and I think probably in the Disney canon,

I think it's probably, I think probably the horniest of all the cartoons. And I'm counting The Little Mermaid in there as well, actually, you know. Within six months of the Avril Lavigne concert, Chudley and Timothy had moved in together and were a couple. But after a few years together, things started to go a bit strange. So it was 2006, which meant we'd been together for seven years. And Chadley just started behaving very strangely. You know, he would disappear at all times of the day and night. He started using very complex maritime phrases, you know, out of context, which I found really strange.

Or he'd start telling you facts, you know, facts about boats, which sayings came from boats. I mean, this happens with a lot of relationships especially especially ones involving men they become middle-aged man and they start spouting facts about the navy so you must have thought well this is annoying but you know we've got to expect this you're in a relationship with a man that will that will happen absolutely and i can remember when i came out to my parents you know as a teenager my mother you know was so understanding but the one her her big fear and i can remember you know tears in her eyes she said to me what happens when you become middle-aged and your partner starts spouting out random facts you know but i didn't want to hear it then i was i was too

young yeah you know i was too excited to start my life, you know. But she was right. So, you know, he was behaving strangely, but, you know, a middle-aged man spouting random maritime facts, it's not the strangest thing in the world. So I didn't really, you know, I didn't think it was too much of an issue. But then, you know, I found a tri-corner hat in the the trunk as we say over here in the trunk of our car kind of old-timey sort of napoleon style exactly yeah i think napoleon lord horatio nelson it's

you know it's the three it's tricornered you know it's um and as soon as i saw it i thought to myself okay something's going on here you know so, so I confronted Chudley and the full extent of the problem became clear. You know, he had purchased a secondhand German battleship and was also keeping a full-time crew of 90 sailors on there at a very competitive rate. And I suddenly thought to myself how could i've been so blind and i guess you have to ask him you know why why did you buy a battleship because yeah this feels like maybe i'm getting ahead of you here but this feels like more than just an interest in in the maritime this feels like oh something else it's it's it's definitely an escalation and i kept asking him you know i

mean i was i was so upset i was so angry and upset and i kept saying why have you done this why have you done this and he just sat there and he just he just all he would say is i think i know what robert's planning trust me we need this and that that's Robert, his brother? His brother who I've never met. So how do I know? You know, maybe we do. Maybe we do. But at the end of the day, it turned out that Chudley was right. Fast forward about a year, about 2007.

I'm woken by the sound of cannon fire. I'm lying on my back. I open my eyes, and the roof of the house has been completely blown off. So I get up, I look out to sea, and I can see that we're under attack from another battleship flying the British flag. And Chudley's fears had been borne out,

and actually, I bet at that moment, you were pretty glad you had a secondhand German battleship. I was absolutely delighted. And even more so, I was glad that it was staffed with a crew of 90 sailors on a competitive rate. Because if those 90 sailors were staffed on a less than competitive rate, they may not have mobilized into action at the speed that they did. I mean, it was absolute crazy. It was Judley got straight on the phone, called the crew. And to be fair to them, within a couple of minutes, they're already returning fire. You know, again, competitive rate. You get what you pay for, it turns out, when you crew a secondhand German battleship. And we were really lucky.

German battleship and we were really lucky. So we're just there eating our breakfast and watching the battle and these ships, this British ship, is pretty evenly matched with our German ship. I mean, I don't know how many sailors were on the British ship and I certainly don't know what rate they were on, but they were giving it their all. So I thought to myself, my God, there's a chance that we could,

there's a chance we could lose here. You know, they could sink our battleship and then what happens to us? You know, we're in big trouble. But after about 10 minutes, the British battleship took a direct hit from an old Russian submarine that had appeared. And it turned out that unbeknownst to me,

Chudley had also bought this old Russian submarine. So even though he'd revealed to you that he'd spent 10 million on a battleship, he'd still kept from you the fact that he had also bought an old Russian submarine. I wasn't prepared for it. But I suppose in the moment, I was grateful that we had the Russian submarine to bolster our forces. Chudley was right. Yeah, I mean, he was just pleased to punch, to have sunk that battleship. And you know what?

It really brought us closer together. You know, I will take some pride in the fact that the battle cruiser that bore my name did not sink immediately, The battle cruiser that bore my name did not sink immediately, but made it pretty far back on its way to England before it sank. More after this. If you're hiring, you're currently dealing with a slowing economy, as we all all know and that adds to your challenges. Thankfully there's a hiring partner who is focused on you and your needs and that partner is of course ZipRecruiter. Now the good thing about ZipRecruiter is it has straightforward pricing so you can stick to your budget and it finds great candidates fast saving you time and money using their smart technology which allows you to invite the top candidates to apply for your job.

Four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate within the first day. Try ZipRecruiter for free at ZipRecruiter.com slash beef. That's ZipRecruiter.com slash B-E-E-F. I'm Jordan Morris. And I'm Jesse Thorne. On Jordan and Jesse Go. We make pure, delightful nonsense. We were open awesome guests and bring them down to our level. We got stupid with Judy Greer,

my friend Molly and I call it having the space weirds, Patton Oswalt. Can I get a Balrog burger and some Aragorn fries? Thank you. And Kumail Nanjiani. I've come back with cat toothbrushes, which is impossible to use. Come get stupider

with us at MaximumFun.org. Look, your podcast app's already open. Just pull it out. Give Jordan Jesse Goatry. Being smart is hard. Be dumb instead. Now, you mentioned earlier that beef-wise, you were building up from a a small stock cube in the morning through cooked beefs in the day and then through to raw beef at the end of the day and you were of course talking about the raw beef banquet yes which took place every day this would be um served around 5 30 p.m and she was not afraid of raw meat. She loved a tendon, and she would dig in there with, it was, I think, safe to say, her favorite meal of the day. And one of the things that I really treasure about that meal is that when she would eat that raw

meat, she would look up at me as she was chewing, you know, as the blood was just, you know, surrounding her mouth almost clown style. She would maintain steady eye contact with me, and this is how it should be. And I will revert to the monster that lives inside me and I will tear the flesh and I will remain supreme, which I think is, that's a good way for a monarch to feel. And when, when this was happening, was it just her on her own or was she also with her despicable children? The children would be there. They would face the wall. And this is a custom from time immemorial. Later, it was referenced in the movie The Blair Witch Project. But the kids would be forced to come into the room, face the wall, and listen to the sounds of their mother eating this raw flesh.

And it was, you know, the symbolism there is never forget we are a pack. I am the leader of the pack. I eat first and then you eat after me. We are inbred and we like it that way. And so the likes of Prince Edward and his wife, Sophie of Wessex, they would then come in and sort of have the scraps. They'd be able to turn around once the queen was finished. Yes. Once the queen was finished and they would have the scraps. They'd be able to turn around once the queen was finished. Yes, once the queen was finished, and they would have to wait until they heard the door close on the other side of the room. They would not see her enter or leave.

Once they heard that door, they could then turn around and they could feast on the scraps. And if they were, you know, if the queen was feeling generous that day, the scraps would be on the table. But if she were feeling, look, she's a mom and she had kids. And sometimes the kids will disappoint you or make you angry or challenge you in some way. She would leave the scraps on the floor. And then she would,

I feel like I could say this now, there was a painting that had the eye holes cut out that she could remove and then watch the kids, Charles know charles and the grandkids as well she would watch uh you know uh william and uh oh i can't say his name anymore it's a shame really um but she would watch them uh you know crawling about and eating the scraps and so just in terms of that the person whose name you can't bring yourself to say um just in case the listeners aren't sure who you're talking about are we talking about a certain member of the royal family who is now a very very good podcaster one of the world's best if you want to take out any modifiers there i can probably confirm what your suspicions are. Sure. I think people will understand what we're talking about.

Yeah, I think so. Okay. I'd like to get back onto the theme of whether you overstepped the boundaries of your job and whether you used your influence in a way that was unbefitting the role. Your brother, Chadley, was eventually executed, right? Yes. Chudley was eventually executed, right? Yes. Flash forward to 2010, and Chudley wins a competition, an all-expenses-paid trip to London.

And of course, I'm excited because it's a chance to come home to London, which I haven't been back to since moving to America. So yeah, I'm excited to show Chudley London, to take him around all my old haunts. I want to show him the sights. And what's great is the trip, the holiday that he's won, comes with all of the sightseeing included in it. So, you know, we're going to go to the aquarium.

We're going to go and see Jersey Boys. But we start with the Tower of London. And at one point during the tour one of the beef eaters um which is you know one of the guards said to chudley you know do you want to put your neck on the the execution block this is where countless people had been beheaded in the old days and uh i mean what a what a photo opportunity right well exactly you know immediately we're thinking to ourselves you know we'll pop that up on Instagram. This is Facebook profile photo 101.

It's gold. Yeah. Yeah. It's the absolute dream. You know, he's there and maybe he looks a bit scared. You know, the beef eaters. He's playing along. You know, he's good value.

So he puts his head on the block and we're all laughing, you know, because it's, you know, we think it's like a bit, you know. And we've sort of made friends with the other people on the tour as we've been walking around. And the Beefeater gets a big axe, a gigantic axe, and now we're really laughing, you know, and he raises it over his head and he says, someone's been a naughty boy. You're going to have to get your head chopped off, you know.

And we're going, oh, no, please. You know, Chubby's going, oh, no, go on then, you know. And we're going, oh, no, please. You know, Chudley's going, oh, no, go on then, you know. And we're all having so much fun. And the axe came down and chopped Chudley's head clean off his body. And I thought to myself, it must be some sort of like a hologram. You know, they've used AI or maybe they've used a 3D printer to render a head, perhaps when our backs were turned

for a moment when we weren't looking. Honestly, it was only when Chudley's head rolled off the block, rolled towards me, stopped at my feet. His head looked up at me and said, it's Robert, it's Robert.

He's finally got me, the bastard. And then, obviously, he died. And that's not a hologram? No, that's when I realised. That was the moment I thought to myself, that wasn't a hologram. And honestly, right up until the moment his head actually came off and I realised that that axe was real,

I was having an absolutely brilliant time. So obviously it's total chaos. You know, there are people screaming, tourists are running everywhere. The beefy thing, he's indiscriminately beheading tourists. You know, I'm in shock and grief and fear. Then I'm sick all over his head. And then before I know what's happening, I'm bundled into the back of a van by somebody from the security services. And we're off. We're screeching through the streets of london and they said to me you can't ever tell anybody about what's what's happened today and they said if you promise us now not

to tell anyone we can show you this movie we've got it's called despicable me and it's got these characters in it called the minions and they're really like cute and charming and you're gonna love it and this film will never be on general release so the only way to ever see it is to be silent about this incident wow that's a really weird sort of thing to have to think about isn't it i thought to myself so these people are responsible for murdering the love of my life and now they want to try and buy my silence with a film called despicable me and i know the law if there's one thing i know well if there's two things i know it's a apple disguise of the peach and it's the law so i said to them i said i'm not you can't silence me you know i'm a british citizen i'm going straight to

the police and i'm going to tell them everything. And that's when they were like, okay, you can do that. But if you do that, you can't watch Despicable Me. And I think that then they told me that Steve Carell did one of the voices. Right. Yeah. Okay. And then I was in the horns of a dilemma. Then I thought, you know, he's very, very talented.

Yeah. And they were saying, you'll never see this film you'll never see it and i guess more as the conversation goes on you're kind of building up this film in your head more and more is this kind of like this does sound good actually you know absolutely yeah because you know i i'm saying no no no this is about truth this is about justice and they were like yeah but you have to understand there's like the world, where the minions live. It's like a big cave and they go up and down on these like lifts and stuff. And I was like, this does sound good.

And I said, well, could I maybe watch like a bit of it? See if I like it. And then if I don't, if I do like it, I'll keep it quiet. And if I don't like it, well, then I'm going to go to the police and tell them that you've executed my boyfriend. And that was, they really didn't want to do that. They were, they said, no, no, no. You have to make the decision first. Then you can watch the whole film or you say no. And you, and you'll never. And I remember, I remember the, the word, the exact words, you will never watch watch despicable me and i think that's what i that's really when the decision was made and so you did say i will keep my silence and i'll

watch the movie i really wanted to watch despicable me so did you watch it then and there in the back of the van or were you taken to a cinema or how did that work yeah i was i was taken to a secure facility underground and and taken into taken to an mi5 briefing room and they'd set up a there was a projector and there was a a woman selling overpriced soft drinks they'd really they'd made a big you know they've made a big fuss so i i bought a drink and some revels and um um, you know, I sat down and yeah, you know, I mean, it's,

it's good. It's a good film. Now, obviously our listeners will be thinking, well, hang on, you know, your side of the bargain was to never tell anyone about this.

You've just told the beef and dairy network about this. We're a media outlet. This will go out to millions. You know, you've, you've told the world you haven't kept up your side of the bargain. No, because they didn't keep up their side of the bargain.

Right. Despicable Me was put out on general release. I see. And then they brought out Despicable Me 2, Despicable Me 3, the Minions movie, and Minions 2, The Rise of Gru. So everyone's seen it. That wasn't what was agreed so now i just i you

know i i have to tell my story i have to i have to blow the whistle i have to i have to do it for chadley i allowed my silence to be bought on the promise of being one of the only people to ever see Despicable Me. And that did not happen. Everyone's seen it. Everyone's seen it. Sir Robert. Yes. I will ask you again. Over and above the battleship and the execution of your brother,

did you abuse your position? I've got a story here from the daily telegraph in 2010 where they write what's going on is this american leather-clad kinky beef eater fucking the queen that i'm gonna be honest with you that makes me so angry because I don't fuck I make love in September last year we all said goodbye

to her majesty for the final time we said goodbye to Her Majesty for the final time. We said goodbye to our defender of the beef. Traditionally, the monarch's mannet beef is either buried alive with the monarch's coffin, or their tongue is cut out and they are exiled to a remote island. When a monarch dies, traditionally their mannet beef will not transfer into the following reign of the next incumbent of the throne. It's an incredibly close, incredibly complex relationship

between a monarch and a mannet beef. This is someone who will have spent their entire life delicately calibrating their own taste buds to the unique beef profile of that monarch with whom they've shared their life, their bond. It's a sad day, of course, because this is someone who has given themselves, given their life to serve a monarch of a foreign nation

in the interests of world peace, of diplomacy. But the sad reality is you've got to move along, you've got to move with the times, we've got to cut this guy's tongue out. However, Sir Robert wouldn't be buried with the Queen, and he wouldn't have his tongue cut out. Under the cover of darkness, he stole away from Buckingham Palace, because he wanted to keep his tongue, so that he could use it to blow the whistle on King Charles.

It's easy to assume that I'm a coward who loves his tongue too much, but I'm not a blind man, and I noticed many things about the heir to the throne over the years. I had a long time to observe him, and I will call him His Majesty Charles III, but that is, in my mind, just a title. It is not something that he fully embodies because we are talking about a man here, definitely more man than God,

who is, at best, ambivalent about beef wow not that he hates it not that he loves it but in his words could take or leave it and you've heard him say those words on many occasions what you're saying will be a huge shock to people listening because obviously it should be the british the british British monarchy and beef are intrinsically linked. They are custodians of the country's beef, and they are a conduit through which God and beef collide and create a kind of earthly avatar that they then embody. It's God's beef form on earth. God's form on earth, well, I mean, briefly Jesus Christ, but then beef has been the stand-in, if you like. So what was Charles doing that made you feel uneasy about this? He's gleefully telling people, shoehorning it into conversation when people aren't even talking about beef. But if he will say, you know, you could be talking about Formula One racing, and he'll say, oh, I could take or leave beef. And you'll say, we were talking about racing cars. And he'll say, oh, I thought I heard somebody say beef. Wow. And he would say, oh, I thought I heard somebody say beef. He's willfully doing this. So what is King Charles then? If he can take or leave beef, what are we talking about here? What kind of a person, if indeed we're talking about a person, would that be?

too far but you'd have to put your head in in the sand to not hear some of the conspiracy theories that are going around online hashtag lamb king um the idea that that charles is is a shewing beef entirely and instead has brought in a new regime of lamb at the palace can you shed any light on this what i do know is that it smells very minty around Buckingham Palace these days. I do know that this king wears more sweaters than any monarch before has ever done. I mean, he's got jumpers for days, this guy. He's got pullovers. He's got v-necks. He's got cardigans. A sweater every day, a new sweater every day. So I'm willing to say that, yes, this so-called king is eating lamb every chance he gets and has no compunctions about doing so. Now that's behind closed doors.

How soon until he's doing this in front of everyone? How soon until he's doing it in the Christmas address? Just sitting there with a big old slate of mutton in front of him and just eating it with his hands and licking his fingers, saying, boy, oh boy, do I love this lamb. And that's certainly going to please New Zealand. But are they part of the Commonwealth anymore? I don't think so. And I made sure of that. Well, thank you for giving us this wonderful interview, Sir Robert.

And I just want to say thank you for everything you did for our Queen. She was a wonderful woman. And I feel warm inside with the knowledge that she spent her last 30 years on Earth with you at her side, slipping her your beef. It was my purpose in life, and I was lucky to have it. And if God should ever reunite us again, I hope there's beef in heaven. And I hope my brother's not there. A big thanks to Sir Robert Battlebus,

now, of course, in hiding, and also to Professor James Harcum and to Timothy Spaglioni. And a final thanks to Her Majesty. We'll miss you, Babs Rascal. So that's all we've got time for this month. But if you're after more beef and dairy news, get over to our website now,

where you'll find all the usual stuff, as well as our off-topic section, where this month we reveal which moths you can trust. So, until next time, beef out. Thanks to Mike Shepherd, Paul F. Tompkins,

and Max Davis. And just to say that I think all of the tickets are now sold for our live show at the London Podcast Festival on the 16th of September. Sometimes some sort of last minute tickets kind of appear sort of on the day. I never quite understand why that is, but like 10 or so seem to always appear.

Don't quite know why that is, but in general, it's sold out. Thanks to everyone who's bought tickets. There are, however, still tickets to watch it as a live stream. And I think not only can to watch it as a live stream and i think not only can you watch it as a live stream if you have a ticket you can then watch it at any point during the following week so those are still available and there'll be a link in the episode description so there we go that was episode 99 oh my god okay zebras orangutans. Oh, yes, sorry. Hi. Not used to the animals talking. Who are you?

Yes, my name is Carrie Poppy. I co-host a podcast called Ona Ross and Carrie. This is my co-host Ross right here. Okay. We investigate spirituality, claims of the paranormal, and we were wondering if we could get on the ark. You did come two by two. I appreciate that. Though most of the things I'm letting on the ark don't talk.

I'm going to be talking all up on this boat. Do you mind both? I prefer ark or barge. Okay, I'm not listening. But if you let me on, then I will make my really good podcast on your boat, barge. Can you at least help clean up all the poop? I guess I don't see why not. Well, I'll check out the podcast.

Where do I find it? It's on MaximumFun.org. MaximumFun.org.