Off Menu with Ed Gamble and James Acaster - Ep 21: Dara O Briain

Episode Date: July 10, 2019

It's the grand re-opening of the magical restaurant, and our first guest in Series 2 is Dara O Briain! Not only does the 'Mock the Week' host talk us through his dream meal, he gets even with Aisling Bea and explains what helps him write all those jokes.Recorded and edited by Ben Williams for Plosive Productions.Artwork by Paul Gilbey (photography and design) and Amy Browne (illustrations).If you'd like to see more of Dara switch on your television. Or follow him on Twitter: @daraobriain.Follow Off Menu on Twitter and Instagram: @offmenuofficial.And go to our website www.offmenupodcast.co.uk for a list of restaurants recommended on the show.Ed Gamble is on tour. See his website for full details.James Acaster is on tour. See his website for full details.Watch Ed and James's YouTube series 'Just Puddings'. Watch here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, listeners of the Off Menu podcast. It is Ed Gamble here from the Off Menu podcast. I have a very exciting announcement. I have written my first ever book. I am absolutely over the moon to announce this. I'm very, very proud of it. Of course, what else could I write a book about? But food. My book is all about food. My life in food. How greedy I am. What a greedy little boy I was. What a greedy adult I am. I think it's very funny. I'm very proud of it. The book is called Glutton, the multi-course life of a very greedy boy. And it's coming out this October, but it is available to pre-order now, wherever you pre-order books from. And if you like my signature, I've done some signed copies,

which are exclusively available from Waterstones. But go and pre-order your copy of Glutton, the multi-course life of a very greedy boy, now. Please? Well, pull up a chair and tuck your napkin into your collar. It's the Off Menu podcast. Oh, good to hear your voice again, Ed. Everyone's missed it. Oh, it's been nice to have a little break, hasn't it? But lovely to come back and see you, James. Yeah, exactly. You know, we can't not eat forever. I don't eat in between series. Oh, that's not healthy. Well, I've decided that's what I'm going to do. It keeps me wanting. I eat only the meals from the podcast of series one. Oh, right. How's that been?

Oh, I'm very, very fat now, because I've just been eating three-course meals every day. Drinking 27 cans of Stella overnight. Yeah. Carriage really fucked me over. I've been drinking so many Stella's. I've been drinking so many Stella's. Did you hear that? Yeah, because you can't be expected to learn how to speak. I've been drinking so many Stella's. But it's series two now, James. We add in another menu to your diet, won't we? Finally. Today. And who? Who? The person adding variety to my diet today is the wonderful Dara O'Brien. Mock the week's Dara O'Brien. More like Mock the Food.

Is that good? Is that a good pun? Yeah, I think so. Don't look at Bonito. He doesn't know. It's got double vowels in it. Yeah, but it doesn't... I don't think it... Mock the food doesn't work. Consonant, vowel, vowel, consonant. That's how it works. And then that's a good pun. I don't think it's based on that. Are you thinking of countdown? Eat the food. Eat the food. Eat the food. Is a pun on Mock the week. Yes.

Yeah. Okay. I'll take it. Dara O'Brien from Mock the week. More like... Eat the food. More like... Okay, but you shouldn't have said more like again. Because I said more like. But that was a double pun. Because it's the same. It's a pun on Mock. Right. Well, it's lovely to be back. Dara was a great guest. Our secret ingredient that if Dara says he will get kicked out the restaurant is what, James? Cottage cheese. James always has cottage cheese like that. That's quite the reason he doesn't order it because he has to say it like that and he's been thrown out of many a cafe. But the main thing that we want to hear from Dara,

we do not want to hear cottage cheese, but we do want to hear what his favorite ever start at main course, dessert, drink and side dish are. That's what we want to hear and it better not contain cottage cheese. I don't think it's going to contain cottage cheese. Cottage cheese is disgusting. It's like a little baby's been sick. I absolutely hate it. It's just like mainly water. Yeah. And then like, this looks like, oh, this looks like it's kind of rolled off someone's body. Do you know what I mean? Not really, but it's a nice insight into how your brain works. It's like someone's, a human being's melted or something and it's just rolled off of them.

Well, hopefully Dara will not mention a melted human being in his lovely meal. He better not. Oh, we've been sent some nice stuff from drinks biscuits. Oh yeah. My brain can't make sense of that. What am I made to drink the biscuits? They're little biscuits, but they go with drinks, James. You can have a little gin and tonic, like one with a little wine or something, but that was very nice. Thank you. And also we compare them with some lovely wines that we've been sent from Leith's Wates Wines. Oh, the world is really sorting us out. We don't have to even think about what we eat anymore.

Mate, I'm absolutely loving this. Keep it coming, I say. Keep it going. We're encouraging it 100%. But for now, this is the off menu of Dara O'Brien. You get the fly? Yes. Oh, good job. We are joined in the dream restaurant by Dara O'Brien. Hello. Hello. How are you? Very well. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, here he is. Oh, wow. It's another smoke. Oh, it's fake. And now it's dissipating and it's... Welcome. Oh, James A. Caster from an amazing effect. Welcome along, Dara. Thank you for responding to me properly. Most people...

Sorry, there's a little bit of smoke there. Exactly. You're definitely, I mean, if you're only listening to this at home, you're missing half the effect there. It is amazing how much effort you put into creating the impression. Yeah. It's amazing. A French whorehouse, because that is... Yes. Or is it just that I see the front? Because that's my ideal restaurant. That's you. Yeah, yeah. Everyone sees a different thing. Okay. Yeah. I see like a classic 80, 90s.

Yeah. You've just kind of given yourself away there. You know, like when people like, then that politician tried to call another politician, I was like, isn't it appropriate on the Labour website, you are recommending the people that there's hot horny girls in that area? And then everyone was like, that's your algorithm. Yeah. That's like you just saying, oh, this is a whorehouse. It's like, uh, Dara. It's just because of your eyes. It's more the look I felt that you were aiming for, but maybe that sets off my food choices perfectly. We don't know. We don't know yet. It's like the magical place.

You're having snacks from... No, no, no. I'm now turning the hand. No. And your starter is a brothel soup. Oh, we laugh. The sophisticated laugh of a soldier returning from a war in the Crimea or something. I didn't know you spoke such good French, Dara. Oh, a bit. The, yeah, it's compulsory in our schools until they're 18. Is it? Yeah, it is. Yeah. I didn't know that. Well, I probably spoke, did French until I was 18, but I couldn't tell you any... Well, actually, B's done this podcast and absolutely,

you phobos off. She didn't do any French on it. No, that's true. Really? Yeah. I think she didn't speak any French, but she's... She didn't speak any French. She literally had to do French, by the way. She was in the same schools as my wife. She had to do French. Well, she's not using it like you are. Yeah. Well, you know, she wasn't, she doesn't do the scene setting in the same way. I did listen to the Action V podcast. Sure. In which she spoke a length of a meal that we all had. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I cannot remember.

But I've been in lobster and burger. Yeah. I don't remember how she can be going, um-num-num-num-num. Sure. This is the best thing ever. I don't want to sleep with any of you. Um-num-num-num-num-num, which is... It's so... Oh, I'm so relieved not to have any... There to be any sexual chemistry at all around the table. Um-num-num-num-num-num-num. That's heaven. Mary and I are trying to go, okay. That's fine. I'm glad you're settling scores at the top of the podcast.

Well, I'll get on to Osmond later. No, no, I remember... I'm very patty-safe. I don't remember the specifics of... We brought Ashton for a meal and it was the lobster. She'd always wanted to eat because she... There was no tension. There's no sexual tension. There's a lot of free... And the three married men that she was with. I don't confirm there wasn't any, but yeah, because I was really working hard on Ireland at the time, you know, really. You're a long way... You're Mrs. and Ireland at the moment, so...

Yeah. I didn't... I forgot that there was that crossover and that story was in there about Dara not being sexy enough for Ashton. You know, just no one except... Just despite the guys as sexy... I mean, just some sort of... Sure. ...fabos off with them. Yeah, sure. I look forward to seeing what dish you've prepared as a comeback to a later on. Yeah. Yeah, beef, obviously. Ever beef. With Ashton.

Well, you're very sexy in the restaurant right now. Thank you. Thank you very much. Everyone's been saying so. Oh, thank you. But that... They're all... The French prostitutes in the 1890s. That is literally what they're about to do. Oh, it's you. You are very sexy. Soldier returned from the Grand Bien. He really is. Actually, that's a good point. I don't doubt... I doubt they're working. But I said it to us when you weren't around.

Yeah, that's true. Oh, okay, okay. We said you were coming in and they were like, he's so sexy. Oh, yeah. Obviously, we don't see them as that. We see, you know, you and Ed see different things. Yeah. Yeah, you see them as, like I said, robots, don't you? Yeah, they're my genie robots. Yeah, okay. And Ed...

Squirrels. Oh, okay, fine. Little squirrels. They're just obviously squirrels. Yeah, it's pretty weird when they said you were sexy, actually. Yeah. I'm not happy with any of that. Please, no.

Are you a foodie, Dara? I like food. I think I'm... That's probably evident from a general manner of the way I carry myself. I like, you know, I enjoy... But I would have the same... I was kind of thinking about this in the way here because I felt I should give this a moment's thought. Yes, thank you. Thank you. We appreciate that.

But in some ways, it's probably a bit like if and when I go into a music podcast or do desert island disc or something or talk about something about my musical taste, I have a very broad but very shallow... Oh, I love Thai food. That dish, I love that dish. Oh, I love, you know, Mexico. I like that part of it, you know, so I... Yes. Yes, so I like a lot of different things, but few of them.

I heard someone yesterday, I've heard someone say... I love food. Food is awesome. I could eat all food. Was it yourself? Because it was exactly the sort of thing you would say. It wasn't myself, but like it was someone that I just thought... None of that, none of what you said means anything. And they were saying it like, you know, it's a group of people and they were trying to sound cool.

Oh, right. It wasn't just like someone being enthusiastic. It was like people were about to go into like a meeting. I should just met them all, was trying to sound real cool. I could eat all food. As if food was her thing. Yeah, I could eat all food. I could eat all food.

Yeah, but I see people saying that like, it's like music. Everyone, of course, everybody likes music. Yes. Yeah, the country's going, well, this island, we see it and I'm like, oh, Ireland is unique for its, you know, laughter and music. Everyone laughs, lads, everyone laughs. And there's music everywhere. Cavemen, hit rocks, there's music.

There's always been music. And food equally. Yeah, yeah, nom, nom, nom. I would go back for, I'd go back for seconds like food, but I'm not necessarily, well, I love what they've done with this. I would go to a restaurant just to have 60 different flavours. You know, that thing where you come out of somewhere like the Fat Duck, I've done the Fat Duck a couple of times.

And you go, oh, some chips would be just great now. It's been like 40 courses of different flavours. I totally appreciate that. Yes. But I'd also like to eat a meal. You'd like to fill yourself up. Yeah, there's a lot of like, I'm not saying that I would sit dipping the chips into, or take the headphones off to go,

oh, I suppose you enjoy this cloud of foam. Okay, I'll just put on some chips. Nom, nom, nom, nom. Can I just take the iPod to McDonald's? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've hacked the pod, and I'll just put on Ace of Spades. And I'm enjoying this more. The, the...

Did you have to do it? Is that, this is where you have to put the headphones in? Yes, there is. And the idea is, it sounds as the sea. So you hear seagulls and trawler men arguing. And nets and the rattling and that ding ding noise If you listen for too long, your body washes up on the beach. Yeah, and they go, oh my God, no!

Why, why? You have to take them. And shingle and stuff. And then you, and then while doing it, you eat a muscle. Oh, right. There you go, that's so much more. And to be honest, it's a lovely bit of theatre. It's a very interesting thing.

I love the idea of that. I'd be well on board with that. Yeah. You know I would be. Yeah, yeah, you'd like that. But then, I know your music tastes, you don't listen to sea music. No, I don't think you have to necessarily be in,

you're not like going, oh yeah, that's some good sea music. Yeah, it's not. Is that the whale song? Yeah. Sorry, what beach, what beach is this? Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it's me. You haven't heard of the beaches I'm listening to?

Yeah. You're a beach. Yeah, it's pretty. More of a cove. Yeah. Really? Yeah, you wouldn't know it. You wouldn't know it.

Yeah, it's more stony. But yeah, you listen, you like your sound. Oh, I hate stone beaches so much. I went on a stag do to Brighton, worst weekend of my life. Why did you even end up in the beach? What time of year was it? What?

It's last year when the World Cup was on. Oh, so somewhere likes it. Yeah, but they were like, they booked us kayaking. And I just was on the verge of tears the whole time. You got like, my back was absolutely killing me. I got no core strength at all. I wanted to lay back. It's another good thing for that, yeah.

Because you have to sit up while you're doing like, something you've never done before. Absolutely horrible. And then at the end of it, you have to take your kayak back to the shop and walk barefoot across a pebble beach. And I, the amount of times I nearly cried in front of little kids is embarrassing.

Oh, man, I hated it so much. And like. And unfortunately, there was someone there recording for Heslin Blumenthal's restaurant. So that's the big thing. Yeah, so someone would be eating this and be like, Oh, I wish I were dead. Oh, man.

I love writing in general, but that beach. And it involves adopting a position, the other one that you normally, like we did filming, I remember once with some in Thailand or something, and the guys would meet monks and you're supposed to sit in that position. And you know, I can't just physically. I can't sit on the floor.

Like, I went to Japan quite recently and we did a couple of those meals in proper kaiseki. Yeah. And it's impossible. So everybody else has to set their cross-legged and me sort of half kneeling down. And one leg, or one leg. One leg is in the jaw.

And the other leg has to be, by necessity, straight out, 90 degrees. In the groin of a waiter who's going, Yeah. Really? You're kind of insulting me. You're like, I can't, I can, I can have to do both of them.

Yeah. I can do one of them really well. And getting up is a whole other thing after sitting like that for an hour and a half. There was a place I had to wear the kaiseki in a Ryokan or something. And, but there was a dip in the floor. There was a little hole.

Yeah. Yeah, that's useful. Anyway. I like that cheat. Yeah. I'm going to put that in my house. Are you? Yeah.

Obviously, I have a little hole in the floor. I can sit and like, dangle my legs in it while I'm eating my food. Are you a flat or a house? I'm a flat. Upstairs. Is an upstairs flat? Yeah, yeah.

Second floor. I just, I'm just teasing out a possible design flaw with that, that me. Well, I see what you think. Yeah. Yeah. I'm just saying. Yeah.

I don't see the problem. There's a design flaw with that design flaw. Yeah. Absolutely. Well, I think so. So you're going to... The funny thing is, those legs belong to James A. You know what I mean?

No, they do. They do, actually. Oh, yeah. No, because they could see up into my flat. I just do two little holes for my legs. Yeah. I sit there and dangling my feet into the flat. Yeah, yeah.

But yeah. You're going to lose a lot. They won't tickle my feet. Yeah, they're going to lose a lot of socks. That could tickle my feet though. I don't put my shoes on. Can I do it? There's so many issues with it.

Otherwise, I would tickle my feet when I'm eating. Would there be other times when I go... I want to take off my shoelaces together. Would there be other times when I go, oh, James is a lady back. Oh, yeah. James is entertaining. I think I was coming through to see this.

Yeah, yeah. I could do that anytime I wanted to think I've got a lady around. Yeah. Put on my tights on the higher heels and put those through the holes. Yeah. Dharma, would you like sparked in or still water? Still water for camp, please. Always still?

Yours is still man? Always still. I can't stand the taste of sparkling water. I think it's a dreadful thing. Yeah. It is weirdly the thought experiment that we had when we were children when soda stream was popular in Ireland.

Sure. Yeah. Oh, I'm sorry. Soda stream was aspire to in Ireland. I never had soda stream. Soda stream was something that the O'Connor's had it. And we would go around to the O'Connor's. My uncle had it.

My uncle had soda stream. But no, I never had soda stream. Yeah. Whenever I'd go over there, I'd be like, first, straight through the door. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I didn't even take my shoes off. Straight to the soda stream.

Fizzy lime, please. Fizzy lime. Fizzy lime. That was your one? Yeah. I don't remember having enough to establish a pattern of what I wanted. I do know that the thought experiment was,

what would you do if you did it with water? What would it taste like? Yeah. And then a massive industry swung in behind that notion. I mean, I only idly mentioned that. And then kickstarted a whole thing that I now I think should apologize for. So the whole fizzy water thing was because I,

as a seven year old, mused on the what if, you know, tweeted in some form of early kind of. You were running for office at the time. You said it in one of your rallies. Yeah, I did. What if I said by the giant boats on myself? And they said it as a ridiculous thing. My opponent is the sort of person who would bubble

a fire in the tap water. But yeah, that's how, that's how little he, how much of an establishing deletion is. And that was a bit of my poppy's moving to try it out. But that idea remained. And then the major company. No, I think, I think it's really, I find a brackish term he's all the time.

Brackish term he's all the time. I've never heard you say brackish. Right, no. Well, you know, for example, you were married to me. It would have gone past the point of a joke about 14 years ago. That's just, you know, I'm a brackish and tart. You say that to the waiter every time.

Yeah, that is, I find that brackish. Still, please. I find sparkling brackish. Right. But it's a bit bitter. It's a bit, it's a unpleasant term. Yeah, I never really go for it. I think it's fine with a little,

with a wedge of lime again. I think I just like fizzy lime. It's fine with a wedge of lime. Okay, we will come to this. The insertion of fruit into a drink is that the drink has not been designed with that fruit in mind. Right.

I object to this and I have objected to this. I have done this. We may mention other cola-based drinks later as the next thing goes on. But this idea of like, oh, this is the thing you ordered. But I've taken on myself to put in a really strong flavour on that you didn't ever ask for. Okay.

Sounds like someone has never had a Jack Bauer and Coke. I beg your pardon. What's a Jack Bauer and Coke? When I worked in a kitchen. Oh, here we go. I would get... The Mash King. This is before I was the Mash King.

Yeah, okay. I was the Mash King at the next kitchen. I worked at this as the first one. After work, I'd always get a pint of Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola? Yeah. Yeah, okay. Was that one of your funny jokes

you used to make in the kitchen? It was called a Coke. Me and David Tren called it Coca-Cola. Right, okay. I always have done. And then... Stop trying to make Coca-Cola a thing. It's not working.

If it stopped at you and Tren, it's definitely not working. A lot of things I've said on this podcast. Catch on then. Yeah, okay. Coca-Cola is definitely now going to catch on. Yeah. It's why is it not Coca-Cola?

God, that would be... Is that too much? A bit babyish in it, too. Okay, you're right. It was just the right amount of babyish. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm taking it too far. Coca-Cola.

I've infantilized it. It's too far. Yeah, yeah. That was a bit silly. Okay. But, yeah, I would never say that. But I would get a pint of Coca-Cola and I would always ask.

So, I hated ice in... So, you were fruit with drinks. Yeah. I'm lucky with ice. I think it's a false commodity up in there. The coniness is water's down your drink. I don't like having ice in the soft drink. Well, it cools your drink.

Are you happy with the process by which it cools your drink? Nah, not a... It's not a fair swap. It's not a trade. I don't like the trade-off. You get a cooler drink, but it gets watered down. No, thank you.

And also, you don't get as much of the drink in there because the ice takes up all the room. Oh, no, no, listen. Listen, we all registered that as one of the great scams, which is the... A glass filled to the top with ice and then a small jet of cola.

And I've... I have gone... Kohli. Kohli. I have gone... I'm sorry, sir. This is a quality restaurant. Take this Kohli back and send me

a fuller Kohli. Or while I... I have gone... As a notion, it's brackish. And you do that to me. Or when they sell you the tiny bottles, the 20-centiliter bottles, and that's your 3.50 worth of Kohli.

I am not doing this. And I will stamp and I will scream in my high chair until you give me the proper... I find that could be complete rip-off. So what I would do instead was... And to be fair, I guess, in a way, this is also just filling up a glass.

But I would literally get them to put as much of the sliced up fruit in the glass as they could. So just loads of lemon, orange and lime is what we had at this pub. And they would just fill it with that and then put the Kohli Kohli all over that. And then I would just let it sit for a bit.

So all the fruit, like a punch, soaked into the Kohli Kohli and I would drink it. And a few people in the pub saw me doing this and started copying me. And there's about four of us who used to do this after work. And then when I was not around, one of them named it a Jack Bauer and Coke.

Now, there was no reason why it was called a Jack Bauer and Coke at the time. A few of them were just watching 24 quite a lot. And so they called it that. I was not happy with the name. No, no. Especially because I was the one who invented it. And then I didn't get to name it.

Yeah. And then they named it something that I wasn't even watching myself. But that is what it's called. It's a Jack Bauer and Coke. That sounds like a terrible drink. It doesn't sound good. It was nice at the time.

Was it nice? Why did it add notes to it? So fruity. Such a delicious. Now, Kohli Kohli are doing it all the time. They're releasing stuff. It's like, oh, peach flavor. Yeah.

And all these different flavors, like lemon and all that. This is natural fruit flavors. This is what they're going for when they do it and they never achieve it. So they'll get all the artificial flavors. This is natural fruit in the cougar cougar. But it does seem like, you know,

it's like precious. But I like the flavor of, well, the diet ones now more than the original. Yeah. They're funny with the therapy now. Yeah. I do, but I've got a lot of flak on that. Yeah, you have.

I'm not in line for saying that. Really? Yeah. Yeah. I find, yeah. Who get really angry? They do. They do.

They do. They do. That sort of thing. They should just start. If you feel it rising in you as any of us speak, just check us. Just take a moment and go, it's a big universe.

It's bit the pips and feel the taste of things being varied. It is. But I just like the taste of it. And so my life is a constant struggle of finding a spirit improvement and not just the scooping out of it. Yes. Because sometimes it's buried under an iceberg

when you've got to take some of the ice out to get the thing to get the bit of lime out. Yes. But then you're left with, now I'm holding a piece of lime, a dripping piece of lime at the table. And I'm not supposed to just put it under the cloth. This has a really good potential

for a spotted in heat magazine. Ah, I feel a piece of lime. Holding a little bit of lime. Not the weak host Dara O'Breen digging around for a bit of lime and then holding it whilst it drips onto the table. Some barman did, I did, it added me into a thing where he said,

I had that at Dara O'Breen in there complaining about the lemon or the ice drink. Like, yeah, you put another flavour in. Like, and it's a really strong flavour. It's like, oh, that's a nice drink. Maybe like some ketchup in it. No, I don't want you to add another. I order because I like this flavour.

Good idea, though, for new pubs, then we'll put ketchup in the Coca-Cola. Yeah. Okay. Dara started it. Is that Tony Soprano and Coke? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tony Soprano and Coke.

Pop it on the door, Brad, Dara. Oh, geez. Pop it on the door, Brad. God, you pick your moment. Even when you know it's happening. Even when you was fully aware that this was going to happen at some stage. I mean, it's not even an issue, it's Brad.

But, uh, but... Oh, wow. Nice. He's surprisingly aggressive. I don't think he comes across as aggressive on the podcast. Yeah, well, people didn't ever experience it in person. In the podcast, I listen to it and think, you know... Yeah.

That's pretty funny. Also, it has got more aggressive. Yeah, I feel you have to be raising it now. There's certain people that I know have listened to it. You know, you gave away early doors in this podcast. You listened to Ash's episode. I was like, he's going to know it's coming. I've got to make sure I pick my moment,

get you talking about Coca-Cola. Me distracted. Yeah. I mean, I had to be being here and the... I mean, this is the order of it. I mean, this is the format. Yeah, yeah. But still.

Yeah. Still. Those are very aggressive ones to be fair, yeah. It was a very aggressive one at the end. Um, the answer after I've been startled and recovered my composure. By the way, am I still holding a piece of lime? You are, for the whole meal, I'm afraid.

That doesn't seem like a dream restaurant. And it never dries. Yeah, and it just comes to me. I'm like, even when it does dry, they come over and top it up. Your lime has dried and they give you a little bit of lime. Here is that. They've got a little, like, just cotton bud with water

and they just sort of base the top of it. Yeah. So I'm just standing there with it pooling underneath. Under the best. Yeah. So yes, bread. Bread, absolutely bread. Poppidoms, fine in place, but like I wouldn't, you know,

they're there if they're there. And they're such a conduit for chutney. They're just, I mean. Oh, the words for that. Yeah. Like, I just can't wait. Yeah. But they are there.

They're thick. No one will go, well, I've got a bit of poppidom now. It is just the, it's a chutney fork. It is a large break at your own size chutney fork. Chutney, the red one and that other sort of yogherty, milky one. That's, what is that? Is it just mint?

Mint yogurt. Mint yogurt. Oh, fine, good. Then I back my own decision to have a very different thing. Let's just go back a little bit. It's pronounced conduit. Is it, that's how it's pronounced? Conduit, yeah, the word.

You want to say it for a laugh? No, no, it's conduit. Okay. Yeah. Driver, yeah, to drive. Okay. I've been saying conduit. I'd say conduit as well.

Conduit, yeah. Okay. Oh, listen, actually, I'm like, I'm sorry. Maybe people do. No, no, no, no. But I would look around, Dara. Where are we? You say conduit so all the ladies understand what you mean.

Oh, I don't know what you're laughing at. Oh, my God. Oh, hello. I wasn't challenging your idea. I was just like, in the past, I've been burnt on this show by like, you know, saying blimmies and stuff. Yeah. Blini.

Instead of blinis, James had been saying blimmies. I've got a few of those. Oh, I've got a very good one. I just forgot one of those that I only found out last week. Oh, no. Do you remember I found a knock? Yeah, Gillette. Everything, Gillette, for some time.

That's the problem, yeah. But apparently I've been a fool. But I've found ladies. And now the ladies are all wearing gelets. Because that clearly is what I like. My granddad was very good for those. He's from Northern Ireland. And instead of Peugeot, he used to say Puget,

even though he was told time and time again that it was not a Peugeot. It was Peugeot, not Puget. Was it Puget, we said, as well, on Ireland? Puget, he would say. OK, that's maybe wrong. And I mean, it rarely came up, but Femme Fatale was Femi Fatali. That does come up very rarely.

And when it does, it's usually in contexts where it's a bit like the Coca-Cola. Femme Fatale ruins it. Like at the end of like a top quality, 1998, like Malice or one of these films, or that one with Kathleen Turner and all William Hart, which is already body heat. Right.

Right, at the end, she goes, well, I just, I guess, I'm just that Femme Fatale. What is courtroom drama? Jagged Edge or whatever. Are you Femme Fatale? Femme Fatale? Yeah. Also, Edge, don't think it hasn't gone unnoticed

that you just tried to score points of your lineage. Really, really slid that under the doormat, didn't you? If you've got a green card, play it with me. He did it straight away. Because in this current, I don't know when this is going out, post-Brexit or pre-Brexit. Sure. At some points, it's going to be very different

post-Brexit show, isn't it? Yeah. So fruit, remember fruit? Yeah. Remember vegetables? They were great. Remember non-British apples? Well, what's quite good about this podcast

is people send us food for free now. So all we're doing is stockpiling. We are. A couple of little... Is that why there's like a big bag of rubber dums? Rubber dums, yeah. They're on the table. That's why Edge imagines scribbles

because they help us score all the food up. In a little song, in the tree. It's a good song when they stack them up. Bread, by the way. Totally bread. Is there a certain bread? Yeah. Do you know what the one that, if this is the dream,

those ones that comes in a loaf? Like a crispy loaf? White, obviously, like a fool's here. But a little crispy loaf, and you can take it like a quarter of the loaf and take that apart. That's quite a... It's like the one in Ratatouille that she squeezes.

There's a bit in Ratatouille where the lady that he makes friends with is the best sign, and she just says that bread is all about the sound and she squeezes this bread, and it sounds amazing. It's the best sign in bread. Oh, wow. Yeah, there you go.

Have a good night of bread. Yes. They're like the 1890s. This is going to be the 1890s theme. I'm like a Daimler car horn. To alert the man walking in front of the flag. Butter, Dara? Yeah, there's a butter.

I'll have to take salted or unsalted. I'm all right. It comes with a little round ramekin dish. That'd be great. Yeah, it's a more rather dish for you. Yeah, I feel that's part of the experience. And not that I have to slice it away in layers and then apply the layer to the bread

and take another slice, but I'd like it to be now for a while, so then just move smoothly. That's what I think. I would also go for the dippy, oil and vinaigrette thing. You want to go for both? Yeah, for the hell's of it.

You can, you can. You can have both. I'm doubling up on all of this, lads. So spread on the butter and then dip in the oil. No, no, I wouldn't. And then one day I might do the butter. I don't care. Mix it up.

And also if there's a tap and add, like a bit of olive tap and add or something, you know what I mean? While we're doing this. Everything on this, like whatever. Come tap and add would be great. I think this is the first mention of tap and add. This is the first tap and add mention.

I'm not really sure what we're talking about. Oh, it's just, it's, it's like olives, crushed your little things. It's like, it's like, it's a spread. Amnesia or like spread. Amnesia, like a spread with a bit of some vegetables. But yeah, but that's a bit, I think you spread it like,

but it's often mixed with butter, I think. And so it's a straight onto the bread. Oh, I've never had this before. It sounds delicious. That's why I'm on the street. It's very, I think it would be. It's very nice. Yeah.

It's not like a hummus or something like that. Like whatever it was. It's very grown. It's a very grown up taste. Okay. When did you first have a tap and add then? God within the last, I don't know, 10 years. I wasn't on offer.

I don't know. I don't remember going, hmm, this will change everything. Remember that. Remember this day, darling. Remember the day we discovered tap and add. Yeah. I do know that the oil and vinaigrette thing

really tundered into our lives around about 2002, 2003. I remember because I just moved over to London and suddenly everyone was doing it. And I sort of, well, well, here in the London, and now are you all doing this now? I knew arriving in London like all the lights,

you're spinning around in the middle of Oxford Circus and then suddenly there's oil and vinegar. Everywhere. Everywhere. Jets are coming in and all over, all over the statue in Piccadilly, all over the Eros just splattered with vinegar and vinaigrette and oil.

It was an awful situation. One for the Fatberg now. Yes. It's a historical remnant of that one sequence when that all went oil and vinaigrette. Yeah. It's a game of ratios that it is. It is an exciting thing to have to break to one layer

to get to the other layer. It's like a liquid cream egg. You have to get to one layer to get to the yumminess that's like kicky yumminess of the thing, of the vinegar underneath. But if there's too much of one, then it's just, all you've done, you've just created a Molotov cocktail.

You've created like the swaddling for a bomb. That's one of the reasons you've created an oily mass. And now you've got that in your hand and like the lime in the other. Like it's... And the Chappanard, that's a right off now. You can't go anywhere near that. Well, you can.

I mean, these are all have to be applied to different batches. Which is why you want the mini loaf that has the whole... Yeah, yeah, tear it up. Cream eggs. Yeah. Their whole campaign of how do you eat yours and stuff like that.

Remember that? I do remember. Yeah. Yeah. When there's only one piece. Have you ever seen anyone eat a cream egg in any way but one? I mean, there's not... You nod the top off and then you lick the middle out

and then you eat the rest of it. Well, actually, maybe it's different. Well, hang on. Sorry. What is the other way of doing it? You just bite into it and eat it. Oh, oh, really? That's what I would do.

Yeah, just much away at it. No, you... That's the squirrels, right? You nod. Like little, like tiny... No, you nod away and you... You nod the top off. Do you...

Oh, dear. Okay. Until you create like a whole large enough to insert your tongue. To lick the whole thing. To lick the whole middle out. To lick the whole middle out. And then you eat the shell. And then you eat the shell.

Yeah. That's absolutely the way you do it. I just think that's a very... I think we know what's going to make it taste like a thing next year. Yeah. Oh, okay, right. Mara's virus, right? Mara's virus, right?

Shut them up on your ass. No. What are you doing with that? It's just eating. You eat the toffee layer off and then you fold it over to create a milky way. All right. It's a cream egg.

Yeah, that's what you do. You nod them and you lick out the middle. Well, you don't. But, I mean, you should say I. Wonder. That's what I do. Well, yeah, it does that. That's what I do.

Sensible consumers. Yeah, one is in one person. Yeah, one person in the world. But you just... The whole arse and one... No, not the whole arse. No, I don't think you're pulling him out and then... And then, yeah, punch his head in the jaw

to create an explosion. But you just bite the top off. Maybe another bite in the side. You just keep this bite. Eat it like an apple. It's a cream egg. I know what. You throw away the middle.

No, no, throw away the middle, to be fair. Yeah. David Trent, come back to David Trent again. Once he gave his son... We called them cream yuggies. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, he gave his son a chocolate orange for Christmas and his son had never had a chocolate orange before.

And he just sat there and ate it like an apple. What would you like your starter to have? The starter... I find the starter... It's quite a... I find the starter menu to be quite an appealing one in terms of... It's a wonder that... It hasn't...

It's never kicked off the old starters thing unless you call it tapas and then fine. Sure. But there was one in Middlesbrough. Starters only restaurant. Which was next door to the cinema that did Two for One Wednesday. And we went in to see some dread film we were touring in Middlesbrough about the loom of fate and...

And you did a show... Wanted. Wanted. Yeah, a series of international assassins. And then came out and the place was packed with Two for One Wednesday and all the students would come out for Two for One Wednesday. That was a very popular thing to turn out that initiative. Yeah, you're the surprising.

Yeah. Next door there was a starters only restaurant. Where you could just order your wings and your, you know... Friedo Misto or whatever, that's all they had. And I thought that must be genius. But actually it's never really worked. It's not taken off. It's not taken off as a thing.

Yeah, whereas I happily... Yeah, I think they're a glorious thing. But like I mean, there's loads I like. The one I would go for it was on the thing. Because I was... The philosophy I took was... Okay, if I was just there and I happened to see this... I had it in Vietnam once.

And which brings up... Ideas, oh my God, was a very exotic mixture of spices. It was in a French restaurant in Vietnam. And it was chowder. Creamy fish chowder in a bread bowl. Yes. Oh, yes. And a bread bowl is just makes it...

With a hash... With a hat even though it lit, it was still slightly off. Joey, I had the best chowder I've ever had. Belfast. Really? Yeah. In whatever hotel it was I was staying. I can't remember what the hotel was.

But it did this amazing chowder. I was there for three days and I had it twice. That's how good the chowder was. Absolutely delicious. Loved it. Things that Belfast does very, very well. Belfast does... It got into whole pop-up restaurants a little bit later and does things very well.

Belfast... Bougiamt and Belfast does the best burrito in the world. Bar maybe... Mexico, perhaps. Yeah, but in this part of the world. Because they do a thing that nobody else thinks to do, which is you go along the line and you go, no, no, no, no. And then they...

At the end they do a thing. They do a little shaky, shaky thing. So all the favourites mix. They shake the burrito. They shake the burrito. This seems like, why has nobody done this? You shake the burrito and therefore you mix the flavours. And it's not like, you know when you're eating a burrito.

And burritos are great because they really... Like, I like them as a mathematician because you get a strong sense of exactly what the volume of food you're eating. It is H multiplied by 2 pi r. That is exactly what you do. Yeah. Have eaten. The...

Yeah, pi r's great, actually. Sorry. So you totally know the volume of food. I will eat this cube of food and I've eaten this. But when you bite into it, some of it is like, I seem to be again going mainly through... Just rise for eight years. Rise for a while.

Oh, now I've hit the... And so that sounds... What's a green... Maybe it's a guacamole. I know it ends with guacamole. And not like in a fun barucasol chewing the... Do you think, oh, I'm... Now I'm having soup.

It's lovely. It's going on my throat. I'm going to get somewhere in here this chicken. And I'm going to get to the chicken. So much is about things you get through to get to the thing you want to do. Yeah, absolutely. A trifle. But Boojums, genius, shaky, shaky, shaky, shaky, shaky.

Just a case of like flipping the mattress a bit. Flipping the... You know, you're not knocking the balance that it's sitting on, right? Giving it a couple of goes. And then all the flavor and then every bite. Yeah. Hold up, but they're not shaking. This is before they've wrapped the burrito up.

Before they wrapped the burrito up. Yeah, okay. It's open. I had an image that they'd wrapped the burrito up. Like a cocktail. And then they'd shake out the cocktail and stuff like that. Yeah. And I was like, how is that even...

They do tricks. They're throwing it in the... Yeah, yeah, yeah. That would be... If they could do that, like in a roller-down one, I'd do that for you. But no, they'd do a little thing and then they'd say, and you go, you are a genius. That is good.

So I prefer burrito bowls. Just naked burritos. Oh, really? So you can mix. I can mix it all then. Yeah. And I find... I don't get as full as I get with a normal burrito afterwards.

I can't deal with a burrito. And that is basically a nap for me. That is a... Yeah. That is a really good nap. A really good solid arrival of... Yeah. Just everything in there.

It's just too good. Pyro Square at Times H amount of food. Yeah, it's just good to me. I think I love everything. And also, you can pick and choose. Weirdly, I had one the other day in Norway, in an airport in Norway, in Buda Airport, or Tromsø Airport, in Northern Oregon.

There's doing gigs up there. And the guy said, oh, we don't have burrito. And then he went the other way along the line. What? He went the other way. And he said, would you like some... I forgot the name. I think again, it's green.

Guacamole. And I said, yes. So he smears that onto the bread first. Whoa. Then smears the salsa on. Gives the option of sour cream, which is a gift, because it's white and cold. And that's what it generally looks like.

And then worked his way backwards to the meat, right? Wow. And so the second... And there was no rice, which was a bit of a plot. But the... He got to the beans. He said, I think we want some beans. This is great.

What beans have you got? Expect them to say pinto and... Black beans. Black beans and pinto beans, right? And he goes, baked beans. And it literally was just Heinz baked beans, right? And I had two things fighting. First was my urge to be in some way culturally correct.

And somebody noticed. It has to be made with... Was shouted down by a boy going, you love Heinz baked beans. Like, you're very happy to have Heinz baked beans with any meal. You'll have Heinz baked beans. So just have the Heinz baked beans. But you're not obliged to force him to then go, all right, we'll get you some pinto beans.

Yeah. But he was like, he said, yeah, baked beans. Was it good? It was grand. It was fine. It sounded like a really weird breeze. It was so nice. So nice, but about Heinz baked beans.

But Heinz baked beans, yeah. And then he broke some natures in for crispiness. Oh, that's good. Oh, yeah, yeah. I like that. I like that idea. Look, it worked. It was a very pleasant breed.

It wasn't as quite as... I think without rice and baked beans, was it not too saucy? I just imagine you taking one bite and it just flopping over and just loads of baked beans. Yeah. But he had nothing so heavy in the salsa. Like, when you make them yourself and you lift it up

and you have to make that little nappy at the bottom for it, you know, where it folds. Yeah, and it's actually quite traditional nappy. You fold over, fold the legs in. Are you happy there now? And then you ease it because it all pulls at the bottom. Yeah. So anyway...

How's about this chowder, darling? Chowder and a bread bowl. Chowder's lovely. Chowder's gorgeous. Chowder's the finest thing that they've ever done. What fish is in the chowder? I think you can vary it. Yeah.

I believe there was... Broad, there'll always be some chunky white fish. Depending where you are, you see the proper part of the world. And some prawns. That's enough, you've got two times the fish, three times the chowder. It's impressive enough. Not too heavy on the corn for me,

but tons of cream, you know. You know, yeah. There was a festival in Kinsale that only ran for one year, the Kinsale Comedy Festival. And we all went out to this comedy festival and it was a total disaster. It hadn't been our festival, so nobody's had any of the shows.

I mean, two of the shows got pulled, which is a total result, because all we were doing was going from seafood restaurant to seafood restaurant and eating chowder. Chowder festival. And the outstanding addition to it was we were queuing up for chips late one night and there was a thing,

like a round ball of something in batter. And there's a guy ordering it and we were going, what is that like? And it's a potato in batter. Just with a full battered potato. A battered potato for the full carb thing late at night. What kind of potato? Was it like a jacket potato?

Roasted potato? Do you know what? I don't think it's roast. Roasted, I don't think you'd like roast thing in oil and then put the batter in there for more oil on it, because it could be just a large boiled potato. But it's better. Would you have that with chips?

Yeah, he did. He had battered potato chips. That is absolutely amazing. But yeah, so I'm not saying all... I mean, we weren't going to chuck around any stereotypes, but that is a great story. We haven't got, we'll get to it. We'll get to a potato.

We'll get to a potato. But yeah, I think chowder is a fine thing. I can name great chowders I've had. Legendary places I do just do. Do you eat the bowl? Sorry, not tradition, but yeah, in this situation, specifically, yes, with the bread, yeah, you do, yeah, you do. You break off a dip, break off a dip,

and you work your way down the bowl, I think. I've already had bread, and now you're having a bread bowl. Wait, wait, wait, okay. I'm... This is a fancy restaurant in which I can do whatever I want. Absolutely, absolutely. There's no judgements. There seem to be.

No, no, no, just need to ask him. Oh, see, yeah, it's like the 1890s. Most of the grocery trees. Cabo, cabo, Ali. Cabo, you're the lady. Oh, Emily Cup. I mean, just don't get ahead of ourselves. But would you like all of the crockery tonight

to be made of bread up and sort that out? It's not that I need to eat through the whole everything that I want to be nothing left by the end. Well, we could do it. Look at the table out of bread. Oh. The chair. The chair has the blue and tall would do.

Yeah, he would do everything apart from the bowl made of bread. Yeah, why don't you put me in a normal bowl? In bread for the meal. Put the bread in through and I'll slowly eat my way out. And then I emerge at the end. Like a reverse creme haig. I'll emerge out of the thin hole at the top. Still holding a little lime as you're on the front.

Tunnel your way out with the bread. Yeah, no, there's a path from one. So yeah, I remember that being absolutely lovely. But it's just a combination of a couple of other things. But the dipping in, the creaminess of it. Oh, God, very, very good. Chowder is very underrated and I think most people forget about it. So I'm glad that it's been brought up in this podcast

because I always forget how much I love chowder. And then when it's on a menu, it's like, you know, sometimes you're at a disco or something. You're at a disco. You're looking at me as if I go to a disco. You're always at disco here, aren't you? Oh, yeah, good point, actually. I love a disco.

Yeah. It's like the best songs are the ones that you absolutely love, but you forgot about. Yeah. And they play on me like, oh, yeah. That's what chowder is. So that's what, if you see chowder on a menu, you go like, tune.

Yeah. I would not go like this. Grabbing the person you're with and screaming in their face. Yeah. Do you remember chowder? Do you remember chowder? Say it, Frenchy. Yeah, that's what it always reminds me of.

As soon as you said chowder. Chowder. Chowder. Chowder, yeah, I know. And we come on to your main course. My main course, yeah. What was it like? Well, see, I went around the house a bit on this.

I'm going, what do you, you know, how fancy it has to go or what do you think? But honestly, it'd be meat. Yeah. Meat off the, I mean, thematically, meat that is falling off the bone, broadly speaking. So like a ribeye, like a, and not even meat I eat is as carnivorous as this, but I'm here.

I'm here now. Sure. And, or the ribs, very good ribs. Very good ribs falling off the bone. Wet-robe rather than dry-robe, I think. Yeah. Yeah. That is emerging delightfully.

You got all the sauce. Yes. The whole thing. But actually lamb, lamb. Oh, yes. Lamb shank. Yeah, that's the ultimate falling off the bone experience, isn't it?

You're really left with a proper bone in the meat. And actually, I've had an Indian that's, Indian lamb shank is fantastic. It's a couple of places to do that. Yeah. And it's pointed, if I see that, if they have it's gujarati or something, they're gujarati lamb and shank, it's like one of the visual effects where all the other letters,

like a credit secret, all the letters, powder away. Like the end of that big movie that appeared last year that we still can't spoil, I presume. All the other characters on the thing just go to dust. And I just, that now, that is the thing. Yeah. Absolutely. But I once, we filmed years ago, I think I'll three men on a boat.

And the very end of the very first episode was Griffry's Jones, was on an island somewhere preparing a meal, where it's myself and Rory. And the contrivance was that we found a pub and we decided to stay there rather than go back to the island. And surprising amount of people for years felt that we genuinely had left Griff on a zone on an island. And there's obviously like a camera crew and everything.

And I'm still entirely sure that Griff, this has been explained to Griff. So they got an honest reaction off him, but we were all the time going, they're not going to leave him before we stay here. And it's great. But what sealed it here for me is, I saw them carrying lamb shank through the restaurant.

An order of lamb shank and it came with two shanks. Double shankage. Double shankage. You actually could, you could, you could mind being all of that part of the sheep. Like they, yeah, you could do anything, whatever. So it's a lamb, we've done lamb in the past at home, where you just lashed in the oven for eight hours

on a really low heat. Yeah. And I glazed it up actually, usually with like a balsamic glaze. And it just comes off the bone beautifully. Every time I have lamb shank, I'm surprised by how like moist it is. Oh yeah, sure.

Delicious. I don't think I've ever had a bad one. It's just like, yeah, living in Britain. Yeah. Growing up with dry lamb. I'm going to say that. Dry? What?

All the lamb in my childhood was dry. I don't think I liked lamb. Oh, I think. For years, I thought, I don't like lamb. It's the worst of all the meats. And then I went to New Zealand and everyone was like, lamb is the best. What are you doing?

Gave me some lamb. Yep. And it was amazing. I've been living the dark. Well, were you eating lamb chops and like lamb? There was kind of weird on the cutlet, like where there's like a tiny bit of lamb. A tiny bit of lamb on the end of a stick.

And it's like a lamb lollipop. And then you get one bite off. It will lamb you pop. And it doesn't matter how many they put onto the plate. Yeah. If you want to have the lamb cutlets, there could be 19 of them on the plate. Normally, there's three, which is a ludicrousy small amount.

Well, I went to Tayabs recently. The, I think it's a Pakistani restaurant in. It's very famous. It's in Whitechapel. And they're famous for their lamb chops. And it was with my girlfriend. And I was like, we'll get three orders of lamb chops. She was like, that's ridiculous.

And I was like, just you wait because there's only, there's only a couple of bites on each one because they're mainly they're like little lamby pops. And it's just, you just go through a whole plate of them. They're absolutely delicious. But they are like, you just, it's like someone's had to go at them before they've arrived. Yes.

And you always end up in a really good, just go on. No, this, this, this is, there's something in this. This thin strip of meat on the other side of the bone. That's, that's yourself to have that as well. So like people really go crazy on the lobster going, no, I think, I think, like, am I still ever a good feeling that I have, there's been a bit of lobster. I've not been told about it.

And all these years I've left it behind. Sure. A hidden bit. Yeah. There's a hidden lobster, an Easter egg of lobster, that if you don't know. So Dari, have you not been. All this time you've not been.

You've not been eating the lobster. You've been eating just lobster brain. That's all brain there. And brain and fingernail, you believe it. It's like a stick. But it's, it's like. A huge stick. I mean, we never say it because it seems crap.

But that's, that's what we said. It's a lobster stick. It's not the meatiest stick in the ocean. Yeah. I mean, why we ate it. It's a butter sauce. We do like, the brain thing was just to like, you know, we have that kind of, we made it for the soup.

The stock. The bisque. We did some bisque with the brain with a cock. Lobster cock. Is, is what you're supposed to call. Bite off the top and suck up the middle. What are you doing? What's the matter with you?

You got a cream, I get. The, yeah. But the, with the lamb chopper, do you go really? And I'm not annoying at it. Like an animal. I don't. The shank, you get a lot of bang for your butt with a shank. You do?

You get a lot of. And you, the shank is 360 degrees. Yeah. There's the shank you do. Like you go, hello. Hello ladies. There's more of this. Like, you know, much like the adobe or something.

And you go, oh, I'm finished. I'm not, I'm back in this again. Well, as soon as it's your dream restaurant, we can present it for you if you like on a, on a rotating plate, like a constantly rotating plate. Made of bread, don't worry. So you can. No, I like it.

I like it, you know. You like the surprise of flipping it over. Well, well, well. I think we meet again. Your side dish, darling. Yeah, again, you can do all sorts of, and actually the side dish I'm picking isn't necessarily the best to go with this.

I think this goes best with, you know, with, you know, rice and sauce or mash and gravy is really very good. But I would like just to go on the record. Yes. That the side dish should always be in all meals. Yes. Chips. Should always be.

No matter what the meal, no matter what the thing is chips. And I mean chips, chips, chips, proper chips. I'm eliminating. Well, when you say proper chips, what do you do? I mean, potato has been dipped in oil and cooked, right? Yes. Rather than fries. Yeah.

There was an ad that ran for years for spry, crisp and dry. And I had a frame with basically some like them, some like them, and some like them. But we all like our chips, crisp and dry. No, we don't. We don't. All like our chips, crisp and dry. We like chips.

I can get from a chip shop where if you hold at one end, it does bend slightly under its own weight. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Or with the skin still on in areas that feel definitely like you have taken a potato, put it to like a machine, and then fried that thing up like rather than it being some sort of process of, yeah, no, it's so proper.

And I, and oven chips get on my, there was one for that. That's kind of rectangular shape. Yeah, oven chips are awful. They're awful. They're on the bottom. And if you go into a place and that's what you get, it's like the, and no, no, I ordered it. I had a really strong image in my head of what I was going

to get, and then this came out. And this is not, no, this is not the thing. So chip shop chips, really. Chips, chips, chips, chips. Yeah, from a chip shop. Yeah, like chip shop. Was there a particular chip shop growing up? There was a number of them.

All the chip shops in Ireland are run by Italians because that is their cuisine. And they came to Ireland and thought, well, we should introduce very like battered fish and chips to the Irish. They were called Mascones. Oh God, we did them in Brae. They're all from Italian families.

And yeah, they're all chip shop chips. I know a guy got banned from one of them for going, how are you Tony? Tony's a man from the counter. Chips are one by grease and the other. I was told to leave. Chip shop chips in Ireland. We have a different curry sauce as well in Ireland,

which is a less kind of probably fruity curry sauce than you have here. Yeah, and then there's the usual kind of, and then there's obviously the potato and batter, which is a very specific thing. But proper chip shop chips, I don't understand anything. I mean, there's a phrase that Kate Moss said once about, nothing tastes as great as being in fields.

Being skinny feels, yeah, yeah, yeah. Lots of chips too, lots of chips. There's a list of things that taste better than that. Yeah, and I've been, again, I've lost them. My own times I've lost weight and it's kind of felt good, but yeah, but it's come back because it didn't feel as good. Let's get some chips. What would you like to drink, Darla?

Obviously, I would have replaced the water at the front with a diet or a Coke Zero, any kind to be honest, because often that'll be, the water will go untouched and I'll do the Coke Zero throughout the meal. But with this meal, I would like that wine, you know, that wine, that wine that you had, and you don't know, wow.

Oh yeah, I really like wine. This is amazing. And that wine that you then chase forever, I'd like to finally meet that wine again, because I have had that one a few times, enough times, so that I own a lot of wine, because I think one of these wines in one of these bottles. It must be.

Yeah, and they will find me in front of like a huge wine cupboard, some say, just pulling cork, they go, no, I'm going to smash, I'm pulling the other one, no, where is it? Where is the wine that I had that time? Where is the chateau d'etre? Like trying to find the golden ticket. Yeah, that I had that one time,

because I've had occasionally just a stunning bottle of wine. Yes. That's really gone well, red, it'll be red for this, because it's a thing, whatever, and I can even express preferences in terms of grape, an area and region, whatever the answer, the number of preferences. But yet, there's no, I've got my writing wine.

Right, okay. I'm writing wines, and then I've got, their writing wines are quite different, either to drinkers or to, they're one of the other wines. I don't know if you write with wine. No, but I love this. I love that you, I imagine you put some spectacles on, and get a glass of wine.

Well, I put spectacles on because I need to wear spectacles. Yeah, that is the thing. You've not seen them publicly, but they only, I mean, we've just increased the font size on the autocue, but eventually that will run out, and I will have to unleash my glasses. I only got glasses in the last year, and I have, for some reason, stumbled on a wireframe glasses,

which are either Swedish architect, or Nazi bad guy in race in the last act. They're somewhere in those two locks. And, but no, there's a mirrorless group that comes to South Africa wine, which is my choice of writing wine. It's not too expensive, you know, and by two glasses in, that stuff is kind of flowing.

And then on the fourth glass, I'm just so happy with how good it was an hour earlier. And God, I used to be so funny then, and the fifth glass is like, I really should, I really got nothing good happening here. So I find, because I don't know if you're like, there's only a small window of useful time when you're writing stuff.

I think that's, creatively, you can crave for a couple of hours really usefully. So I time that with wine. Yeah, you have a little treat alongside it. I think that, you know, because then you have to react off something as well if you're sitting on your own, just to knock yourself slightly off your axis

with a little bit of, you know, get a little bit of a buzz on then. So I'm just going to try that. Honestly, recommend it. It's a great thing. And for that, I'm going to see my next show as we go. And you don't perform a drunk. Yeah, but it's just for the...

Well, if you write it drunk, I think you're going to have to have performing wine as well. Never thought of performing wine. Performing wine. That is a level of complex, even I didn't think to bring to it. But there are, and I've bought, like, I mean, I've bought really nice wines

and I have them sitting at home and think of whatever and then I open them and go, no, okay, but it's like, yeah. But there's a lot more, I'll be honest enough to admit, there's a lot more, this is fine. Yeah, yeah, yeah. As a ratio to when this point,

can I please have the one, that one time where... We can, you've come to the right place. There's a few who have got in touch with the podcast and offered wine tastings. And so I have a feeling, Dara, you're going to get offered a wine tasting off the back of this. I'll see if there was a really good...

Broadly, Pinot Noir, particularly Burgundy, maybe fine wines at the Bordeaux, but actually I'm at Valpolicella or the Barola regions, obviously. I'm more than happy to further my tiny knowledge. I found as I got to the age of 40, that I was very happy to stop being an expert on things, in any way or to pretend to be an expert on things,

and discover things that were totally new to me, that I wouldn't, but yeah, but that I was very happy to admit to, I only know a bit about this. Yeah, I'm not going to fight any corners on this. You know, to know a little bit about jazz or a little bit about fine wine or a little bit about some of the classical music,

whatever, and yet be free of any kind of obligation to that certainty you have in your 20s where you go, no, this is the best, this band. If you don't like this band, you're wrong about this because it's a band, I think. That is quite nice to get to the point where you just go, well, good. It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter. You literally, this is about... I really have 20 years. Nobody wins this battle. There is no victor, there's no laurel wreath handed out for you to be the best at this. So yeah, let's try that wine.

Let's drink a couple of glasses of that. I even have a thing called caravan. Caravan was a Christmas gift. Caravan is a wine extraction system. Right. Oh, yeah, yeah. The wine, it's basically a hypodermic needle on the end of what looks like a corkscrew thing.

Okay. You take the wine that you want to try, that you wine has been sitting in your house for 10 years because you got it as a present in your wedding and it's never been enough times where it's like, shall we open one of the wedding wines or the other wine? You know, because you just collect, these things, people give you gifts or whatever.

And so you're sitting and you go, that's too good to drink just to drink. So you end up with like a number of these bottles and you're going to go, when is there going to be a time good enough to mark an occasion? This thing, you just push it in through the cork, right? That's got an argon gas container at the end of it,

like whatever, and you press it a few times and the argon goes into the bottle. It pushes wine out. Argon is a non-reactive gas, so the wine doesn't age as if you'd open the wine. You take a glass out of it or two, and then you pull the thing out and when you pull the syringe out,

the cork closes under its own pressure and reseals the bottle. What did I just hear? That's a really good way of drinking wine and no one noticing. It's exceptionally good for that. It is very, very good, without having to top it up with like,

it's a leucosate or something or whatever. You take that to a hotel. Yeah, yeah. You go through the mini bar. They surely noticed if your hand was resting gently on the, whatever, their margot that they'd left out at the demonstration, you're just slowly pushing an invisible thing too.

They all know about things. Does it also work with Coca-Cola? It doesn't work with Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola is the most precious and rare of all things. It has to be drunk there and there. I want one, Ed. Write that down. Oh, you want me to write down

that you want one of those? Yes. All right. That brings us to the dessert. Oh, yeah. My favorite course. Ed's a starter boy. I'm a dessert lad.

I tend to, I think I'm more of a starter boy than the one in the air. It's got a lot of bits of meat. Yeah, but the, and again, it's kind of gone around in this for a while. I like the, I'm going to go for the one. It's very traditional, very traditional, but there's a 50-50 chance it'll be wrong.

Okay. 50-50 seems that, and it's often not indicated, or it's incorrectly indicated. I love one version of it, and I love the other version of it. Wow. Okay. Trying to guess what this is

before it's even been said, but it's quite hard to... There are, I think, the reason it's 50-50 wrong is there are two ways of making it. Yes. There's a hot way and a cold way. Oh, and you don't like the cold way, because you don't like cold things. Incorrect, actually, in this one.

Oh! I had the cold way. Both of them are, it's always served, it's always served a cold. Yeah. But there's a cold-prepared one, and there's a baked version of it. Oh, Benito's got it.

Benito's got it. Where's the Benito site? It is totally cheesecake. Well, don't Benito, it is absolutely cheesecake. There's hot cheesecake? Baked cheesecake. There's two ways of making it. Well, they don't serve it to you hot,

no, because that'd be insane. I, I, that is why I was thinking. But like the, the New York style. Yes. Is you bake, you make the mix, you bake the mix, and then you cool it in the fridge after it. And what it does is it kind of, I think it does different things with the sugars as well,

but also traps air in it. It's kind of puffier, fluffier, and it's acrid and rank. I don't know what's sticking in the word. It's just too, it's again, we're back to the count. It's too, oh, it's too much, too much sweetness, and it's all fluffy and it's really, well,

whereas the, you know, more, let's call it gelatinous one, the more kind of like Philadelphia mixed in with the kind of acrid, nice, lemony, tang. And sour, sour. Sour, and then, and then it's kind of a, and it gets closer to say like the creme brulee type thing, like we have to, to a gel kind of thing,

rather than what's, what's the rest of it? Like it's gel, I'm not gonna, I don't, I don't like cakes. Yeah, I don't like cakes, I'm totally wrong, but I don't like cakes, per se, like the, the, the, but I do, I don't like cakes. I don't like cakes, yeah. I can do, I'll do a cake, but I'll, you know, I don't like that big puffy,

like Victoria's sponge type thing. When I'm away for it. But the, but that, that with the raspberry coulis, and this situation, all bets are off, see. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We live in up to Danzie world, right? Gold, coulis, not necessarily ice cream or cream, because I think that, that takes me for it.

You've got, you've got that covered in the cake, right? Yeah, yeah, have you? Sure. Biscuity base, obviously, is vital to us. Pottery biscuit base. Yeah, but it was, okay, space, space, space. He is tired of that. That's why we did one thing with them and go 8-bit,

and he seemed not to find it as endlessly charming. That's heavy, that's dead. The, I mean, but yeah, that, the cold Christmas of the lemon and that, like the, and then. And so it's a citrus, a citrusy flavour? Citrusy flavour, yeah, exactly. I mean, the, the finest ones that my sister used to make. Well, if you want to up the citrus,

don't forget you're holding a bit of wet lime. Oh my God, it's been in my hand all along. Oh. If I just put this over here. It's like a shiammunga twist. It was there all along, and it was, why is he holding it? No one knows why he's holding it. The whole time.

It's so complete in the cheese cake, and squeeze it all over it. Except it was lime in this. And I'm doing goat ears, but that's key lime pie, which is a different one. Oh yeah, never cross the citrus strings. Never, never in there. We put those two things together.

Yeah, you can possibly combine lemon and lime. No, that's unheard of. I've been eating too open for the same time, and I'm watching your head explode. Your name's not Fido Dido. That's a bang on reference. I haven't been a generation of the Americans. So yeah, but a really nice one though.

And I've been in places that I actually have advertised it as. It's on the menu as New York Starter Cheesecake. And I know to order because I know they're wrong. Oh. Yeah, there's one in there, which is a lovely pizza restaurant in Dublin called Gotham City. And at the end of it, and the guy goes, Cheesecake, in a real good of,

Dara, you know you're going to have the cheesecake. Shall we just stop dancing this time? No, we do. Much like the 1890s pastries are always saying to me, but yeah, we stop dancing and shall I just give you the cheesecake? And but that is totally not. It's a cold baked one. But it's very difficult.

And waiters, you go, this is a baked or cold. And they go, it's cold because it's arriving cold. And you're going, no, you don't know. You don't know whether you're doing it or not. Don't know what you're on about, man. It's just, thank you. You're wasting my time here. Up, lift the table.

It's a bread table up. Throw it all over the place. Like whatever. Yeah, it's gone. So the entire restaurant, for example, I think in America that thing was House of Cheesecake or whatever it's called, that chain. The Cheesecake Factory?

Cheesecake Factory, that's it. That factory should be ripped down. Should be flattened. It should be turned into a park that children are playing. Because it is, it's all baked. Yeah. I've even talked about Cheesecake Factory before in this podcast. Cheesecake's quite a popular dessert.

I think this might be the third time. Oh, really? At least a second. Joel had cheesecake, definitely. I think that wasn't going to save him. I ignore the controversial Joel. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is for the best.

I don't need your order back to you, Dara. Yes, do, please. Check. You would like some still water. You would like some white... Or a coaxier, really, to be honest. Yeah, well, I mean, I don't remember. I was after it.

Okay, that wasn't the question. You would like some white bread, crispy life, with some butter, already soft, and some oil and vinegar, and some tabernac. Yeah, cool, let's go for it. As well. You'll start to chowder in a bread bowl, like the one you had in Vietnam.

Yeah. Your main, you would like a lamb shank. You didn't actually specify where you wanted the lamb shank from. But there's a restaurant in... Actually, I'm going to go for the Indian lamb shank, because that's a particularly good way of doing it, and I've had it in a few different places. The one that's called Gaylord,

I think it's called the restaurant. It just says... Oh, yeah, it's quite near here. Yeah, quite near. Oh, yeah. Just in London, yeah. I'll just pop over. Yeah.

Signed with some chip shop chips. You haven't specified a chippy, but you said a few earlier. Let's go for... You pick any Italian name, and there'll be a chip shop named after Mario's. Yep, there's Mario's at Moscone's. Joy Pesci. There's one called Cow.

Oh, there was... I'm trying to find... Oh, do you know what? Why are you... No. From Picante in Broughton Street in Edinburgh. Oh, you can't go to Picante. The one that has a DJ in it.

The one with the DJ. Yeah, the one with the DJ. Yeah. You were like, That's wine as your drink. Oh, that wine. A dessert you would like. Citrus-y cheesecake with some Marsby Coley.

Yeah. Cult-prepared. Not baked. Not baked. And I would throw the entire meal back at you if it's baked. Oh, that sounds delicious. And also, I'd like to eliminate all baked cheesecake, so I never make a mistake again.

You want to put them into Room 101? Yeah, because I'm not part of this format as well? Yeah, why not? Yeah. That's in the restaurant. Yeah. There's a Room 101 in the restaurant as well. We incorporate that.

We incorporate all the panel shows that are in this restaurant somewhere. Okay, fuck grand. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because Brexit is like a cake. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so it's in there somewhere.

Yeah. You can put it in Room 101. Just corridor full of panel shows. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming, darling. It's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you very much. It's been a pleasure to be in your restaurant.

I think its business model is a total disaster. Your inventory elements alone, your stock, how are you keeping it going in this kind of way? The costume, the gas, you know, the whole thing. How are you keeping nine 1890s French prostitutes constantly employed? Again, Dara, that's all on you. They're the other superior security.

That's ragunty to the back of the room with fellow members of the Napoleon's Army. But yeah, it's been a joy. Thank you. What a lovely meal. Delicious meal. I had not thought about lamb shanks in a while, and now I really want a lamb shank.

The lamb shank and the chowder, they were really, yeah, they caught me off guard. Very filling, homely meal, right? Yeah, yeah. The chowder's very, oh. Be up for them any time. Oh, you've got to suck the bone. I'm just going to say that.

Suck the bone. Hashtag, suck the bone. Hashtag, suck the bone. Yeah. Might already be a hashtag in a different industry. No, he caught his cheese, so that's good. Thank the Lord. A little bit of extra info for the listener, though,

off the air. I punched him anyway. Yeah. Just did it anyway. I was looking forward to punching him so much, even though I like him. Yeah. Wonderful guy, giving me many opportunities

in the industry. Really great guy, but we've all got to get punched now and again. I got myself amped up to punch him, so I had to do it. He had to stand on the chair to do it as well, didn't he? I had to stand on the chair, and he didn't know what I was doing. He was like, why are you standing on that chair? I was like, you stay still.

Yeah. And I bopped him. You bopped him, one, right on his kisser. Right on the kisser. Well, thank you so much, Dara, for coming on, and thank you so much for being a good sport, about being punched in the face afterwards. If you like the sound of Dara,

and you'd like to explore more of his work, just turn on the television. Yes. Just put it on. He'll be on it. Just put it on. He's a great guy. Yeah.

See him on anything. If you like a gamble, and you want to see more of his work, go and see him on tour. Go and see me on tour. I can't promise that I'll be on the television when he turned it on straight away. I'm on it now and again. But bop onto my website, edgambel.co.uk.

Come and see me live. Come and see me do some of my humor. Yes, please. Do you have any job papers? Where are you on? Oh, I'm not sure. But hey, just remind people, got some Netflix specials.

Watch them. Yeah. Go and watch them. They're blooming good, I'd say. Hands in them. I am. You can hear me chuckling away. He's in the audience laughing.

Uh, so a little bit of an Easter boy. Uncredited, uncredited. So, thank you for listening to the Off Menu Podcast. Please go and review us on the iTunes app or wherever you listen to your podcast. Five stars. Thank you. It's very much the Uber system.

Five stars or nothing. Yes. And I'd mean no review. I don't mean no stars. Five stars. Thank you. Five stars. Thank you very much.

Goodbye. Subscribe. Thank you. Goodbye. Hello, it's me, Amy Glendale. You might remember me from the best ever episode of Off Menu, where I spoke to my mum and asked her about seaweed on mashed potato

and our relationship's never been the same since. And I am joined by... Me, Ian Smith. I would probably go bread. I'm not going to... I'm not going to spoil in case... Get him on, James and Ed. But we're here sneaking in to your podcast experience

to tell you about a new podcast that we're doing. It's called Northern News. It's about all the new stories that we've missed out from the North, because look, we're two Northerners. Sure. But we've been living in London for a long time. The new stories are funny.

Quite a lot of them crimes. It's all kicking off. And that's a new podcast called Northern News. We'd love you to listen to. Maybe we'll get my mum on. Get Glendale's mum on every episode. That's Northern News. When's it out, Ian?

It's already out now, Amy! Is it? Yeah, get listening. There's probably a backlog. You've left it so late.