Off Menu with Ed Gamble and James Acaster - Ep 249: Rhys Nicholson

Episode Date: May 15, 2024

‘Drag Race Down Under’ judge and ‘Taskmaster Australia’ star Rhys Nicholson is our guest diner this week. And they’ve brought along their pal Jeff Tartare. Rhys brings their new show ‘Huge Big Party Congratulations’ to the Edinburgh Fringe this August and then is touring the UK. For dates and tickets go to rhysnicholson.com.au Rhys’s book ‘Dish’ is out now. Buy it here. Watch Rhys’s special ‘Live at the Athenaeum’ on Netflix. Follow Rhys on Instagram @rhysnicholson Recorded and edited by Ben Williams for Plosive. Artwork by Paul Gilbey (photography and design). 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. Watch Ed and James's YouTube series 'Just Puddings'. Watch here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Off Menu podcast putting the lemon of humor up the chickens butt of the internet. Short and sweet, that's it, gamble. My name is James A. Castor. We own a dream restaurant and every single week we invite a guest in and ask them their favorite ever star on main course dessert side dish and drink. Not in that order. And this week our guest is Reese Nicholson. Reese is a wonderful comedian, television host as well. Yeah. Drag Race Down Under. Reese has a fantastic comedy special on Netflix,

but I can't pronounce the name of the theatre it's live at the Atheneum? Atheneum? Atheneum? Theatre it's one of my favourite comedy specials full stop. I only know that it's called the Atheneum because that's where I did my shows in Australia not in that room but in the smaller room upstairs. Congratulations. Yes. Live at the Athenaeum is the name of the special. They are a wonderful comedian. And they've also got a book out called Dish, which is a food-based book, James.

A food-based memoir. So come on. This is a comedian writing a food-based memoir that is right up all of your alleys. You have no excuse not to buy it. And we're very excited to have them here. We've been trying for a while. Trying for quite a while to get Reuss on. So we finally did it, Cobbers. Reuss is here. Yes, we did it, Cob we're very excited to have them here. We've been trying for a while. Trying for quite a while to get Reese on. So we finally did it Cobbers.

Yes, we did it Cobbers. Well done to you. Well done to all the Cobbers out there. That's something that I don't know. I sometimes have to do adverts on off menu just for the Australian listeners. And we always say Cobbers all the way through and we get I think fair to say complaints. No, I don't think we do get complaints. I think they quite like it actually.

Yeah, they do like it, but some people are confused to say, why do you keep saying coppers? Because they don't know it's just for the Australian audience. The great thing about James is, is he came off social media because it made him feel quite negative and he didn't enjoy the process of being on social media. So now what he does, which is very James A. Caster, is rather than being on social media, he imagines that all of the feedback is negative on social media. Keeps me off of it. It works. But of course, if Reese says a secret ingredient on which we have pre-agreed, we will have to remove them from the restaurant.

Yes. Sorry, Reese. This week, the secret ingredient is sesame snaps. Sesame snaps. Sesame snaps. Now this has been suggested by Liv on Twitter. So probably quite a negative tweet that she sent us. But Liv, now Liv has chosen sesame snaps. I'm going to go along with it, but I love sesame snaps. Why?

You're the only person who eats them. I'm currently going through a big sesame snap phase and I really get excited when I remember oh I bought, there's sesame snaps in the cupboard and I can eat them. They're delicious. One of the things in newsagents where there's dust on top of them because no one buys them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But there's a nice little like healthy green grocery type place near me. I go there and there's a whole bunch of stuff that I like to buy from there, vegetables and fruit and like some really good juices, kombuchuchas and then as I'm chilling it up, I was looking to see the sesame snaps I'm going I'll chuck them in as well and then I forget that I've got them and then I remember in the house

I want like a sweet treat, but I don't want anything too big and heavy I remember there's sesame snaps in the cupboard and every time I eat them I think I always forget how good these are It's not a life. They're delicious. The sesame flavour, the snap. Well it does what it says on the tin, doesn't it? Yeah, three of them as well. I always think there's two. James, this is not a life man. I always think there's just two and then the third one's a nice little bonus surprise. You surprising yourself by buying sesame snaps and then remembering you've got them in the

house and then remembering there's three in a packet. Yeah. Do you just talk to yourself while you're them in the house and then remembering there's three in a packet. Yeah. Do you just talk to yourself while you're in the house being like, Oh, there's three. Well, lovely. I've got cats now so I can talk to them and tell them, Oh, I always forget the third one, don't I? Yeah. Why didn't you call your cat Sesame and Snap?

They're great names for cats. Oh, maybe, maybe they can be their surnames. Yeah. Terry Sesame and Rue Snap. Perfect. Well, hopefully even though James love sesame snaps, we hope that Reese does not say that. Right, let's get on with it.

This is the off menu menu of Reese Nicholson. Welcome, Reese, to the dream restaurant. Welcome, Reese Nicholson, to the Dream Restaurant. Welcome, Reis Nicholson, to the Dream Restaurant. We've been expecting you for some time. Oh, this is very, I'm, cause I listen to this podcast, so I'm a fan of the podcast, but I'm also friends with you. Yes. So there's a few layers of weirdness with this.

And I've thought about, like, I've thought about my menu before. It's like similar when you watch a game show on TV, you're like, I'd be good at it. I could do this and now I'm doing it and I do not feel confident. Have you, have you had that before with a game show that you've watched on TV and then you had to do it? No, it's not going very well for me at home. What are the big Australian game shows? Uh, the news? Is that, that feels like a game show from time to time? Uh, no, we have like all of the like prices right and all those types of, there was a Wheel of Fortune for a while.

There was this one guy called John Burgess, who was like a big, like that, he was like the big game show host. And he still, I did a horror, that sad thing where, um, he's not really in show business anymore, but he would come back to do like little comedy sketches for things and just watching a man in his eighties who was like the height of comedy. I did a weird thing with him once. It was like the Australian version of balls of steel. Oh, wow.

I was 19. I didn't have an agent. Um, the, and he was on it and he was playing himself, like a kind of crazy version of a game show host and we were doing a promo for it and he wouldn't sit down and he was like 80 something and I was like sit down John and he went no no it'll crease the suit and it's like oh it's this era of show business. That's very old school. Yeah. How's the chase doing in Australia? Is that still going well? I remember when that launched I was quite excited that you were getting the chase. Yeah people love it. Because you got the UK version of the chase as well because when I came

to Australia recently I landed as really jet lagged. And then I walked into the hotel and on the TV and the reception of the hotel was Paul Sinner doing the chase. And it's quite, it's tragic because then what you caught, we're constantly comparing and it's shit. Yeah. Like out of the shit compared to that. I'm sorry.

Oh no, I think we've done a few good things. Like we've just got Tathmaster. Yes. It's like, I think it's, I think it's as good. Yeah, it's very good. I watched the whole thing. Yeah, it's good. I think, and I mean, this comes out in a long time.

I'm on the latest season and a similar thing to this actually, where like I could do this and then you're in it and you're like, I'm losing my mind. Yeah. That's the one where you watch it and you think, I'd find all the loopholes. Yeah. And then you turn up on the day and go, oh, I think I'm an idiot. Yeah. We did, we were doing 10 tasks a day.

Wow. Yeah. I've talked to you guys now and you were like, we were talking about it at dinner, you do like five a day. Five or six. Yeah. At the studio, at the, at the house at 6am, start the task. Oh my God. Yeah. Wild. Lost my fucking mind.

Like an actual job. Yeah. I can't believe James that you ever looked at Taskmaster and thought, I'm going to find all the loopholes. I thought I could find all the loopholes. You? Yeah. Yeah. Cause I'd see Richard Osmond do them and go, yeah, that's what I'd do. But Richard Osmond is a very clever man. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But what you understand is I just seen him do the loophole. So I knew the loophole. So I was like, ah, I would do that. We should really ask you if you like food though. Oh, yeah. That's right. It's not Ed's podcast. I do. I do really like food. I'm always nervous to call myself

a foodie one because it doesn't sound good. And also, I think like I also play video games and I love video games, but I would never call myself a gamer to a gamer because they are scary virgins that will kill me. But you know what I mean? There's like a kind of like, I think that would be offended by how I, but I do, I think in another universe I would have liked to have been a chef maybe, but well, I'm not saying I have the skills of it. I think I've thought of this before where I think it's a similar conceit in a way,

comedy and being a chef, because you're trying to like deliver relatability. You know what I mean? Like kind of like you want people to be like, oh, this feels like it, but you want to like surprise them at the same time. Yeah. And you want to put some of yourself into it. Yeah. And yeah, it also be universal.

What, come in the food? Yes. Is that what you meant? Is that not what? Oh God. Never come to my house for dinner. Or come to your house for dinner. Been to Ed's seven times. Always asked. Well, that's the secret you go to the dinner.

He doesn't tell. But yeah, I think, do you know what I mean? Like, I think it's like a similar want of people to like you by things that you produce, but also want to rattle them a little bit. Yeah. So when I watched like season one of Chef's Table, I did, I was not prepared for how much I was going to cry. And it's because I, I think I related far too much to every time they were talking about

the actual like creative process of making the food. Yeah. I just kept on crying. I was like, man, he's just process of making the food. Yeah. I kept on crying. I was like, man, he's just talking about a souffle. Yeah. I'm in tears because, like, he's talking about how much he wants it to represent himself and for people to get it and for people to just word it. And there's like an intensity about it.

Like I think recently, in the last kind of year or so, I've become friends with Ben Shuri, who's from the... Is he from season one? Season one, final episode of season one. I cried during that. Yeah. Talking about the pit. Talking about digging the pit. And he like, he loves comedy. And so he comes to like his comedy club that I own in Melbourne.

And there's an intensity about him, but he's also very funny. But in a way that it takes you a minute. I think comedians are the same. If you don't have the context that someone is a comedian, and they're trying to be funny, you're like, what's wrong with this? But you know, and I think he has a similar thing where he's so intense, but very like, I think, I don't know, I think you've got to have like an editorial kind of brain to be a chef. And also shit hours and there's a lot of nut cases in the industry. Yep. And you're either very cokey or not cokey at all. Quite jealous that your friends have been, should we? Well, I'm jealous. I'm almost, I'm nervous now that I've said friends, like we've, we've

been to his house a lot of times. But now I'm nervous. Did he know that you were there? Yeah. Nope. Oh, right. Okay. Not necessarily friends.

Heavy sleeper. Just spying on him going, they do come in the food. But he does, and he does this thing that I think it's what I've always dreamed of being able to do is like, he lives in this really beautiful, and I hope this isn't too private, he lives in this really beautiful like frozen in time mid-century house in the suburbs of Melbourne. And he invites over, he's done it, we've been to a couple of them now, where he'll invite over kind of 10 or 12 people of all varying backgrounds and job descriptions. And we have like a kind of six

hour dinner that he cooks. And it's just, you know what I mean? Like it's like what you would want in a movie to be your life. Like it's a proper dinner party that you feel like celebrities have. It was like an F Scott Fitzgerald novel or something. Yeah. And he'll disappear to be making the food for a little while. And you just see everyone quietly trying not to like, just keep your shit together. Like it's like the food for a little while and you just see everyone quietly trying not to like just keep your shit together. Like it's like the food is so good. I'm similar apart from the fact that I live in a small,

messy house in East London and I only ever invite James and Nesh. Never together. We always start with still of sparkling water. Do you have a preference? Sparkling. Like it's obvious. Yes. Whenever someone says still on this, I'm like, do you not drink, like it, it just,

it feels like an upgrade to me. And I know this is even cliche to be saying this cause I've also heard it, but like, you know, I drink a lot of water, but I know that when I got a photo stream, I drank a lot more water. There's something, it's like fun. I like, I like when kids call it spicy water or like they... What? But you know when kids don't have...

I have a friend who kid doesn't know how to describe sparkling water and it's like similar when people say it's crunchy. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And they say like, it's spicy water. Yeah. And it's like, yeah, that's, you're right. This is spicy water.

This feels spicy. I have a distinct memory of being a kid and a friend of the, one of my dad's mates showed me a card trick and not having the words to describe how it made me feel afterwards. Oh, this is vintage James Ocas the stuff. And so I was like, it just made me feel so careful. I have a really distinct memory of saying that to everyone. Oh, guys, I felt so careful when he was doing the magic trick. And they were like, what are you talking about?

But I get that. I totally get it. Careful, he's trying to trick you. Yeah. We're just not sure. I was a weird little, like my mum always says I was very like wide-eyed when I was a kid. And I would try and word things in very strange way, like, what was it? There was one where there was a big bowl of grapes on a table at like a party,

and I looked at my mum and said, there's a man in my head, and he's holding up a pitcher of grapes, and he's holding it up very high. Which is the scariest way from an eight-year-old, no, I must be way younger than that. Straight to the child psychologist. So I'm trying to say like, I want these grapes and he's holding it up real high. So I want these grapes badly. They're not for me, they're for the man in my head. They're not for me.

The man in my head wants grapes. And he's showing that by holding up a picture very high. Very high. Very show, give me these grapes. What do we want? Grapes. When do we want them? Now. Well, so, I mean, for this podcast, really, are we finding out what you want on your menu? Are we finding out what the man in your head wants?

Yes! And he's holding a picture up very high. Very high, of sparkly water. Sparkly water. Spicy water. It is, I guess, spicy, like, I've never thought of spicy as like a... But I guess when you're a kid, everything's tactile. You're not really, it's not about flavors yet. Everything is like, you know, I love seeing babies in videos eating ice cream for the first time, cause I think it's probably the colds that they lose their mind about first.

There's that one, that famous one of the baby kind of going, and then it does that, you know, maybe when they go like, oh, like their faces just stretch out as much as possible and it grabs the ice cream and just starts pushing it into its face. Like it wants it to be part of it. Yeah. I don't even know what eating is, but I just want ice cream in my brain. I guess babies are like, they get milk for ages, right? Yeah.

And then they have ice cream. They're like, fuck, you can do this with milk? Why haven't you been putting your tits in the freezer the whole time? That's exactly what I mean. She's holding your tits in the freezer the whole time? That's a woman in my head. She's holding her tits in the freezer. Very high. Very high. That woman retired from me quite a few years ago.

Anything in the water? Or you just want it to spark? I don't mind a bit of lime in there. There's something now owning a venue, being able to go in and having access to a bubbly water tap and pint glasses anytime I want is maybe the richest I'll ever feel in my life. Like being able to walk around a bar and have no one go, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, what are you doing? I mean, I don't have my RSA, I probably shouldn't go back there. But like a huge, like a really big pint glass of very cold, spicy water with some lime in it.

Which is probably acknowledged that you own a venue. You own? Comedy Republic. I'm not, I'm not saying, and anyway, come on, I don't want to Dan accoridate it, but the, it is my Crystal Skull Vodka. Yeah. I own a comedy club in Melbourne, co-own it with my partner, Kieran, and our business partner, Alex, and it's like a little 150seater kind of thing with a nice bar in it.

And it's nice. It's a great club. Thank you. And great bar. And it's not, it's like the whole thing of it is we wanted Luke, our hospitality manager, like our bar manager, we want it to be like a good bar. I think comedy clubs don't often have that, but you can get, it's to the point now that when I come in, one of the bartenders will usually be like, do you

want a Riesling or an Old Fashioned? now that when I come in, one of the bartenders will usually be like, uh, do you want a Riesling or an Old Fashioned? Like, depending on my mood, but just the fact that I get to go in somewhere and I have an order that someone has to make me. Yeah. I think there's probably a way of doing that other than buying and running a venue. Oh, okay. What would you, what would you recommend? Just go to a bar a few times. Just be niche. Go anywhere with niche. Everyone knows. Like, I went around Shepard's Bush with him once,

and he had to do a load of errands, and everywhere we went, they were like, Nish! And I like, get him, like, plate him up what he wants already. It's like he's Berlin Beauty and the Beast. Yeah, and I was like, what the hell? I'm staying in his flat at the moment, or in his house, and it is exactly what you think Nish's house looks like. Yeah.

It's great. It's like, it's like Brian Blessed lives there. Do you know what I mean? Like, there's just so much stuff. Yeah. Like he's got stuff. It's like what I, it's what I want it to look like. Yeah. Like it's not chaotic. It's just got a lot of stuff in there.

Then he's tidied up. Yeah, then he's, he's put in. It's a little bit chaotic. But like, but you know what I mean? Like it looks like it's like, oh yeah, no, this is what Nisha's house looks like. Yeah, it's like books and guitars and comics. Yeah. Pop it up, absorb bread! Pop it up, absorb yeah, this is what Nisha's actually like. Yeah, it's like books and guitars and comics. Pop it up, absorb bread! Pop it up, absorb bread, Reese Nicholson!

Pop it up, absorb bread! Every time it went a bit quiet, I was like, it's coming. Yeah, always 10. Bread, bread. Pop, as an Australian, you're not getting pop-it-ups anywhere else. Yeah. I don't think. I do like, I like pop-it-up. I learnt from this very podcast from Jamie Oliver about the crushing it up and putting it over the top.

I never thought of that before. And that's my whole vibe now. But my whole, I'm basing my entire personality on that. Thank you, Jamie Oliver. I'm sorry that some of the restaurants didn't work out. Um, I want just a classic, nice sourdough. I want it warm, not toasted. Like warm, like very fresh.

And I want, there's a place called in Melbourne called Etta, which is like, Kyron and my partner Kyron and I go there. Anytime I've been away for a long time, it's like quite near our house. And it's a good, it's fine dining, but not fine, fine dining. And you can just, and the lady there knows this, and they have this burnt or kind of browned butter with the salt through it. But I think they brown it and then they like aerate it again and then chill it again.

So it's super like light and it just spreads over and it's real good. And it's like kind of nutty. Oh, that does sound good. Do you find, because you live in Melbourne, that you go to other countries and we kind of let you down when it comes to stuff like sour, hipster dine. Now listen, not let it down. I think whenever I'm say here, for example, like I think I realize how lucky we are. There is some incredible food in the UK, but I think you've got to be like Australia.

I think we just are able to grow things more. Like our produce is kind of fresher and our, yeah. And you know, we, we have continued relationships with the countries around us. Um, so we can get food brought in and et cetera, et cetera. I think like you just have to be a little bit more selective here if that makes sense. Do you know what I mean? Like you have to really, there are certain places, like we had an amazing dinner the other night. Sorry, James. Um, we went to St. James, St. John and ordered the whole menu.

That's a great feeling, isn't it? It wasn't just the whole menu though, because some things we were like, three of those, three of those. The guy, I'd never had this before, the waiter came to check on us to see if we were still, this was still the plan halfway through. Like we must have looked unwell. We did cancel one dish, I think, but I believe that was a salad. Oh yeah. It's like, do you still want everything? It's like, no, we don't want the salad anymore. We'd like to cancel shitting normally tomorrow.

Thank you. We'd like to remove that from any of our lives. Whether you've got good gut health or not, it's going to be weird tomorrow. Hope you're not staying at a friend's house. Yeah, I think particularly like I realized when I was picking the dishes that I want for this, they're all Melbourne places. And I've, I've eaten a lot of other places and I like other places, but I just noticed like the kind of comfort dishes that I like are all good.

That's what I found about Melbourne, cause I'd never been there before until recently is like in like the Chinatown bit, you could walk into anywhere and it was going to be good. There was no, like, I wasn anywhere and it was going to be good. Yeah. There was no like, I wasn't hitting up Google going like, oh, this place is supposed to be terrible. You could literally just walk in anywhere and it was amazing. One thing that we don't do that I love that you do here is you franchise nice places. We don't have that. We don't really have, as soon as something has more than three locations,

you're like, oh, like this is like, you know, restaurateurs like Andrew McConnell and these kind of guys that own big restaurants in Melbourne, they have three of them, but they're not connected by name or anything like that. Like, but you know, things like, I don't know, like all your burger places here are all good. We don't really have that. Like Nando's is good here. Nando's is not good in Australia. Yeah. I mean, we've talked about that on the pod before.

You had an awful experience in... Well, in Wellington, to be fair, in New Zealand, but like, yeah. It's quite grim. Oh man, I'll never forget it, man. There's a goddamn pipe going halfway, just straight down the middle of the legend of the Barcelona's cockle. Couldn't even read the whole thing. You love to read it, don't you?

Oh, we'd like to know that they're honoring the legend like everywhere else does like we do in this country, but you put a goddamn pipe halfway through it. You're like, well, now no one knows what happened to the cockle. So I feel fucking happy. It's not often an English man gets annoyed with New Zealand for not honoring cultural traditions. Yeah. Look, as an Australian, I can't have any point of view about that, that is. I mean, to be fair, you guys started it.

Yeah. We continued it. Um, yeah, but, yeah, I think we just- I was talking to someone about this the other day where Melbourne is like a very touristy city, but we don't have any touristy things. Like Sydney has the- we've clumped them all up really, to what's new. But Melbourne's tourism is, hey, how good's this? Like, you just come there because it's nice and the food is so good. And I, but I give a lot of credit to New Zealand as well. Like New Zealand has some of the best food I've ever eaten in my- and same thing, you can just

walk in anywhere and it'll just be some very intense Kiwi chef that's like just scooping shit out of the water and throwing it into a pot and then making you eat it. Okay. That sounds more threatening than I meant it to. Well, let's get onto your dream stuff. Let's get onto the menu proper. We know it's going to be from Melbourne. You know it's from Melbourne. Spoiler alert. It's still going to be places I didn't go.

It was fun, we had to go to Melbourne for the first time. Cause normally I'm asking Ed for recommendations and he recommends some real fancy places, really delicious. And Ed was like, where shall I go in Melbourne? I was like, you've got to go to Schnitz. It's the first place James sent me. That's, that's an example of a thing that has a lot of franchises that I wouldn't. Yeah, sure. Like, I mean, I've eaten it. You find schnitz in, uh, you know, like a mall that has had its heyday.

That's where I went. Yep. Yeah. Like a place that you're like, Oh, I didn't even know there's a mall here. And there's like a nail salon, which is with one lady standing in there waiting for anyone to come. Yes. And a barber that you'll net, that no one will ever go to.

I went to schnitz. This is the first day I arrived. I was feeling pretty jet lagged. Yeah. I thought I just need something. I don't really know where to go. Oh, James told me to go to Schnitz or just get it out the way. Early doors. Cause I'd seen a few of them around and I was like, well, I'm not going to enjoy this. No. Went into Schnitz, uh, looked at what James told me to order. Looked at that on the menu, thought no fucking way, that looks disgusting. It's got beetroot and egg and pineapple in it. Yeah, it's got egg and pineapple in it.

The beetroot is made out of it. Egg and pineapple. Yeah. OMG wrap. Yeah. Love it. From Schnitz. Anytime of day.

For some reason, Australia has an upset, like there's a type of pizza called the Aussie pizza and it's just a meat lover's pizza with an egg on it. And I don't know why they've decided egg is Australian. Like yeah, you put an egg on there. Australian. Beetroot, we love putting beetroot on things. I've got my burger kitchen here, like years and years ago, I think they had like one they said was Australian. The Aussie burger.

And that had beetroot and an egg on it. We had the McOz, that was, and the only thing it was just a, it was a quarter pounder with some beetroot on it. It's disgusting. Yeah. It's weird. I don't mind beetroot, but I don't want it with egg on it. And then you forget you've eaten it and you think you've got cancer.

Yeah. Every single time. Yeah. Anyway, sorry. I ordered a schnitz. I thought it's fine. I'll go in there. I'll get it over with and the rest of the trip will be nice food.

But no one has to know I've come to schnitz. I'm standing there waiting for my schnitz. Someone comes up going, I'm coming to see your show tonight. I love the podcast. Can I have a photo? I'm like, schnitz. Someone comes up going I'm come to see your show tonight. Oh, I love the podcast can have a photo No schnitz. Not like this. Did you say that they asked if I'd sent you? Yeah, is James send you here? I've mentioned it on the podcast before I like saying it to Australians because I know it's the worst I can say I went to fishbowl a lot though. Oh yeah. I like that for a chain place. Yeah.

Quick salad. Yeah. All of that. That was good. But the rest of the, the rest of the meals I had were heavy multiple course meals. It took me a second then to remember that, cause I grew up, I didn't grow up there. I lived for a while in my early twenties in the King's cross in Sydney and there was a strip club there called fishbowl.

Oh yeah. That's what I know. I was like, Oh, they do a and there was a strip club there called Fish Bowl. Oh yeah, that's what I meant. In my mind I was like, oh, brilliant. They do a good salad at the strip club Fish Bowl. Beautiful wings. Your dream starter. My first thought was to just say seafood platter and then covers everything. Yeah. I think I like good food, but I always, I always find that my

tastes fall into like what is quite, what movies have told me fine dining is. Like things like I usually order like a steak tartare because I love it. And I, I do not make it at home. Like, I don't know. You just say, I feel like you might be the same where when I'm at a restaurant, if I enjoy something, I'm like, how can I remake this at home somehow, or make a version of this?

And something like steak tartare feels so out of anything raw. Yeah. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like you're not messing around with that. No, like you're not doing sashimi at home. No. I mean, and if you are, I hope you had a nice life.

Enjoy it. Like, especially not giving it to people. Yeah. Like there's, I've made some horrible mistakes trying to recreate things, but it's only ever for Kyren and I, I will never like the,, you've ever had a dinner party and someone's trying something for the first time? Like you are a lunatic. This is insane. I like the way by the way you said, oh, I'm not going to cook it for people. I'll just cook it for me and my partner.

Cook it for Kieran. Yeah. It'll feel like a kind of a pact we made. I've just noticed I wrote down steak tartare and it's auto corrected to Jeff Tartare. Beef Tartare. Jeff Tartare. Come on down to Jeff Tartare. Bring the truck. Bring the trailer. Kids get in free. I would go to Jeff Tartare.

I would. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I would definitely go to Jeff Tartare. Do you think it's like a, is it a themed French restaurant? I feel like the way you did the advert there, I feel like it's like a franchise, like fast food, tartare restaurant where they like shovel out the tartare and put it in a bucket.

Yeah. They're like, but yeah, that's just mints, isn't it? Yeah, that would be mints. Big tub of mints. I do like the, when you go to Paris and they do it at the table, like that's like the dream. Yeah. But it also, I remember feeling very grown up realizing I liked it. I think I can put

most moments in my life that I've felt like mature because, you know, first time I ever ate a whole Big Mac, I was like, I'm a big kid. I can do it. You know what I mean? Like things that your dad used to eat. YouTube videos are like. Yeah. Your face stretching out. I'm a big kid. I'm a big boy. But also like the steak tartare. That's something you don't see at base.

If there was YouTube videos of babies eating steak tartare for the first time, I'd watch them. I think it would work because unless it was, you know, if there was too much Tabasco in there, but like it's a, it's baby food texture. A lot of French food is baby food. Really, it's a lot of like whipped up thing. Like we've made this thing that used to be alive into a mush. Enjoy. Snails isn't baby food. Well, I guess sometimes babies might eat a snail by accident. Yeah. They love it. They love it. Kids eat sand. You know what I mean? Like it's good for the immune system. Yeah. Yeah. Give them some garlic. It's good. I was reading the other day and I think it's like a famous thing, but the, um, or to learn the bird, the little bird where you have to put a hood over

because you don't want God to see you eating. Just French people. Fucking hell. Like French food is probably my favorite food, I reckon, in terms of like the big classics. But then you get to a point where you think, were you guys bored? Just bored. So you're like, let's make this animal as scared as possible near the end of its life. And then we'll make people hide from God as they eat it. I don't know how much that's going on in France anymore.

Well, it's illegal. They made it illegal. That's what I was looking at. I was like, I was trying to remember, I just finished writing a book of essays and I was trying to remember as part of an essay, whether that was a real thing. You know, you have memories where you're like, is that real? Or if I, is this from like, have I made like a little bloom house movie in my head about a chef? But it does just fit like, cause they boil it in Quantro. Yeah, or no, what is it? Something like that.

And then you put the whole bird in your mouth, givets and everything. Beak, you're eating a beak. It can't be nice, can it? How do we know? How do we know they're doing that? Cause they're covering up with the thing. They could be doing everything.

Might be magic trick. Well, that's the idea, the whole thing, they put a napkin over their head to hide from God. But God sees the bird go in under the thing. Will God can famously see everywhere, right? Yes. Yeah. No. So, doesn't mean he can't see under a blanket.

I think it says in Corinthians he can't see under a little napkin. Unless you have a little napkin. And I said to Moses, I've not read the Bible. That's why napkins on lap started. It wasn't to get rid of the crumbs or anything like that. It was back in Roman times, everyone was just getting absolutely whacked off. Yeah, at the table. Stop at the vorat- vomitorium, come back to the feast, get jerked off, napkin on the- nap- nap- napkin on the lap. So God can't see.

God is none the wiser. God's like, look at them having a good time down there, those Romans. Good on them. Table matters. Wait, what are you doing to my son? That's what God sounds like by the way. I want to let down, get to God. And he's like, hello! It's just me.

But my actual one, after all, is, and it's another kind of grown up thing. There's a particular thing at this place called Carlton Wine Room in Melbourne, which is it's an anchovy toast. And it's just very, but they do this and it was the first time I'd ever eaten anchovy toast when I ate it there. And it has now it's like a main, when people come over for dinner, it's like my main thing that I open with, but I'd make, they do it. It's like very like thin toasted, like kind of grilled bread, kind of crispy. And then it's like there's like whipped ricotta on it or something that they, that they pipe on.

And then there's, I think they've got kind of thick coins of pickled gherkin, but it's still like kind of crunchy. So I'm getting very emotional. Um, and then the anchovy over the top. And then there's some sort of like very light spice. That's the thing I've tried to make it at home. And then there's something like, it's good. It was okay at home, but there's something missing.

There's something sprinkled over the top. I mean, it sounds amazing. And it's just light. And I like to have like, there's a place in Melbourne called Barmigo that they do like half martinis when you get there. And it's just a perfect way to, with like a little entree and maybe like an oyster. Can I have it?

Maybe I'll have an oyster as well. The anchovy toast and one oyster. I don't want to like. You don't want the half martini? No, I do want the half martini. And it's just like, it's not because sometimes a full martini at the beginning of a meal, if you haven't eaten, it's beginning, it's going in hot. Yeah.

That's my dream. Yeah. Yeah. Full martini straight away. Well, we did, we went to Gimlet in Melbourne and that was a similar thing. We were, and I had to do a gig after that. I don't know how you went and did a gig after that. I don't remember too much of it. Like that thing where you're having a nice dinner and I was like, I've got a gig, so I better not.

I'll order by the glass now. I won't, let's not get a bottle for the table. I'll just have, and I had like four glasses of wine during the dinner. After martini. Yeah. Yeah. Oh boy. Anytime I've done a gig, even vaguely tipsy, I've gone on with a game plan of like, just if I could just do your material, you know your material. And it's like, oh, just go

on, just do it, get off. And then two seconds in, I've confessed to them that I'm drunk. Yeah. Yeah. We went to this restaurant, Gimlet in Melbourne and Gordon Ramsay was there. Yes. Was he? Yeah. And he walked through the kitchen to go to the toilet. Yeah. It's like you walking around the bar. Yeah. That's a power move.

Yeah. And I don't think he even, cause in my head it was like, oh, he must be walking through going, great job guys, great job guys. Now just walk through. Sorry, got to shit. It was exciting though, wasn't it? Yeah. To see Ramsey. Well, and a few weeks before the Obamas had been there and classic hospitality. I found this out, this is all we were having dinner at Ben's house and there was some chefs there. And we found out it was one of the chefs from Gimlet and he said, oh yeah, the halfway through the dinner, he mentioned that the Obamas are at his restaurant tonight and we, the, the dinner stopped.

We were like, excuse me? What are you doing here? And he was like, oh, but I kind of understand. He was a little bit like, why would, you know, it's like a hospitality mindset. I love chefs and people that their whole lives are about hospitality because- I said, oh, are they in the private dining room? And he went, oh no, it was booked. But you know what I mean?

It's like, I can't, I respect it so much more because it was about, no, it's, I But you know what I mean? It's like, I respect it so much more. Cause it was about, no, I don't care who you are, it's booked. And so that was very impressive. And apparently, yeah, they, they sat like the Obamas just sitting out with secret service at tables around them, eating a good time. Great. I would have, I would have wanted to work that night. I mean, that's, that's still pretty bonkers not to be there.

It would have been a buzz to be there, but what do you actually, I think I prefer the story that I didn't go. You didn't go. I think there's more satisfaction. The payoff you get to meet a president. I think to decide not to meet a president is pretty fun. If you were working there, James, say you were a waiter there and you were assigned to the Obama's table, how are you playing it? Full erection whole time? Napkins going on.

Are you saying anything specific or are you just treating them like normal customers or are you trying any little jokes? Are you asking them any questions? It's a very good question actually. I think I'd try and play it cool to begin with. Yeah. Definitely. But then like, I think probably pretty quickly I'd go into like, asking them questions. Yeah, confess you're drunk within two seconds. Yeah, yeah. I mean, actually, to be honest, if I'm going to go by a recent experience

when I met, I met Andrew Garfield the other day. Oh my God. And I did not play. He hates Mondays. Oh my God. And I did not play that cool. And he's not the Obamas. So I think he's not. And that's not an insult to Andrew Garfield. I'm sure he'd agree that he's not the Obama. I asked him about every film he's ever been in. Yeah. Yeah. I was, I was, it was at a festival and I was drunk. Yeah. My opening line to him, I'd never met him before and he was chatting to Nish Keemah gets another shout out. Yeah. Everyone loves Nish. He was chatting to Nish. I couldn't see who it was. And Nish was just chatting to someone at Glastonbury. I walk over, I

realize who it is. I go Garfield, you motherfucker. Right. Another person we can't have on the podcast. Oh boy. Oh no. He just don't want to live podcast. His response was pretty good. He goes, Hey Castor, you can't. I was like, that sounds pretty good. But then, uh, then they proceeded to just tell him about all of his films for like a very long time. Yeah. And that's, so that's ruined. Yeah. Now we've ruined it. Did he have to, do you make excuses and leave? Yeah, eventually. But like we, we had him there for quite a while.

Had him there. Had him there, you know, he couldn't get away for a bit. Yeah, he was in a corner. Yeah. I've never understood the concept of just walking up to someone you admire just to meet them. Yeah. Like it's like similar, like, but you met him in the right way.

Like you met him in the right... Let's say the story again. again. Garfield, you motherfucker. You didn't handle it well, but you're in the right circumstance. Yeah. You could have, you could have mutual friends. Yeah. So that's how the dishes started talking to him. Yeah. But also I just watched silence. The Scorsese film had done it for the first time. I'd never seen it before. So that's what I said. So I said, call him a motherfucker. And then I sat down and it was like, I saw Silence the other week, man, you're telling people to trample all the way through that film. You keep telling them to trample because you're telling people to trample on the Bible.

And he was like, yeah, you like the trampling stuff. I was like, yeah, you just tell them to trample all the time. Like, oh my God. So not, it wasn't even I loved it or a great performance. It's more, these were some of your lines, Andrew. Yeah, but that was my favourite bit was how much he kept telling people to trample. So I was like, that's great. I told him that seeing Spider-Man 2 in the cinema was the worst experience I've ever had in the cinema. Not because of him. Not because of him. It's because of the people in the

cinema. Hearing how you talk to people sometimes is like watching an episode of the Undateables. I thought it went alright. You said the trample. You still taught them the trample. Thing I remember about you. Yeah. I once saw David Byrne across, I was at like, during Sydney Festival at this kind of, and I was plus one, never a bride, and saw David Byrne talking to Nick Zimmer, Kataris from Yeah Yeah Yeahs,

and they were chatting. And David Byrne is my favorite thing. Like, and I almost went and then went just with thinking, what's, what's the end goal here? I'm just another random person in his life that says, I love everything about you. And then I walk away or I can go, I saw him. You know, like I think, and I guess what I'm saying, it's similar with the Obamas where it's like, what's the end goal? You're like, Hey, I love what you, I love how you killed Bin Laden. Like, you know what I mean?

Like, no. I bet they don't get that very often, right? No. Actually that's my answer to the question. And you put in the check down and by the way, loved how you killed Bin Laden. Oh yeah. I can't Bin Laden, not having fun of the drones. No?

40 minute video about the operation to kill Bin Laden the other day. I love it. It's well exciting. Yeah. Your algorithm must be. Yeah, it's fucked. All over the place. Yeah, absolutely fucked. My algorithm, I don't know why, recently just started showing me

pilots very calmly dealing with emergencies on flights, recently he's just started showing me, um, pilots very calmly dealing with emergencies on flights. And it's just recordings with pictures. It's not the plane that they're on. It's just video of planes flying with like, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh but there's no... Anyways, that's my algorithm. Yeah. I've got, yeah, mine's a mess. Pilots landing a plane. Pilots landing planes, drag queens, and food. The Reese Nicholson story. Yeah. If someone finds a video of a drag queen calmly landing a plane while eating a burrito. Some had Jovis on toast.

Oh. Yeah, so now I've got, um, wrestling, food, military operations, and reviews of first-class cabins in commercial planes. Yeah, I get that as well. Someone very calmly showing me a seat. Yeah. Or the showers. I saw one the other day on one of the big planes, the shower upstairs started leaking. So water was pouring into economy. And that to me is a perfect metaphor for pouring into economy. And that to me is a perfect metaphor for how, for like class, like it's just a perfect class system of just the dirty water of the rich pouring onto like even premium economy.

Yeah. But there must've been people sat in economy being dripped on going, what is dripping on us? And they go, oh, it's the shower. They got a fucking shower. Oh, it smells so beautiful. It smells so clean. There's no clearer class system than a plane. Like, you know, like it's such a, there's no middle class in a plane. The, the just jump from even premium to economy. And you turn different ways as well. Or you walk through the rich people to get to the poor people. You can see, you can touch it.

And then they make you walk through it again to get off. Just like kind of messed up beds in the sky. Everyone looking really refreshed. Yeah. Empty martini glasses. Clear evidence of an orgy. Yeah. Okay. For me, ASMR light triggers, Disney World vloggers, and videos of myself on panel shows.

Hahahaha! Your dream main course. Dream main course. The first obvious choice was like just a ribeye, like a big steak. I think a lot of lockdown for me was wanking and, um, Karen's gone for a walk, quick. The, the, the quiet, hurried wanks of long-term relationships during the lockdown. Um. Leads this pathology, but.

The quiet, hurried wanks. Karen's gone, this next one's called Karen's Gone For A Walk. Quick. But I wanted to get quite good at cooking a steak, like properly. I've started now finishing it off in the oven. Hold for applause. But the, and cast iron, we got a barbecue during the lockdown. Like I feel like we were in a very, obviously had full blown mental breakdown during the lockdown, put on 10 kilos, but at the same time was just doing big cooks all the time. Just learning I cooked a lot of fried chicken. I cooked a lot of fried chicken.

I cooked a lot of steaks. I started just making milkshakes with bourbon in them. We'd watch five movies a day sometimes. That's 10 hours of movies. Anyway, that's bliss. That's absolute heaven. This is the kind of like, like if there was a character called Jeff Tata, that's how I would imagine their living.

They're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Milkshakes of bourbon in them. Steaks. Yeah. It was the life that I know would lead to, you know, you see guys, they're not like, just their paws, you could go swimming in them, like their noses seem like something you've put on top of their head. Like, and you just read all the time and just very kind of, just every, anytime you move, there's like a...

They're having big, big dinners every night. Yeah. Big boozy dinners. I've heard that story about apparently, uh, Mel Brooks had dinner with Alfred Hitchcock and they like have this big dinner. He's trying to, I think he was, it was to make high anxiety. He was going to make like a Hitchcock parody and they had this big dinner and he was full, like feeling so sick and just trying to pitch and I want to do this and I want to do this and the waiter came at the end to give the check and Alfred Hitchcock apparently said, we'll go again. And they just did the whole dinner again. Oh, I love it. We'll go again. So I was thinking steak and then I was thinking lasagna, partly because my dad makes a really

good lasagna, but in that way that I'm not even sure if it's good, it's just what my dad made. Like it was the, I don't know if you had this as kids where you could pick what you wanted on your birthday. And it was all, both my sister and I would always choose lasagna. My dad makes it like a really great lasagna. And I'm going to bring up Ben again. The last time we went to his restaurant, Attica, his new kind of main is a lasagna

that he spent the better part of a year designing. He came past our table. He was working that night and he did that where the, they kind of crouched down next to the table and it's automatically much more intense. And he explained like how he'd gone through with this, uh, how he's designing this and it took a long time to, but the way that they do it is it's the pasta is like big strips of pasta and he pipes on the meat and the bechamel and stuff and rolls it up almost like a cinnamon roll. And then they bake it like that and so it's presented to

you in the middle of the- and it is- it was one of those things where you eat it and the, everyone goes quiet for a little while, like no one's, no one's talking. It's just similar to with the steak. I went on a holiday with some friends in the south of France and it was one of those steak restaurants where you pick, like I'll have 200 grams of that and all blah, blah, blah. And the most expensive one, the guy, he was taking us through and he went, and this one, they feed the cows beer and cereal. And we were like, we thought it was maybe like a language issue.

And we thought maybe they're giving them like hops or like, but anyway, no, no, they mix beer with cereal, like oats, and they feed it to the cows and they get, they're just out there drunk and it marbles the beef in a really particular way. And we were like, okay, well, we're going to have to get some of the drunk beef. And it was the greatest. We do all try it. We were there with someone who had been a vegetarian for a very long time. And we were all, it was like in a movie when you eat something and everything

kind of goes blurry around like, and she tried it and was like, yeah, no, this is. And then I think she might not be a vegetarian anymore. Anyway, I feel like Zanya is one of those things, it's still not my main, but it feels strange to make it for a dinner party, but I don't know why you wouldn't. Do you know what it feels? Yeah. Homely, but I think it's, it delivers and it feels like the easiest thing to make, make it during the day.

Anyway, there should be more. I'll make a couple of massive lasagnas a year. Yeah. And then there's no way I'm getting through it. So section it up, freeze it and then... Never eat it. Any day I'll be like, if there's no food in, I'll be like, fuck, there is though. Do you microwave or bake?

Bake. Bake, yeah, got to bake. I wouldn't be surprised if I'd just lick some loco loco loco loco loco loco loco loco loco freezer. Yeah, I would do that. The way the weather is at the moment. Yeah. I love a lasagna lolly.

Yes. Currently hot by the way. Yeah. I love a lasagna lolly. Yes. Can't be hot by the way. Yeah. Your heat wave is adorable. So this is exciting now because both of those honorable munchens sound absolutely delicious. Yeah. But that lasagna, that steak. So I feel like I'm going to just, it's my basic bitch to, I just want, I just want a fried chicken burger. Wow. I felt like that went off a cliff there.

Yeah, right off. I mean, not a good one. I think if I'm honest with myself, that is what I want to eat. All the time. Any time. It could be the middle of the night and you shake me awake. And you go, what do you want to eat? Fried chicken burger.

Karen and I went on a holiday years ago. We went to Palm Springs and he pointed out to me. Also, it's about right in thinking that Palm Springs is the name of your wanking book. Yep. Oh, it's lovely. It's lovely. Went to Palm Springs and I did, I probably jerked Karin off a lot on that holiday as well, so it all comes together.

Yes. The Karin Wheatley, my partner. My partner in life, my partner in business, my partner in coming. He pointed out to me at the end of the week that we've been in Palm Springs, that I had not noticed I'd eaten a fried chicken burger every single day. But in had found new way, like it wasn't like I'll have another fried chicken, but it was like we'd be at a different restaurant and I would order it for lunch and just, I wasn't making the connection. You're going, oh, I might have a fried chicken burger.

It is. So I will always be at a restaurant and be like, I think if it's just lunch, I'm just going to get like a salad or something. And then the waiter comes and I just panic and order a fried chicken. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It needs to be like with a floor on it. Like, no, like not crazy. Like I want an American, like a chicken, what they call like a chicken sandwich in America. Like that, like a potato bun, not a brioche. Yeah. Fried chicken where I, when I, I've made it at home before where you buttermilk brine it and everything

with some pickle juice in it. And then you put a little bit of that into the flour to make it like kind of claggy and that turns into that little bits. And like some sort of mayo, like a chipotle, but not like crazy spicy. I don't want to shit myself on the street. And like a very acidic kind of vinegary coleslaw. Yeah. And with some curly fries. Yeah.

Like thick curly fries. To me, they're the best chip. Yeah, I don't know why. When it's made well. We went to the pub the other night and just ordered some chips and we ordered every type of chip that they had. Yeah, there was a lot of those. It wasn't just me and Ed.

Yeah. But that's a good- It was just me and you? Yeah, if Ed suggested it. I'll do anything he says. But like they said over. Okay, good't know if Ed suggested it. Um, I'll do anything he says, but like they sent over, they sent over. I'll work on my Ed imitation. Two figures to palms. Yeah. They sent over the like French fries. Yeah. Thick cut chips. Thick cut chips, chip

shop chips. Yeah. And uh, curly fries. Thick cut chips are not good. I'm trying to think, I couldn't not get a hold of what I was trying to say there. How high is the man holding the sign of the thick cut chips? Just shake it. Yeah, pretty low. I think he's on the ground. He didn't even make it. The thick cut chips, I think are a, they're a scam. Fish and chips, proper thick cut.

The like, bit soggy. Chip shop chips, fair enough. Yeah. But I think they're a scam. Fish and chips, proper thick cut, the like chip-soggy. Chip shop chips are enough. Yeah. But I think they're a middle ground. And I think they're a kind of, I mean like the kind of like almost veering on a wedge type of chip. Yeah, no, I agree with you with those. Yeah. Just get it. I think roast potatoes are one of the greatest gifts that our Lord has ever given us. Don't pop a napkin over them. Yeah. But yeah, a thick chip is no. It's like when they, you remember there was a while where polenta chips were like a big thing? And they always came in like a little stack,

like as if the restaurant had just thought of this and they were so proud of themselves. I don't know why I'm so angry at polenta chips. Yeah, no, no, the little Jenga stack is not, yeah, it's like, oh, that's not making it better. I can still see there's only six of them. And you're aerating them as well, so they're getting colder as you go through. There's like, oh, that's not making it better. I can still see there's only six of them. And you're aerating them as well. So they're getting colder as you go through. There's a real time, similar to, uh, Halloumi, real time limit on Halloumi. Yeah. Soon as it goes down, you don't have long.

Yeah. And as soon as it's shit, it is irreversibly shit. There's a deadline. Like a polenta chip, like a thick cut chip. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Obviously the curly fries one when we were doing the, yeah, the taste test of the, of the chip.

I think because it's, it's fun. Just on a kind of, on a looking level, a baby would love to push it into its face. Yeah. But just all the little kind of, kind of craggy crispy bits that come off it. Yeah. And some bits are soggy in the middle of the spring, which I like. Yes. And if you're dipping like a kind of thick, like a aioli or something, it kind of goes up into there.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. An extra little reservoir aioli or something, it kind of goes up into there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Get an extra little reservoir of that. Yeah. And some of them are so massive. Yes. I think what fucking potato did this come from? Yeah. I don't know why that's made me laugh.

How much wasted? There must be a lot of potato wastage in curly fries, surely. But then are they using that to maybe make the mash? That's what I'd like to think. Maybe. Or do you think if you got a bowl of curly fries that all came from the same potato, you could rebuild the full potato? Mmm, the full potato.

You'd probably need a screwdriver or something to get it all back in. A big good task master task. Yeah. I want to- Put together this potato from curly fries. I want to buy one of those vegetable sheet cutters that make really thin. Yeah. And I want to start making pomeannas at home, like the kind of hundred layer. Like just, I love a gadget. Are you a gadget? Are you like a gadget chef?

We've run out of space for gadgets now. And also they get used like twice and then they just sit in a cupboard. So I'm like that with hobby. Like any, I recently bought a rug tufting gun. I'm going to start, I'm going to start making my own rugs. And then, um, didn't do that. And now I've just got literally hundreds to thousands of pounds worth of rug tufting material just in the house. It was like, it felt like the, you know, during lockdowns I was like, I'm gonna make a quilt. Bought all the quilt stuff that arrived.

Nah, it's all in the drawer now. Just stair it all instead. Yeah. Yeah. Got a lot of food in your house. I do. Nah. It's all in the drawer now. Just there at all instead. Yeah. Yeah. Got a lot of fried chicken. A lot. I do.

Yeah. In the kind of in the area under the stairs that there's definitely things I've hidden from Kyren that aren't for like deep dark shame reasons. They're just like, oh, he can't know I've bought that. He can't know that I bought that and then wasn't interested in it. Except I hope he doesn't open that door. That's just full of. Yeah.

Yeah. Just fabric and my wank poetry. Rug tufting gun. Wow. You must have been pretty confident when you ordered it that it was going to be a... I mean, ordering a rug tufting gun. Well, I think I'm still going to do it. It's pretty fun.

I have used it and it's pretty enjoyable to do. And it's like embroidering, but big. And it feels quite... It's a very gay, but big. And it, it's, it feels quite, um, it's a very gay thing to do, but it feels quite straight. I think in terms- What other things fall into the category of a gay thing to do, but it feels quite straight? I don't know.

Um, love women. Yeah, I think. Incredibly gay. In terms of the hierarchy of guns, it's probably the least threatening, I'd say. Yeah. Although it's pretty sketchy. So it, it's probably the least threatening, I'd say. Yeah. Although it's pretty sketchy. So it, it pushes thread in and then snips it. So it has these like watch clips on YouTube.

It's pretty full on. Like- I'm not sure my algorithm can take that to be honest. We go, who the fuck are you? Who's using this YouTube? Did you mean- Yeah. Did you mean gun?

I'm the type of gun. You mean big gun, right? But yeah, fried chicken burger and just not bonkers like I don't want you go to those kind of burger places now and it's like back in my day it was just chicken and coleslaw now but um like I want some pickles on there. I love that guy. That's um that's uh Jeff. Yeah it's got me. Jeff da da. Come here, in here, have some steak tartare, Jeff Tata. I love it. If Brian's rushing a million miles an hour, but it's not to get anywhere.

A lot of urgency, but nothing's going on. Anyway, the beef, you cut up the beef. I love it. You brought the kids, beautiful. Family, family. We're all family odd man who was desperately trying to appear normal. Yeah. Like trying to, he. Jeff had to say ta-ta to that. Where's Jeff from? None of your business. One question or definitely no.

That's his catchphrase. Doesn't talk about his past. In Jeff, ta-ta ta ta! That's his catchphrase. Ta ta! Doesn't talk about his past, Jeff. In Jeff ta ta, ta ta means hello uncle boy. Ta ta! I don't know where he's from. He's been somewhere in the south of America. Yeah!

Yeah, like the deep, like, the shallow south. Not the deep south, just the kind of- Yeah, the shallows. The paddling end. What do you think he looks like? Uh- No neck. Oh, actually, I imagined like, like quite a long, but horizontal neck.

Oh, yeah. Like just completely coming out of his body horizontally, but just like a tortoise, potato head on the end. I think he looks like, I'll tell you who I'm imagining actually. I'm just imagining the food critic from Ratatouille. No, that would be better actually. Let's go with that. Yeah. Who were you imagining? The Peter Falfon family guy.

Yes! Herbert! Herbert the Pervert. Yes. I imagine he looks... I've started describing a particular type of dad on stage recently, like small dads. And I think this is what he looks of, like holding up a frog. You know what I mean? Like that kind of like round egg body. I think that's what Jeff Tata...

Little thin legs.... with very long little legs's what Jeff Tata had. Little legs. Little legs. Yeah. And their wives dressed them. Small dads. Yeah. Little dads. Jeff Tata doesn't have a wife though.

No. Jeff Tata is single forever. There were a lot of people, there was a lady that owned a flower shop down the street that he was always like, ah, give her some, what do you buy a lady that owns a flower shop? What do you give her? That one's a flower shop. What do you give her? A Pepsi Max. Every day I give her a Pepsi Max. Oh, I feel sorry for him now.

Your dream sides dish. Again, had a lot of thoughts. We've got the curly fries, of course. Curly fries, but I think they- They're part of the main- Anytime a place sells just a burger, fuck off. Yeah, exactly. If it doesn't come standard in her, like add some other sides,

but chips come with a burger. Yeah. If you order it, if you go to Macca's and just- Oh, McDonald's, sorry. In Australia, we call it Macca's, and I didn't know that wasn't a thing here. Yeah. And that blew my mind that it wasn't even-

It's not just a nickname, because we call it like Mackeys or Mackey D's sometimes. Mackeys. Mac here. Yeah. And that blew my mind that it wasn't even, it's not just a nickname, cause we call it like Mackies or Macky D sometimes. Mackies. Mackies. But it's on the adverts it gets called Mackers. We're loving it. It's a very relaxed culture.

Mackers. Yeah. In most ways. And then other ways, not so relaxed. Very much not relaxed. Very firm views actually. Side things, keeping it. And it's always the struggle.

I feel like you must come up against with guests on this thing where do I pick a thing that's going to go well or is it just my dream and I think I've gone with what's going to, I just want, I went through all the kind of dreamy site like you know, Brussels sprouts having the biggest glow ups of the mid 2000s or like all of those types of, you know, broccoli and all those things. But I think I just want a very basic, like what I would describe as a restauranty green salad and maybe like a cucumber salad next to it, because I'm going to be eating the fried chicken and the curly fries and I want, I went, where was I? I was in Newcastle and I was on, just on tour and I went to an Indian restaurant and I hadn't

realized I'd never ordered Indian by myself. Like, you know what I mean? Like, and it really made me decide what I wanted to get from this experience. And they had a salad, I can't remember the name of the place, I'm sorry. It was like a, I think it was in Newcastle, it was 100% vegetarian and vegan and kind of trendy. It was like, it was a Friday night, a classic thing, I'd had an afternoon show and I was just going to eat and then go back to my hotel room and be sad and lonely.

But everyone's at the beginning of the best night of their lives. I'm just alone. But I ordered a couple of things, but then got a cucumber, like chunks of cucumber that were in rice wine vinegar and had some maybe like sesame seeds or something on it. And it was just in between each bite of thing, just cleansed. And it's made me go, Oh, I want that anytime I'm eating something heavy now. Just refreshing. Just to refresh him.

And it's not changing anything about your mouth. So yeah, I want something like that. And then like a, yeah, just like a, something that in between big bites of the very heavy chicken burger, I'm eating like a very acidic, uh, what do I want? Like a kind of butter lettuce with some parsley in there, some dill, some tarragon, and with a kind of vinaigrette, like a shallot vinaigrette, and then heaps of salt. And just like resetting your mouth every time. Yeah, every time.

Between every bite. And I know that's not, it's not like the most interesting, but it's, I think it's what I want from a side dish of like, it's helping the other dish. It's not kind of, I think, you know, sometimes a side dish, they step above their means from time to time. They pull focus. Yeah. And you don't want that. Some people have like, you know, some people arrange their off menu menus to be like, just like a greatest hits. And some people think of it as a whole meal. Yeah. And you're thinking of it as an entire meal. And I'm like, it does make sense with the burger and the fries. I mean, it seems I often, I always make a green salad when we eat at home, like, whatever it is. I mean, not, you know, not, but I, I make a salad if we're doing a roast.

And I had someone online really go me. They were like, this is madness. It was like, but it's, you're just eating so much kind of heavy beige food. You want something that's not going to make you, you know, a bit of fiber in there from time to time. And yeah, just a reset. Yeah. Did you talk around the person online? No. Did I talk someone around online? Yeah. I think that's famously possible. Yeah. And I think they were probably a Drag Race fan. So, you know, another classic toxic member of society.

A particular type of fan. But yeah, no, and I wish I had something more interesting than that, but I think it's what I want. You know, there's, I love all the other, that same Palm Springs time, we were going to a lot of steak houses for dinner. That kind of classic Sinatra went here, kind of Musso and Frank's type of place. And we just were, and it was the, it was pretty hot weather. And you'd go in there and you'd eat like a big steak and then all the, um, like macaroni and cheese with the breadcrumbs on top of it and all the things. And then trying to walk home

in like the desert. I went to a steak house in Palm Springs and it does feel like you've got to do it. It's classic. 100%. Like you feel so fancy. I love a place and I think that's why I like French food as well is old white stuff. Very old white stuff. I think you get that a lot more in those kind of steak houses and stuff. Like Mousse and Franks particularly where they've, oh, they've literally, this guy worked here for 50 years. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they're the same people.

Cause I don't know, you just kind of trusted a bit more. There's a bit more of a respect for hospitality over there, I think. Yeah. Well, there's that pride in it as well of like the history of the place. Yeah. Like you say, they'll say like such and such, I hate here. And there's like, like when you're being weighed on by someone who clearly thinks the place is lush. Yeah.

It's a lot better. And yeah, they're like, they're very happy to work there. And they like, I love getting judgment from a, from a white staff. It's like, I genuinely quite enjoy that. Like if it's like a nice place, because it's like, yeah, you think I'm not good enough to be here and I kind of understand that. Like, it's like being, you know, told off by someone who works in a clothes shop. You're like, you know, I'm buying the clothes, right?

Anyways, um, class systems. So I mean, I, like, I really thought through a lot of, like I wanted to have a lot of impressive side dishes. Like, you know, there's obviously, I make like a lot of things that, you know, an Arlenki is, any, you know, have you noticed the big thing in restaurants now of like a kind of yogurty sauce on the bottom of a salad now? They put it on the bottom and then, yeah, and then the leaves on the top or whatever, yeah. Yeah, that's just seems to be like, is that going to stop? Do we think it's like, I think it works for when it's like veg, when they

put vegetables on top, because then you get the spoon and you can kind of, and you get the whole wall. And yeah, yeah, I like that. But yeah, with the salad, you want to, it's like, similarly, all, all new plays involve a camera now. You notice that someone Someone did it well once. This is all of them now, I reckon. What do you mean? And then they project. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Did you know you were coming to see Kiss? That's how they do it. Couldn't think of any other band. Whenever I order, I quite regularly get sticks and sushi on delivery room and I'll get the cauliflower that has the black truffle sauce on top. Shout out to that dish.

That's a great dish. Yeah. But they have it that they'll put a little drizzle on the top, but most of it is on the bottom. And when you get it takeaway, it comes in this like black container. So I can't see the sauce on the bottom and I'm having a guess chasing it around with the cauliflower. And I only know how much sauce I've got on there. When I pick it, I'm chasing it around the bottom. I'm having a guess chasing it around with the cauliflower yeah I only know how much sauce I got on there when I pick it you know I'm chasing

it around the bottom I'll bring it up I just rubbed it around the plastic again even God can't see it I don't know where any of it is it's a nightmare I do it regularly do you like the chase so I think you like the chase not as much as Australia like that yeah I wish I'm trying to get better at that type of cook I'm not a good better at that type of cook. I'm not a good, Kyren is really good at looking what's in the pantry and going, I'm going to make this. And I, and there's a confidence in that, that I don't have. I'm still very recipe based. And then I changed that recipe over like six times of doing it.

And then it's mine. You know, I mean, like I'm not good at, I can work, I like to work things out and I like to try it, but that involves me looking at other recipes for things. Yeah. I need to order in specifically for something that I am going to cook. Yes. And then I'll use a teaspoon of some spices, I'll put them on a shelf and three years later, I will throw them away. Yes. Yeah.

And my big clear out yesterday, actually. Yeah. My big kitchen clear out. We didn't have any food in either. And I was like, I don't know what, what am I going to eat? I can't get another delivery. And very luckily I've been sent a big box of stuff from Bella Zoo who do a lot of olive oils and I opened the box and there was some pasta and pesto in there. I was like, it's pasta pesto tonight. I almost want to, and I mean, I feel like this is the dream of everyone that likes food, but I want to do like a proper, like cooking, like a six week, nine course and just understand things a little bit more. Like, and I also wish I could talk about, I mainly like, yeah, I just finished

writing a book of essays that has recipes in it, but it's not like a food book. It's like, there's some bits about food and I'm very open about, I mainly just want to get into the food. Like I just, I want to be, have a TV show where I just eat, you know, that's my dream job is like just going to another place and eating. Yeah. Well, I'm living, I'm living that dream. I also want to do a course. Like I, in fact, I think my mom said she'd buy me a course for my birthday three years ago. So I'm going to, I'm going mum said she'd buy me a course for my birthday three years ago. So I'm going to, I'm going to do it at some point, do a Leith's course. Two years ago, I nearly completely quit comedy to go and do a course for six months. I thought

I'd just do a, like a proper like every day. Well, yeah. That's why I've had to put my, I'd like to make it clear. He was pointing to Benito. Not me. I'm not the prick in this situation. Yeah. So I'll just, I'll go and do like a week, a week course. Just to be able to be like, Oh, I can cook sauces. Like I could just whack, I could whack up a sauce and stop it. Um, I could whack up a source now and again, you know, we all have to work with that without thinking about it. You know? Try and rhyme that sentence with something. Get yourself a poem. A dream drink. Dream drink. Now this is someone who owns a bar. Yeah.

So someone who owns a bar, choose in their dream drink. I mean, I'm not good at, but like when we have dinner parties, we, and we have like a little, this happened just before lockdown, actually, my friend Luca Muller and Alex Ward and her partner Hannah, we have like a little dinner club that we, we have like a group text and mainly during lockdowns we just sent pictures of our dinners to each other. And then that turned into like we, we're on a constant kind of pilgrimage

where we go to nice restaurants together and like it's this group of, anyway. And Kiren, when we have them over for dinner, usually takes care of the bar. Like he's, he's when I'm, I've started like trying to get good at cooking. He's getting good at making drinks. Oh, this is perfect. The perfect household. It's pretty good. Yeah.

I think, I mean, with the burger, I don't ever, I'm not a beer drinker, but I feel like the burger wants a beer with it. Like I will only ever drink it like a pale ale or something with like Korean fried chicken or something like that. Like something that will, or I'll drink like a, but then like my favorite thing is a Riesling, like a very cold Austrian Riesling. We went to a restaurant once and we got a magnum of Riesling, which is very funny. They are very funny. It's like, and especially like a little, a little white stuff person trying to, you know what it looks like, you know, the Galliano bottles?

Yeah. But huge. So long. And just trying to pour it into these teeny tiny little white wine glasses. Very funny. Very, very funny. Yeah. I think my, my actual dream drink is a very cold Austrian, like a kind of bitey Riesling to cut through whatever you're eating. Cause I think- So like acidic, a bitey Riesling to cut through whatever you're eating. Cause I think- So like acidic, a drier Riesling. Yeah. Yeah. No, not sweet. Not. And I think Riesling, similarly is having a bit of a glow up.

And like, when I think Riesling, I used to think like sack wine, like, or as we call it in Australia, Gurn. That's what you call it. Gurn. Gurn. Cause we, I think Australia, we invented the sack wine. Do you mean like the box wine? Box wine. Yeah. But it is in a the sack wine. Do you mean like the box wine? Box wine, yeah. But it is in a sack. It's in a sack inside the box.

Yeah, we take it. So we have a thing in Australia when you're a kid, it's called Goon of Fortune, where you hang sacks of box wine, the silver sacks on like a clothesline, like a, we call them holes hoists, and you spin it and someone is standing on each point of the clothesline and when it stops at you, you have to like guzzle it. Did you say when you were kids? Well, like teenagers.

Oh cool kids. Yeah. The coolest kids in town. The coolest kids in town. And no one wins. No. Is the, does one of the bugs have something disgusting in it? Nope.

No. It's just, and now you're drinking this goon. Now you're drinking this goon. And now you're drinking this goon. I think maybe sometimes you play it with one of the myths. It's almost like, it's opposite Russian roulette. Yeah. Like. So you lose by not getting one.

I guess. One of you. One of you doesn't get some. Doesn't get a drink. Yeah. I mean, is there anything worse? So you're all laughing. The guy who doesn't get one every time.

You're like, ah, fuck you. You're so beautiful. You're like, ah, fuck you, fuck you Jeff. Oh, not Jeff Tartare. Oh no, no good for old Jeffy. So you want to go Austrian Riesling. Do you not feel like you're betraying your country folk by not having Australian Riesling? Cause there's some fantastic- I'll just say it fast and they won't know.

Yeah, they won't know. What did you say? Austrian Riesling? It is Austrian that I'm thinking of, right? They make good wiesling? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. 100%. Very delicious.

I think I also, I've noticed as I've gotten older, I think, you know, when you first start drinking wine as an adult, you automatically go to very heavy, like I remember wanting like cabsabs all the time and like just these kind of, a lot of tannin talk, a lot of big chat about tannin. And now I'm only 33, which is not old, but I just want Pinot all the time. Pinot Noir, like just a very light, like a whisper of a red. Something veering towards, like a natural bit, something veering towards a rose, but it's not sweet.

I do, I find myself in a similar situation, but then also if you're eating like a big meal, something heavy, I do want like that proper blood wine. Yeah. Thick blood wine. Proper like blood wine. You know, when you get it out- Well, this has been fun, guys. When you get out of the bag, it's like you've gone into a hospital

and taken a donation bag. That's quite often how I want to, I'll order a glass of that by the glass at the very, like, after, after every, that kind of bit where you're waiting for the check and someone's still finishing their drink and you go, you know what? I'm going to have one. And then you find just, cause drunk you is like, this is the best time to drink the heaviest red wine. I'm only on stage in eight minutes.

Yeah. 4.30. I think I want the Riesling. I think I want a nice cold glass of Riesling. Lovely. Does sound good. Yeah. So with the, you know, you got the salad there in between each bite of the burger.

It's all kind of mixing together. Yeah. What order are you doing the bites in? You're doing burger, salad, Riesling. That's a gold. God, this is like Star Wars. Trying to decide which one to watch. Is that, is that, is that? That's the thing. Isn't it like with now that there's like nine of them, they're always like, um, that's what

they're always like. Um, what order do you show your kids? Oh yeah. Star Wars. I've got to decide that now. It's a bit different because you're then going back to it. That would be like showing them a bit of start, the first one, a bit of the next one, a bit of the second one and then going back again.

Yeah. A scene of each until they're all done. But I think now that they have all the other, like the, all the little Han Solo, like I mean, do you show them, I mean, don't show them Han Solo, I guess. I think just let them find it by themselves when they're teenagers. Yeah. And let's be honest, do they even have kids? Who? The nerds? The nerds, yeah. That's a point. Good point.

Jeff likes Star Wars. Yeah, yeah. Of course he does. Of course he does. Wanted to show it to the flower girl. He made a whole little list. How are they going to view it? When she won't show her head so low, she won't get it. And then he went to the flower shop one day and it had shut.

Yeah. Turned out with a drug friend. She got killed by the man. Yeah. She's something the man. Yeah. She's something the more interesting character. I can't believe we spent all our time with Jeff Tartaglia down the street. Incredible. So lovely glass of cold Riesling. Yes.

Burger salad with curly fries. Yeah. And I think I'm like a Riesling. I think you can also, you can go the whole time with a Riesling pretty lightly. Like, and you can decide whether you sip in that Riesling or you can decide, like it's pretty gulpable, like a good, and you can get absolutely, you know that feeling when you're so drunk at a dinner, it feels like you're day drunk? Yeah. Like there's a giddiness like to the sugariness of it. And it feels like I could be at an outdoor daytime party right now, but it's 11pm and my heart is racing. Like I want to like, I haven't wanted to do drugs in years, but we should get some ketamine.

That would really light tonight up. There's always someone, there's always someone that, you know, that wants the night to not end. You know, they're always like, let's do another round. And everyone is, there's someone that's throwing up next to them. And their partner is way too, it's always the partner of the person who's way too drunk that needs to be taken home. Does that make sense? Do you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, sure. We arrive at your dessert.

Yes. So excited about this, obviously. Okay. I'm always excited about the desserts. Yes, I know. I'm pretty sure that you like desserts. Uh oh. Okay.

Where we going with this? Interesting. Okay. I think I've maybe found a way though to help out with the constant struggle of this podcast of the cheese and dessert thing. First of all, let me say I'm not a very deserty person. Usually dessert for me at a restaurant would be, if I was true to my heart, I think I just want a spoon and I just want little bits of everyone else's, whatever else they've ordered. Okay.

That is my perfect dessert. The desserts I do, like, you know, look like creme brulee, I like a, I like a rambaba. Like a good, they have a really good one at Carlton Wine Room. But I went to a restaurant in London recently. It was an Italian restaurant. in one room, but I went to a restaurant in London recently. It was an Italian restaurant. We ordered pecorino, big slices of pecorino that they'd put brown sugar on top and blow torched. Wow. Oh my God. Well, I don't know what that restaurant is because I'd remember that. And it felt like a kind of pecorino brulee type of thing. And it was wildly good.

And it was as simple as that. Like it wasn't, they hadn't done anything else to it. Was it Brutal? Yes. Was it Brutal? It was. I've still not been, but yeah. Wow. That's how good at gambling is. He hasn't even been and he wasn't even know that from the menu at Brutal, but he was able to guess it was sounds about that ballpark and he got

it. Yeah. It sounds like that sort of place. Like is that a famous, cause we literally, we were staying around there once, Karen and I, and we just went in, we were like looking for somewhere to do that. So it's a Russell Norman place who, he had Spuntino, but he's got, um, Pol Pot. Pol Pot? Pol Pot. Pol Pot.

Wow. He's got a Cambodian restaurant called Pol Pot. It's very controversial. It's kind of like a, you cook your own thing. It's like the whole pot. It looked, I mean, this isn't helpful for the, it looked like that. I love it. I love it. I can't see zoom. Oh, it's going on like a slideshow. I've got to be quick. It's like, so it looks like a slice of pizza, but creme brulee on the top. Yeah. Yeah. Do you think, if you're not, you would try and get all the description out before the picture moved on as if the picture when you'd forget immediately what it looked like. That's how I

felt. That's what happened to Reese. I felt like, okay, it's going to move on in a second. It's like a slice of pizza with a brulee on the top. Cause if the picture had gone, I would have lost all my words about what that was. That was how I felt. Also, I didn't know what the next pitch was going to be. It's always a worry. Yeah. I've been in a relationship long enough, it's not ever going to be a dick pic. I've heard how many times you jacked him off at Palm Springs. Yeah. Hey, that was five years ago. I think that is the thing about like getting the 30s, but like it's all just

pictures of like, if it's a bit of skin, it's just for medical reasons. It's like, it look bad? It's bad to you? Do you think? I can't see this bit of my neck. Can you take a picture of it? Or screenshots of things, fucked people have said on the internet, that use screenshot. Like that's the only thing that'll ever get me canceled properly.

I think it's like not dick pics being released. It's like someone just releasing all the screenshots I've taken. Yeah. Sure. Instagrams. Yeah. I was like, just why are you doing this? Stop getting a Patreon. Is this what you want for your dessert?

I think I want everyone else to get stuff. Yeah. And me to just, usually I get a drink for dessert. Like I will get a digestive, like a kind of an Amaro of some sort. Maybe like a Furnabranca with like a kind of an amaro of some sort, maybe like a fernabranca with like a little bit of ice in it. Maybe a amaro montenegro, which is like so old, but it's so good. Like that's another, that's something that's happened in the last couple years of realizing how good digestives are after a dish, after a meal. Like properly, I was a smoker

for years and that was my digestive, but now I need to rely on herbaceous Italian liqueurs. Have you had the mint Fernet Branca? No. I had it in Australia for the first time actually. Maybe I have. In Sydney and I loved it. Yeah. Oh, it's just like super lovely mouthwash.

Yes. And it's like- Super lovely mouthwash. We often now, Caran, like it's a nice way to end it. If we've had dinner and maybe we've had a glass of wine, drink dinner, and then maybe we go and watch a movie in our lounge room, we'll have like, we'll just bring a little vernal brunk or something in there. Cause it's, you're not getting pissed on it. No.

But it feels nice to drink something. It does settle your stomach. And chefs love it, right? That's great. They'll drink it. They're having a massive meal to be able to eat more. And it feels grown up to order it. I don't know. It's like knowing about things like that is very satisfying to me. I also like, but usually I will get an old fashioned or a Manhattan. I've gotten very into Manhattans. They get you. I think we had Manhattans at, or I might've had a

Manhattan at. I think you had a Manhattan. And I got, like they fuck you up. I think've had a Manhattan that I got like they fuck you up. I think I had a Negroni at the end of the day. Yeah. Yeah. A great Negroni's again. I love a Negroni at the start. I think they're another bit of a Negroni's are having their moment. Like the Aperol spritz moment that everyone anytime, um, just a DRE, a traditional drink is on a bus stop.

Like, Oh, look who's back. You know what I mean? Like suddenly Aperol spritz is everywhere. Yeah. Suddenly like Negronies are on bus stops. Like really good on you. Yeah. I had a Negroni that night. You went to do a gig, which is mad because we'd had like a, it was like three and a half hour for a meal. Yeah. Really big steak dinner. It was a charity event. I was doing comedy to charity events. Yeah, you even, a cocktail to when the bill had come already. I think, and then even madder than that,

I just went home and went straight to bed. No, yeah, I went and like- McGrone, good night. I definitely, and I'd forgotten what I, I think it might have been a, not a grim charity, but it was like a very good cause. And she said that classic thing of walking out and just being like, great job everyone for coming out and supporting us. Having no fucking clue why it's there. Like, yeah, no, we're raising money for cancelled white men. Like

a legal fund? That's cool. So I think what I actually want my dessert to be is everyone else, a little bite of everyone else's cool. Um, so I think what I actually want my dessert to be is everyone else, a little bite of everyone else's dessert. And I'm having- Do you want a long spoon? Yes, a very long spoon. Or can I just for this, can we use the magic of the genie? Can I have a very long tongue? Yeah, absolutely. Like an ant eaters head, like in Beetlejuice when they pull out their faces. Yes. Do you want the ant eaters head or do you want the chameleon tongue or whatever?

The bit of both. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And so I lean over and just go like, bloop, bloop. Yeah. Little bit of it. And it's quite a strong tongue and it breaks through the brulee. Yeah.

And then just kind of scoops little bits out and then takes it back in. Can the tongue go all the way to the kitchen? Yeah. So you can taste everything that they cook in. Yeah. Yeah. And they don't know. No. They don't know.

I think they'd know. Your tongue and Gordon Ramsay both walking through the kitchen. You can sneak, you can sneak sneak your tongue in behind Ramsey every time he goes to the toilet. Yeah. The worst sentence anyone's ever said. You can sneak your tongue in behind Ramsey before he goes to the toilet. We've not had Gordon Ramsey on this podcast, but it's not going to happen now. We've not had Gordon Ramsay on this podcast, but it's not going to happen now. I think you might have upped our chances actually. And he knew all about it and he remembered that night. But you are having the bruleed puckerina.

I think that to me is, I guess I'm just offering that as a potential middle ground. I think that sounds like a good bridge from the main course to the dessert. Like a little lecture course in between, bring that out and then the desserts. It was a lot. Like I would say there were two big chunks of it there and that was too many. We could have had one together. Like it was delicious for that kind of thing where you're like, Oh, this is a lot of Pecorino. Yeah.

I'm, I'm booking that place straight after we finished recording. I want to eat that. And Sima, I think you could potentially make it at home as well in a very impressive pop it down type of way. It sounds like it would end in tragedy. If I tried that. That's life, baby. Sure, you've ordered a blowtorch that you've set in your house. Oh, I've got a blowtorch at home. Should I call Kieran? He never comes off well in the work that I do. He's the best person I've ever met in my whole life and he's always just like, ha ha, I fuck him. That's completely changed my life for the better.

But like, no, in comedy he will always just be the guy. The blowtorch. Making cum. And making. Making. Regent Mayne, you're back to your now. I'll see how you feel about it. Yeah.

You would like a pint of very cold sparkling water with some lime. You would like warm sourdough with brown butter. Yep. Starter anchovy toast from the Colton wine room. And oyster and a half martini from bar. Margot. Main course, fried chicken burger with slaw, chipotle mayo in a potato bun with curly fries, side dish, a restauranty green salad

and a cucumber salad, cleansing the palate in between bites. Drink a very cold, dry Austrian Riesling. Riesling? Riesling, yep. Dessert. Show title next year. Austrian Riesling. That's good. You should do that. Well then of course, before the dessert, the brulee pecorino and the dessert, a mouthful of everyone else's and a digestif, which we landed on.

Um, I'll try the mint fenobranca. And also, obviously you would like an anteater's tongue. Yes, please. Throughout that course. Please. And a long face. And a long face. Why the long face?

For all the dessert. We finally know. How do you feel about that menu? It feels good. It feels good. I think, and I, I've been thinking this whole time, like, I don't know who I want to have it with. Like, I think in the kind of, I had to, very recently, for the book, right, the acknowledgements. And I was like, I don't know how to do it. Like, what are you meant to do? And so I just wrote every name I could remember of people I've had nice dinners with, like you guys are in the acknowledgements for my book.

Right. Um, but it is quite funny. I'm using no last name. So there's a lot, turns out I know a lot of James's and a lot of Ed's. Um, but I think I just want like a rolling, somehow if we could use the magic for me to experience dinner with every single one of those people equally. Do you know what I mean? Like some sort of multiverse situation. And that would feel good.

But no, I feel good about that meal. I think I would enjoy that. It's like, we need to make sure your tongue can travel across multiverses. Yes. Okay. I can do that. Yeah. Thanks, man.

I appreciate that. You are a sit at the bar type of person. Yeah. For my loan. Yeah, actually. Yeah. If I'm with Charlie as well. It feels nice to be, loan, definitely. If it's just you and Charlie? Uh, yeah, actually, yeah. If I'm with Charlie as well, we'll sit at the bar. It feels nice to be, again, I'm talking about the feeling growing up, but like, yeah, it's just the two of us.

If we go to Etta, that place that we always go to when I get back, we always sit at the bar. It's like fun to like, there's something to look at when you run out of conversation. Sure. Do you know what I mean? Like, oh, what's he doing? Yeah. So if you want to pretend you're not together, that's fun as well. Okay.

Yeah. I don't like it though, when they bring the food from behind you. No. And you're sat side by side. Yeah. So if you want to pretend you're not together, that's fun as well. Okay. Yeah. I don't like it though, when they bring the food from behind you. No. And you're sat at the bar. No, no. I like to be able to see the food coming and get excited

rather than suddenly it's there. What? Like a magic. Yeah. Would you say it doesn't make you feel careful? Very careful. Thank you very much, Reece. Thanks for having me.

Thanks for having me. There we are. Great episode. Thank you very much, Reece. Thanks for having me. There we are. Great episode. I knew it would be a great episode. Yeah. Reece loves food. Reece loves food. Reece loves food. We knew that menu would be good.

And the whole thing was delicious. Yeah, absolutely. Detailed descriptions of the food. We very much appreciate that. And didn't say sesame snaps. It didn't say sesame snaps which is good because I would have broken my heart to keep them out for them because I love sesame snaps. Yes you love sesame snaps, you love Reese Nicholson. Yeah, Reese Nicholson is like the third sesame snap that I've forgotten about. Me, you and Reese., that's lovely. They'll be chuffed to hear that.

Yeah. Slash confused. Don't forget to watch Reese's special live at the Athername on Netflix. Drag Race Down Under. I think they're also, there's a book out called Dish. Which is food related. Food related. So come on people. It's sort of a food based memoir slash essays type thing.

If you only buy one food-based memoir published by Penguin, make it Reese's. Ah that's good of you. But if you buy two... Yeah do buy Glutton the Multicourse Life of a Very Greedy Boy by Ed Gamble. Yeah if you buy two. Yes. But only if you buy two. Only if you buy two. You'll probably just buy one so buy Reese's book. Reese should have called their book Reese's Pieces. Oh yeah and released it one chapter at a time. Yeah, that's great. We'll go and tell Little Sesame Snap that now.

Thank you very much for listening. We will see you next week. Goodbye. Goodbye, Cobbers. Hello, it's Rob Orton here. Now I've got a podcast called the Rob Orton Daily Podcast. It's a short poem or story or amusing on a particular subject every single day. What if you commissioned Picasso to paint your house and he just painted it white? Would you be annoyed? Wouldn't it be good if you could pour miracle grow onto other things,

such as pizzas? Have you ever thought about what a beach might be like if it was made from digestive biscuits? Have you ever tried to cry about something you're not thinking about? If you would like to listen to a daily podcast that includes subjects I've mentioned there, then please listen to the Rob Orton Daily Podcast.